On 1 and 2 January, Indian Hindu extremists organized under the BJP-led All India National Students Council chanted slogans against China and Nepal at the Indo-Nepal border area adjacent to Nepal’s Kanchanpur district. Just because India has signed a nuclear treaty with the United States of America, is it necessary for Indian political forces to feel intoxicated and chant slogans against neighborly countries? Is it a civilized way of doing politics? Is it in conformity with the norms and values of international relations?
When more than 99 percent of the Nepalis have already given their verdict through the 19-day April uprising in 2006 that they reject monarchy completely, why should extremist Hindus of India make efforts to preserve feudal monarchy in Nepal? Do they know how much the Nepalis have suffered from monarchy? Do they know that the Nepalis, too, are human beings seeking equal human dignity and the right to make their own decisions regarding their future? Have the Nepalis ever launched any border aggressions against India? Why do Indians alone, with the support of the SSB (their border security force) capture Nepali citizens’ land, houses and property? It seems, they need more human awareness and moral guidance from the Indian government. It has now become apparent that extremist Hindus of India have been more hurt by the Nepalis’ decision to abolish feudal monarchy in Nepal than Nepal’s concerned royal family members themselves. There are two reasons for this.
First, they have been following a very dangerous expansionist strategy to capture Nepal by glamorizing Nepal’s outgoing monarch as the Emperor of the Hindu World. They want to extend India’s border up to the bottom of the Mount Everest through Hindu emperor strategy.
Second, the Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) has advocated for the preservation of Nepal’s monarchy for its own political and social interests for maintaining its political existence in India. In India, extremist Hindus launch genocides in village areas, especially in Bihar. Hundreds of Dalits have already been massacred just in the name of feudal practice of caste untouchability. Indian mainstream media rarely report heinous crimes committed by Hindu extremists there. Their rule rules out ethnic diversity and inclusiveness. Because of their own anti-diversity and anti-inclusive narrow-minded ideology, they cannot view Nepal’s current diverse and inclusive trends very positively. To take advantage of Nepal’s transition period, they have used their lackeys in the Madhesi Janadhikar Forum (MJF) and the Jantantrik Terai Mukti Morcha (Goit) and Jwalasingh factions. These Nepal-based groups, with the help of Indian money, weapons and criminals gangs, have been criminalizing Madhesi people’s psychology to annihilate any change-seeking and progressive political forces in Nepal. In this context, there are many yet-uninterpreted underlying variables which will be unfolded on the coming days.
India has systematically encroached Nepal’s territory in the Indo-Nepal border region. In recent days, Susta in Nepal’s Nawalparasi district has become a symbol of India’s continuous border encroachment. India, a long former British Colony herself, has now ignored the fact that Nepal is a sovereign and independent nation. She has subtly encouraged her border security force SSB and Indian villagers to capture Nepali land and use it as their own. The local inhabitants of the disputed area have said that India has already encroached more than 14,000 hectares of Nepali land. Nepali students and youths, who marched up to the encroached area, have confirmed it.
This is a serious sovereignty issue over which the Nepal government has most surprisingly remained passive and silent. Ordinary Nepalis doubt the moral integrity of the current mainstream political leaderships and the government itself. After more pressures from groups outside the government, the phony parliament has raised the border encroachment in the parliament. Although this kind of border encroachment from India is not a new thing, it has been intensified in the recent months. On 1 and 2 January, India’s BJP-led students demonstrated against Nepal and China at the Indo-Nepal border side.
Still mysterious in this context is the total silence of the Nepal government even after the youth wings of the major political parties submitted their memorandum with a view to attract the attention of the government towards the continuous border encroachment.
Although the Nepal government has looked impotent in this matter, the Nepalis have taken the initiative. Youths, students, women, intellectuals and business people have demonstrated at the border side giving a clear message to border aggressors that the Nepalis will not tolerate their continuous border encroachment. They have expressed their commitment to sacrifice their lives for the sake of preserving Nepal’s sovereignty.
India has deliberately and systematically continued encroaching Nepal’s bordering territory since the early 1960s when King Mahendra bargained with India for sustaining his autocracy. Since then, it has become customary for other power-crazy political party leaderships to remain indifferent to national sovereignty for their personal advantages.
Civil society members of Nepal have emphasized on the need to launch a top level diplomatic negotiation in order to pressurize India to immediately stop encroaching Nepal’s territory.
If India, ignoring Nepal’s sovereignty and independence, continues encroaching Nepali territory in the coming weeks, it may be necessary for the Nepalis to harshly treat the Nepali traitors on the one hand, and rapidly internationalize the issue on the other.