NEPAL INTIFADA

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widely-hated King Gyanendra of Nepal, which we have been seeing on the TV screen

for the last 15 days, mark a defining moment in two confrontations------between

the King and the mainstream political parties, which have been wedded to

multi-party parliamentary democracy for many years and between the King and the

Maoists, who are a recent convert to multi-party parliamentary democracy. These

two confrontations, which were going on in parallel ever since the King

suspended parliamentary democracy and assumed arbitrary powers in February

last year, have now merged to form a single stream of protest against not only

the King in person, but also against the very institution of monarchy. 2. If

the Maoists of Nepal, who reportedly already control 70 per cent of the

countryside, had not changed their tactics recently, it is doubtful whether

the mobilising powers of only the Seven-Party Alliance (SPA), constituting the

mainstream political parties, would have been sufficient to bring about the kind

of mobilisation which one has been watching on the TV screen. 3. Where are

these protesters, many of them young, coming from? From Kathmandu itself? No.

Many of them are from the surrounding rural areas. This is not apparent from

the TV screen, but becomes evident when one reads print media accounts of the

uprising. 4. Let me quote from a

report carried by the "Hindu" of Chennai on April 21,2006. It says: " The

violence (on April 20) came as an estimated 30,000 people, who had walked in

from surrounding villages, began marching along the main road to the City

centre. The group at Kalanki was among the largest of several that gathered at

different entry points to the City to continue mass protests against King

Gyanendra's rule". 5. The future implications of the Intifada in Kathmandu

have to be seen in the context of the two tactical changes adopted by the

Maoists recently in their campaign to capture political power in Nepal. The

first is their proclaimed willingness to shed their concept of the dictatorship

of the proletariat and to work within the framework of a multi-party

parliamentary democracy in a Republican form of State. It was in pursuance of

this modified objective that they have joined the SPA in its struggle against

the King in the hope that this would strengthen their seeming democratic

credentials. 6. The second is the benign face projected by them towards

India as votaries of good Indo-Nepal relations and as well-wishers of the

efforts of the Government of India to bring the Maoists of India, who pose the

most serious internal security threat in India, into India's political

mainstream. 7. The second change has been surprising,

considering the fact that till last year the Maoists of Nepal were projecting

their campaign to capture political power as a three-phase struggle---the first

directed against the Police, the second against the army and the third to be

directed against the Indian army. Their argument was that India would not be a

silent spectator of their capturing power in Kathmandu and that the Indian

army would hence intervene to remove them from power. They were, therefore,

stressing the importance of solidarity with the Indian Maoists so that the

latter, through stepped up operations in India, could keep the Indian security

forces preoccupied with internal security duties in order to thwart any attempt

to intervene in

Nepal. In this connection, reference is invited to my paper of 13-7-2001 titled

"The Maoists of Nepal : Three Perspectives" at

http://www.saag.org/papers3/paper277.html . 8. These tactical changes came in

the wake of the failure of the repeated attempts of the Maoists to extend their

control from the rural areas to the urban and finally to Kathmandu, the

capital. Mao had said, capture the rural areas and then surround the urban

areas and launch the final assault. They had no difficulty in capturing the

rural areas because the ill-trained and ill-motivated rural police hardly put

up any resistance to them. In the urban areas, and particularly in Kathmandu,

they have had to confront the well-trained and well-motivated Gurkha soldiers

of the Army. 9. The Army is not strong enough to liberate the rural areas from

the control of the Maoists, but it has shown itself to be strong enough to

preven the Maoists from extending their control to Kathmandu. The Maoists have

a demonstrated capability for sporadic acts of urban terrorism, but do not as

yet have the capability to capture power through a frontal confrontation with

the Army. 10. The Maoists have, therefore, chosen to achieve through

cladestine penetration what they cannot achieve through a frontal onslaught. It

should be clear to anyone well-versed in understanding Maoist tactics that they

have been taking advantage of their co-operation with the SPA in Kathmandu to

