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Nepal History and Politics
Chapter 1: From Pre-political to Medieval to
Modern
Nepal is a country of many
different cultures. Almost too many, it seems, to have evolved in such close
proximity, within such a small country. This is particularly evident in the
central hill regions, where rugged topography, poorly developed transport
routes, and largely localized subsistence economies historically limited
widespread travel as well as incursions by the outside world. Sociocultural
groups, or “hill tribes,” such as the Magar, Gurung, Tamang, Rai, and Limbu,
each developed their own languages, customs, and religious practices, often
varying from one region, one valley, or even one part of a given valley to the
next. Despite this relative isolation, however, a slow trickle of outside
influence has seeped into Nepali culture. In the Kathmandu Valley, this
influence can be traced as far back as the 3rd century BC, when followers of the
northern Indian emperor Ashoka arrived with the newly disseminated teachings and
iconography of Buddhism, including stone monuments known as stupas - some of the
earliest examples surviving to this day. Hinduism made its mark on the country
more insidiously, moving up into the hills from the south and west. The first
significant infusion came during the late 11th century, with the spread of the
Chalukaya Empire from southern India. More Hindus arrived from Northern India
during the Muslim conquests in the 13th century. Still, these incursions sent
only relatively small ripples into present-day Nepal, leaving the bulk of the
region remarkably untouched until the last half-century. Only along the narrow
band of plains bordering India to the south and in the high mountain valleys
connected by seasonal passes to Tibet have outside influences been the
historical norm, and for the most part, those only served to mold the culture
and daily life of the villagers in those border regions.
The tendency toward isolation of
villages and ethnocentrism of clans in the country’s heartland was challenged in
the middle of the 18th century, when Prithvi Narayan Shah, a strong ruler from
the kingdom of Gorkha (located in central Nepal), set out on a campaign to
forcibly unite the previously disparate groups. The resulting Shah dynasty of
Hindu kings established control in the Kathmandu Valley in 1768, and has
continued to rule in Nepal since. The power of the monarchy suffered a setback
in the mid-19th century, though, when Jung Bahadur Rana, a regimental army
commander, took advantage of a brief period of political instability and seized
power. He then killed or ran off all of his political rivals, and established
the Rana regime of repressive, all-powerful prime ministers, who would retain
control of the country for over a century, from 1846 – 1951. Interestingly, the
Ranas allowed the Shahs to continue to reign as figurehead kings. This ploy was
no doubt designed to placate the population, who had come to believe that the
Shah kings ruled by divine right, as spiritual embodiments of the Hindu god
Vishnu.
Another interesting historical
twist was Nepal’s escape from the fate of European colonization, made possibly
largely by its favored status with the British Empire. During the Sepoy
Rebellion in northern India in 1857, and again in WW I, Nepal had contributed
many of their crack Gurkha troops to the British army, and were in turn rewarded
with a “Treaty of Perpetual Peace and Friendship,” as well as a sizeable
annuity.
The Ranas’ major abuses of power,
though, including doling out large chunks of land and medieval-style serfdoms to
friends and relatives, led to a gradual buildup of opposition. Educated Nepalis,
including a number of ex-army officers living in India, began forming political
groups which criticized the regime and called for reform. These groups,
particularly the incipient Nepali Congress, led by B.P. Koirala (for whom the
B.P. Koirala Institute of Health Sciences, in Dharan, is named), contained many
members who had also distinguished themselves as strong and valued supporters of
the struggle for independence in India. By the late 1940’s, pockets of armed
resistance had gained strength along the Indian border, and skirmishes spilled
into Nepali towns as far north as Pokhara. In addition to these pressures, the
Rana regime faced an inhospitable political climate, with the Chinese communist
presence massing in Tibet (which was occupied in 1950), and the Indian leaders
favoring a progressive and sympathetic political buffer, which they’d identified
in the Nepali Congress. Events came to a head in 1950, when Nepal’s King
Tribhuvan, who had been increasingly critical of the Ranas, fled to the Indian
Embassy, where he was offered asylum. Under pressure from within Nepal as well
as from the Indian government, the Rana prime minister finally ceded power. Per
the terms of the Indian-brokered “Delhi Settlement,” control of the country was
returned to the king, with the understanding that he would work to expedite
popular elections and the creation of a new constitution based on governance by
the people.
