Somber Questions In The Shadows

The deferral of the parliamentary vote to amend the Constitution to reflect our new map has stiffened the shadows. Not that Nepalis haven’t been left to take their most consequential decisions in the dark.
The purported arrival of Indian troubleshooter Shyam Saran, hectic bargaining within the Madhes-centric parties and the Nepali Congress (think Millennium Challenge Corporation compact) and the prevalence of palpably cooler thoughts have injected anticipation and apprehension.
The injurious insults the Indian still complain about, their candor in conveying their broader magnanimity to Nepal, and their public brazenness in postulating ways of possible retaliation have plunged bilateral relations to new lows.
The debate on Kalapani, Lipulekh and the wider swath of territory up to Limpiyadhura has certainly enlightened Nepalis on multiple disciplines. What was simplified as King Mahendra exchange of barren and treacherous terrain for two trunks of gold (or was it support for the partyless Panchayat system?) has now unfolded itself into an intricate lesson in history, geography, hydraulics, international law and diplomacy.
If an all-powerful monarch, whose mere word constituted law, gave away those vast tracts of land to India, why are we even questioning why, much less expecting to get it back? Are we also going to nationalize the ‘birtas’ and land ‘bakas’ the monarch had handed to his favourites?
Our post-1990 leadership was not stupid to rake up the issue and then let it die. The British East India Company through the Sugauli Treaty in 1816 may have accepted our sovereign territorial rights east of the Kali River. But it turns out that they began the cartographic aggression long before Indian independence.
After Warren Hastings, the first governor-general, departed Calcutta in 1785, Britain had no further relations with Tibet for nearly a century. In 1884 the Indian government prepared to send a diplomatic mission to Lhasa to define the spheres of influence of the Tibetan and Indian governments. Colman Macaulay, a secretary in the government of Bengal, was responsible for the negotiations. While Macaulay obtained Chinese assent to conduct a mission to
Lhasa, he had not gained the Tibetan government’s approval. Instead, the Tibetans dispatched troops almost 21 km into Sikkim. The British decided to suspend the Macaulay mission since its presence was the Tibetans’ argument for their occupation. Tibet’s refusal to retreat precipitates new fighting. Eventually the Anglo-Chinese Convention of Calcutta was signed on 17 March 1890, under which Tibet renounced suzerainty over Sikkim and delimited their border.
Despite Tibet’s inward turn, Britain persisted in its plans for Central Asia, cultivating so-called ‘pundits’ who traveled in disguise into Tibet also along the western routes. With their compasses and 100-bead rosaries, they secretly counted their steps to map the terrain later. British Indian maps began encroaching eastward into Nepal, as Calcutta and London sought new routes to Tibet. The imperative became more urgent amid British suspicions that Russia sought to boost its influence in Tibet, possibly with the connivance of China, widely deemed a serious menace to India.
At the turn of the century, Governor-General George Curzon, who had long obsessed over Russia’s advance into Central Asia, now feared a Russian invasion of British India. In 1903, he dispatched the Younghusband military mission to Tibet, eventually imposing the Treaty of Lhasa the following year.
The Tibetans naturally loathed the treaty, while the British realized they seemed to have misread the military and diplomatic situation. The Russians did not have the designs on India and would go on to suffer defeat at the hands of the Japanese, which further shifted the balance of power.
The Anglo-Russian Convention of 1907 produced a semblance of stability following the ‘Great Game’ , while the Qing dynasty headed toward collapse. Five years later, the Republic of China proclaimed Tibet a part of China but did not try to reoccupy it. In 1914 a treaty was negotiated in India by representatives of China, Tibet and Britain. Again, Chinese suzerainty over Tibet was recognized and a boundary negotiated between British India and Tibet. As the Chinese never signed the treaty, it never came into force.
As the Chinese persisted with their objections, especially their refusal to recognize any treaty between Tibet and Britain, other players became interested in the region. A German expedition arrived in Tibet in 1939, led by Ernst Schäfer, a protégé of the future Nazi SS leader Heinrich Himmler.
At about the same time, a Japanese mission arrived in Tibet for ‘research purposes’. Three years later, the United States government sent Captain Ilya Tolstoy, a grandson of the Russian novelist, “...to move across Tibet and make its way to Chungking, China, observing attitudes of the people of Tibet; to seek allies and discover enemies; locate strategic targets and survey the territory as a possible field for future activity.”
As the British departed the subcontinent in 1947, the Chinese communists were closing in on a full takeover of the mainland and formal annexation of Tibet. Independent India’s views on the territory currently in dispute were colored by the imperatives of cooperation and later conflict with the Chinese.
After the 1962 Sino-Indian border war, Nepal began consolidating its partyless Panchayat system and went on to forge a road link with Tibet in 1968. A confident and assertive Nepal forced the Indians to vacate their military checkposts in the Nepali Himalayas in 1969, but New Delhi went on to fortify its military position in Kalapani.
So, was the trade-off (temporary or final) related to the Cold War-driven regional rivalry that already claimed our democracy and was creeping upon our country? Maybe Kalapani was why the Kodari Highway didn’t evoke any of the much-feared punitive measures from India, which rarely went beyond verbal outbursts. If communism couldn’t come to Nepal in a taxicab, maybe it was because our extreme western flank was too fortified.
If so, was that the kind of persuasion the Indians engaged in with our multiparty and republican leaders? After having made much noise initially, did they acquiesce in India’s stand through the ratification of the Mahakali Treaty and, subsequently, on the sidelines of the 12-Point Agreement?
Furthermore, is New Delhi’s surprising hard line on an issue it has hitherto regarded as bilateral dispute stem from its displeasure at this ‘reneging’ on the part of the broad-based Nepali leadership? All good questions. But a better one is whether Nepalis will ever get answers.

