Tag Archive for 'Prachanda'

Nepal under Maoism: War without bloodshed

Published on March 30, 2009 in Heritage, Nepal and Politics. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , .

From The Economist:

dahalNEPAL’S Maoist prime minister, Pushpa Kamal Dahal, or “Prachanda” (fierce), recently said that running a country was harder than running a guerrilla war. He should not have been surprised. The Maoist-led coalition government was formed after the ex-guerrillas pulled off a stunning election victory last April, just two years after they tramped in from the jungle. It faced three giant tasks: to bring better government to one of South Asia’s poorest countries; to help sustain a peace process that followed a bitter, decade-long struggle; and to preside over the writing of a new constitution. Achieving all this, within the 30-month term allotted to a government, was bound to be difficult. Yet there is now a growing fear that failure-in a country that has seen civil war, a royal coup, the abolition of the monarchy, huge protests and an ethnically based rebellion in recent years-may spark a fresh crisis before long.

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Nepal’s royal palace: Versailles in green nylon

kathmandu_palace

THE stuffed tigers have seen better days. The big dynastic portraits, of double-chinned Nepali princes and their fair-skinned consorts, are catching dust. But the Narayanhiti Palace, Kathmandu’s recently-vacated royal residence, is less remarkable for its faded splendour than for its dreadful modern design.

Completed in 1969, on the site of an older palace, it is built in concrete and marble, with acres of laminated wood panelling and hideous pink carpet. The royal bedchamber, last occupied by King Gyanendra, whose 2005 coup led to the abolition last year of his 240-year-old Shah dynasty, is rather poky. A bedside clutter of family snapshots and porcelain knick-knacks is simply poignant.

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Pushpa Kamal Dahal: a name never to forget

Published on September 24, 2008 in Nepal. 0 Comments Tags: , , , .

From The National:

The piece of paper that confirms the name of the Nepalese prime minister.

The piece of paper that confirms the name of the Nepalese prime minister.

While torrential downpours are nothing new this time of year in the Indian capital, the situation was especially critical because of a crumpled sheet of paper being carried.

On that piece of paper was stamped a very plain, but vital fact – the official identity of the prime minister of Nepal.

For years, the man had simply been known as Prachanda, a Nepalese word meaning, “The Fierce One”.

But when the revolutionary guerrilla stopped dogging the government and actually became Nepal’s prime minister last month, he wasted no time in dogging the media with one burning question:

Nepal's PM Pushpa Kamal Dahal

Nepal's PM Pushpa Kamal Dahal

What to call him?

Would it be his guerrilla name? Or the one he was born with, but subsequently disavowed because of its caste overtones – Pushpa Kamal Dahal.

With Prachanda – we shall call him that for now – visiting India this month, it seemed the perfect opportunity to get to the bottom of it. After all, the Indian government would have to call him something.

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After Koirala, what?

Published on June 30, 2008 in Nepal. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

Manjushree Thapa, the Kathmandu-based author of ‘Forget Kathmandu: An Elegy for Democracy,’ in The Indian Express:

Girija Prasad Koirala’s resignation as prime minister has been greeted with equal relief and dismay in Nepal. Ahead of the April 10 Constituent Assembly election, Koirala had announced that no matter what the outcome, he would resign afterwards. When the Maoists came in as the largest party, though, his apologists began to claim that the election had been only for a constitution-drafting body, and not for a government. They argued that the interim government – with Koirala as the prime minister, and also as the provisional head of state – could only be voted out with an absolute majority. Koirala went along with this dubious logic; and his refusal to resign came across, to his detractors, as an expression of megalomania.

This launched a month of intense inter-party bickering, bickering which cast an anxious shadow over what should have been a joyous moment for Nepal: the abolition of the monarchy on May 28.

The subjects being bickered over have been among the most decisive of the peace process, subjects that will make or break Nepal in the coming years. Who is to be the head of state, the prime minister or (with the king now gone) a president? Which of these should hold executive power? How, if at all, should the Nepal Army and the Maoists’ People’s Liberation Army be merged? Who should be the commander-in-chief?

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‘We are trying our best to understand democracy’

The Maoist guerrilla leader who is about to become Nepal’s prime minister faces a dilemma: how can he reconcile his ideology with the realities of political office? Raymond Whitaker of The Independent met him:

It is not easy securing a meeting with the Maoist guerrilla leader poised to become prime minister of the new republic of Nepal.

Prachanda, which means “awesome” or “the fierce one”, came out of the jungle two years ago, but his journey from insurgent commander to mainstream politician is far from complete. As if to emphasise his distance from the Kathmandu political establishment, which he calls “feudal”, he lives in a run-down area of the city, close to a rubbish-strewn canal. His house, with sandbagged emplacements at each corner, is guarded by unsmiling male and female cadres in camouflage fatigues and caps with a red star on the peak.

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Hello Maoists, bye bye king

Published on April 13, 2008 in Nepal. 0 Comments Tags: , , , .

Former rebels are poised to take power in the beleagured kingdom of Nepal. But they must put aside a crime-tainted past and deliver reforms, writes Ed Douglas in The Guardian

Jubilant supporters of Nepal’s former rebel Maoists took to the streets yesterday to celebrate what they are already claiming as an election victory in the troubled Himalayan kingdom.

Preliminary results indicate the Maoists are well on the way to becoming the largest party in the country’s first elected constituent assembly, in elections aimed at cementing a peace deal that ended a decade of civil conflict. Their faces smeared with vermilion, several prominent Maoists who won seats, including their leader ‘Prachanda’, staged impromptu victory parades.

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Previously in AW:

In Nepal, the Maoists’ long journey to mainstream politics

Published on February 4, 2008 in Nepal. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , .

In Outlook, Manoj Dahal interviews Prachanda, chairman of the Communist Party of Nepal-Maoist.

In December 2007, Outlook featured a story on Prachanda (The Rado Maoist), chairman of the Communist Party of Nepal-Maoist, on the remarkable change in his lifestyle after he emerged from the bush to join mainstream politics. The story said he sports an expensive Rado watch, travels in an airconditioned Pajero, loves his daily two pegs of Johnnie Walker whisky, and has been accused of promoting his children in the party hierarchy. On a cold January morning this year, the Maoist supremo, dressed in a trendy tracksuit, met Outlook’s Manoj Dahal and sportingly fielded questions on his new lifestyle, the problems revolutionary parties encounter in maintaining their ideological purity and India’s role in Nepal.

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