Nepal: Federalism Distaste?

Kathmandu: Nepal’s ridiculous but yet witty deputy Prime Minister Sujata Koirala has set the ball rolling.

Albeit the ball she has rolled only after her visit to Beijing wherein she met with the Chinese Prime Minister and President Hu Jin Tao along with Nepal Prime Minister Madhav Kumar.

Sujata now beamingly claims that the “Nepali parties did a blunder by committing to divide the country of federal lines”.

She further claimed the other day that the federal divisions contain the kernel of disintegration of the country as a whole and thus she forcefully demanded that a referendum be conducted to understand the mood of the population as to whether they need such federal units or not?

Sujata has spoken what her father Girija Prasad Koirala could have suggested her in private to speak. She spoke what she had been told to.

Or else, a buffoonery Congress woman of the sort of Sujata can’t speak on such a “big” issue that has tentatively been decided by the Constituent Assembly that the country will after the draft of the new constitution be divided on several Federal states. The question is also that will the constitution be drafted on the stipulated date?

Sujata perhaps is sure enough that the constitution can’t be drafted on time and thus the demand for a sort of poll may have come from her pertaining to the Federal structure. Naughty Sujata!

To boot, the Maoists on a unilateral but whimsical manner have already accomplished the tasks of the Nepal CA body by declaring several federal units and in the process have challenged the CA body’s legal authority.

With the declaration of States by the Maoists, the raison d’être of the CA body has come to an end, opine constitutional experts. 

Analysts remain bemused listening to Sujata’s aversion she exhibited against the division of the country on the lines of federal units.

Her blunt revulsion against the federal structure has come at a time when the nation-state has already accepted that the country will have various federal units to which practically all the major political parties of the country have already put a stamp which means that the parties agreeing to the Federal structure can’t take their acceptance back under any new pretext or the other.

Moreover, Sujata’s own party-the Nepali Congress, too has provided its green signal to such a federal division of the country in the very beginning of the political change of 2006.

Thus, the question arises as to what forced or made Sujata to ventilate her feelings against the very notion of the federal structure?

What she spoke can’t be her brain, analysts maintain. Should this mean that she spoke her father’s inner views? Could be?

But why this father-daughter combine have now begun airing their views as regards the federal system of governance in this country?

Intelligent brains claim that both father-daughter combine could have been “instructed” by some alien powers in the immediate vicinity not to embrace federal system because time permitting such a system may pave the way for the country’s vertical and horizontal split both.

Is it then the fear of sure shot disintegration of Nepal that this duo has begun airing their views through the media of late?

Interestingly, some high placed sources claim that the Chinese authorities may have sounded the disadvantages of a federal structure while Sujata and Nepal PM were in Beijing.

Sounds logical because if Nepal embraces federalism then its profound impact can’t be denied in Tibet-the underbelly of China. An already beleaguered China as regards the Tibetan issue perhaps doesn’t want to invite more problems by suggesting Nepal to go on for federal system of governance.

However, there is yet another set of Kathmandu intellectuals who authentically claim that both Koirala and his daughter may have well been advised by the Indian establishment to register their protest against the federal structure in Nepal for such a division in Nepal will have its immediate impact in the adjoining provinces of India, for example, Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, if not beyond.

The Indian fear is that the moment Nepal is divided in several federal units, many villages and districts in the adjoining Indian provinces will begin demanding the same rights.

To recall, some districts in Bihar and in Uttar Pradesh are comfortably bigger in size and territory than entire Nepal. The oppressed and the dejected ones in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh too will demand separate state for themselves in their bid to free themselves from the landlordism that prevails in Bihar and UP of India.

More so the Telangana’s demand for a separate state in India has already alarmed the powers-that-be governing the Indian Union. India thus will not want to invite more troubles for itself and thus may have insisted upon the Nepali leaders to refrain from going federal.

This logic too sounds irrefutable but will the Madhesh parties digest Sujata’s version? The objection at the CA has already begun by these parties.

The meek and subdued manner with which Nepal Prime Minister told the media the other day that Sujata’s version on federal division were her own personal remarks does tell in many more ways than one that both Sujata and Madhav Nepal have returned convinced from China that division of Nepal on federal model will be ultimately counterproductive for this country whose spillover effect could be seen both in the North and South.

Interestingly, Sujata’s mind on federalism in Nepal came just the next day of the Nepal Closure sponsored by Rastriya Jan Morcha against the federal system of governance for Nepal.

This Morcha or say front has been voicing its serious concerns over federalism for the front believes that such a model will eventually split the country on caste and ethnic lines which time permitting will disintegrate the nation-state.

Even more puzzling is the fact that the Rastriya Prajatantra Party led by Kamal Thapa too is against the notion of institutionalizing federalism in Nepal. The party led by Thapa has been demanding a sort of referendum to decide the fate of the Nepali monarchy and that of the federal structure as well.

With Sujata’s sudden demand for a referendum for deciding the fate of federal structure, and the disgust of the Jan Morcha and Thapa’s party over the same makes one to believe that a sort of polarization is soon to take a formal shape which would stand against the division of Nepal on federal lines.

Mind it, Kamal Thapa is not that far from the Indian establishment. He still enjoys cordial relations with the South Block, India.

An overly excited Sujata has already claimed that her party has had a good number of central committee members who were against the federal structure and she hopes that these CC members will certainly toe her line of thinking as regards federal system of governance which is against.

Having said all these, it yet remains a mystery as to why all of a sudden Sujata changed her stance as regards the Federal model for Nepal? Who made her to change her previous stance? Or, is it that she really felt or concluded that the federal model for Nepal was dangerous and an alien idea to split Nepal into pieces?

Time will only tell as to why, how and who changed her mind?

Let’s wait for some time.

Posted on : 2010-01-06 19:35:44

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