NEPALESE DEMOCRACY AND ITS DISCONTENTS

John Whelpton

Introduction
The literal meaning of `democracy' is `rule by the people', or, in other words, a political system in
which ultimate authority is shared equally by all members of the community. In Nepal as elsewhere
such a system is widely endorsed as a desirable state of affairs but there is no precise, shared
understanding of what it implies in practice. In Nepal, even more than in most other places, there is
also a sense of deep disillusionment with what a system describing itself as democratic has actually
achieved. This paper aims to look briefly at the problem of definition , then to examine some of the
reasons for disillusionment since the heady days of 1990, and finally to make some tentative
suggestions on how the system could be made more responsive to the needs and aspirations of the
Nepalese people as a whole. My perspective is limited by the fact that I have never lived or worked for
an extended period in the countryside where the majority of the population live. I have to rely on the
reports of those who do have rural experience, on my own experience of life in the Kathmandu Valley,
on discussions with politicians, journalists and academics and on the study of the documents produced
by such people. Mine is thus one view from the centre but it may perhaps complement contributions
from others with deeper knowledge of particular sections of rural Nepal.

Models of democracy

At its loosest, `democratic’ is virtually a synonym for `fair’ or `reasonable.’ Some years before the end
of British rule in Hong Kong, a Malaysian Chinese who had recently moved to the colony surprised me
by saying how much more democratic her new home was than her old one. Malaysia, of course, had
throughout her lifetime had a government chosen by universal suffrage. In contrast, Hong Kong’s
governor was simply a British appointee and even today only a few hundred members of an electoral
college have a say in the choice of Chief Executive. She explained, however, that tolerance of criticism
of the authorities was greater in Hong Kong and that in Malaysia ethnic Chinese felt discriminated
against by `affirmative action’ policies to aid the majority Malay population. The same facts would
probably be very differently interpreted by a Malay beneficiary of UMNO’s policies, but the key point
is the confusion which easily occurs between democracy as a form of government and the positive
results which are expected to flow from it.1
If the focus is returned clearly to the mechanism for making political decisions, three main
operational definitions of `democracy’ seem to be available. The first, which dominates mainstream
political thinking in Western democracies, is the pluralist one, under which everyone is legally free to
advance their own opinions and competition for support between different political parties aggregates

1
Pre-1997 Hong Kong is cited by Fareed Zakaria (`The Rise of Illiberal Democracy’, Foreign Affairs, No.76, Nov/Dec 1997,
p.29) to illustrate the difference between freedom and democracy. He interprets the latter simply as a system of government
involving competitive elections but, while freedom of speech is possible without democracy, democracy is not possible without a
degree of freedom of speech and of political organisation, without which elections would be meaningless.

1
the many conflicting interests, much as the free market aggregates preferences in the economic sphere.
Critics on the radical Left do not always reject this conception completely but argue it cannot be true
`rule by the people’ unless everyone is at the same starting line:
In a parliamentary democracy … you don’t redistribute the property, you just advocate free
competition. Free competition among unequals is naturally in favour of the more powerful ones.
When we perform this new democratic revolution we will immediately redistribute property. We
will confiscate all landed property and redistribute the wealth among the poor. The political
institutions may be the same. We believe in political freedom. We will have elections, but the
elections so far have been dominated by money.2
Baburam Bhattarai’s argument (advanced some years before the start of the `People’s War’) has some
force but it ignores the fact that democracies in Western countries do in fact redistribute wealth on quite
a large-scale (more so, of course, in most European countries than in the U.S.A.) and that, even where
considerable economic inequality exists, the dependence of wealthy contenders for power on the votes
of their fellow citizens places a powerful weapon in the latter’s hands. More fundamentally, Bhattarai’s
critique also ignores the reality that in any large and complex society, where not all decisions can be
taken directly by the whole citizen body, power and influence are bound to be unevenly distributed. A
successful revolution on the lines he described would inevitably leave those in commanding position
within the revolutionary party and army in a stronger position than ordinary citizens, even if (as has
generally not happened after Marxist-inspired revolutions) they were willing to allow their opponents
freedom to organise politically. Inequalities would not have been eliminated but they would be based
more upon `raw’ politico-military power and less on power mediated through money.3 Whatever the
precise basis of the power-holders’ advantage, however, full freedom of political organisation and free
elections opens up the possibility of significant change, since although those defending the status quo
are able to delay the erosion of their privileges they cannot postpone it indefinitely. A good illustration
of the process is provided by the slow decline of upper-caste dominance in north India since universal
suffrage was introduced in the early 1950s. Democracy on these lines is not a utopian solution and is
unlikely to produce instant transformation but, for units on the scale of present-day states, it does
provide a framework within which change may be sought..
A second model of democracy, contrasting with both capitalist and Marxist versions of the
pluralist ones, is a system under which everyone taking an active part in the decisions affecting their
own life through discussion, with voting as a last resort if consensus cannot be achieved. For direct
democracy of this type a necessary (though not a sufficient) condition is that the units involved should
be small, face-to-face communities, and thus its advocates normally also stress decentralisation and
local autonomy. On the assumption that some degree of centralisation is desirable, the direct

2
Interview with Baburam Bhattarai,, 8/9/1990. See Martin Hoftun et al., People, Politics and Ideology, Kathmandu: Mandala,
1999, p.239. In the context of Nepal, with its constitutional monarchy and strong influence from the Indian and British systems,
Bhattarai naturally refers to `parliamentary democracy’, but his argument would apply equally well to a `bourgeois’ democracy
with a strong, executive presidency on French or American lines.
3
Hence the argument often made that communist revolutions in the last century represented in a way a reversion to pre-capitalist
structures rather than a transcending of the limitations of capitalist ones. See, for example, Ernest Gellner, Conditions of Liberty:
Civil Society and its Rivals, London: Hamish Hamilton, 1994, p.206.

2
democracy model cannot really replace the pluralist version but it can be applied at lower levels within
a larger unit. In the Nepalese context it is most obviously applicable at settlement level, and particularly
to ethnically homogeneous settlements where traditional decision-making procedures may in some
ways approximate to it. Even in multi-caste/multi-ethnic villages, there appears to have been a
preference for consensual decision-making, subsequently superseded by the requirements of the
Panchayat system and even more by those of multi-party democracy.4 The traditional system (even
supposing we are justified of seeing this as a single system),was not of course as harmonious as
sometimes supposed, since, even without the conflicts of interest between landlord and tenant or
creditor and debtor, inter-personal conflicts could prove highly disruptive.5 One also has to beware of a
seeming consensual decision which really only reflects the fact that a discontented minority feels
unsafe in openly challenging the wishes of a dominant faction. Nevertheless, and despite misuse of
`traditional’ structures as a buttress for royal autocracy before 1990, practice in rural Nepal has at its
best provided a relatively conflict-free method of reaching decisions and this constitutes a potentially
valuable resource.

There remains a third model, which lacks logical coherence but retains a powerful grip on the
imagination of many people. This seeks to resolve the practical difficulties outlined above by
conceiving of `the people’ as if they were an entity with a single will and purpose. Such a notion
figures in both liberal and Marxist rhetoric of democracy and arguably has some justification when a
very large proportion of a population is united in, and overwhelmingly focussed on, a single cause, as
was the case in the Kathmandu Valley at the climax of the janandolan. In ordinary times, however, `the
people’ is a conglomeration of individuals and groups, boundaries between them shifting over time and
from issue to issue. The danger then is that the illusion of a single popular will is sustained by
substituting for the fractious reality the policy of a smaller group, most typically a political party
governing under a one-party system. Democracy then becomes simply rule by the party with constant
invocation of the name of `the People’, just as a theocracy is rule by a priesthood with constant
invocation of the name of God.6 Although now Nepalese across the political spectrum (including, at
least intermittently, the Maoists) usually express commitment to a pluralist conception of democracy,
the concept of a single popular will and the unique qualification of one’s own political faction to
interpret it, still persists particularly on the Nepalese Left. Thus, it has often been suggested that under
naulo janbad there might be a plurality of parties but that `reactionaries’ would be denied freedom to
organise, with `the people’ deciding who the `reactionaries’ were. This view was widely held within the

4
In the village panchayat in Ilam studied by Lionel Caplan, candidates were elected unopposed in every ward in the first
elections, local people feeling that contested elections would `show our quarrels’. The panchayat normally reached decisions by
consensus, with local `notables’ also attending the meeting. But there was an increasing realisation that a dominant faction could
if it wished push through its own agenda by majority vote and then denounce its opponents as anti-Pasnchayat if they tried to
block its implementation (Caplan, Land and Social Change in Eastern Nepal, 2nd.ed., Kathmandu: HIMAL, 2000, p.159-62}
5
Cf Barrington Moore, Jnr, Social Origins of Democracy and Dictatorship, Harmondsworth: Penguin University Books, 1973
p.498, 502
6
It is, of course, conceivable that in particular circumstances a society’s best interests might be served by one political party’s
authoritarian rule, just as they might be served by colonial rule. The point is simply that such a system should not be called
`democracy.’ Much better is the cheerful honesty of a Cuban communist who, when taxed about the restrictions on political
activity in his homeland, replied, `Sure, Fidel ‘s a dictator but he’s a good dictator.’