Soon thereafter, Nepal opened its
borders, allowing the entry of foreign aid organizations and tourists. The most
famous of the new arrivals, of course, were Sir Edmund Hillary and his chums,
whose siege-style expedition on Mt Everest’s newly-opened southern flank
successfully “knocked the bastard off” in 1953, and led to media coverage which
exposed the country virtually overnight to the delighted eyes of the world.
Chapter 2: The Halting and Flawed Arrival of
Democracy
For the first half decade
following overthrow of the Ranas, King Tribhuvan oversaw a series of short-lived
governments with representation by leaders of various political parties. Partly
due to the inability of the inexperienced leadership to work together
effectively, and partly due to the king’s unwillingness to cede power, none of
these early experiments in rule by popular leaders were successful or
long-lasting. Tribhuvan died in 1955 and was succeeded by his son, Mahendra.
With no real progress toward any form of representative democracy, the public
began to agitate for elections in increasingly threatening civil disobedience
campaigns. Finally, in 1959, the king allowed elections to be carried out. The
Nepali Congress won an impressive majority of the parliamentary seats, and BP
Koirala was named prime minister. However, the king retained the right to name
many of the representatives himself, and to override or remove the prime
minister if he saw fit. After less than a year and a half of this stilted form
of democracy, he chose to exercise that veto right, and then some. He outlawed
political parties, and saw to it that Koirala spent the balance of his political
career effectively disempowered in jail or in exile.
Mahendra then created his own
version of a representative government, called the Panchayat system. It allowed
for popular election of representatives on the village and district levels, who
then selected members of a national assembly, called the “Rastriya Panchayat,”
in Kathmandu. However, this body could not introduce any form of legislation
without approval of the king, and political parties remained outlawed. Moreover,
the king maintained control of the army, managed the Supreme Court, and reserved
the right to single-handedly change the constitution at any time. The Panchayat
system, while repressive in many ways, did make some progress in human rights
and development. It reclaimed estates from Rana control and moved toward land
reform in the countyside. Roads were built across the width of the country in
the Terai, swamplands were cleared for agriculture, and malaria was brought into
check.
Mahendra was succeeded in 1972 by
his son, Birendra, who brought youth and a brand-new modern education to the
throne. His interest in development and technology, however, was not initially
matched by progressive politics. It took the better part of a decade of
agitation by student groups and political parties to move Birendra to call for a
referendum on Nepal’s government. Held in May 1980, and felt to be run by fair
electoral principles, this vote brought out 4.8 million of the 7.2 million
eligible, and resulted in a 55% vs 45% victory for the continuation of the
Panchayat system. To his credit, the king saw the sizeable opposition as a call
for reform, and soon after the election he allowed his subjects freedom of
speech, relaxed the laws against political parties, and created a Constitution
Reforms Commission. This commission oversaw a fairly significant change in the
government structure, in which the popularly elected Panchayat members would
choose a Prime Minister (though the king had ultimate powers of approval).
But the promise of smooth sailing
proved to be short lived. The Panchayat government ran into problems with
infighting and factionalism, and the political parties stepped up demonstrations
again. Aside from the Nepali Congress, which factionalized repeatedly, and a few
other minor parties, there were several branches of the Communist Party,
including a more mainstream segment which would later participate in coalition
governments, and more radical groups who increasingly agitated against the
status quo. Finally, in 1989, political unrest came to a head following an
incident with India involving breakdown of long-standing trade treaties. This
resulted in closure of the borders and interruption of import of gas and
kerosene. Agriculture suffered, as did tourism. Increasingly threatening, and at
times violent, demonstrations by political parties and students led Birendra to
call for a second referendum in 1990. This time, the Panchayat system was
canned, and multiparty democracy was promised once and for all.