Our Not-So-Bad Battle Of Narratives

From the worsening din and discord, it’s clear that the territorial dispute between Nepal and India has transcended the realm of facts into one of narratives and perceptions.
The boldness of Prime Minister K.P. Oli’s government in publishing a new political and administrative map depicting Kalapani, Limpiyadhura and Lipulekh as part of Nepal has taken the decades-long bilateral struggle to a new level symbolically and substantively.
While Nepal’s audacity is fraught with risks – evident as well as unanticipated – there are novelties on the Indian side as well. For one, the Indian media have grown belligerent based on what they consider to be their own set of facts. No less curious is the resoluteness coming from sections of Indian officialdom in refusing to discuss the issue. The professed determination of some of us to fight to the finish is matched by the other side’s unsophisticated display of their primacy and preponderance.
Indian accusations that Nepal is pressing its claim at the behest of the Chinese may be easily undermined by the fact that New Delhi and Kathmandu have been addressing the territories as disputed for decades. Yet the Indians have flashed their version of the China ca(na)rd amid the precarious COVID-19-coated global geostrategic fault-lines.
True, many prominent voices in India support Nepal’s claim, minimize – if not entirely refute – the China angle and resent references to our former status as the world’s only Hindu state. But they are simply drowned out by the dominant view amplified by the reach and rancor of Indian television outlets.
Traditional editorial writers and commentators are still counselling quiet diplomacy to prevent a further slide down a slippery slope. But those pleas are tagged with exhortations to ensure the restoration of India’s primacy in Nepal. Simply put, when Indians start raking up how Jang Bahadur Rana colluded with the British East India Company to suppress the 1857-58 Mutiny (which may Indians today call their first war of independence), you have to concede we have hit treacherous ground.
This does not mean we have reached the point of no return. Around the world, countries have longed lived with competing territorial maps, forcing third parties to clarify that their depictions do not endorse or undermine such claims.
If Indians today have security sensitivities in the Kalapani area that they feel far surpass our own vis-à-vis China, we can certainly appreciate that. But certainly not enough to renounce ownership of territory that we firmly and unequivocally believe belongs to us.
The people residing in the area may have mixed feelings about the dispute. Yet we cannot ignore how those feelings have been shaped by the reality that the territories have been under Indian occupation for so long.
Perceptions, though, work in many ways. For instance, implicit in accusations of third-party instigation is sometimes keen awareness of how benefits could accrue only to those who are not the principal belligerents.
Tortuous as the labyrinth may appear now, it may also contain the seeds of a solution. They can sprout only after the shouting match subsides. For now, though, screaming on may be good for both sides, if it helps to explain ourselves better to each other.

