The Hindu Business Line : Is Nepal headed for Reign of Terror?

All is not well with Nepal. Disturbing visuals and distressing reports have become the norm. I have a friend in Kathmandu with whom connection became difficult after a nervous Gyanendra ordered cell phone providers to switch off all mobile services.

So, on Sunday morning, I sent him a mail; not to the King, that is, but to my buddy: "It is agonising to read about the turmoil in Nepal. I've been anxious about your safety. Hence this mail."

Little did I expect a reply, because the last thing you expect people in a troubled city to do is to check their inboxes. But reply he did, though hours later. "My dear Murali, thank you very much for the enquiry and the concern shown towards me. I am within the house and not going out anywhere." Safe and immobile!

"The situation here is very fluid. Today again curfew clamped with shoot-at-sight orders. All flights are cancelled except those of foreign airlines. No transport within Kathmandu and to places outside Kathmandu. How long the situation will continue cannot be predicted now."

Politics is also in a flux. "Even the political leaders cannot take a decision due to pressure from public. The people want the King to abdicate, which he is not doing." He narrates, "Yesterday the crowd went near the palace but due to heavy rains everybody dispersed and no untoward event happened." Thank (Rain) God!

"People want constituent assembly to be constituted by election and to draft a new constitution without any role for King in it. All the government employees also have joined the protest and no work goes on in any office. Banks run with skeleton staff to disburse cash to the needy and other regular banking business and all are suspended."

My learned friend, whose name I'm not divulging, for his own safety, is of the view that the situation is quite complicated. "Political parties cannot go for a compromise solution with the King or risk popularity." It seems the parties are so divided that they cannot take a unanimous decision as to how to proceed further in the circumstances. Understandable.

"The political parties could have constituted a Revolutionary Council as was done during the French Revolution by Robespierre," reads the mail. From a page on Wikipedia, you can refresh your history lessons - that Maximilien Robespierre was "a very influential member of the Committee of Public Safety, which oversaw the period of the French Revolution in which the revolutionaries consolidated their power; a period which is commonly known as the Reign of Terror." He was a disciple of Jean-Jacques Rousseau.

A page about `French Revolution' on http://en.wikipedia.org has visuals such as the Guillotine, using which "8,000 to 40,000 people were executed during the Reign of Terror." The Thermidorian Reaction resulted in "moderate Convention members deposing and executing Robespierre and several other leading members of the Committee of Public Safety."

Let me revert to the mail on hand: "Political parties are also afraid of Maoists who may overwhelm the election with majority, in which case the political parties' voices will be submerged.

Therefore, the political parties are playing the blaming game on the King, to extricate themselves from any unpopular move."

He is afraid that if the chaos continues for some more time Kathmandu will be bereft of victuals slowly and black marketing will start giving place for further agitation.

"The European countries, the US and India want a ceremonial King to be in place and persuading the parties to accept the King's invitation to name a Prime Minister but the public as well as the parties consider it a trap."

E&OE@TheHindu.co.in

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