3
UML in the early nineties, and is still held by C.P.Mainali, long a dissident within the party but now
leading his own splinter group.7 It also probably remains strong in the ranks of more radical groups
such as the Unity Centre and Masal, now grouped together in the People’s Front and co-operating
tactically with other parliamentary parties. It is certainly also the preference of the Maoists, who broke
away from the Unity Centre in 1994, though they may in the end feel obliged to work within a multi-
party framework rather than return to civil war.8

Nepalese democracy
The second and third models of democracy outlined above influence the thinking of many in Nepal, but
at national level the country’s experience since 1990 has been of the first version. Disillusionment with
the results grew throughout the 1990s and, since the royal take-over in October 2002, the system has
been effectively in a coma. Argument still continues over whether it should be resuscitated or declared
dead and a completely new beginning made but, after Gyanendra’s even more complete assumption of
power in February 2005 and suspension of freedom of speech and assembly, a fresh start looks the
more likely eventual outcome. The reasons for disappointment with the working of the 1990
constitution stem partly from limitations inherent in the system itself, but more particularly from
problems which afflict democracy in many developing countries and, finally, to the ambiguity over the
control of state power resulting from the events of 1990-91.

At the most general level, pluralist democracies even when operating most successfully inevitably
produce some discontent because of the gap between the aspirations bound up with democracy as a
slogan and the actual results. Cynicism about politics and politicians is the norm even in countries
where democratic institutions are fully secure and the standard of living far higher than in Nepal. The
definition of `politician’ produced by Manjushree Thapa some years ago - `the epitome of all that’s
worst about Nepal’ – brings to mind the American poet e.e.cummings’ offering in the 1920s: `A
politician is an arse upon which everything has sat except a man.’ Disenchantment in Nepal has been
worse because of the exhilaration which attended the end of the Panchayat system and perhaps also
because of special features of the South Asian attitude towards power and those who seek it. It has been
said of India, but applies to the wider region also, that `authority is acceptable, but to struggle for a
position of authority is not’9, and that `authority … appears to be subject to much more abusive

7
Mainali, broke away with Bamdev Gautam in 1998 to form the CPN(ML). He refused to follow Gautam back into the UML in
2002 and has now re-constituted the ML on his own. For UML views in the aftermath of the janandolan, see John Whelpton,
`The General Elections of May 1991,’ in Michael Hutt (ed.), Nepal in the Nineties, New Delhi: OUP, 1993, p.55-57.
C.P.Mainali’s views are briefly outlined in Hoftun et al., p.241 and more fully by Krishna Hachhethu (Party Building in Nepal:
Organization, Leadership and People, Kathmandu: Mandala, 2002, p.177), who tabulates their points of difference from rival
UML positions. Mainali himself confirmed to me two years ago that he still believes that a ruling communist party should
exercise overall supervision of other permitted parties as currently occurs in China (interview, Kathmandu, 26/7/2001).,
8
An anonymous reviewer of this paper pointed out that `invoking the people’ (i.e claiming that one’s own decisions are made in
the name of and on behalf of the people) is a rhetorical exercise common across the political spectrum and cannot therefore be
regarded as a distinct `model’ of democracy or linked specifically with the Left. However, whilst it is certainly true (as already
pointed out in the main text) that this concept of `democracy’ is a flawed one, the concept does appear to have a particularly
strong hold on a section of the Left. The ascription of agency to classes rather than to individuals in some varieties of Marxist
theory makes it easier to slip into this way of thinking and rule by the people in this abstract sense is surely the only meaning
that can be ascribed to the word `democratic’ in the names of former East European communist regimes such as the German
Democratic Republic – such states were very clearly not democratic in either the pluralist or the `direct democracy’ sense.
9
Myron Weiner, `Struggle against Power: Notes on Indian Political Behaviour’, World Politics, 8 (April 1956), p395, quoted in

4
criticism and much more effusive adulation than one is accustomed to elsewhere’.10 The contrast
between the rhetoric of self-sacrifice and family-like solidarity, which politicians themselves frequently
espouse, and the reality of political competition is deeply felt. The longing for an authority figure able
to cut through and transcend the struggle undoubtedly explains why many ordinary citizens in the
Kathmandu Valley appeared to welcome Gyanendra’s action against party politicians in 2002 and 2005
and, arguably, is also part of the appeal of the Maoists with their personality cult of Prachanda.

In terms of actual results between 1990 and 2002, Nepalese democracy was a hybrid similar to that
found in many developing countries, including much of Latin America and South-East Asia. It
combined many of the positive features found in long-established democracies but these co-existed
with grave failings even by the far-from-perfect standards of Western Europe or North America, let
alone the ideal standards democracies everywhere aspire to.

The positive achievements were considerable, especially if one compares Nepal since 1990 with
outright autocracies such as North Korea or with countries like Burma or Algeria which permitted free
elections but then refused to abide by the results. Although this right of political association was
slightly restricted by a constitutional ban on parties with communal or secessionist objectives, parties
of this kind were in fact allowed to operate so long as those objectives were not made too obvious by
their constitutions or insignia. There were also genuine elections, even if abuses of the kind to be
discussed below did occur. The electoral process was clearly not a sham since a party in power could
be voted out, as in fact happened to Congress in 1994 and would have happened again in 1999 had the
UML not obligingly split in 1998. Supporting evidence is provided by opinion poll data which was
normally not too far out of line with results of the election themselves and by the general trend of a
gradual drift to the Left, which would have been more pronounced if the Maoists had not split from the
United People’s Front in 1994 and moved outside the system (see Table). Whatever cheating occurred
affected the results at the margins and would not have prevented a UML-led Left-wing government
coming to power had the Leftist parties managed to work together.

TABLE: ELECTORAL SUPPPORT FOR CONGRESS AND LEFTIST PARTIES11

May 1991 May 1991 Nov 1994 Feb/March 1999 May 1999
(Sample) (Election) (Election) (Sample) (Election)
Congress 43.5 39.5 34.5 32.2 37.2

Robert L.Hardgrave, Jnr., & Stanley A.Kochanek, India: Government and Politics in a Developing Nation, Orlando, Florida:
Harcourt Brace Jovanovitch, 1993, p.167.
10
W.H.Morris-Jones, Parliament in India, London: Longmans, Green, 1957, p.34, quoted in Harcourt & Kochanek, p.167-8.
11
General election figures are the official ones for percentages of total valid votes cast as tabulated by Karl-Heinz-Krämer. For
fuller discussions of the three general elections see Whelpton, `General Election of May 1991,’ Hoftun et al., p.200-207 and John
Whelpton, `Nine years on: the 1999 election and Nepalese politics since the 1990 janandolan.' European Bulletin of Himalayan
Research, no.17, 1999. p.1-39, but note that vote percentages are calculated there on the basis of total valid and invalid votes cast
and so differ slightly from those used here. The May 1991 sample survey was carried out by the Political Science Association of
Nepal to coincide with the election (see Ole Borre et al., Nepalese Political Bahaviour, New Delhi: Sterling, 1994, p.169) The
1999 sample figures are from the ORG-HIMAL poll as reported in Spotlight , 23/5/1999

5
UML 26.7 29.3 31.9 31.9 31.6
[ML ---- ---- ----- 3.9 6.6]
UPF 8.9 5.0 1.4 --- 0.9
NPF ---- ---- --- --- 1.4
NMKP __ 1.3 1.0 ---- 0.6

In addition, the period after1990 saw the development of a flourishing `civil society’ with expansion of
the media and freedom to express opinions across the political spectrum. This was curtailed to some
extent after the Maoists’ decision to attack the army in November triggered the first imposition of a
state of emergency. However, even before the emergency was allowed to lapse, the braver sections of
the media (including, of course, both HIMAL SOUTH ASIAN and Himal Khabar Patrika) continued
to print stories that were embarrassing to the authorities.12

One can finally note the proliferation of interest- and concern-groups of all kinds. There is considerable
cynicism amongst Nepalese intellectuals concerning the role of the multitude of NGOs, many of which
are really private businesses rather than philanthropic or campaigning organisations.13 Nevertheless.
many of their critics have acknowledged that they can sometimes promote positive changes. One
particularly effective organisation has been BASE, whose influence at grassoots level has recently
made them a target of the Maoists and whose work promoting literacy and political awareness
amongst the western Tharus is particularly well-known. Their achievement in bringing about the formal
abolition of kamaiya status was diminished by the government’s failure to make proper provision for
the ex-kamaiyas but this was nonetheless a positive step and their result in the adult literacy field have
been very impressive. BASE is among a number of NGOs demonstrating that it is not impossible to
combine access to donor funds and a social conscience.14

Politics as organised crime?