Chapter 3: The Democracy Years and Beyond
The arrival of Democracy took the
country by surprise. Though political alliances had existed long before that
point, including the two most powerful, the Nepali Congress and the United Left
Front (with its various communist factions), who ultimately brokered terms of
the new democracy with the king, the leaders had not planned well for the actual
moment of realization. Subsequently, during negotiations, the king managed a few
political end-runs, such as retaining the designation of the country as a “Hindu
kingdom” (though now without a capital “K”), also formally identified by the
seemingly contradictory epithet, “constitutional monarchy.” Far more important,
though, was his continued position in control of the army. Additionally, the
political parties failed to follow through on initial plans to hold to task
those responsible for the worst social injustices during the Panchayat era. The
Mallick Commission, created to address such abuses, fell by the wayside, and
many of its potential targets were welcomed back into government without
censure. This set a tone of impunity which was to continue to plague the country
with corruption and pillaging of government coffers through the many power
changes to come. And come they did. Over the decade and a half since the
monarchy has “ceded” power, it has been rare for governments to last much longer
than half a year. In a wacky, continuous reshuffling of governments and
alliances, the Nepali Congress and the CPN-UML (Communist Party of Nepal -
United Marxist-Leninist, which, in its efforts to join the melee, quickly became
a social democratic party in all but name), have each brokered deals and shared
power with factions of the RPP (Rastriya Prajatantra Party), the minimally
reformed party of the old Panchayat leaders. Blame has been passed back and
forth for inability to balance the budget, failure to quell the Maoist
insurgency (see below), and plain old-fashioned graft and corruption.
Chapter 4: The Monarchy, Past to Present
toward an Uncertain Future
The monarchy in Nepal is a
complex institution fraught with contradictions, particularly since the advent
of democracy. Although the Nepali people have clearly indicated their preference
for a democratic form of governance, there remain strong ties to the king as a
cultural and spiritual leader. As an incarnation of Vishnu, one of the most
powerful in the pantheon of Hindu gods, the king and his direct heir to the
throne are felt to be above the laws of regular society (thus, Parras, famed
bad-boy and most recent crown prince, was effectively immune to being tried for
at least one murder he was widely believed to have committed before ascent to
the crown-princehood). Among his most important duties, the king is expected to
lead major religious ceremonies, bless people and public institutions,
participate in international diplomacy, and play the role of cultural father
figure to the Nepali people.
King Birendra, who oversaw the
transition to democracy and lorded alongside the politicians for the first ten
years, was generally a popular leader. His brother, Gyanendra, on the other
hand, had never been a darling of the people, and his son Parras even less so.
When the palace
massacre occurred in June 1991, reportedly
perpetrated by an intoxicated and emotionally troubled crown prince Dipendra
(who died the next day of a gunshot wound to the head, said to be
self-inflicted), and the only members of the immediate Royal Family to survive
were Gyanendra (out of the country at the time), his son Parras (in the room
with the victims, yet “miraculously” unharmed), and a sister of the king who
would die suspiciously soon after in a helicopter crash, conspiracy theories
buzzed. For a time after the massacre, it was commonly believed that Gyanendra
had orchestrated the murders in order to usurp the throne. Although there was
some threat of widespread violence in the immediate aftermath, things gradually
quieted down. There are several reasons for the people’s acquiescence to the new
king’s ascention, but perhaps most important is the king’s status as incarnation
of Vishnu, which trumps the legal code of common humans. In a country as steeped
in history and Hindu tradition as Nepal, where kids cut their teeth on such
Hindu epics as the Mahabharata and the Ramayana, full of intra-family power
struggles and inescapably fated tragic events, it is perhaps not so surprising
that the public ultimately accepted the new, tragically altered structure of the
royal family.
Gyanendra began exercising
strong-armed tactics from the get-go. Eventually, in Feb 2005, he kicked out the
Nepali Congress-led government of Sher Bahadur Deuba. citing a need to more
effectively quell the Maoist insurgency, as well as criticism of the parties’
ethics. In its place, he appointed a bunch of his royalist followers, who proved
no less poorly equipped to meet the challenges of ruling the country fairly and
squarely, or quelling the insurgency. In the wake of this takeover, 7 major
political parties formed an alliance against monarchical rule, then took the
unprecedented step of aligning with the Maoists (who took the similarly
unprecedented step of aligning with them), citing a common central goal of
ending the “autocratic monarchy.”
