Roman emperor Nero is said to have been playing the fiddle while his kingdom burnt. This isn't true; there were no fiddles in the first-century Rome. But this anecdote has stuck as an indication of the lack of statecraft of this brutal dictator who spelled a hasty end of the illustrious Julio-Claudio dynasty with his desperate suicide in 68AD. Nearly 2,000 years later, the political leaders of Nepal could also be accused of playing the fiddle as the country was on the verge of a catastrophic implosion. Like Nero, the leaders of our political parties, big and small, have time and again shown their readiness to compromise on national interests if it serves their vested interests. Perhaps there is no better example of this self-serving bias than the forcible bandas and strikes they like to impose on the beleaguered country. The latest addition to this depressing trend is the two-day banda being imposed by CPN-Maoist and various Madhesh-based parties. The banda was apparently called in opposition to the proposed six-state model. Whatever the underlying reason, forcible strikes cannot be a feature of a working democracy.According to Nepal Rastra Bank, the direct economic cost of a day of nationwide general strike is around Rs 1.8 billion. This was before the earthquake. At a time when everyone should be focused on rebuilding the broken country, some political outfits are trying to thwart even essential rebuilding and reconstruction works and in the process denying a means of livelihood for hundreds of thousands of daily wage-earners. But this is not to single out the political parties now in the opposition. Had Nepali Congress and CPN-UML been in the opposition camp, they too would have resorted to this undemocratic means of protest. So it is not the political beliefs of the parties calling for bandas that we oppose. We rather believe that forcible strikes—whoever calls it, and for whatever reason—should have no place in a democracy that operates on the basis of a social contract between its citizens. This contract can only work if there are strong mechanisms to ensure that a particular view or doctrine cannot be imposed through brute force.
Given its advantageous geography—in close proximity to China, India, Bhutan and Myanmar, which, according to the World Bank, are four of the fastest growing economies in the world—Nepal could have achieved its target of above nine percent annual growth through 2022. But prolonged political instability and the Great Earthquake have combined to significantly push back the country's development agenda. And these frequent strikes and bandas only add to the misery of the poor and marginalized people who are hit the hardest by such disruptive protests. How can such violent, uncivilized and costly forms of protest be justified in the name of the people? So it would perhaps be wise to outlaw them in the new constitution. Considering the huge costs of bandas and the disproportionate benefits of a banda-free Nepal, this might be the right time to go down this untrodden path.
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