Offsetting these achievements, however, and distorting the electoral process were widespread abuses,
often involving outright criminality. Intimidation, `booth capturing’ and ballot-rigging undoubtedly
occurred and were highlighted by their depiction in Manjusree Thapa’s novel The Tutor of History. Just
12
Even after the more stringent censorship imposed after Gyanendra’s complete takeover on 1 February 2005, these and some
other publications continued to test the limits and printed implict criticism of the royal move.
13
For a highly critical view, see Saubhagya Shah, `Development critique – From evil state to civil society’ HIMAL November
2002, p.10-17 and a more sympathetic one, Celayne Heaton Shrestha, `NGOs as thekadars or sevaks: identity crisis in Nepal’s
non- governmental sector’ European Bulletin of Himalayan Research. No.22: 5-36, 2002. Whilst stressing the primacy of
politcal action, many Leftists accept that these organisations have a contribution to make. See for example, Bishwakarma, Hira,
`Dalit Andolanma ENJIOharuko Bhumika’ (esp. p.356-8) and Bishwakarma, Padmalal. `Kina Uthna Sakena Ekikrit Dalit
Andolan?’ (p.311) in Onta et al. (eds.), Chapama Dalit, Kathmandu: Ekta Books, 2001/02. In contrast, the Maoists generally see
NGOs as a diversion into reformism of popular energy that should be fuelling the class struggle and reacted with great hostility
the more nuanced views of Marxist critic Khagendra Sangraula in his novel Junkiriko Sangit , Kathmandu: Bundi-Puran
Prakashan, 1999 (see Pratyoush Onta, `Democracy and Duplicity’, in M.Hutt (ed.), Himalayan `People’s War’, London: Hurst,
2004.)
14
For differing perspectives on BASE’s role, see Fujikura (2001), Gisèle Krauskopff, `An `Indigenous Minority in a Border
Area; Tharu Ethnic asociations, NGOs and the Nepalese state’, in David Gellner (ed.), Resistance and the State: Nepalese
Experiences, New Delhi: Social Science Press, 2003, and also Guneratne, Arjun, 2002. Many tongues, one people: the making of
Tharu identity in Nepal. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.

6
how extensive these abuses are is, of course, difficult to establish. As already argued, they do not
totally invalidate Nepalese elections and it is in any case the defeated parties, naturally anxious to
explain away their defeat, who were the most frequent source of complaints. The scope for abuse was
less in urban centres where the scrutiny of the media and `civil society’ is at its most intense. One
enduring image from the 1999 election in Kathmandu is a photograph of the man who formed the post-
election government, Krishna Prasad Bhattarai, being turned away from a polling station in Kathmandu
because he had mislaid his identity card. Such scrupulous observance of the regulations was often
absent in remoter areas and it is generally accepted that wherever a particular party had a
preponderance of activists it would try to prevent opponents from exercising their rights.15 A party in
government was in the best position to exercise improper influence because it could make use of the
administration and the police in addition to its own cadres. It was alleged in 1994, for example, that
the manipulation of recounts had derived the UML of a clear majority in 18 constituencies.16 It is also
widely believed that the police were improperly used against ULF (Bhattarai) cadres in Rolpa in late
1995, some months before they launched the `People’s War’ in February 1996.17 Opposition groups,
however, also certainly resorted to intimidation when they could get away with it, involving both
parties’ own long-term activists and sometimes also hired goondas, whose role had long been important
in areas across the Nepal’s southern border. The need to pay for such support in turn increased parties’
appetite for `black money’, even if individual politicians could resist the temptation to enrich
themselves personally.18
Amongst many possible examples, there were frequent reports of malpractice by UML workers
in M.K.Nepal’s Rautahat constituency and violence erupted between factions within the UML’s own
ranks on the eve of the 1998 split. Also, in 1991 Masal activists in Pyuthan barred Girija Koirala from
campaigning in the district as well as preventing an NGO from carrying out an American-financed
voter education project.19 The Maoists’ turning their activists into a military force is in a way only an
extreme manifestation of a tendency already present within the system. Governments abusing their
powers and the Maoists resorting to armed rebellion bear the major responsibility but everyone on the
political stage is to a certain extent the victim of a prevailing culture of abuse: if everyone believes the
other side will not abide by the rules then nobody has an incentive to play fair themselves.

Politics as gang warfare is a reversion to the process by which states themselves most likely emerged.20
Within industrialised, democratic states the process has been largely superseded by rule-governed

15
Hoftun et al., p.251.
16
Chitra K.Tiwari, `Post-election analysis II: Nepal under UML’, posted on Nepal Net (Internet), December 1999.
17
Deerapk Thapa,, `Day of the Maoist’, Himal, May 2001, p.4-21; Mary DesChene, `“Black Laws” and the “limited rights” of
the people in post-andolan Nepal: the campaign against the proposed anti-Terrorist Act of 2054 V.S.’ Himalayan Research
Bulletin, 18(2): 41-67, 1998; interview with Ramesh Nath Pande, 25/7/01.
18
Even the 1950-51 anti-Rana movement, which first introduced multi-party democracy to Nepal. was said by a 1951 British
embassy internal report t to have probably depended on the services of `out of work “goondas” from Calcutta’ (see Hoftun et al.,
p.18).
19
SEARCH, Strengthening Democratic Processes in Nepal:Voter Education Program, Kathmandu, 1991, p.87-88.
20
For interpretations on these lines, as opposed to social contract theories, see, for example, chapter 14 (`From egalitarianism to
kleptocracy’) of Jared Diamond’s Guns, Germs, and Steel: the Fates of Human Societies (New York: Norton, 1998) and Charles
Tilly, “War Making and State Making as Organized Crime,” in Peter Evans, Dietrich Rueschemeyer & Theda Skocpol, (eds.)
Bringing the State Back In, (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1985), 169-91.

7
competition, even though the whole structure is underpinned by the state’s own monopoly of physical
coercion and players may still enjoy advantages from their ancestors’ success at banditry. However, the
law of the jungle still largely prevails in the international arena and to an extent within countries like
Nepal with a weak and contested state structure.