Street protests mounted, and
things came to a boil in the spring of ‘06, when the people’s uprising, or
Janandolin, resulted in fatal clashes between police and civilians. Under threat
of full-on revolution, the king ceded power to the alliance, and the mapping of
a new road to ”Democracy” was begun. That road, however, promises to be nothing
if not bumpy. The Maoists have been slow to call off their “people’s courts” in
rural areas, which still “try,” and sometimes brutally punish (even execute)
people deemed to have committed crimes against “the people;” furthermore, the
issue of disarming the rebels (and, in an equal amount, the army) has required
untold negotiation and the intervention of the UN. Election of members of a
constituent assembly to form a new government was scheduled for June ‘07, but
has now been pushed back to December. In the mean time, an interim government
has been placed under the questionable stewardship of GP Koirala, senior member
of the Nepali Congress, who racked up an impressive list of corruption charges
during stints as prime minister in recent years. The Maoist leader Prachanda,
looking rather impotent on the sidelines, is making more and more noise about
the potential resumption of massive street protests (whatever that might mean…).
For now, the country waits with bated breath to see what the politicians will do
next. Optimism, though present, is guarded.
Chapter 5: The Maoist Revolution: Roots to
Present to ???
The roots of the Communist Party
of Nepal (CPN) go back to its founding in Calcutta in 1949, just prior to the
end of the Rana regime and return of King Tribhuvan. A decade later, stirred to
action by King Mahendra’s brief trial of “democracy” and subsequent retraction,
the CPN began factionalizing between hard-liners and the more centrist elements
targeting the political mainstream. One of the most important splits occurred in
1974, when a radical “Fourth Congress” of the CPN broke off from those loyal to
the more moderate General Secretary (and founder of the CPN), Pushpa Lal
Shrestha. One of the major distinctions of the 4th Congress was their
unwillingness to unite with the country’s other political parties in a joint
attempt to increase popular representation in government. Instead, they remained
committed to the call for a constituent assembly which had never been granted
despite Tribhuvan’s promise in 1951, a demand which the political mainstream had
by that time relaxed. They also defined themselves from early on as a group who
would not stop short of violent revolution as a means of political change.
It was from radical splinter
groups of the 4 th Congress in the mid-1980’s that the two most important
leaders of the Maoist movement, Pushpa Kamal Dahal (AKA “Prachanda”) and Baburam
Bhattarai, rose to positions of power. When the Democracy movement came to a
head in 1990, though they were not aligned with the mainstream Communist Party
of Nepal (Unified Marxist-Leninist), which retained close ties with the Nepali
Congress and other major political parties, they ended up playing a central part
in the final street demonstrations which culminated in the King’s capitulation.
Prachanda and Bhattarai then formed the CPN (Unity Centre), with the former as
the general secretary, and the latter as the head of the political wing, the
United People’s Front, which won 9 seats in the new government (the third best
showing after Nepali Congress, with 110, and CPN-Unified Marxist Leninist, with
69). In 1991, in its first congress, the CPN (Unity Centre) adopted the
political ideology of “Marxism-Leninism-Maoism,” and advocated a protracted
“people’s war,” which would begin in the countryside and eventually reach the
cities. The party underwent more bickering and splits, and in the 1994 midterm
elections, Bhattarai called for a boycott. In 1995, Prachanda and Bhattarai
formed the CPN (Maoist), ideologically aligned with various radical (even
terrorist) movements, including the Sendero Luminoso in Peru, through a
violence-embracing Maoist web-based group called the Revolutionary
Internationalist Movement.
On Feb 4, 1996, Bhattarai
presented to then-PM Sher Bahadur Deuba a list of 40 demands related to
“nationalism, democracy, and livelihood.” Included in these were: removing the
political powers of the king completely; drafting a new constitution under a
constituent assembly; granting complete freedom of speech and publication;
declaring Nepal a secular nation (it had been officially identified with
Hinduism, although other religions are allowed to exist and freely practice);
providing villages with roads, drinking water, and electricity; and
nationalizing the property of “comprador and bureaucratic capitalists.” The
demands came with an ultimatum that if they were not met by Feb 17, the Maoists
would be “forced to embark on an armed struggle against the existing state.” In
fact, the Maoists did not wait until the 17th, but launched attacks in six
districts on the 13th, inaugurating the “people’s war.”
