Terai And India

(Courtesy: Zizimous)

The possibilities of elections happening are slim. Although the Election Commission may be in a position to clear all technical hitches that might have stood as an obstacle to pave way for elections, political difficulties and issues still remain unsolved and these unsolved political issues are most likely to stand as obstacles for the upcoming elections.

More than fifty percent of the electoral constituencies are in the terai. After 1999, that's when the last elections happened, the Maoist insurgency escalated. As a result, there was a political vacuum in the Terai and the Maoists took advantage of the situation and filled in the vacuum in Terai. Early this year, a forceful agitation erupted in the Terai that symbolically altered the political dynamics of Terai. Consequently, all political parties, more significantly the Maoists lost their base in the Terai. Ever since then the Indians have been insisting the Prime Minister to move the Nepali Congress in the Terai and fill the vacuum in the Terai. However, due to Maoist pressure and Sitaula's maneuvering in collaboration with the Maoists, Nepali Congress failed to enter the Terai.

India, on the other hand has had to reconsider her strategy vis-à-vis Nepal. It now becomes apparent an issue such as 'national security' is more of a priority than democratizing Nepal. The Indian Prime Minister recently described the Maoists problem in India as the greatest threat to their national security. The Indian establishment is particularly worried that should the Maoist regain ground in the Terai, neighboring states that are vulnerable (Bihar,Jharkhand,Chattisgargh) would ultimately fall into the hands of a greater Maoist movement. This is because the RIM dictates the Maoists and concurrently the RIM initially wants the Maoists to establish total control in Nepal before attempting to make further inroads into India from their perceived base in Nepal.

GP Koirala

After Mahanta Thakur quit the Nepali Congress, GP Koirala called a meeting of the NC,UML, and CPN-M high command. In that meeting, it is learnt that GP Koirala had told both Prachanda and Madhav Nepal point blank that India was now scheming designs to remove all of them from power. Having gauged the political developments wrongly, GP Koirala initiated the 23 Point Agreement out of annoyance towards India. On the other hand, the Maoists realized that a serious crisis of confidence had emerged between GP Koirala and India; and naturally the Maoists capitalized on this situation and forced their way through the 23 Point Agreement.

Secondly, GP is now more reliant on the Maoists because he has now distanced himself from India, Nepali Congress and the other democratic forces. And the Maoists have given him assurances to back him to the last moment should he yield to their demands. Therefore, the importance and relevance of Sitaula can be best explained by concluding that Girija now depends heavily on the Maoists to propose his name as the first president and for that matter, Sitaula is Girija's point man.

The Maoists

For the Maoists the 12 Point Agreement and all other subsequent agreements are a catalyst through which they aim to achieve their revolutionary goals. For that matter even the elections are a catalyst through which the Maoists aim to achieve their revolutionary goal. Like Baburam Bhatterai recently commented " we do not want to participate in an election we will lose". When the 23 Point Agreement was signed there are two other agreements that have not been made public: seat sharing agreement in which both the NC and UML are to give some seats to the Maoists and; a Finance Ministry source has confirmed that the GPK government has allocated the Maoists a substantial amount of money that amounts in millions as a compromise for their participation in the polls. But more importantly, elections will only make sense to the Maoists if they can win and implement their revolutionary ideals. However, if they lose the elections, their revolution would have ended and their purpose of participating in the elections to achieve their revolutionary goals would have also failed. Similarly, an electoral defeat would also put the party in a crisis both ideologically and politically.

Other Hurdles

There are two other hurdles, YCL and the relocation if internally displaced people. First, it is unlikely that YCL are going to mend their ways. Since the PLA are locked inside the cantonment, the YCL is the only force through which the Maoists can demonstrate their machismo in the street and mobilize force during elections. It is very unlikely that the Maoist high command would put pressure on the YCL to curtail their unruly attitude because the Maoists high command rely on the YCL as their only effective organization to organize both violence and to mobilize cadres for elections. Since the Maoists have come closer to knowing that they more unpopular than they think they are, the Maoists rely very heavily on the YCL to force people to support them either through force or intimidation.

The other last hurdle is the relocation of the internally displaced people. The internally displaced people are primarily the cadres of Nepali Congress and the UML. In the last ten years when the Army and the PLA fought in rural Nepal, people left in exodus in search of safer places. Unfortunately, the Maoists cadres are cultivating empty fields and have taken in possession of thousands of empty houses across Nepal as theirs. Today, due to the governments indifference there is growing disillusionment towards NC and UML as both these parties have failed to protect their displaced cadres who are also now considering associating themselves with other political parties or launching a political movement simultaneously with the terai movement.

Conclusion

Every one knows the possibility of elections happening is remote. The Maoists will walk out of the government in a couple of month's time when it becomes obvious that elections are not possible. After quitting the government, the Maoists will try to position themselves as the alternate and try to capture state power yet again. On the other hand, blaming the Maoists solely will not solve the problems. GPK and the present government have lost the steam and momentum to either hold elections or solve the Maoist problem. Not only has Girija succumbed to the communists and committed a political suicide but; Girija has also dragged Nepali Congress and now efforts are underway to drag the Nepal Army into complete destruction to pave way for the communists to capture state power.

Related Posts:

Smoke and Mirrors - Why Nepal's Constituent Assembly Elections Won't Happen in April 2008
http://nepaliperspectives.blogspot.com/2007/12/smoke-and-mirrors-why-nepals.html

Special Session and After: Thinking Past the Nepali 'Post-conflict'
http://nepaliperspectives.blogspot.com/2007/11/special-session-and-after-thinking-past.html

Betrayed Beyond Belief
http://nepaliperspectives.blogspot.com/2007/10/betrayed-beyond-belief.html