Whilst operating in some ways as private armies, political parties can also absorb mutually-hostile local
factions and in the process intensify that hostility. In the 1991 election, it was noted that competition
between national parties could easily mesh with factional politics within villages, as one group might
adhere to a particular party to obtain support against a local rival.21 This process was observed in at
least one village in the Kham Magar area, with one clan supporting Congress and the other the
UPF/Maoists. In the context of the `People’s War’, a dispute which might have been previously
resolved within the village might escalate into the assassination of a rival as a `class enemy.’22 Whilst
there has naturally been a tendency for richer individuals to gravitate to right-wing and poorer ones to
left-wing parties, the rivalries involved need not always have been of a purely class nature, a problem
which Chinese Communists had encountered long before in an extreme form:
: .. the deep-rooted divisions within the countryside meant that winning friends automatically
risked acquiring enemies. The Chinese communists who established their rural Soviet areas in
1927-28 found, to their unjustified surprise, that converting one clan-dominated village helped to
establish a network of `red villages’ based on connected clans, but also involved them in war
against their traditional enemies, who formed a similar network of `black villages.’ `In some
cases,’ they complained, `the class struggle was transformed into the fight of one village against
another. There are cases where our troops had to besiege and destroy entire villages.’ 23

Patronage and corruption

The politics of intimidation were, as has already been seen, linked with the politics of patronage and
corruption. The trading of political support for favours or protection will occur to some extent in any
political system but is particularly pervasive in Third World polities. Both cadres and voters frequently
sought immediate favours for themselves or their friends and relations in return for their support rather
than opting for the party whose blueprint for the future of Nepalese society most appealed to them.
Examples were villagers who sold their votes, the bus conductor who got his job through Congress
connections and feared he would lose it when UML came to power, or the packing of the state
intelligence services with cadres who did little other than draw their pay.24 Here again, the Maoists can
be seen as a good example of the system in operation, as well as a reaction against it: their ranks

21
Fred Gaige and John Scholz, `The 1991 Paliamentary elections in Nepal’, in M.D.Dharamdasani (ed.), Varanasi: Shalimar,
1992, p.51.
22
Anne de Salle `The Kham Magar country, Nepal: between ethnic claims and Maoism.’ European Bulletin of Himalayan
Research 19, 2000, p.63.
23
Hobsbawm, Age of Extremes: the Short Twentieth Century 1914-1991, London: Abacus, 1994, p.81-82, quoting Manfred Hinz
(ed.), Räte-Chine: Dokumente der Chinesischen Revolutionn (1927-31), Berlin, 1973.
24
Minendra Rijal, .then an advisor to Sher Bahadur Deuba and .later a member of the Planning Commission, confirmed in an
interview in August 2002 that this was one of the reasons for the state’s lack of accurate intelligence on the Maoist insurgency.

8
certainly include people motivated by ideology or a desire for revenge against state excesses, but
membership of the Lal Sena also ensures a regular income.25

Among those who reach the highest levels the patronage game became of over-riding importance. The
intensity of competition for ministerial office was partly the result of the increased opportunities for
dispensing patronage that it provided, whilst even ordinary M.P.s .were able to play the game to some
degree: under a system introduced by the 1994-95 UML government, they .were each given control of
a large block grant to spend as they saw fit on local development projects. Parties also offered large
financial inducements to individual M.P.s to tempt them into changing sides. Particularly notorious was
the decision of two Congress M.P.s to absent themselves from parliament when a vote of no-confidence
was brought against Sher Bahadur Deuba’s government in early 1997.

The patronage system is, of course, intimately linked to the problem of corruption. Politicians
channeling favours to their supporters or collecting the funds to do so through `donations’ from private
businessmen were acting in ways which both the law and much Nepalese public opinion regard as
corrupt, even if some of these transactions might have been regarded as part of normal social practice
in previous generations. The exact scale of abuses of this kind at the apex of the system is difficult to
determine, as is the extent to which corruption, already a much talked-about problem in the Panchayat
years,26 increased under the multi-party regime. Tougher anti-corruption laws were enacted under the
2001-2002 Deuba government, and action was taken against a number of former ministers. Even more
radical action against corruption is expected from the Royal Commission set up after Gyanendra took
over direct control of the administration in February 2005. However, there were accusations that the
selection of targets after Gyanendra’s )ctober 2002 `semi-coup’ was politically-motivated and, given
the sweeping powers entrusted to the new commission, there are fears that abuses will increase in
future.

Corruption has long affected day-to-day interaction between members of the public and the
administration .In a 2003 survey by the Nepal chapter of Transparency International, respondents
reported having to pay bribes in 48% of transactions with the police and the courts and 25% of those
with education, electricity and tax offices. A perception that the police were willing to side in disputes
with the faction which offered them the largest bribes, together with their reputation for brutality, eased
the task of Maoist insurgents in driving them out of many areas of the hills.27

25
After the ceasefire earlier this year the Maoists were reported to be trying to further expand their armed forces by telling
potential recruits they would be assured later of a job in the national army. This view of the Maoists was expressed by one of
Manjusree Thapa’s informants on a recent trip to Jumla: ` Only 15 to 20 percent of their workers are ideologically motivated. The
rest are jobless kids who wouldn’t be given money if they asked for it from their parents. So they join the party, and extort from
us with their guns.’ (`Peace Bridge’, Nepali Times 4/4/03).
26
For a brief discussion of the growth of corruption before 1990, see John Whelpton, A History of Nepal, Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2005, p.178
27
See Sara Shneiderman & Mark Turin, `The Path to Jansarkar in Dolakha: Towards an Ethnography of the Maoist Movement’
(paper presented at the November 2001 SOAS conference on the Maoist movement) for characterisation of the police on these
lines among the Thangmi ethnic group, who had been particularly receptive to Maoist approaches

9
Whether out of intimidation or in expectation of benefits, the ordinary voter may often be concerned to
predict the outcome rather than to help determine it: the key consideration is to be on the right side of
those in power. A desire to go with the winner can be a factor in democracies anywhere, but in a society
like Nepal’s the band-wagon effect is stronger. Local elections, for example are often seen by voters in
the United Kingdom as an opportunity to register a protest against the government just as mid-term
Congressional elections are likely to produce a swing against the party controlling the White House.
In contrast, Nepalese local elections produced comfortable majorities for the party in power at the
centre, viz. Congress in 1992 and the UML in 1997.28 Improper influence on the conduct of the
elections will have been part of the explanation, and also the Maoists’ campaign of intimidation against
Congress candidates in 1997, but the desire to have better access to resources under control of the
national government was of great importance.

Keen awareness of the `Back the Winner’ factor also appears to have been a key element in stances
currently taken on the constituent assembly issue. In principle, elections to a constituent assembly, if
not preceded by the kind of redistributionary measures Baburam Bhattarai called for in his 1990
interview (p.2 ), might be just as likely as parliamentary elections to go in favour of `reactionary forces’
, as some Left-wing commentators pointed out.29 The Maoists’ insistence on this issue partly reflects
the fact that it was an original objective of the 1950/51 movement against the Ranas, but at the present
moment it is the demand’s symbolic value that is probably more important. Simply because the
Maoists’ have been demanding it for so long, securing it would be a signal to the country that they were
now setting the agenda. For precisely the same reason, the two major parties were unhappy with the
idea and wished to preserve the constitutional order achieved through the 1990 people’s movement that
they themselves had headed.30 It is only after the royal takeover and the setting aside of that order that
a significant numbers of people within the UML and Congress warmed to the constituent assembly
proposal and even now (March 2005), with the younger generation of even Congress activists
increasingly tending to republicanism, much sentiment in the two parties still probably remains
opposed.31 The same logic of needing to be seen to be in control of events would most likely see the
king attempt to have the monarchy itself omitted from the scope of the constituent assembly’s
deliberations.

Ethnic and caste issues

The paradoxical fact about ethnic and caste identity in Nepal is that it is of great importance in day-to-

28
The government in 1997 was actually a coalition headed by the NDP’s Lok Bahadur Chand but the UML provided its largest
block of supporters and, crucially, Bam Gautam was in charge of the Home Ministry.
29
See, for example the analysis by. Shyam Shrestha, (member of the Unity Centre central leadership) `Ke Maobadiharu Pherieka
chhan?’ Himal KP14 March 2001, and, more recently, Pushkar Gautam, `Shakti Puja ra Prachandapath’, Himal KP 15/3/03. In
the aftermath of the October 1917 revolution, elections to a constituent assembly did indeed go against the Bolsheviks and were
set aside by them. See also Shiva Gaunle, `Bicharo Sambidhansabha’, Himal KP, 17/1//02: for the argument that a constituent
assembly in an country is more likely to ratify changes already made than to initiate them.
30
Krishna Hachhethu, Party Building in Nepal , p.210, argues that the unexpectedly poor performance of the ex-pancha parties
in the 1991 elections stemmed precisely from the fact that Congress and the UML were now seen as the dominant forces.
31
The old argument against acceptance was put explicitly by Raghu Pant at the UML Convention earlier this year when he said
agreeing to a constituent assembly `would look like the UML going the Maoists’ way’ (Kathmandu Post –internet edition, 3
February 2003).

