top of page
Writer's pictureDr. Sanjeev Chopra

Kathmandu Chronicle: Reclaiming India- Nepal Relations


The story of Nepal is closely intertwined with Kalimpong , the place of my first posting as an Assistant Magistrate  and Dehradun , where I have hung my boots after superannuating as the Director of the LBSNAA.  It was only after the Anglo Gurkha war of 1814, and the Treaty of Sugauli in 1815   that  Nepal had to cede both Darjeeling and Dehradun .  Both became prominent towns – first of the EIC and then of the Empire : both were home  to educational institutions ,  clubs, hotels. Anglo Indian establishments and military installations .  Many Gurkha soldiers who served the   British Indian armies also opted to settle in Darjeeling and Dehradun, thereby changing the demographic profile of the two districts : in  Darjeeling the Gurkhas now constitute a majority , and have been asserting their ethnic and linguistic identity.  Dehradun boasts of  Nepali language radio station ,and Nepali is an   optional subject in   schools in Gurkha dominated areas. The valour of the Gurkha troops in all of India’s wars have been immortalised in the narratives of Gen Ian Cardozo, whose book Cartooz Saheb is about his tryst with the  fearless Gurkha Platan .


Therefore, when I came across  Kathmandu Chronicles , I took to the book like a fish to water, became I was thirsting to place   my anecdotal recall , supplemented by the occasional writings in media about Nepal into a perspective . Kathmandu was also my first foreign visit - a college trip in the late seventies - , albeit one without the need to have a passport , and one was struck by the poster on every shop ‘Jap Desh Jap Naresh ‘ from the road side tea shop to the  Youth Hostel where we stayed  . These posters emblazoned the airport at Kathmandu  as well as the Soaltee Oberoi  when I was in the Valley  for  my first  official visit in the early nineties. By the time of my third visit in 2005, King Gyanendra was still the monarch, but the Jap Desh Jap Naresh poster  was not mandatory.  At the airstrip of Simikot , the Nepal Police and the Maoist cadres were fully armed , and  both charged their levies from the travellers !


This eminently readable  256-page book  is a joint venture of Ambassador  K V Rajan , and Nepal scholar Atul K Thakur  goes beyond facts which can easily be  accessed from Wikipedia , JSTOR    to build a narrative .  The   three sections of the book – Diplomatic Gleanings : A first-person  account  by Ambassador  KV Rajan  , and the next two under their joint authorship  -Transitions of the Himalayan Kind and Repurposing India Nepal  relations –    help us   understand the current status of the relationship between the only two   overwhelmingly Hindu majority  nations with   common places of pilgrimage ,  scriptural texts  and the cover of the mighty Himalayas .  It tells us about  how  the close but often tensed up relationship between two asymmetrical neighbours. While India believes that on account of its deep rooted historical, cultural and spiritual  connect with Nepal , it has an important stake in the political economy of Nepal, the latter feels that India often behaves like a Big Brother , and therefore  tries to counterbalance this by making tactical  alliances with China  It is interesting to note that even though Communist China and the Hindu monarchy were poles apart ideologically, they were happy to collaborate to corner  India .In fact in the late nineties , this Hindu kingdom allowed the ISI to operate from its territory – leading to the hijacking of  the  Indian airlines aircraft IC 814  which saw   terrorists being swapped for the daughter of the political bigwig Mufti Sayeed .

Getting back to the book – lets get to the sub title which talks about reclaiming India Nepal relations – for the past is past : but we can draw some important lessons. From the times of King Tribhuvan who was able to  shed the hegemonic control of the  Ranas in 1951  ( who had effectively become hereditary prime ministers – thereby the de facto rulers) , there is one lesson that we are still in the process of learning . Writes Rajan ‘ An important lesson from the Tribhuvan years   was that with a small and vulnerable neighbour , the style of diplomacy matters as much as the substance ; that even when Nepal appears to be seeking India’s advice and support, it is not necessary to broadcast it so loudly that it echoes and re- echoes in the mountain kingdom’