To understand how the Moaists
became such a strong and well-entrenched presence in Nepal, it is necessary to
look at the political situation in the periphery around the time of their
inception. Much of the radical left’s original power base had historically come
from rural districts in the west, notably Rolpa and Rukum. It was no trick to
enlist people in these regions against the status quo, as they were among the
poorest in the country, and suffered the most egregious forms of feudalism and
abuses of authority by corrupt local politicians. In exchange for their
political backing (or even simple tolerance) of the more radical pre-Maoist
communist parties, the people paid with crackdowns by the government, including
mobilizations of the police against civilians with proven or suspected
connections with the communist left. As early as 1992, the INSEC (Informal
Sector Service Centre) Human Rights Yearbook in Nepal reported that “political
workers, employees and teachers have been the victims of arrest and torture
because of political revenge,” and that “there are many incidents (to show) that
political parties with support from the ruling power had taken political revenge
in this district.” When the Maoists began launching their own attacks against
landowners, politicians, and the police, the violence began escalating, with the
people stuck in the middle and out of sight of any significant form of
international monitoring.
Had the government responded with
reasonable dialogue (and perhaps a well-aimed concession or two) in these
regions, and refrained from exercising iron-fisted crackdowns, it is extremely
unlikely that the Maoist insurgency would have occurred at all. G.P. Koirala
(not to be confused with B.P., his predecessor), at the helm of the Nepali
Congress since the arrival of democracy in 1990, has been saddled with much of
the blame. It is alleged that his anti-communist leanings motivated him to
ignore, if not actually support, much of the brutality. However, other parties
aside from the Nepali Congress, including the mainstream communist CPN-UML,
which has intermittently shared power in coalition governments, also lent
support to strong-armed anti-Maoist policy. Police actions initially focused in
the west, where, in 1995, “Operation Romeo” resulted in hundreds of arrests
without warrants and many reports of torture, and caused thousands to flee to
jungle hideaways or across the border to India. Despite lack of progress in
securing any form of political stability through “Romeo,” the government
expanded these tactics, eventually launching “Operation Kilo Sierra” and
“Operation Kilo Sierra Two” throughout the country in the late 1990’s to combat
the wider spread of Maoist influence. By this point, the revolution had reached
the international spotlight, and neither side was pulling punches. Thousands of
Maoists and suspected Maoists (many of whom were essentially innocent bystanders
in areas of Maoist control) were killed in these campaigns of terror, while
large numbers of police were killed in raids on their posts.
After the royal massacre in June
2001, the Maoists stepped up their attacks on police posts, citing their
distrust of Gyanendra and building hatred of G.P. Koirala. Although they once
again entered into a series of talks with P.M. Deuba (who took over when Koirala
resigned in the post-massacre political disarray), they broke a ceasefire in
November of that year with their first ever direct attack on an army barracks,
in the western town of Dang. If the Maoists’ apparent willingness to draw the
army into the conflict and to alienate a relatively sympathetic negotiator such
as Deuba is puzzling, it is equally unclear what’s become of their political
ideology. There has been a good deal of watering down of their initial espousal
of “Marxism-Leninism-Maoism,” as well as their stance against the “comprador and
bureaucratic capitalists” in the early-mid 90’s, despite their assertion in 1995
that they would “never allow this struggle to become a mere instrument for
introducing partial reforms in the condition of the people, or terminating in a
simple compromise by exerting pressure on the reactionary classes.” Now the
party leadership is advertising itself to the people as essentially an
anti-Monarchy and pro-democracy organization, and has even stated, “The CPN
(Maoist) makes public its commitment to clearly institutionalise the values of
competitive multiparty system.” Whether or not they will honor this curious
pledge remains to be seen, particularly in light of the unlikely chance that
their strange political bedfellows will turn over a new leaf and become
trustworthy stewards of the welfare of their constituents.
REFERENCES:
CIA World Factbook – Nepal
(http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/np.html)
Current Update as of December 2005
State of Nepal
Editors: Kanak Mani Dixit, Shastri Ramachandaran
BP Koirala India-Nepal Foundation/ Himal Books, Lalitpur, Nepal 2002
People of Nepal
Dor Bahadur Bista
Ratna Pustak Bhandar, Kathmandu, Nepal, 7th edition 2000
BBC World service
Wickipedia ()
Harvard International Review ()
INSEC online ()
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