10
day interactions between individuals but that, as an issue in national politics it has generally been much
less important. This is in the first place because the sheer number of different groups in Nepal makes
co-operation across ethnic and caste boundaries vital for effective action at almost any level. Secondly,
especially before the advent of mass literacy, villagers have naturally seen themselves as members of a
face-to-face, localised group rather than of one dispersed over the whole country: the ethnic community
(as portrayed in census statistics) is as much an imagined community as the nation itself. Against this
background, during the Panchayat era representatives of different groups predominant in a particular
area were frequently co-opted into the system but they were content to accept patronage and control
from the national, high-caste (and particularly Thakuri) elite centred round the monarchy, The pattern
to some extent perpetuated that which had existed before 1950.
Political mobilisation on the basis of ethnicity was not entirely absent, however. Limbu solidarity,
partly cause and partly result of the long survival of kipat tenure in their area of the eastern hills, has
been a significant factor throughout most of Nepal’s history as a unified state. Modern-style ethnic
activism arguably emerged in embryonic form shortly before the end of the Rana regime with the
establishment of the Tharu Welfare Society in 1950, or even earlier with stirrings of Newar cultural
assertiveness in the 1920s. Such activities were curtailed under the Panchayat system but began
reviving around the time of the 1980 referendum and, after introduction of direct elections to the
Rastriya Panchayat, the need for candidates to appeal to a mass electorate arguably made ethnic (and
also caste) considerations more salient .32 At the same time, whilst the Parbatiya and Newar upper
castes remained dominant in Panchayat politics, increased efforts were made to co-opt members of
other groups and though was largely still confined to lower levels there were also some more senior
appointments.33
With the return of fully competitive politics in 1990, the pattern of co-option was continued,
particularly at the grassroots level in the political parties.34 However, freedom of organisation and the
fact that there was no single centre of power (the palace) as a source of patronage encouraged ethnic
activists to become more assertive. In particular, demands for affirmative action policies
(reservations)35 and for the use of minority mother tongues become increasingly insistent and have, at
least in principle, won a degree of acceptance across the political spectrum: `positive discrimination’ to
redress the under-representation of the janjati (as well as of women and Dalits) was one of the general
promises made by Gyanendra’s royalist cabinet in February 2005, and, unlike the takeover itself, it was
non-controversial.
The degree of under-representation differs greatly from group to group.and incorporation has
generally gone furthest with non-Parbatiyas longest associated with the Shah dynasty (viz. Gurungs
32
This was reflected, for example, in the electoral success of Yadavs, a dominant caste in some Tarai district and also the 1986
defeat of Harka Gurung, a solah jat Gurung who failed to retain char jat support.
33
Harka Gurung’s career as Vice-Chairman of the Planning Commission reflected King Birendra’s appreciation of his
academioc achievements but, like the appointment of the Dalit Hiralal Bishwakarma as an assistant minister, was also probably
intended to project a more inclusive image..
34
Hachhethu, p.193.
35
`Reservations’ has normally been understood as quotas in education and in public sector employment. There are now demands
for the concept to be extended to the private sector (see for example Padmalal Bishwakarma, `Dalitlai arakshan kina ra kasari?’,
Onta et al. (ed.), Chapama Dalit, p363. ) Legislation extending reservations to private sector organisations was enacted in the
Indian state of Maharastra.in January 2004 though it has yet to be implemented.

11
and Magars). In contrast the Tamangs, the group with the highest figure for mother tongue retention of
any of the non-Parbatiya hill groups, remain particularly marginalised.36 The same applies to the Kham
Magars (linguistically distinct and less assimilated than the southern Magars) whose territory forms
part of the Maoist heartland and who provided many of the rank-and-file fighters in the early days of
the insurgency.

Although their problems have, at least until recently, received relatively little attention, the Dalits, who
come at the bottom of the traditional hierarchy as codified in the 1854 Muluki Ain, are still the group
most strongly discriminated against. It is significant that janajati representation in parliament has not
been grossly out of line with the janajati proportion in the total population, whereas the 1999 House of
Representatives contained no Dalits at all.37 Attempts to mobilise Dalits to improve their condition
also date back to late Rana times, with the advancement by some members of the Bishwakarma section
of the Kami caste, largest of the untouchable groups, of a claim to tagadhari status. However, their
action was viewed with suspicion by members of other untouchable castes and a feeling that the
Bishwakarmas are pursuing a hegemonic agenda of their own has continued to complicate efforts to
create a united Dalit movement.38 The tendency for Dalit organisations to splinter and to accept
patronage (and some degree of control) from one of the political parties has also been a factor in this.39
In the Western hills, the most backward part of the country, Dalits are traditionally known as
Doms and make up 38% of the population.40 In much of this area, there are virtually no non-Parbatiya
groups and the cleavage between the Doms and the `pure’ Parbatiya castes is a particularly stark one.
The Deuba government’s call in 2001 for the Dalits’ admittance to temples had some success in the east
but reportedly met with strong resistance in the far western districts, from which Deuba himself
comes.41 Ten years previously, a Congress candidate in the Bhajang constituency had readily admitted
to exploiting high-caste feeling against them by branding his Communist opponents `the party of
Doms’. The result will presumably have been to reinforce the Doms’ own Leftist allegiance and over

36
See Ben Campbell, `The Heavy Loads of Tamang Identity’ in David Gellner et al. (eds.), Nationalism and Identity in a Hindu
Kingdom, Amsterdam: Harwood, 1997.
37
There was one Dalit (a Damai) among the 202 members of the 1991 House of Representatives. The Dalit proportion in the
total population is disputed. A figure of 20% is often quoted by activists (and was used in 2003 in a speech by a government
minister, Narayan Singh Pun). However, the 1991 census reported a figure of 16.9% and that of 2001 only 13.3%, presumably
because of Dalits adopting surnames of higher castes (see Baburam Bishwakarma, `Kasari ghatyo dalitko sankhya?’, Himal KP
30/3/03, p.42). Members of hill janajatis, who are around 26% of Nepal’s total population, accounted for 22% of House
membership in 1991 and 18% in 1994, whilst for Tarai ethnic groups, 9% of the population, the corresponding figures are 8%
and 6% (data from the 2001 census and from Harka Gurung, Nepal; Social Demography and Expressions, Kathmandu: New
ERA, 1998,p.149).
38
See Padmalal Bishwakarma,. `Kina uthna Sakena Ekikrit Ddalit Andolan’, in Onta et al.,Chhapama Dalit, Kathmandu: Ekta
Books, 2001-2, and Dilli Raman Dahal, this volume. In Dhorpatan, Bishwakarmas apparently continue to claim a higher caste
status and this is accepted by local Tibetans but not by the upper castes (Colin Millard, `Democracy and Dissent in Nepal: an
Overview with some Perceptions from the Valley of Dhorpatan’ , in David Gellner (ed.), Resistance and the State: Nepalese
Experiences, New Delhi: Social Science Press, 2003.)
39
Padmalal.Bishwakarma. `Kina uthna Sakena…, p.305-8. Amongst some Dalits activists this process went so far that separate
factions emerged aligned with the three members of the Congress troika.
40
Figure calculated from 1991 census data by Harka Gurung (`Trident and Thunderbolt: Culture Dynamics in Nepalese Politics’,
Mahesh Chandra Regmi Lecture delivered at Social Science Baha conference, 24/5/2004, Table 7). The name Dom, also used in
the Indian Himalaya west of the Mahakali, may possibly be cognate with Roma, the name used for themselves by the Gypsies,
who emigrated from India in the Mioddle Ages (George van Driem, Languages of the Himalayas: an Ethnolinguistic Handbook
of the Himalayan Region. Leiden: Brill, 2001, p. 1101).. Whether the Doms are the descendants of a pre-Parbatiya population or
emerged by internal differentiation within the Parbatiyas, they are certainly regarded by other Nepalis as Parbatiya and Hindu.
41
Himal KP 16/11/01. The report gives the example of a temple in Doti which was closed to all but the temple priests in order to
avoid having to admit the Doms.

12
the country as a whole they appear particularly responsive to Communism in general and to the
Maoists in particular.

