|
|
Baburam Bhattarai
|
Nepal in Transition: From People’s War to Fragile Peace Edited by Sebastian von Einsiedel, David M. Malone and Suman Pradhan, Cambridge, Rs 495
The monarchy in Nepal had become an anachronism long before it collapsed in 2008. Not only the Maoist rebellion but also waves of democratic uprisings since the 1960s had shaken the foundations of the polity that was created by the palace. The challenge before the new republic, when it came into being, was twofold — it had to find durable peace and it had to build a State that would be fundamentally different from the one that the Shah dynasty ruled for nearly 240 years.
Nepal’s search for that peace and for an inclusive State is the subject of this book. It is a collection of essays by diplomats, scholars, legal experts and journalists, many of whom are well-known writers on Nepali politics and society. Most of the essays have refreshing, authentic tones primarily because the writers themselves have been involved in peace negotiations among the Maoists, the democratic parties and the palace at different stages.
They include Ian Martin, who was the head of the United Nations Mission in Nepal from 2005 to early 2009, Rhoderick Chalmers, the former South Asia Deputy Project Director for the International Crisis Group, and Frederick Rawski, a former Nepal Country representative for the International Commission of Jurists. Their essays, along with those by Teresa Whitfield and the Indian writer, S.D. Muni, shed interesting lights on India’s and the international community’s interventions towards ending the 10-year-long Maoist insurgency and the subsequent peace process.
The Nepali contributors to the volume, however, look to the future from a different perspective. The essays by Mahendra Lawoti, Bhojraj Pokharel, Deepak Thapa, Devendra Raj Panday and Suman Pradhan ponder key questions on whether a federalist structure is the best guarantee for building an inclusive State. Building a new Nepal is not only about the political or the constitutional process. At a more important level, it is about building a new society, in which the indigenous nationalities and other hitherto marginalized groups suddenly emerge as key players in politics and society.
Like dynasties everywhere, the Shah rulers captured and controlled all resources of the State. Their rule was essentially by a small group — ‘the caste hill Hindu elite (CHHE)’ — according to Lawoti, although it comprised barely 30 per cent of the population. The birth of multi-party democracy in 1990 and then the Maoist insurgency have changed that social order dramatically.
None of the major political parties can now form a government without the support of the Madhesi groups, which are the biggest of the indigenous nationalities based in the Terai. Dalits, Madhesis and other such indigenous groups were practically unrepresented in Nepal’s legislatures in the past. In the Constituent Assembly formed in 2008, Dalits had 8 per cent of the seats. Madhesis and other groups together had nearly 20 per cent of them.
It is all in the making, though. The old social order is still strongly entrenched. It has its champions even in the democratic parties and will not easily accept the emerging social forces or a federalism based on ethnic politics. New tensions are bound to permeate Nepal’s politics and society for many years to come. What happens in Nepal will also matter for the world, as the country is increasingly seen as the theatre of a new Great Game between India and China.
|
