Indian blockade

Remember the time

Published On: September 21, 2016 01:00 AM NPT By: Mahabir Paudyal  | @mahabirpaudyal


One weakness of Nepal’s educated class, civil society and even media is that they do not ask critical questions at critical moments

A year after constitution promulgation, we are where we were back then on ‘contentious’ constitutional issues. But normalcy has been restored in Nepal-India relations, we have been told. The blockade has gone, and KP Sharma Oli, who was blamed of ‘inviting’ and resisting it is no more the prime minister. 

As I had predicted, Madheshi Morcha finally made resignation of KP Oli the bottom-line of their ‘struggle for freedom’. The standoff would continue until Oli was in power because Morcha’s agitation (by extension India’s resentment) was against Oli, mostly for his unflinching stand against the blockade. It is no coincidence that Morcha and India have started to come to terms with Kathmandu after Oli’s ouster.

It is yet to be seen how the demands of Morcha and India will be accommodated by constitution amendment. What can be said is that those demands cannot be addressed to the liking of India and Morcha, so long as the current power balance remains intact.
Madheshi leaders celebrated the Constitution Day as a ‘black day.’ But for the country and the rest of the people, the 137 days in which Morcha/India subjected us to a virtual siege are the darkest days in modern Nepali history. It is time to revisit and memorialize the misguided protests by Morcha and illegal and inhuman blockade that India imposed on Nepal for no good reason.

Madheshi Morcha had started agitating against the constitution as early as July, 2015 even while provincial demarcation, with which they said they had main reservation, was being deliberated in Kathmandu. 

It must be recalled that a number of options had been floated. One, letting a Federal Commission decide names, number and boundaries of provinces. But Morcha demanded all this be sorted out then and there. Two, keeping disputed districts of Jhapa, Morang, Sunsari, Kalilali and Kanchanpur under union territories. Morcha wanted them in Madhesh provinces. Three, adjusting Madheshi and Tharu dominated parts of those districts with Tharu and Madhesh provinces respectively. Morcha wanted all of those districts.

Yet another option was to hold a referendum on five disputed districts to let the people decide where they wanted to belong. None of these options were acceptable to Madheshi leaders. When I discussed these possibilities with Sadbhavana Party Co-chairman Laxman Lal Karna in July last year, he had said “suppose that you hold a referendum for province delineation. What if this triggers a demand for a separate country?” 

Morcha was bent on using violent protests as a strategy to make Kathmandu bow down.
That India was with them all along became clear when, on September 22nd, it imposed economic embargo on Nepal. 

India, then, made its seven-point amendment proposal public through The Indian Express, which among other things demanded that citizens by naturalization should be allowed to hold top posts of President and Prime Minister and Kanchanpur, Kailali, Sunsari, Jhapa and Morang be included in Madhesh provinces. India’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs Spokesperson Vikas Swarup denied the report but The Indian Express stands by it to this day (see “Make seven changes to your Constitution: India tells Nepal,” September 24, 2015). 

So long as Oli was the PM, Morcha had made written commitment on two only-Madhesh provinces the preconditions for talks. Today Morcha has settled on much less. It has mellowed after the government agreed to compensate the families of the victims, declare those killed during the movement as martyrs and bear the medical expenses of those injured during clashes with security forces. This much could have been done through Oli’s government too. 

This is no consolation to the families of the victims who had been provoked to sacrifice their precious lives for the kind of federal system that will be hard to institutionalize and sustain and that is sure to fail in the long run. 

If Morcha really wants to resolve the boundary issue, it will have to come back to one of those proposals floated a year ago. Any revision that puts the rest of the country perpetually under the prospect of being blockaded by another province will be unacceptable to the larger masses. Any revision that does not recognize hill-plain interdependence will be rejected by Nepalis. After last year’s blockade, any attempt to merge any district with province two or extend its boundary to other districts is sure to be met with strong resistance. The standoff had continued last year because Morcha was asking for the impossible—separating the entire plains from the hills. Unless Morcha gives up on this rigid stand, there is unlikely to be a solution no matter how many rounds of talks are held.

Politicians and intellectuals sometimes give an erroneous analogy from Mahabharata to justify Morcha’s demands. The Pandavas, they say, had only demanded five villages. What happened when the Kauravas denied them even this much? They ask. When you draw parallel between disputes of Hindu mythology and that of province demarcation of far-reaching national consequences, the only reasonable response to such logic is a pity.

Uncertainties loom. It seems the bad days are still to come. But this is no time to forget those dark days. Let us recall the days when Madheshi leaders delivered hate speeches in Tikapur of Kailali. Let us remember how these leaders offered the bounties of Rs 5 million each to protestors in case they got killed. Let us remember those painful days when the rest of the country was denied food, fuel and medicine simply because major parties had refused to be dictated by foreign powers. What was all that cruelty for? Just to remove Oli from power? Just to please India? 

One big weakness of Nepal’s educated class, civil society and even media is they do not ask critical questions at critical moments and they are deeply divided when they should remain united for a greater cause. Nepali media was divided before the constitution and even after days of the Indian economic blockade. 

Indian retribution had been felt days before constitution promulgation. Media should have raised a unanimous voice against this. It could have put pressure on the agitating forces to come on board the constitution making process. Instead some advocated halting the process. Others refrained from calling it a “blockade” even after the blockade had throttled the entire country. If the media had taken a uniform stand on blockade, it would have forced India and Morcha to soften their stand.

As for our intelligentsia (more about it in the next column), it does not need to be mentioned who condemned the blockade, who instigated it, who stayed silent and who supported it. Others stuck to “put your house in order” refrain while it was clear that doing so was beyond the capacity of Nepali actors.  

We often forgive political misdeeds as historical necessity. The Maoists wrecked the country in the name of equality, prosperity, development and creation of corruption-free society. None of these seem to be their priorities today. We have never asked them why they held the country hostage for a decade if they were to abet instability and misrule.
One year after the siege, we have also stopped asking critical questions to those who imposed or were mobilized to impose the inhuman blockade. We need to ask them uncomfortable questions: Why did you go as far as blockading the country and destroying the social fabric? Why did you become accomplices to the greater design to disintegrate the country? Why did you hold the country hostage for five months? We need to ask these questions to about everyone who led or supported the blockade or those who could have made a difference by speaking against it but who stood aside as silent spectators.

Last week when I met Federal Socialist Party President Upendra Yadav to interview him for this newspaper I had raised these same questions. He tried to justify the blockade with usual explanations: the state had pushed them to the fringe, did not allow them to protest within the country and so on. Politicians do not apologize even for as great an offense as a blockade. But you must not stop asking them questions. As for 137 days of siege (September 22, 2015- February 5, 2016), sufferings of those days need to relived in memories. All painful stories need to be told, retold and passed on.

Twitter: @mahabirpaudyal


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