In fact, the    prime minister who understood this sensitivity of  a small neighbour was Lal Bahadur Shastri, who visited the kingdom twice – first as Home Minster and then as the Prime Minister .  His personal rapport with King Mahendra – the successor of King Tribhuvan -   and the great improvement in the relationship in that brief period has unfortunately been missed out by the authors .    In my view, the reason for  Shastri’s success in India Nepal relations was based on the foundation   that the government must not play favourites – either with the Place or the fledgling leaders of the democratic movement , and that India must publicly acknowledge that Nepal was a sovereign country with freedom to decide about her  political choices . However , this is what Nehru , Indira and later  Rajiv Gandhi were not willing to accept. In their view , India was  the ‘big daddy’ of the South Asia  and had to be seen and acknowledged as such . Moreover    ‘ the inability or unwillingness of senior bureaucrats to suggest alternative, or more moderate options to their political bosses ’did not augur well for the connect  between the two countries .

 

 

The  relations between the  two countries touched the nadir when in the 1973 NAM conference  when King  Birendra  insisted on   protocol privileges higher than  Mrs Gandhi  – he was after all the head of state  whereas she was only head of government . He also used the forum  to float the idea of Nepal being declared internationally as a zone of peace. When Sikkim was merged with India , the anti-India sentiment  in Kathmandu was quite high , and the late  King Tribhuvan’s informal  discussions about a federation of India and Nepal with Nehru was deliberately misinterpreted  as an attempt by India to take over Nepal. In fact, there is no document or record to support  the claim that even as Patel wanted the integration to take place, Nehru was opposed to it .

By 1990 – Nepali Congress  had proposed  the  new Constitution – monarchy with Parliamentary democracy and identity as a Hindu kingdom  and 1991 Girija Prasad Koirala won. However , India     was not fully invested in Nepal, and Pranab Mookerjee lamented that it was the short sightedness of ‘our bureaucrats ‘ which stood in the way . By the late nineties, relations had deteriorated .


The patricide and fratricide at the Royal Palace on June 1, 2001  in which the crown prince shot down  his father  King Birendra, mother Aishwarya  saw the king’s brother assume power . His political thoughts and ideologies were frozen in time . Unwilling to read the writings on the wall , he dismissed his democratically elected Prime Minister , dissolved the Assembly , and drove the country to civil war by  seeking to deploy the RNA against the movement for restoration of democracy . Thus, it was the  Constituent Assembly    abolished the 240-year-old Shah monarchy  on 28 May 2008 . And it was no longer the world’s only Hindi kingdom: it was now federal democratic republic.

 

However, as the authors point out , the weak institutional structures along with  the make -ups ,  break- ups and fissures in the political parties of Nepal   saw  11 governments since it abolished the monarchy in 2008.Nepal’s electoral system is such that it is almost impossible for any party to secure a majority in the 275-strong House of Representatives to form a government on its own. Of the 275 members, 165 are elected under the direct election system, or first-past-the-post system, and the remaining 110 are elected under the proportional representation system. The lessons for India are  to not curry favourites , but work with every stakeholder in the system .  Perhaps this has to be borne in mind when the competing political parties lay their claims on Kalapani in the Pithoragarh district of Uttarakhand and Susta area in West Champaran of Bihar .


How do we repurpose these relationships .  The  authors have identified water resources, including flood management and hydropower ,  trade – with special status to goods of Nepali origin into India  and tourism as the key growth drivers . In fact, Uttarakhand is currently in the process of  an air connectivity between Dehradun and Kathmandu to give a boost to religious  and adventure tourism . The authors make a case for people centred development with focus on health, education ,skills and livelihoods , rather than   capital intensive projects in an ecologically fragile environment .  Nepal’s economic downturn is now a Victor Hugo movement for Reforms. Finally, they talk of bilateral , regional and sub regional co-operation , especially through waterways , rail connections and highways like the  THEC Trans Himalayan  Economic Corridor as well.

Th way ahead is to focus on the long-term interests, more people-to-people contacts, perhaps a few concessions on the Agniveer scheme , and an understanding on the part of India that investing in its immediate neighbourhood  for its economic  development and political stability is best for India ‘s own strategic interest in the region . A stronger Nepal is good for Nepal . It is  equally good for India .


In fine I would strongly recommend the book, for a review is only an opening , an invitation to delve deeper ! please welcome the Kathmandu chronicle to your bookshelf !

 

 

 

 



 

36 views0 comments

Recent Posts

See All

Kommentarer


REC- VoW Book Awards 2024

bottom of page