With the Far West shutdown coming to an end after 31 days, local people breathed a sigh of relief. "Everything was out of gear due to the strike," said Lok Bahadur Saud. "Life is now limping back to normal." [break]
The euphoria in the Far West at the end of the 31-day strike has muted the sadness caused by the CA´s demise. The locals say they are certainly disappointed at the expiry of the CA without a new constitution but their angst has been compensated by the withdrawal of the near-perennial shutdown.
"I would definitely have been happy to see a new constitution," says Kishor Joshi, who runs a stationery shop in Dhangadhi. "But I am still happy since I can now reopen my shop after such a long time."
Ramesh Joshi, a local trader in Dhangadhi, was busy Monday dusting off the dust that had settled over his shop for the last month. "I kept my shop closed for a whole month," he says. "Dust has covered all the racks. I had to spend a whole day cleaning up. I hope I´ll never have to face such a situation in future."
As the indefinite strike -- called by locals and the Tharuhat Struggle Committee (TSC) one after another -- crippled normal life in the Far West for over four weeks, bus passengers remained stranded and people in the hills faced a severe food shortage.
On Monday, the stranded passengers began heading toward their destinations. Trucks laden with food and other essential items also started moving.
Local people had called for an indefinite strike for the first time on April 27 demanding an undivided Far West province in federal Nepal. They called off the strike following a deal with the government.
But the deal created furor within the Tharu community. The TSC, which is for an autonomous Tharuhat province including the Far West´s Kailali and Kanchanpur districts, instantly called another strike. Later, when the TSC demand was addressed, locals demanding an integrated Far West were once again up in arms.
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