Nepal democracy aborted

By Tukoji Pandit - Syndicate Features

The Nepalese journal Kantipur has made a sensational disclosure that the former Himalayan kingdom was on the verge of witnessing a ‘soft coup’ if the Maoist leader and prime minister, Pushp Kamal Dahal alias Prachanda had sacked the Nepalese Army chief, Gen Rookmungad Katawal, just after the latter refused to meet the deadline for his resignation.

The journal has reported that as many as 25 top generals of the Nepalese Army had met to discuss the ‘coup’ plan because they think the Maoists are bent upon destroying the professional Nepal Army and hand it over to their trigger-happy cadre of former guerrillas. The Nepal Army trop brass also feels that the Maoists are equally determined to throw out democracy from the country, once and for all.

Troubled already by problems in two other neighbouring countries, Sri Lanka and Pakistan, India could not have been comfortable over the latest developments in Nepal where the Maoists do seem to be working to formally abort democracy in their anxiety to convert the country into their Utopian dream of a Maoist state.

It should come as no surprise if allegations of an Indian hand in the planned ‘soft coup’ are aired widely in Nepal. Not so much for preparing the mutinous plan but helping the Nepalese general in some other ways. It has been said that India has been acting as a communicator between the president of Nepal and Gen Katawal’s Army. The sudden dash of the Indian ambassador in Nepal to New Delhi might have been seen as part of a wider Indian angle to the ‘coup’ plan.

While pointing fingers at ‘Big Brother’ India is a favourite South Asian pastime, it cannot be denied that India may not remain disinterested if the Maoists in Nepal achieve their ambition of making their country a Communist dictatorship and a Chinese surrogate. But the Kantipur report, based on an account given by one of the participants who had discussed the ‘soft coup’ plan, suggests that the provocation for tinkering with the idea of a ‘soft coup’ came from within.

All but one of the generals at that meeting is supposed to have said things like: ‘The virus that is trying to destroy the (Nepal) Army is in this room’ and that ‘The root cause of the trouble is here’. The only general who did not speak on these lines was Lt. Gen Kul Bhushan Khadaka, the second in command in Nepal Army and the officer, who the Maoists want to appoint as the chief of Nepal Army in place of Gen Katawal.

His presence would also suggest that it was not one of those sequestered meetings, presumably in an underground cell, that the generals hold before taking over power, with or without bloodshed. Gen Khadaka might have been very uneasy when he heard all his colleagues gang up against him, with Gen Katawal making a pointed attack on him when he said: ‘We should not let politics enter our house…we should stop this trend to knock at politicians’ door for promotion.’

Khadaka might have been sorry to see that a plan he had prepared ‘months’ in advance and submitted to the Maoists had gone awry, as was the chance, at least for the moment, for him to become the Army chief. An important component of the Khadaka plan was to enforce ‘integration’ of all the 19,000 members of the People’s Liberation Army (of Maoists) into the Nepal Army and conferring the designation of a Major General on the PLA chief. Also, no fresh recruitments were to be made in Nepal Army. These are the sort of things that the Maoists want to hear.

The Maoists of Nepal appear to be in a hurry to prove that they are not willing to accept democracy as a form of governance for their country and that they would do anything to subvert it, even at the risk of plunging the country into another period of long unrest.

Prachanda has said repeatedly that the ‘peace process’ that saw the Maoists come to power and then led to abolition of monarchy is in the process of being derailed. Of course, he does not see that his own comrades may have contributed a great deal in harming the ‘peace process.’

The National Assembly in Nepal was virtually paralysed recently for over two weeks because the Maoists refused to honour some of the commitments they had given. They refused to hand over the trio, who allegedly had a role in the murder of a politician. The Maoists are not interested in returning the properties they had confiscated during their ‘struggle.’ The Maoist youth brigade remains a law unto itself.

At least 16 of the 25 parties represented in Parliament have serious problems with the Maoists—and these include the parties that are part of the ruling coalition. The Maoists want total subservience by their coalition partners to their whims.

The Maoists have had little time to attend to the problems that their impoverished nation faces because they cannot perform, so they say, as long as the ‘class enemies’—or whatever the term they use for them—stand in their way. In other words they want the country totally under their rule—no room for multi-party democracy in Nepal.

This is not what the Maoists had said when they decided to join mainstream politics after giving up insurgency that had taken a heavy toll of life in the country. To be sure, the Maoists continue to proclaim their faith in ‘democracy’, ‘freedom of press’ and so on, though their actions point in the other direction.

Despite their brotherly ties with Indian comrades, especially those of the CPI (M), the Maoists in Nepal have made no secret of the fact that they are going to downgrade ties with India that go back long into tradition and history, in favour of forging a close bond with their northern neighbour, China.

India’s comfort level with Nepal cannot rise under these circumstances.

- Asian Tribune -