Kathmandu: The leader of the UML, Shri Madhav Kumar Nepal is a lone crusader now.
His friends belonging to the political mainstream housed together confronting the “unconstitutional government” of Thapa have seemingly left him in the cold.
Some appear to leave him soon in the crusade against the King and his government currently being led by Surya Bahadur Thapa.
The meager and namesake communist parties plus the Congress got a political jerk the day the UML paraphernalia preferred not to join the movement a week prior to the King’s return from his London trip. The UML’s absence on that very particular day at the demonstrations caused panic among the rest of the parties who concluded that the UML could betray the very spirit of the movement if the party were assured of huge political gains. The congress under Girija reacted very sharply on the UML’s mysterious absence.
Later the UML clarified that it was some sort of technical error. However, the error was an artificial one, opine men in the congress.
Once again Madhav Nepal is forced to gulp the bitter pill provided to him by Shri Girija Prasad Koirala, the socalled Commander of the ongoing movement.
The decision of Congress president Koirala to invite the incumbent prime minister Thapa at his tea-party reception and the latter’s presence at the said party must have come as a bolt from the blue to the communist leader.
Shri Nepal maintains that the congress has committed Himalayan blunder by inviting the head of a government which the five agitating parties had collectively dubbed as “unconstitutional” and hence were untouchables, politically and socially both.
“The congress has broken its promise by inviting the prime minister at its party”, is what Madhav Nepal commented recently immediately after the conclusion of the congress sponsored tea-reception.
This sudden development in the congress camp which incidentally commands the movement, if it were any, is sufficient to send spine chilling waves in the minds of the communist leaders more specially to its leader—Madhav Nepal.
Madhav Nepal has reasons now to distrust the congress’ fresh political overtures. He knows that the congress is playing foul with him and the ongoing movement but is compelled to honor the congress for fear of being left in the corner, politically speaking.
That the communist leader is annoyed with the congress gets reflected from his expressions wherein he says that he believes that there must have been two set of schools in the congress, the one that favors the continuation of the movement and the one that wishes to join the Thapa cabinet.
The jerks are yet to come for Mr. Nepal.
The one Himalayan jerk he received recently came from his own party. The firebrand UML leader Bam Dev Gautam, once Mr. Nepal’s declared arch rival, buldozed his own party’s decision and accepted TIKA from King Gyanendra this Dashain festival. The party felt very bad but Mr. Gautan provided his own interpretations. The party has so far done nothing against Bam Dev’s hob-nobbing with the King.
Much ahead of this jerk, Madhav Nepal’s present rival, Shri K.P.Woli, questioned the very relevancy and the timing of the movement being waged against the Thapa regime and the King.
All put together, what could now be fairly concluded is that if things remain as it is, Madhav Nepal too would have to devise some other mechanisms to stay in center-stage of Nepali politics or else he would be more or less like a lone crusader. The leader, in so many ways than one, has enemies around him, both within and without.
Enemy from within is more dangerous, it is widely believed.
This finally means that Madhav Nepal will have to work hard to keep his own house in order.