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Maoists put India on the
spot
By Ranjit Devraj
NEW DELHI - While India denies that its
security agencies helped arrange meetings between
a top Nepali Maoist leader and its political
establishment, analysts welcome dialogue with the
rebels as a key to ending a seemingly intractable
crisis in the neighboring Himalayan kingdom.
According to S D Muni, a widely
acknowledged expert on Himalayan affairs, engaging
the Maoists is "a good idea". He pointed out that
India's ruling elite had initially shied away from
the communists, who are in an armed struggle to
create a kingless republic, because of pressure
from various right-wing lobbies that "are working
on behalf of Nepal's King Gyanendra and his
coterie".
Speaking to Inter Press Service in an interview,
Muni - who teaches international relations at the
prestigious Jawaharlal Nehru University -
identified these lobbies as "the Indian army, the
United States [with which New Delhi works closely
on the Nepal crisis] and members of India's high
society, some of whom have blood ties with the
Nepalese monarchy".
Yet another lobby that
has been vocal in supporting the king against the
Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) are Hindu
fundamentalists that belong to various
organizations affiliated to the powerful Bharatiya
Janata Party (BJP) that leads the national
opposition in India's parliament.
Prominent BJP leader, and chief minister
or the western state of Rajasthan, Vasundhara Raje
Scindia, is only one member of India's erstwhile
royalty that has blood ties with Nepal's royal
family.
Apart from the compulsions of
domestic politics, India has strong grounds to
fear the spreading of the violent Maoist
insurgency - which has gripped its northern
neighbor since 1996 and claimed more than 11,000
lives - across the porous borders and into its own
poverty-ridden states, where left-wing extremists
are active.
The Maoist insurgency, and
failure of Nepal's democratic governments to deal
with it, provided King Gyanendra the pretext to do
away with democracy altogether. On February 1 he
dismissed a party-based government and began
ruling directly, imposing emergency rule and
severely constricting political, civil and press
freedoms.
The international community, led
by India, decried the coup and imposed tough
sanctions. The king partially relented and on
April 29 rescinded emergency rule, though
political and press freedoms continue to be
restricted.
But Nepal's Maoists have the
sympathy of India's communist parties which, after
the last elections in May, emerged stronger than
ever before and are influential for the fact that
they lend critical outside support to the
Congress-led, United Progressive Alliance ruling
coalition.
Last week, when India's leading
newspapers reported a secret meeting between top
Maoist leader Baburam Bhattarai and Prakash Karat,
general secretary of the Marxist Communist Party
of India (CPI-M), it drew every shade of reaction
from open approval to outright condemnation.
India's External Affairs Ministry led the
condemnations. "There is no change in respect of
our policy with regard to the Communist Party of
Nepal (Maoist). We unequivocally condemn their
terrorist and violent activities that have caused
enormous suffering to the people of Nepal,"
spokesman Navtej Sarna said at a press briefing.
"Durable peace and stability in Nepal can
only be achieved through a political settlement,
which, among other things, requires the Maoists to
forswear armed struggle and lay down their arms,"
added Sarna.
Sarna's reaction followed
published criticisms by analysts like C Raja
Mohan, who said India's flip-flops in foreign
policy sent some very confusing signals. He
pointed out that New Delhi's position on the
global "war against terrorism" was actually
supporting an absolute monarchy, in a neighboring
country, that just dismantled democracy.
News reports suggesting that Indian
security agencies had escorted Bhattarai - who's
on Interpol's high security risk list - to a
meeting with Karat did not elicit a response from
Sarna. The spokesman just repeated Karat's earlier
denial.
For his part, Karat carefully
denied the role of Indian security agencies but
steered away from categorically denying any
rendezvous with Bhattarai.
According to
Muni, Bhattarai and Karat needed no help from
Indian security agencies if they wanted to meet
each other since they were students together at
Jawaharlal Nehru University during the 1970s.
"No solution to Nepal's problems is
possible without taking the Maoists on board,
although unfortunately the fact remains that
official India, especially the External Affairs
Ministry, has refused to touch them with a barge
pole," said Muni.
Muni said that the
episode had to be seen in the context of a move by
Kathmandu to discredit Bhattarai, who advocates
better coordination between the Maoists and
mainstream Nepalese political parties in order to
isolate the king.
On May 19, the Royal
Nepal Army released at a press briefing a dated
videotape showing the elusive Maoist supreme
Prachanda telling his cadres that he had divested
Bhattarai of all his responsibilities since he was
too close to India.
Apart from
discrediting Bhattarai on charges of being an
"Indian stooge', the army has also been keen on
highlighting differences between Bhattarai and
Prachanda - with added claims that the rift has
deeply split Maoist cadres.
But, according
to Muni, the fact remains that New Delhi will
eventually have to win the confidence of the
Maoists if it wants to have a role in brokering
peace in Nepal.
Other analysts, including
Hari Roka, a Nepali student working for his
doctorate in Jawaharlal Nehru University, agree
with Muni's assessment.
"The fear that
Nepal's political parties could forge an alliance
with the Maoists was a restraining factor with the
hawks in the New Delhi-Washington-London axis,"
said Roka, who has been critical of India's
dogmatically repeated official line that stability
in Nepal rested on the "twin pillars of a
constitutional monarchy and multi-party
democracy".
Said Roka: "The reality is
that stability in Nepal now depends on the twin
pillars of multi-party democracy and the
mainstreaming of the Maoists."
(Inter
Press Service) |
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