Simply an election politics!

Niraj Aryal

India’s former Ambassador to Nepal, Mr. Arvind Ram-Chandra Dev, a few years after he returned home from Nepal, wrote in an article published in the Times of India that, anti-India sentiments must be injected into the minds of the people, more so, the cadres of the political parties if one were to win elections in Nepal.

He, giving reference to a meet of a former Indian envoy with Dr. K. I. Singh, further wrote that, “K.I Singh, who was out an out an anti-Indian but, was on record to have assured the Indian envoy that his heart belonged to India and that his anti-India feelings were just an election poly”.

Anyway, for reference, Dr. K.I. Singh was the first and last Madhesi Prime Minister Nepal ever had (Singh became PM in 1957 after Tanak Prasad Resigned). He was critical towards India and a pro-China Madhesi man who became the prime minister of Nepal with King Mahendra blessings. Dr Singh is also known for banning conduct of lessons in Hindi language in some parts of Madhesh.

Now, coming to the point, the matter of discussion is the recent Prachanda’s outburst against India.

How true are the Maoists in their recently readopted anti-India stance claiming that it is India and India alone that is the main cause of Nepali pain?

Now, considering the Maoists’ past comprehension that without India’s support joining the main-stream politics in Nepal would be impossible, that led them to overlook the first four demands among the forty points that dealt mainly with the unequal bilateral relations with India.

After joining the main stream politics, the Maoists continued with their policy to overlook their anti-India posture- that is mainly measured by how one raised issues of national interest in Nepal. Interestingly, the more one raised issues of national interest the more anti-Indian one becomes by default and in the “buy one get one free” offer is also labeled as a royalist or Mandale- a derogatory word used frequently to be described Nationalists by the Kathmandu based south-block mandarins.

However, for Prachanda until recently visiting the Indian mission in Nepal to pressurize Girija for their induction into the cabinet or attending a summit in India to thank for their decade long hospitality becomes merely a brotherly gesture. Overlooking, instances wherein India was involved in encroaching our lands, building illegal dams along the frontier inundating our villages, Indian soldiers from beating our locals to plundering Nepalese women to killing our youths was also acceptable.

But for some understandable reasons, in the next few seconds, the Maoist politics is to take a different turn. They are to re-acquire Nationalistic credentials. They are to talk of unequal treaties, interference in politics, inundation, killings and what not what not. The reason that is known to all including the men seated in the south-block, as said by men like Arvinda Ram Chandra Dev is merely an election politics that our leaders from King Mahendra to Dr. K.I.Singh to Prachanda keep on injecting on us.

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