Editorial»
Republican –minded new generation
JAN 14 - The country’s two mainstream political parties, the Nepali Congress and the Communist Party of Nepal (United Marxist and Leninist) have come out in all transparency with their policy of retaining monarchy. This is in spite of their earlier threats about the possibility of their switching over to the extremist objective of setting up a republican order in Nepal.
Mercifully enough, NC leaders such as Ram Chandra Poudel, Party General Secretary Sushil Koirala,Party old war-horse Chakra Prasad Banstola who, for more than one occasion, had openly spoken of the possibility of the organization going in for a republican order, have abided by their policy of working for the country’s parliamentary system as a limited monarchy after the British pattern.
Similarly, they also showed a good deal of concern at the members of the younger generation, particularly, those belonging to the student communities of various ideological persuasion, for their openly going in for abolishing monarchy as also for setting up a republican order in the land.
The NC leaders have also openly come out against the party’s youth activists for showing enthusiasm for turning Nepal into a republican state.
In this connection, Chakra Prasad.Banstola also has gone on public record as having said: “ The NC has punished some of its youthful cadres for talking about the need for setting up a republican order ”.
However, he also expressed his apprehension that the same could not be the case as of the present day with the changed circumstances of things. Showing similar situation, NC President Koirala also said “ The Republican pot is on the parboil in the hot oven. “ Let the rice cook on its own steam,” and he added a rider of caution, saying, “ Stoking the fire will burn black the rice in the cooking”.
This fear of proclivity found among the young party cadres for a republican order as felt by the country’s cardinal party leaders, shouldn’t be regarded just as a passing affair. If the experienced party old hands know well the high political value of a hereditary ruler in his persona of the head of the state, even with or without the existence of the references to such an office-holder occurring in the famous work authored by no less a political pundit like Walter Bagehot, under the title of The British Constitution.
The NC leaders also have done quite well in seeking restraints in its own party of burgeoning leaders from going to the extreme extent of abolishing monarchy with their jacked up preference for a republican order.
Similarly, the nation’s second most important party, the CPN-UML, has decided to adhere to the objective of retaining the constitutional monarchy during its 5th Central Committee meeting in Kathmandu on January 10. However, an important UML leader requesting anonymity, told mediapersons that the Party had its own firm reservations about whether or not it should go in for a republican set up as also for calling a constituent assembly, the whole matter being contingent upon King Gyanendra’s attitude regarding his reaching reconciliation with the political parties over the issue of how to go about the task of resolving the country’s worsening political problems.”
If the King doesn’t show his sincerity of purpose in resolving the present crises, thereby giving way to further ‘confrontation’, the CPN-UML has its option either to call a constituent assembly to craft a new Constitution or to set the goal of turning Nepal into a republic.”, he said.
When all things related are considered and said, these two political parties have given their pledges of allegiance to the monarchy. Meanwhile, the state authorities at all levels should place high values to such a commitment coming from these two historical parties, for it is these political parties, and these alone, who have all the potentials to stand and work as the bulwark of the edifice of our monarchy.
These two solid quarters, and not the parties of the time-servers from the left-overs of yesteryear’s faceless Panchas or, for that matter, the amoeba-like formless so-called Hindu outfits or, again, for that matter, the pseduo Royalists and half-baked “patriots”, whose slovenly lot have started swaggering in the streets of Kathmandu and places elsewhere as upholders of Nepal’s “hoary Hindu tradition”, as of to-day, can serve as the real escutcheons and shields in the protection and safeguard of the monarchy..
This country’s young generation has shown its tendency of not caring for standing in ceremony with things traditional, however hallowed and puissant these might have been regarded to be by some chunk of the society.
Members of this generation have defied almost everything they regard as the hang-overs from the country’s past history. Furthermore, the upcoming educated class has also evinced a sharp change in their reading habits with developed taste for literature which, in all bold relief, project unconventional, incendiary, and radical ideas and views of a new society to emerge.
Of the vast corpus of political writings, they prefer, for instance, the works of Samuel P Huntington, the renowned doomsayer for monarchies everywhere in the world, over those of classical pro-monarchy writers such as Walter Bagehot and Sir Henry Maine. Those, again, of the radical bent of mind, it is needless to say, pursue studying Marx and Engels, Lenin and Stalin and in the extreme case, even Che Guevara, if not the ill-fated and notorious Cambodian Pol Pot, in spite of the collapse of the Soviet Union, precipitated by the great statesman of the last Century, Mikhail Gorvachov. This is a new development. And the development merits the careful attention of those in high places.Posted on: 2004-01-14 01:44
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