Sadly!

Barbarity! Inhumanity! Heinousness! Atrocity! Savagery!

These are the synonyms that my small dictionary offered to me as I searched for the right word to define the incident that happened today at Chabahil. Sadly, I believe none of these exactly represent what I want to call it!

A mob attacked a stationary microbus parked on the side of the road. The passengers of the microbus were small school children – who had to ran out crying for the mob started pelting it’s windshield with stones.

How shocking is that? Since I saw the photo for the first time at around 3 PM, I am feeling bothered, a kind of numb feeling, and every time I look at these photos I feel a chill running from my heart to my back.

If Keshab Thoker, the photojournalist, had come to me and interpreted the event without the photos, I would never have believed him, for I thought, the peace-loving Nepali would never do such an inhuman act. But there were proofs and that left me trying to think what these innocent children were thinking at that time.

No blame game! I don’t want to blame any party or political leader or anything like that, but probably the ever-flowing news of violence had left us senseless – without any feeling – and that way we, the once proud Nepali as peace loving people, are turning savages from human.

Sadly, there seemed very little things we could do to stop that [and those who could help a little are not willing; for there interest comes above all including the humanity, the nation and the social welfare].

For all of us, it’s now time to wake up!

(All photos copied from myrepublica.com)

Had we known the path of transition into new Nepal would be such woeful, we might have been happy with what we had earlier – that is the common voice in Kathmandu.

Even then, we all are happy to go through all these difficulties of short-supplies, should it mean the coming days would be the one we had dreamt of. But, does not that look a distant star – the hope without much radiance.

***

Tarai is closed due to strike! That is not even a news without adding ‘for the ninth day’. There are curfews in four districts – somewhere for hours, somewhere indefinite. There are clashes between security forces and the protesters – headlines today scream ‘one died and 150 hurt’. Continue reading…

Kathmandu is hit-hard by the protest against petro price hike. There is no vehicular movement as protesters are burning tyres on streets. However, the nature of protest and some of the incidents that I experienced looked ill motivated.

Nepal Government has directed NOC to revoke the price-hike decision immediately, according to breaking news on radio and, hopefully it will all end by this evening. Continue reading…

Sir Edmund Hillary, one of the first two men atop Mount Everest, passed away. The news made me numb and left me blaming myself why did not I try to meet him on so many occasions he was in Nepal. For many Nepalis like me, Hillary – a New Zealander – was more Nepali than his teammate on the top of the world – Tenzing Norgay.

As a child, whenever I read stories of Everest, I had always expected the next time I would read about them; the God would exchange their nationality. I was bothered mostly with Tenzing accepting Indian nationality and living in Darjeeling. Indian magazines I read then always called him an Indian.

As I grew, I accepted the reality. For Tenzing, India was a good offer than living a hard life in Nepal. And, when I knew about Hillary’s Himalayan Trust and the works it had done to uplift the lives of Sherpas, in a corner of my heart, I believed, he too was bothered Tenzing living in Nepal and wanted no more Sherpas to leave the country – and his way of doing that was establishing schools and hospitals for them.

On May 29, 2003, when the 50th Anniversary of the ascent was celebrated, he chose to come to Nepal to accept honorary citizenship and went through the capital city on a horse-driven wagon rather than accepting an invitation by the British Queen. Though his love for modesty was well-known, I never thought he loved Nepal so much.

Then I started believing, Ed was more Nepali than Tenzing! May his soul of a legend rest in peace.

Sir Edmund Hillary – King of the World
Hillary’s Himalayan Trust – Nepal

The Seven-Party Alliance (SPA) government decided to postpone elections of constituent assembly indefinitely. Nepal Communist Party (Maoists) succeeded to persuade/pressure other parties for an agreement that will do no good for the country.

Though I had already predicted in my earlier post that the elections would be postponed, the news of postponement shocked me and made me numb. As any other average Nepali, I believe the unstable situation should end as soon as possible and elections is the only way out of any unseen problems that may arise in future.

Politics is illusion. At least true for Nepali. Only yesterday, after listening to a speech made by a labor leader in a small gathering, I have asked a few others, is politics is all about illusioning people. Same for us – our leaders are keeping us in an illusion while in fact, they have proved themselves as un-visionary as possible.

Our leaders are not only making us believe on their ill-vision but are also not telling us the truth. Past has shown us that all out leaders have failed. PM Girija Prasad Koirala might have been nominated for the Nobel and he might be the only hope today, but he had a troubled history where he had failed to understand even his own friends at the party.

Maoists have proved themselves to be childish in politics. The ‘Roundtable Conferene’ is just an example where they even failed to envision what an average Nepali understood – that it’s not possible to decide on future of the country leaving out Nepali Congress and CPN-UML.

There is a simple logic behind all these failures. Their decision are more based on political ambition and party’s benefits than national interest or intellectual analysis.