In the Dalits’ case, of course, caste status coincides closely with economic status: at village level they
are often the poorest as well as the lowest in ritual status. 42 Controversies over the relative importance
of class or ethnic differences sometimes obscure the point that it is when the two sets of cleavage
overlap that the potential for conflict is often particularly high. Thus tensions between Tharus and
Parbatiyas have been particularly high in the Dang area, where tenants are normally Tharu and
landlords, whilst the violence in the old `West No.1’ district in 1960 involved poor Tamangs against
Parbatiya landlords or money-lenders.
It is still fair to say, however, that, at least for the moment, the ethnic aspect is not the central one
because of the integration of local bocks into larger organisations that have a multi-caste and multi-
ethnic make-up. Striking instances of this are provided by both the government and the Maoists.
Tagadharis are at the apex in both cases: the king and the Shaha-Rana aristocracy around him versus
the Brahmans Pushpa Kumar Dahal (`Prachanda’) and Baburam Bhattarai. At the same time there are.
ethnic minority members in important support roles, notably (at the time of the 2003 ceasefire) the
government negotiator, Narayan Singh Pun, and his fellow Magar,, the Maoist military strategist Ram
Bahadur Thapa (`Badal’).43 The rank-and-file in both the army and the Maoists’ guerilla force are a
mixture of different castes, with members of the same family sometimes on opposing sides.44 There
still remain, of course, the two most obvious lines of cleavage between the Parbatiyas and the Tibeto-
Burman groups in the hills and between hillmen generally and the tarai populations of recent Indian
origin, but the heterogeneity of the groups concerned has prevented any real coalescence. The more
important dividing line is an economic one, with many of the better-off in the hills still being the
descendants of the families favoured by Kathmandu since the foundation of the state. Such families
tend to be from the higher castes but this is certainly not exclusively so and while economic divisions
may correspond closely in some local areas with ethnic ones, this is not so over the country as a whole.
The same fundamental problems are affecting all groups to a greater or lesser degree: increasing
population; a limited and unevenly distributed resource base; competition from more efficient
producers outside the country; and growing numbers of young people educated sufficiently to aspire to
something beyond a marginal existence on the land but not able to find employment meeting those
aspirations.

The legacy of 1990

42
A survey in 2053 (1998/9) showed that between 65% and 86% of Dalits are below the poverty line, making them worse off
than any other group except the Limbus (Padmalal Bishwakarma, `Dalitlai Arakshan Kina ra Kasari’, p.360).
43
This probably remains true today (March 2005) although there are signs of friction between the Maoist central leadership and
ethnic activists who have up till now been aligned with them.
44
One of the army’s problems is reportedly the lack of counselling to deal with this situation. In areas of the hills where Maoist
dominance is particularly strong (perhaps about 40% of the country on an estimate from one Western-INGO worker with
extensive experience in the central hills) they may forcibly recruit brothers or sisters of army personnel in addition (or as an
alternative) to forcing army families out of the area.

13
All of the above factors could be paralleled in many other countries, or (as far as ethnic and caste
factors are concerned) with other parts of South Asia. In Nepal they are complicated by the balance of
power that emerged from the 1990 janandolan. Whilst the civil administration (including the police)
was under the control of the elected government, the army’s constitutional position was ambiguous. It
was formally under the command of the king, who was supposed to act in military matters on the
recommendation of the National Defence Council, consisting of the prime minister, the defence
minister (a portfolio normally retained by the prime minister) and the army’s own chief of staff. In
practice, senior army officers continued to look to the palace, as they had done before 1990.45 Any
group organising armed resistance to the civil administration could therefore hope to exploit this
situation as did indeed happen with the Maoist revolt.46

Opinions differ on how far Birendra (or his advisors) deliberately engineered this situation during
negotiations over the drafting of the constitution, but both royal control of the army and the palace’s
ability to exercise influence in other ways would have mattered less had the political parties been able
to forge a broader consensus on the rules of the game. In fact, even groups who were in principal
committed to the eventual establishment of a republic were willing to make tactical use of the
monarchy and nobody wanted the king’s power to disappear unless there was a probability that they
themselves would be the one’s to fill the resulting power vacuum. Thus the element of discretion
retained by the king in deciding whether to grant a prime minister’s request for the dissolution of
parliament was apparently accepted by the UML during the drafting stage because they correctly
anticipated that Congress would win the first general election. When Koirala did obtain a dissolution in
1994, many parties across the spectrum called for his caretaker administration to be replaced by a
multi-party government. Baburam Bhattarai’s section of the Sanyukta Jana Morcha refused to back the
demand, arguing that this would give the monarchy a chance to become actively involved in politics
once more. Ironically, the Maoists themselves began calling for a multi-party government and their
own violent campaign was the single most important factor in bringing the monarchy back to the centre
of the political stage.

One additional legacy of the janandolan was to boost the attraction of extra-systemic protest. If
mobilising crowds on the street has once forced political change, people in general (and political
activists in particular) will be more ready to use similar tactics again rather than revert to the less
dramatic channels of constitutional politics. This was clearly seen in the results of a 1991 opinion poll,
which showed much greater tolerance of different means of `direct action’ than in western democracies,
and even a significant minority prepared to countenance armed revolt.47 Once again the Maoists have
provided an extreme example of a general tendency, whilst the constant resort to bands and similar
45
It is arguable that, without wholesale replacement of the officer corps an a radical change in its ethos, this would have
happened even if the constitution had put the army formally under government control.. Civilian heads of government cannot
always depend on the loyalty of generals they themselves have appointed, as graphically demonstrated by Pinochet’s overthrow
of Allende in Chile and Zia’s of Bhutto in Pakistan.
46
A point made forcibly by, among others, Deepak Gyawali, `Nepali Maobadko bauddhik anuhar’, Himal Khabar Patrika 14/3/0
47
Borre et al., Nepalese Political Behaviour, New Delhi: Sterling, 1994, p.158.

14
types of agitation by many factions, particularly on the Left, is another manifestation of it. There were,
of course, always plenty of unemployed people available to act as `enforcers’, even where, as was
certainly the case in the Kathmandu Valley, there was little enthusiasm for the protests among the
general population. Relief at the curtailing of such activities partly explains why many people in the
Valley initially welcomed Gyanendra’s state of emergency in February 2005.
Another contributor to this volume, has argued that the band is a reasonable way of putting
pressure on a generally unresponsive government .48 It is true that the right to protest publicly s an
important one and that some disruption has to be accepted as the price for this. However, in Nepal’s
case, the cost to society as a whole have clearly outweighed the benefits (though, like corruption, it
might bring benefits to particular individuals or groups) and such protests have been particularly
reprehensible because of the way they involve coercion of those not wishing to take part: the minority
of those who stayed off the roads or closed their place of business did so out of fear of the organisers’
retaliation, not out of sympathy with the protest. Even without taking into account the Maoist
`blockades’ now periodically afflicting much of the country, the resort to intimidation by so many
different groups made it clear that it was becoming more and more entrenched as part of the country’s
political culture. The pogrom organised by Hindu extremists after the murder of Nepalese migrant
workers Iraq Nepalese workers in Iraq resulted partly from what Pradeep Giri’s termed the `culture of
impunity’ generated in the course of earlier protests.

What is to be done?

Surveying the problems that beset the Nepalese state is a relatively easy task. Suggesting immediately
applicable remedies is considerably more difficult and I certainly do not claim to have any magic
formula to offer. General suggestions such as a greater spirit of co-operation and compromise are valid
but difficult to translate into concrete actions that can be taken at once by particular actors. What
follows is a rather miscellaneous list but one or two of the points raised may evoke some response.49
It is often suggested that the only true solution to Nepal’s political malaise is the improvement of social
and economic conditions and, in the long-term, this is true. The immediate need, however, is for a
political framework within which social and economic needs can be addressed. Since spontaneous co-
operation cannot do the job alone, the provision of such a framework is in the first place the
responsibility of the state, which should be strong enough to enforce the rules but also willing to abide
by them itself. To some extent there has to be a trade-off between the two objectives – the only way to
be totally certain that the police or army never abuse their power is not to have any police or army at all
– but in Nepal, as in many other countries, the state too often fails on both counts. The state needs both
to be strengthened to resist extra-constitutional challenges – in particular armed rebellion – but also to
become more responsive to demands made through ordinary political process. Revision of the

48
Genevieve Lakier, ‘Public spectacle and political power: the bandh and democracy in Nepal’, this volume.
49
Mahendra Lawoti’s Towards a Democratic Nepal: Inclusive Political Institutions for a Multicultural Society (Kathmandu:
Mandala Bookpoint/New Delhi: Sage)came into my hands too late to be properly utilised in revising this paper. It includes
detailed discssion and recommendation on many of the issues here very briefly discussed.

15
constitution itself, whether or not by means of a constituent assembly, may be necessary but rather
more important will be the determination of a sufficient number of people to abide by the rule of law.