penetrate their cadres into Kathmandu by diverting the attention of the

security forces by keeping them preoccupied with law and order duties and to

wait for an opportune moment to strike and capture power. Instead of the old

three-phase struggle, they are now waging a two-pronged struggle----- an armed

struggle in accordance with classic Maoist tactics all by themselves in the

rural areas and a revisionist democratic struggle in association with the

mainstream parties in the urban areas and Kathmandu. 11.The US Ambassador in

Kathmandu, Mr.James Moriarty, is reported to have cautioned the King about the

dangers of a Saigon--1975 situation developing if he did not restore

parliamentary democracy immediately. In a news bulletin on April 20, the BBC

quoted him as describing the present state of affairs in Kathmandu as a

"developing revolutionary situation." 12. His observations are not far-fetched

and his fears are not imaginary. The Vietcong clandestinely penetrated into

Saigon without being detected by the South Vietnamese and American intelligence

and security agencies. When it struck simultaneously at many points after having

taken up position inside Saigon, there was so much panic that Saigon was lost to

the Vietcong without any worthwhile fight. 13. In his greed for absolute power,

King Gyanendra, an unpopular ruler with an equally unpopular son (Paras), has

made a mess of the situation in Nepal.His credibilty in the eyes of large

sections of his people has been damaged.. He has weakened the roots of

democracy. Under the pretext of countering the Maoists more firmly than the

elected Governments were doing, he has trampled upon the fundamental rights of

his people and united the opposition against him and unwittingly facilitated

the exploitation of this unity by the Maoists. The Maoists have acquired a

legitimacy in the eyes of large sections of the people and are trying to shed

their unsavoury image in the eyes of Indian public opinion. The King finds

himself increasingly isolated in the international community. 14. His continued

obduracy in the face of the mounting agitation is strengthened by his seeming

confidence in the continued loyalty of the Army to him. The Army, with its

Gurkha soldiers, has always considered the King and not the elected Prime

Minister as its Commander-in-Chief and as the source of all its powers. Its

loyalty has always been first to the King and then only to the Constitution.

There are no indications of any dilution in its loyalty to the King and in its

determination to uphold the monarchy. 15. In revolutionary situations like the

one developing in Nepal,

the decisive turning point comes either when the army changes its loyalty or

when it starts looking upon the situation as a threat to national security and

intervenes to take over power after ruthlessly suppressing the protesters. Is

Kathmandu moving towards Saigon-1975, when the Vietcong, after having liberated

the countryside, captured power in the capital, or Yangon (Rangoon)---1988, when

the Myanmarese army, facing massive protests by supporters of Aung San Suu Kyi,

crushed the protests ruthlessly killing hundreds of the protesters without

worrying about the international consequences of its action? 16. India finds

itself tied in knots as the situation in Nepal seems to be moving inexorably

towards

a tragedy of immense proportions. In the confrontation between the King and the

mainstream political parties, it cannot support the King. In the confrontation

between the King and the Army on the one side and the Maoists on the other, it

cannot undermine the former. Accepting the pro-India overtures of the Maoists

at its face value has inherent risks. If the armed struggle by the Nepali

Maoists to capture power is all right, how can it be wrong for the Indian

Maoists to try to come to power through an armed struggle? If a political

dialogue with the Nepali Maoists to achieve peace in Nepal is all right, how

can it be wrong to have a dialogue with the Indian Maoists to achieve peace in

large tracts of tribal land

in Central India? 17. India's objective should be to bring the King and the

mainstream political parties around a round table to find a way for the

restoration of multi-party parliamentary democracy with iron-clad guarantees

against any further abuses by the King. The participation of the Maoists in

this process should be made conditional on their giving up their armed

struggle. Once the King and the mainstream parties reach an agreement, India

should resume its counter-insurgency assistance to the Nepali Army. The Maoists

should not have India's empathy so long as they don't give up the path of armed

struggle. (The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat,

Govt. of India, New Delhi E-mail: itschen36

)http://saag.org/%5Cpapers18%5Cpaper1772.html

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