The decision to postpone elections of constituent assembly too followed the same logic. Maoists do not want it as they knew what people thought about about. Congress’ old leader may be willing to solve all this for his credit but he will not mind getting a few more days at the position. Only CPN-UML want anyway, and they have already declared the protests of the decision.

Sadly, we are once again being deceived and I sincerely hope this postponement won’t be counter-productive for the democracy in Nepal.

LINK: CA Polls: A Mirage at Last?

On Tuesday, Nepal Communist Party (Maoists) quit government vowing to begin an agitation and to disrupt the Constituent Assembly election. It came after five months of Maoists joining the government. The latest turn-around of the Maoists, whose 13-year-long People’s War put the country into unprecedented trouble, has ignited the fear of them returning to from where they come.

Most Nepali who lived peacefully without news of killings everyday fear that this could be the end of the opportunity to once again bring a peaceful nation. Many see it as a step that will increase trouble of the country rather than solving it.

Talks are going on to reach an agreement with the Maoists and hopefully, it will turn out fruitful. In the condition where Maoists has vowed to continue alliance with seven other political parties and keeping their army in the UN monitored camps and going through peaceful agitation, it is largely unlikely that they will go back to war again.

Then, what is it? What next?

For me, their latest step is nothing more than their nervous attempt to regain the faith of the people before going into the elections. Since they have joined the mainstream politics, the political scenario has changed a lot. The Tarai Uprising has been the main factor that has swept away their base in Tarai region.

Their early conclusion of Tarai Uprising, when they said its only a mob, has boomeranged. With Tarai people and many other smaller groups attempting to get deserved equality and rights, the situation for the Maoists in government was unfavorable. If these groups reach agreements with the government, Nepali Congress (a party with Prime Minister who lead and Ram Chandra Poudel, who is responsible to talks and agreement as peace and reconstruction minister) takes the credit and Maoists are left with nothing!

Better than that for the Maoists is to assist these groups in their fight (or possibly lead them) so to regain faith and popularity.

Secondly, Maoists had already expressed their fear in facing the people. Their war has caused 10,000 deaths and millions were irked and if they go to election without addressing the problems of the victims, they are unlikely to get people’s favor. It would be the stunning punch for them if they fail to go shoulder-to-shoulder with Nepali Congress and Communist Party of Nepal (United Marxist Lennists) which, many thinks, is unlikely in current situation.

So for them, fully proportional electoral system is the best choice rather than mixed one and if they succeed to make the interim parliament declare republic (their two demands for agreement is fully proportional electoral system and declaration of republic), it will be a big success for them to which they can take a credit and face people.

But if the election is now postponed and something happens in between, Nepali people won’t forgive the Maoists. And, in the condition when the political situation is not consolidated and many trying to play the game, postponement of the election will not be good for the country! So for me, the best option for the Maoists is face the election and before than build some image helping out agitating groups and in Tarai.

“Eleven thousands people have been killed during people’s war, we have neither been able to provide education for their children nor to provide relief to them. Thousands have been disappeared, we haven’t been able to made public situation of any of them. How can we ask people for vote in such situation?”

Maoists Supremo Prachanda, Aug 24

Maoists looked like have felt the ground on which they are standing. Finally, they have spoken the truth they have been trying to ignore for long. The truth that getting support of the people in polls is not as easy as killing them! And, that there are many who just hate them for what they have done and it’s not easy for them to change the hate into love (or even dilemma)!

But sadly, they have spoken the truth along with the call for postponement of the election for constituent assembly – something that many Nepalis believe is the gateway for peaceful future.

Already deferred once, the election is scheduled for November 22. And the Maoists now want the poll on mid-April. Prachanda said: “There is no harm in postponing the polls till mid-April next year.”

Fine for Maoists! But will that be fine for Nepalis? A week ago, Prachanda had said: “There would not be situation where the Nepali people ill not tolerate the postponement of polls time and again.”

And, he was true then. Now he is speaking for his party’s interest. After all, nation is nothing compared to the party for politicians (ah! Our bad luck).

Now, what will happen to the polls?

It will be postponed, for sure. The only person that can convince Maoists on anything these times is none other than Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala of Nepali Congress. But it’s largely unlikely that his party wants the polls so soon.

Congress doesn’t want to go to the polls before their unification of the Democratic Congress (that of former PM Sher Bahadur Deuba). Only after that, they can be assured of favorable outcome from the polls. And, then they need to put in place the organization at the grass-root levels.

Maoists too do not want the polls.

The only big party that wants to have polls as soon as possible is Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxists Leninists) because their grass-root structure is somehow kept okay and that the gain of Maoists is loss for them for they follow (or talk about) same ideology.

In such condition, its sad for the Nepalis that Maoists have came up against the polls.

Well, Royalists your time to see if anything works will be prolonged!