Men, Matters & Memories
M L Kotru
It has been a most unedifying sulk that New Delhi has lapsed into ever since the Nepalese Constituent Assembly finally passed the country’s Constitution, the sixth or seventh such document the country has historically known .Let it be clearly understood that rarely has a Constitution been deemed to be a perfect document when first adopted. It’s only when the document is off the anvil that the faults have surfaced and the animal called constitutional amendment come into play..And that’s the time when nations do take a second,third or may be hundredth look at the various articles that together make for a constitution.
Naturally this happens only when the Constitution has come into play. The deficiencies come to be noticed forcing law-makers in a country to take a second look at things. Take the Amercian Constitution or,for that matter, our own Indian Constitution as an instance. How many times have these documents been amended ever since their adoption. Ours many more times during the last seven decades than say the American constitution which has been around for a few centuries. And all changes have been effected through legislative procedures as outlined in the original document itself’ ? Already about to cross the three-figure mark, most of these effected through legitimate legislative process Laid down in the self-same document.
So, why the great Indian sulk, and one not so covert, at that, after the Nepalese constituent assembly ended its six-year-old endeavour to finalise the country’s Constitution. ? Simply put, because the saffron dispensation in New Delhi didn’t find some of its pet Nepalese concerns taken care of. Yes, Madhesis,mostly from North Bihar and North Uttar Pradesh, may have reason to feel short-changed but why must we forget that that it is a Nepalese problem and the political parties in that country are fully conscious of their responsibilities.The Nepalese constituent assembly was in no way obliged to see that the final document did not contain anything that New Delhi considers unacceptable. The saffornised Delhi of the day is dismayed on many counts including,of course,its allergy to the word secular taking the place of Hindu nation. Remember, given a half chance the Indian ruling party would drop the word secular from our Constitutional preamble even before you asked “how come.”
New Delhi even to this day continues to believe that Nepal is the world’s only Hindu nation;prior to this it was the the only Hindu Kingdom wherein it was fashionable for many tolien to the King of Nepal to an incarnation of Lord Vishnu. Probably a saffrpnite New Delhi would have been happier with a former Indian Ambassador, a senior Congressman from Gujarat who would routinely make it for the feet of the then King Mahendra each time he called on him; he wanted to do the ‘dandavat” pranam because it was his belief that the King was an incarnation of Vishnu.
Our own history of the freedom struggle reminds us of the numerous Nepalese youth leaders who as students at the Banaras,Allahabad and Calcutta Universities, participated in the movement with men like Jaya Prakash Narayan ,returning home to occupy the political space , several becoming Prime Ministers after leading their own struggle against the ruling elite of the day,the Ranas. Some of these very leaders came to be criticized later in their own country for their servility towards the Indian establishment and for soliciting an Indian role in domestic politics.
Fortunately for the country that phase may have passed but the hangover is very much in place. The Indian saffroniotes at least haven’t quite forgotten. And hence their anger that the present political leadership of that country chose not to heed the concerns expressed by the Delhi durbar with Prime Minister Narendra Modi even sending a special envoy, the Indian Foreign Secretary to Kathmandu to persuade the leadership there to reconsider certain constitutional provisions regarding the creation of provinces constituting the Nepalese federation and to safeguard the interests of the very large Madhesi (Indian origin people) population accountimg for almost half the population of the country.
I do believe New Delhi is most probably motivated by its desire to ensure Nepal’s own stability but beyond that it should be none of our business to be telling the neighbouring nation what kind of government it should have. Or, how many provinces need to be created to accommodate various racial or religious groups.
For a country like India which even after over seven decades of freedom has not been able to satisfy the various ethnic,social,linguistic, religious pulls existing within it, we should not be seen encouraging divisiveness within Nepal. Yes, the Indian origin population may perhaps have a problem with the newly-framed Constitution but let’s be clear that it remains a Nepalese problem and Nepal must be left alone to offer solutions.
By the standards that New Delhi would perhaps wish Nepal to go by, even in the matter of administering the country, we may soon find the saffronite prtacharak-turned p[oliticians telling countries like Fiji,Mauritius, Guyana,Surinam with their large Indian populations how to conduct their affairs. The danger inherent to such interventionist postures is that it can be misconstrued as intervention in domestic affairs of other countries.
You do not buy friendship, as many in the current dispensation in New Delhi seem to believe, by merely coming to the assistance of a nation at a time of crisis, as the Modi government did during the earthquakes that hit Nepal recently; you demean yourself even by mentioning such help. Yet to go by the direct and implied suggestions made by the BJP and even Foreign Office spokespersons on a few occasions, the Nepalese must be the last word when it comes to being ungrateful. A pity that such an impression should even be allowed to get round.
The population in southern plains, it has been argued has objected to the pattern of carving out of seven provinces in Nepal as part of t he Constitutional process, leaving the Madhesis and Tharus and their respective political leaderships a lot worried It is a matter that one would expect the Nepalese to sort out in less exciting times.The anxiety over disaffection within class groups is overriding and the Nepalese political parties can’t be unaware of it.
The new Constitution crafted after seven years of interim arrangements, can at once be a source of pride and prejudice, with at least two groups claiming that they have been accorded short shrift in the overall construct .Even so, it remains a Nepalese problem which one believes, is capable of a Nepalese solution. New Delhi doesn’t have to step in to keep offering solutions. Indeed, it should be New Delhi’s endeavour to use its influence,if any, among the disaffected Madhesis so that they don’t fall victim to external influences. the opinion-makers in India,including former diplomatists tied to policy have failed to consider the representative and inclusive nature of Nepal’s Constituent Assembly.
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