Kathmandu: A question that has been still boggling the minds of the analysts and the intellectuals alike is whether with the appointment of Sher Bahadur Deuba, the alleged act of regression stands valid or not?
Varied interpretations are in vogue even after the Deuba set up has taken its formal shape.
For some still the October 4 move initiated by the monarch amounts to regression. For others, with Deuba bouncing back to power has partially rectified the regression.
For a section of the media, albeit the partisan ones, regression continues or the regression is not in its existence.
The Kathmandu based international community too is puzzled on how to take Deuba’s fresh appointment? Whether this appointment has corrected regression or has still intensified the regression, the puzzle continues. If for Koirala and his coalition partners, the act of regression continues still with full force and that their agitation will continue ad infinitum till the people get their rights back. Or in other words, Koirala and his team against regression will not settle for less than the King yielding to their demands.
For the UML, Deuba’s appointment contained some seeds of democratic norms and hence the party decided to call his appointment as an act that partially corrected regression.
For the international community, Deuba’s appointment was better than his two predecessors in the sense that Deuba has armed himself with a much more broad-based government.
A better arrangement than Chand and Thapa’s.
But how the monarch himself views all these interpretations now in circulation in the rumor mill?
It was last Thursday when the Palace secretariat invited Nepal’s media men for a cocktails inside the palace to mark the auspicious birth day of the constitutional monarch.
It was in this gathering of the media men, one journalist, Dev Prakash Tripathi, the editor of the Ghatana Ra Bichar weekly who could not control his temptation when the monarch came in his front and enquired of the King.
Well, Your Majesty, I have a small query. Should I proceed with that?
His majesty nodded his head and the journalist thus put his question which is as follows.
“Your Majesty! Some say that regression still prevailed. Others say with Deuba’s appointment, regression has partially corrected. We the media men are confused with these interpretations. How should we take such interpretations for our journalistic consumption?”
“You ask them”, pat came the reply from the monarch.
(The portion of the talks in between the monarch and Mr. Tripathi is exclusively based on what has been printed in the Dristi weekly dated 6th July, 2004-editor).