Generating such a consensus has been made even more difficult - yet also more urgent –since
Gyanendra’s assumption of total political control and his crack-down even on peaceful dissent. Power
in the urban areas now rests entirely in the hands of Gyanendra and of the army, whilst throughout
most of the rest of the country the situation is best described as anarchy with the local Maoist
commanders in the strongestr position, except when the army chooses to occupy particular points in
strength. It is very difficult to see how the continuing downward slide can now be stopped without
firm action by the international community – and primarily by India.

For very good reasons, neither the Indians nor any other outside power want a Maoist takeover in
Kathmandu (whether or not India earlier on colluded with Maoist activities to further strengthen is own
position vis-a-vis the Nepalese government is, of course, a different issue.) Outside actors will
therefore need to use a combination of carrot and stick to bring the non-Maoist forces into some kind of
alignment so that they can adopt an agreed negotiating position towards the Maoists whilst building up
structures at village level strong enough to counter (and hopefully later co-opt) the Maoist ones.
Because of the central position that the RNA now had in Nepalese politics – thanks, in the first
place to the Maoists and in the second to King Gyanendra – the issue of who controls it will be the
central one in negotiations both amongst the non-Maoist force and then in peace talks with the Maoist
themselves. For the longer term, it must be answerable to the cabinet, as is normally the case in
countries with a parliamentary system. Assuming that Nepal remains a monarchy (and there must now
be a question-mark over the survival of both the monarchy and also of Nepal itself as a state with any
real independence), there is no reason why the king should not remain the nominal commander-in-chief
but he should act in that capacity on the government’s advice. The army needs to be well-equipped
and, more importantly, better trained. Its use for internal security duties should be a last resort but it
should be brought in immediately if protestors or insurgents are strong enough to drive the police force
out of an area. If called upon to act, it should be able to counter attacks of the kind made on many
district headquarters over the last few years but not to use force out of panic or vindictiveness against
the general population. There need to be clear rules of engagement, as is the case with, for example,
British forces in Northern Ireland, and individuals would be liable to punishment for failure to comply
with them. As Indian experience has shown, armed force alone has sometimes been able to contain
rebellion, but the agents of a democratic state should abide by the norms accepted by democracies
across the world.

Even more than the army, the police are poorly equipped, badly trained and underpaid. Most
fundamentally, as has already been said, they are widely perceived as corrupt and as serving the
immediate political ends of the government (or of whoever has bribed them sufficiently) rather than

16
addressing the security needs of the society around them.50 Arguably, their status as a (highly
inefficient) centralised paramilitary force makes it more difficult for them to gain public support and
the American or British model of separate, locally recruited forces should perhaps be considered. There
could still be some equivalent of the Indian Central Reserve Police but this would only be used to
provide support in special circumstances and the central government’s main role would be to set
general principles within which each local force had to operate and to conduct inspections from time to
time. There would also be some degree of supervision by local government but, to guard against
factional influence entering under the guise of `community control’ day-to-day decisions would be
made by the police themselves with reduced scope for political interference. None of this would
entirely remove tensions from the relationship of the police with some sections of the community but it
should be possible to reduce them.

Opportunities for playing the patronage game could also be reduced in other areas of government. To
protect the integrity of the electoral process the election commission’s role could be strengthened,
whilst resource distribution – whether jobs, cash grants or anything else – should as far as possible be
allocated according to predetermined rules. Where the application of objective criteria identifies a large
number of people equally deserving a particular benefit, the use of some form of lottery could be
considered in order to make the final selection.51 Arrangements such as entrusting each M.P. with a
`pot of gold’ to finance development work should be ended, whilst hiring and promotion decisions in
the bureaucracy might be made by interview boards from which those holding office at any level in
political parties were excluded. Ministers would retain a say in appointments at the highest level but
not in personnel decisions lower down the bureaucracy.52

Confidence in the system could also be increased by boosting the monitoring role of the Commission
for Investigation of the Abuse of Authority. There is a problem here, however, of `who monitors the
monitors?’ since, as has already been seen, there have been accusations of political bias in the selection
of candidates for investigation and there are currently fears of greeter potential for abuse in
Gyanendra’s new Royal Commission.53. A strict rule requiring the commission to investigate
thoroughly any complaint laid before it could help here. The possession of wealth out of proportion to
one’s known income is, of course, already grounds for investigation but it could, as in Hong Kong, also
be made an offence in its own right, with the onus on an individual in public service to explain the
source satisfactorily. Legislation could also be passed requiring parties to declare the source of all
donations from companies and private individuals above a specified level. Unless party political

50
The problem is, of course, a long-standing one in South Asia. Writing at the beginning of the last century, Rudyard Kipling
had one of his Indian characters characterise the police as `thieves and extortioners…but at least they do not suffer any rivals’
(Kim, London: Pan Books, 1967 [1901], p.67). Such sentiments would probably be echoed throughout the region today.
51
This method is currently used in Hong Kong to allocate purchase rights for government-subsidised `Home Ownership’ flats.
Drawing lots was an established method of allocating certain public offices under the Athenian democracy in ancient Greece.
52
Well-established democracies differ in the extent to which the civil service is insulated from the effects of party politics.
Political appointments are a more important feature of the American than of the U.K. bureaucracy though even in America the
vast majority of appointments are non-political.
53
See above, pg.

17
activity is funded directly by the state, a major proportion of the money needed for fighting elections
must come from the private sector but the electorate do have the right to know who is giving what to
whom.

Since the issue of corruption has been so important in the delegitimisation both of the Panchayat and of
the post-1990 parliamentary system, it may be worth discussing at some length the role of the CIAA’s
counterpart in Hong Kong, the Independent Commisssion against Corruption (ICAC). The ICAC’s
original establishment thirty years ago was the result of two main factors. First, a grassroots campaign
against corruption, and particularly over a spectacular case involving a senior expatriate police official
who had been heavily involved in the `protection’ racket then operated by the police over most of the
territory.54 Second, the determination of a new governor, Sir Murray Maclehose, to take a less relaxed
attitude to endemic corruption than had his predecessors. The colonial system was at this time
unashamedly authoritarian but, despite its failings, still enjoyed a measure of legitimacy since so many
of its inhabitants were grateful to have escaped the excesses of Maoism in mainland China. However,
although the setting up and empowering of the ICAAC was facilitated by this authoritarian
Whereas Nepal’s CIAA has focussed mainly on allegations of corruption against senior
politicians and bureaucrats,55 the corresponding institution in Hong Kong, the Independent Commission
against Corruption (ICAC) deals with abuses at all levels and also within the business community. The
initial wave of investigations targeted so many people that police officers staged a mass protest against
it. The Hong Kong government decided to offer amnesty for all offences committed before the ICAC
came into existence, but, although this initially dented the credibility of the new body, it has since had
considerable success in reducing corruption in all sectors of society. Whilst Hong Kong is not as
`clean’ as the ICAC’s public relations suggest, syndicated corruption within the police force seems to
have been eliminated and small-scale police corruption is perhaps less of a problem than in London’s
Metropolitan Police.56

`Decentralisation’ has long been a rallying cry in Nepalese politics, figuring both in the rhetoric of the
Panchayat system and in that of present-day Maoists.57 Because so many who use the slogan have
proved in fact to be avid centralisers a degree of scepticism is quite understandable, but potentially it
presents an opportunity to come closer to the ideal of direct democracy (the second model discussed
above) whilst retaining pluralist representative democracy (the first model) as the framework at
54
Superintendent John Godber fled Hong Kong when confronted with evidence that he had accummulated bank balances many
times greater than his official salar. far beyond his means. Securing his extradition from Britain (where possession of assets
disproportionate to one’s known means was not a criminal offence) was an early ICAC success – though some have claimed that
it was achieved by fabricating evidence of another, extraditable offence.
55
Bharatraj Upreti (`Sanketkalin Shasanka Chunauti’, Himal Khavar Patrika, 12/2/05) argues that corruption involving
businessmen has not yet been addressed in Nepal and that doing so is central to the control of corruption in general.
56
Nigel Cameron, An Illustrated History of Hong Kong. Hong Kong: Oxford University Press, 1991, p.319. Before the book’s
publication, I was offered the same comparison by a serving British inspector in the Hong Kong police, who acknowledged the
earlier extent of corruption but had no doubt that his force was now `cleaner than the Met’. There has, however, been a
suggestion that the sudden decline at the end of the 1980s in quantities of drugs seized and in drug-related offences could
indicate collusion with drug dealers (Frank Welsh, A History of Hong Kong, London: HarperCollins, 1993, p.493.).
57
The Panchayat system primarily depended on the monarchy and its control of the army. The Maoists have developed a very
effective network of sympathisers at local level but the main pillar of their present influence is a trained guerilla force which, like
the RNA, combines people from different regions and ethnic backgrounds and can be switched as needed from area to area.