Sell-Out Or Buy-In? Same Difference

If the Mahendra-sold-Kalapani canard has lost its luster in our latest national frenzy,  it’s not because of overuse. When the obsession with cause so blinds you to effect, you sooner or later discern the in(s)anity of it all.
This is not to say that our national discourse is pointless. In fact, it has provided far greater clarity in terms of the past and future.
The anti-monarchy front got away with blaming King Mahendra for so long because attention had been diverted from their own role. Now the popular focus has gone all the way back to what Prime Minister Matrika Prasad Koirala’s Nepali Congress government may or may not have done in 1952. Ditto the elected government of Prime Minister B.P. Koirala. It was, after all, during the latter’s tenure that the deterioration in Sino-Indian relations hit Nepal’s frontiers the hardest.
More importantly, though, in their alacrity and persistence, the blame-Mahendra crowd has undermined its own argument. A sell-out, regardless of its transparency, is premised on an element of finality. Critics have accused King Mahendra for everything under the sun to make any further dent in his reputation. Consider this: When the seller can no longer speak for himself, and the buyer refuses to do so, the best interested parties can do is reconcile themselves to the status quo or find something better to do.
What we’ve discovered in the current debate is that the Nepali Congress, the erstwhile Unified Marxist-Leninists and Rastriya Prajatantra Party all acquiesced in India’s invention of a new source of the Kali River while signing and endorsing the Mahakali Treaty in the mid-1990s. That was when the sun was supposed to start rising from the west and Nepal was to begin exporting electricity via satellite.
As for India’s link road to Mansarovar that kicked up the latest brouhaha, New Delhi was planning to build that right around the time they were forging the 12-Point Agreement between the Maoists and mainstream parties. The Chinese had begun to rethink their traditional support for the Nepali monarchy during their strategic dialogue with the Indians. Beijing would have had less compunction in abjuring its stated recognition of Kalapani et al as disputed territory.
Perhaps the Indians didn’t have to work that hard in 2005-2006 for a quid pro quo with the anti-palace alliance. The Prachanda-Baburam Bhattarai missive three years earlier to the Atal Behari Vajpayee government pledging not to go against Indian interests must have trickled down enough to embolden the engineers, overseers and sundry employees.
Proponents of taking Nepal’s case to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) must have been subdued by reports that India may have won an opt-out from the ICJ on matters relating to its external borders. True, war cries continue unabated, but it’s not hard to associate them with efforts to resuscitate the Millennium Challenge Corporation compact. However the MCC compact fares this legislative session, it can scarcely contain the same combustibility on the streets.
No, Kalapani won’t ever disappear from our national firmament. There is too much at stake for our political class – and for the wrong reasons. Worse, it has become a far too useful attractive issue for non-Nepali quarters (yes, including the Indians) in our geopolitical milieu. With the coronavirus aftermath certain to make geography and politics far more impulsive sources of instability in the emerging order, Nepalis must recognize Kalapani for what it is before betting on a breakthrough.

Enter Comrade Trilateralist (Again)

Worn and wearied by Prime Minister Khadga Prasad Oli’s propensity for political restitution within the ruling party, Nepal Communist Party (NCP) executive chair Pushpa Kamal Dahal ‘Prachanda’ has once again been thrust into a role he seemingly relishes: the trilateralist.
The Oli government is under fire over whether or when it knew India was constructing a link road to Manasarovar in Tibet via Nepali territory and what it intends to do about it now. The national narrative took a sharp turn as the rest of us were still trying to figure out the extent and implications of Chinese involvement in patching up the latest rift in the ruling party.
Things weren’t getting any easier for us. Chinese nationals complaining of having been left stranded here were caught in a scuffle with Nepali police. The Chinese Embassy, almost going along with the Nepali version of events that the protestors attacked first, urged Chinese nationals to follow Nepali laws.
Around this time came a tweet by state-run China Global Television Network suggesting Mount Everest to be on its side of the border, prompting much outrage among Nepali cyber dwellers. The TV station eventually made a correction. From those two reactions, Beijing almost seemed impatient to draw a sharp contrast with New Delhi, which continues to insist the Manasarovar road fell completely within Indian territory.
Not a minute too soon, Nepal’s principal trilateralist swung into action. Since China is also involved in the Indian government’s construction of the link road, talking with New Delhi alone will not be sufficient, Dahal said at a  meeting of the State Affairs and Good Governance Committee in Parliament. The former prime minister’s reference was to a 2015 agreement between China and India to open a bilateral trade route via Lipulekh.
Dahal conceded that the Oli government had failed to take concrete initiatives to resolve the issue despite an all-party consensus after India’s publication of new political map last November. Having just issued a joint statement with Oli on the subject, Dahal has ostensibly chosen to focus more on a resolution than recriminations.
Taking the issue to the international court right away was not a good idea, Dahal said, stating that the issue was a complex one. That is a sentiment shared by others – including leading experts – who insist that Nepal should be prepared for the time, resources, energy and patience such an undertaking would entail.
With bilateralism having a decades-long record of failure here, trilateralism has an obvious appeal. Yet, what makes Dahal – and the rest of us – think that it would make things easier or more effective? The Indians have heard our grievances loud and clear. It’s just that they don’t like them. Now we’ll have to explain everything to the Chinese all over again. After all, it’s not like Nepali media reports and public opinion surveys have had much resonance in the average hearing range up north.
The Indians are not likely to shed their penchant for bilateralism, especially since that mechanism is still in existence. We may be ready to debate why the process has stalled, but would the Chinese be interested? All they did was sign a bilateral trade arrangement with New Delhi concerning territory they believed to be under full and complete Indian sovereignty.
Buyer beware? Sure. But what if we never formally notified the Chinese of the disputed nature of that part of the bill of goods? And, worse, what if the Indians and Chinese start arguing bilaterally?
Might there be a chance of a geopolitical resolution as part of a wider Sino-Indian border bargain? Even there, experience tells us that it would eternally remain in the realm of possibility. How many times have we heard Chinese pledges of assistance to sustain our sovereignty fade into silence when the moment of truth arrived?  
So, yes, Comrade Dahal, the issue may be too complicated to take to the international court right away. But what’s to say trilateralization wouldn’t undermine our ability to exercise that option eventually?

Masking A Morbid Masquerade

It may have been a storm in a teacup, but there’s a reason why our lips haven’t been able to stop quivering just yet.
How Prime Minister Khadga Prasad Oli won over Bam Dev Gautam is pretty clear. What led Pushpa Kamal Dahal ‘Prachanda’ to relent is less obvious. His spokesmen have been clarifying that the Nepal Communist Party (NCP) co-chair joined the rest of the party leadership to avert a ‘political accident’.Still, Oli’s proposal to elevate Madhav Kumar Nepal as the third president of the party must have sensitized Dahal to the prospect of further dilution of his influence, if not power.  For someone whose mind turns so interminably, Dahal wasn’t going to be impressed by Madhav Nepal’s alacrity in rejecting the bone Oli’s threw. The gears began to crank up.
Home Minister Ram Bahadur Badal quietly intimated that his backing for Oli was tied to something called ministerial loyalty. It fell on the otherwise middle-of-the-road general secretary Bishnu Poudel to go all the way in the prime minister’s defense before the resumption of the much-hyped NCP Secretariat meeting on Oli’s fate.
The seating arrangements gave an early indication that the mood had actually shifted. Former prime minister Jhal Nath Khanal emerged from the talks far more sanguine about the party than the proceedings might have warranted. The other member of ‘Bhainsepati alliance’ – Narayan Kaji Shrestha – has made a career of progressing with the flow. That posture went well after the meeting with his status as party spokesman.
While we widely assumed that Oli was running out of options this time, we were also mindful of his sharp survival instincts. The prime minister was thought to have four clear choices: a) acknowledge his shortcomings and promise to work together; b) incorporate dissidents into the government; c) implement the ‘one person, one position’ demand growing in the NCP; and d) provide firm assurances of his resignation from the premiership. There was little doubt that the last two were a no-no on Oli's list. He did do the first in a very oblique way and affirmed the second with no less circuitousness.
We may never know what role Chinese Ambassador Hou Yanqui might have played in all this. A Beijing Compromise of sorts might not be exactly in the offing to replace the fiasco the 12-point foray in New Delhi has increasingly proven itself to have become. If the Chinese were so anxious to prevent a damaging split in the NCP, it’s because they have invested so much in the united party. Foisting a formula on ideological cousins, needless to say, is not the same as imposing a system on a country.
Still, the Chinese seem to relish their open abandonment of the officially vaunted policy of ‘non-interference’. President Xi Jinping’s phone call to President Bidya Bhandari, Ambassador Hou’s hectic parleys with the NCP leadership and the publication of the party panel’s majority opinion declaring the US Millennium Challenge Corporation grant as part of Washington’s Indo-Pacific Strategy may be entirely unrelated. But it has become harder to argue that they are not.
In the end, it looked like Oli critics were looking for an excuse to relent – for now. No matter how you slice and dice it, what transpired Saturday was a mere truce. Each critic still has a reason to be mad at Oli – and now more so at each other. Be careful with that cup, now.