18
national level. What is needed is very careful thought on the size and shape of the smaller units needed
and on which issues are best dealt with at which level. It has been suggested, for example, that
devolving power to actual physical settlements, rather than the arbitrarily delimited Village
Panchayat/Village Development Committees, would allow a degree of ethnic autonomy on a cantonal
basis.58 Use of this geographical criterion would reduce the dangers of reinforcing fluid ethnic
boundaries by basing rights directly on ascribed ethnic identity.

At an intermediate level, district boundaries might, as advocated by Tony Hagen and others, be redrawn
to follow ridgelines rather than rivers, thus producing more economically and socially integrated areas.
Real devolution at this level would also make it easier for parties with strong support within a small
area to implement some of their programmes. If the Italian and French Communist parties could run
local governments whilst Italy and France were allies of the USA in the Cold War, some form of de
facto co-operation between groups with widely diverse ideologies should not be impossible in Nepal.
There area range of policy issues where there is no real need for a uniform solution across the country.
In many countries, for example, the question whether to allow the public sale of alcohol is decided by
referendum at local level: at least one brand of American whisky is not sold in the town that houses the
distillery because the local citizens voted to go `dry.’ Similarly, in the field of education, the central
government might, for example, lay down that all schools must teach Nepali, English and one
additional language, and local government, or even individual schools, could decide whether the third
should be Sanskrit, Limbu or, for that matter, Chinese.59

For government at national level, consideration also needs to be given to changing from the first-past-
the-post system employed in India, the USA and the UK to some form of proportional representation as
found in most European democracies. This issue was raised by the political scientist Chitra Tiwari
during the run-up to the 1991election and found little support,60 but interest in it seems to have
increased since then, particularly on the Left: had the 1999 election been held on a PR basis the UML
and ML would have together obtained more seats than Congress. With Nepal’s unhappy experience
during the 1994 hung parliament in mind, many would still argue that the present system is more likely
to produce a clear-cut result and avoid the need for unstable coalitions. However, the splits that have
occurred in Congress and in the UML (not to mention the smaller parties) suggest that a single party
government is itself an unstable coalition, though temporarily disguised. Given the electoral arithmetic
over the past twelve years (see Table on pg. 4), single-party governments are elected with the support
of only just over a third of the electorate and, in a highly polarised political environment, imposing
their own policy agenda through their parliamentary majority may not be practicable. An extreme
example of this knd of problem is provided by the experience of Chile, where the Marxist President

58
As advocated, for example by Pashuram Tamang, `Address of Welcome at a Ceremony Organised by the Nepal Janajati
Mahasangh in Honour of Ethnic Community Members of Parliament’, 1991.
59
A number of other suggestions for practical devolution are made by Deepak Gyawali, `Nagarikko Dayitva’, Himal KP 27/2/01
(Special Supplement on Himal’s `Bhirbata Kasari Pharkaune Deshlai?’ 8 Fagun 2057 Conference).
60
Whelpton, `The General Elections of May 1991’, p.49.

19
Allende, elected by just 36% of the voters, was eventually overthrown by the army after his policies
had alienated the centrist forces that had earlier on given him conditional support. A constitutional
system which forced Allende to make compromises with other parties would have prevented his
adopting some of his own policies but would also have spared the country the Pinochet dictatorship.

Whatever the merits of moving to full PR, there is also a case for helping smaller parties by removing
the requirement that they must have gained the support of 3% of the electorate to retain recognition as a
national party at the next election. It may be going to far to suggest that the Bhattarai faction of the
UPF would have stayed within the electoral system if they had retained such recognition after the 1994
split,61 but removing the impression that the system is being rigged in favour of the larger parties
would help encourage minorities to work within the system.

Agreement on changes of the kind outlined above, even if achieved, would not automatically solve the
very fundamental problem of the prevailing political culture. Again as in other parts of south Asia,
Nepalse politics has been marked by an extreme tendency to factionalism and an unwillingness to
accept arrangements which do not put oneself or one’s own group at the centre of the picture. The split
between the Girija and Deuba factions within the Nepali Congress is the most conspicuous example but
that party had usually before 2002 been able to avoid going over the brink. The Nepalese Left, on the
other hand, has been subject to so many splits, mergers and re-splits that probably no one has been able
to keep a proper track of them all.62 In this, as is so many other respects, the Maoists are a good
example of the disease they are purporting to cure. Despite the fact that a united Left would have been
electorally stronger than Congress, Prachanda and Bhattarai’s faction were unwilling to work as a
junior partner within such a broad alliance. The justification offered has, of course, been that they
alone are the guardians of the true Leftist faith but one must ask how far that is the real explanation and
how far they were simply unwilling to accept subordination to the UML in a broad Leftist alliance or
alarmed that Nirmal Lama and the old Fourth Convention group might get the upper hand in the UPF.63
However even if one grants for the sake of argument that the Maoists, and Nepalese politicians in
general, have been motivated only by considerations of the national interest, the result has still been an
unwillingness to compromise which would render almost any system unworkable.

As well as a greater willingness to work with those whose ideology is similar though not identical to
one’s own, there could also be greater co-operation right across the political spectrum on issues where,
at least in theory, there is a general consensus. A prime candidate here is the continuing problem of

61
A view advanced both by Deepak Gyawali, `Reflecting on contemprary Neapli angst’Himal, April 2002 , p.37=39 and Deepak
Thapa, `Day of the Maoist’, Himal, May 2001, p.4-21. Gyawali also argues specifically against the 3% rule. Bhattarai’s faction
of the UPF were denied national party status since Vaidya and his followers were accepted by the Election Commision as the
legitimate successor of the pre-division party. This decision was reversed by the Supreme Court in summer 1997.
62
The complexity is most fully illustrated by the fold-out diagram in Bhim Rawal , Nepalma Samyabadi Andolan: Udbhav ra
Bikas , Kathmandu: Pairavi Prakashan, 2047 V.S. (1990/91). A simplified diagram, covering the period up to 1995, is given in
Hoftun et al., p.392.
63
Pancha Maharjan (personal communication) has suggested that apprehension over Lama’s growing popularity was a major
reason behind the 1994 split.

20
caste discrimination. The Deuba administration made a start on this with the campaign against
untouchability mentioned earlier but this, like many of the grand proposals of summer 2001, has not
really been followed up. The refusal to admit Dalits to ordinary social contact with their fellow-citizens
should in theory be easy to address since it does not involve difficult questions of the distribution of
resources and if the easy part cannot be tackled, what hope is there for the rest? There is scope for co-
operation here involving both the political parties now on the sidelines of the political stage and the
king presently at the centre. Would it not be possible, for example, for local leaders of parties to
accompany Dalits into previously forbidden shrines and to repudiate caste taboos by dining publicly
with them? When the king attends `felicitation meetings’ across the country could he not address the
question directly and then ceremonially accept and eat boiled rice from a Dalit in front of the thousands
who have been listening to him?64

If those active in politics are to make progress in any of these areas they will need to be put under a
certain amount of pressure. To some extent this is a task for those who exercise influence on Nepal
from outside the country, whether as representatives of states or of international organisations. For
better or worse they do possess some leverage over those who are, or aspire to be, in authority inside
the country and it is currently hard to see anything other than outside pressure that can reverse the
additional damage done by Gyanendra’s actions in February 2005. Over the long term, however, there
is a more important role for those in Nepal with a deep interest in the country’s problems but who are
not themselves directly competing for political power. They may be ordinary members of political
parties or simply trying to promote particular causes and, as Deepak Gyawali argued before
temporarily leaving the NGO sector to accept an appointment as minister in Gyanendra’s 2002-3
cabinet, activism of this type is needed to balance those engaged in politics primarily because they see
it as their career. If war is too important to be left to the generals, then politics is certainly too
important to be left to the professionals.65

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS: I wish to thank the public figures in Nepal who have allowed me to
interview them over the last few years. I am also grateful to participants in the Social Science Baha
`Agenda for Transformation’ conference for their valuable comments on an earlier version of this
paper.

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