NepalModernization under King Birendra
Ghats along the Hanumante River in Bhaktapur, a place to bathe and
wash
Courtesy Ann Matles
When it became apparent that the panchayat
system was
going to endure, B.P. Koirala and other political exiles
began to
tone down their revolutionary rhetoric and advocate a
reconciliation with the king. On December 30, 1976,
Koirala and his
close associate, Ganeshman Singh, flew to Kathmandu hoping
to "make
a fresh attempt." They were arrested for antinational
activities
and violence, and a tribunal was set up for a trial. After
considerable agitation, Koirala was released in June 1977
because
of ill health. He met briefly with the king and then went
to the
United States for treatment. When he returned to Nepal in
November
1977, he was again arrested at the airport. After further
public
agitations on his behalf, he underwent five treason trials
in early
1978 and was ultimately acquitted. Thereafter, despite
factional
splits, the Nepali Congress resembled other opposition
parties in
its acceptance of the king's power. Thus, the pattern of
modern
Nepalese politics was established--loyalty to the king and
opposition to his government. In practice, there were
continuing
student demonstrations against the panchayat system
and for
human rights in 1977 and 1978.
On May 24, 1979, King Birendra announced on Radio Nepal
that
there would be a national referendum in the near future,
during
which the people could decide to support or reject the
panchayat system of government. This referendum
represented
the first time in modern history that the monarch had
publicly
consulted his subjects. Political freedom was allowed to
all
citizens during the period of preparation for the
referendum, and
there was intense realignment of political factions inside
and
outside the panchayat system. Finally, on May 2,
1980, out
of a potential 7.2 million voters, 4.8 million cast their
ballots.
The outcome supported the panchayat system, with
54.7
percent for and 45.3 percent against it. Koirala and the
Nepali
Congress accepted the results. Although the referendum was
a
victory for the king, its narrow margin clearly indicated
the need
for change. Accordingly, the king quickly confirmed
freedom of
speech and political activity and announced the formation
of an
eleven-member Constitution Reforms Commission. The result,
in
December 1980, was the Third Amendment of the 1962
constitution,
setting up direct elections to the National Panchayat,
which would
then submit a single candidate for prime minister to the
king for
approval. A Council of Ministers would thenceforth be
responsible
to the National Panchayat, not to the king.
In March 1981, the Constitution Reforms Commission
announced
that elections to the National Panchayat would take place
on May 9,
1981. Aside from pro-Moscow factions of the Communist
Party of
Nepal and a "Group of 38" from the Nepali Congress,
political
parties rejected the amended constitution and refused to
participate in the elections. The Nepali Congress led by
Koirala
observed an "election boycott week" from May 1 to 8, but
on
election day a 52 percent turnout of voters chose 111
representatives to the National Panchayat. Surya Bahadur
Thapa was
returned as prime minister, and the king formed a twenty-
eight-member Council of Ministers in June 1981.
Opposition politics were in a state of disarray,
dominated by
the terminal illness of Koirala, who died in July 1982.
The victory
of the king was not complete, however. During the
elections, more
than 70 percent of the candidates favored by the king
lost. The
panchayat system, a major source for local
patronage, was
becoming the stage for factional fights and shuffling
coalitions.
On many college campuses, elections for student unions
went to
communists after violent clashes.
The trend toward factionalism in the National Panchayat
intensified in 1983, when a serious food crisis and
charges of
corruption caused the fall of Surya Bahadur Thapa's
government.
Lokendra Bahadur Chand took over as prime minister, but
two blocs,
or samuha (see Glossary)
had emerged in the
National
Panchayat around Thapa and Chand. The factional fighting
did not
prevent the celebration in 1986 of the panchayat
system's
twenty-fifth anniversary, which created an opportunity for
the
second general election to the National Panchayat. The
Nepali
Congress and most other opposition parties again boycotted
the
elections, although the communists and a few other small
parties
did participate. The elections drew 60 percent of the
voters, and
60 percent of the members of the National Panchayat
supported
Marich Man Singh Shrestha as prime minister.
Before elections to the local panchayat the
following
year, the Nepali Congress announced that it would continue
its
boycott but then changed its strategy and allowed its
members to
run for local seats, claiming that it could "capture the
outposts"
of the system and politicize the people. The poor showing
of the
Nepali Congress candidates embarrassed the party, however,
and
revealed its isolation from many rural voters.
Despite low growth figures, throughout the 1980s Nepal
at least
had made some progress in economic development, but it
remained in
any case one of the poorest countries in the world
(see Economic Setting
, ch. 3). The king was achieving a higher profile
in
international affairs, canvassing widespread support for
the
declaration of Nepal as a zone of peace and participating
in the
South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation
(SAARC--see Glossary;
International and Regional Organizations
, ch. 4). These
modest trends encountered a sudden interruption in 1989
when a
major international incident with India occurred. On March
1, the
Indian embassy announced that trade and transit treaties
with
Nepal, renewed regularly since the 1950s, would expire
twenty-two
days later. Both the Indian and Nepalese governments
accused each
other of delaying negotiations. When March 23 arrived,
India
declared the treaties had expired and closed all but two
border
entry points with Nepal. These closures caused huge
backups on the
border and delayed or halted the bulk of foreign trade,
including
crucial shipments of oil and gasoline and the tourist
trade, a
major source of foreign exchange carefully cultivated
under King
Birendra. There was a severe decline in agricultural
production,
layoffs in factories increased, and the inflation rate in
1987-88
rose to 11 percent. The growth rate of the economy, a
healthy 9.7
percent in 1987-88, declined to 1.5 percent in 1988-89.
The Nepali Congress, early in its history accused of
bowing to
Indian opinion, in September organized a National
Awakening Week
during which 3,500 party members committed nonviolent
civil
disobedience. Student demonstrations against India began
to take on
antigovernment tones, and all campuses in Kathmandu closed
for two
months. The crisis demonstrated the fragility of the
political and
economic system in Nepal--an old culture but a young
nation--
landlocked between two giants and directed by a medieval
monarchy.
* * *
The most complete and readable account of ancient and
medieval
Nepalese history in English is Mary Shephers Slusser's
Nepal
Mandala, which also contains an excellent bibliography
of the
considerable work available only in Nepali. Luciano
Petech's
Medieval History of Nepal (ca. 750-1480) contains
interesting details and summarizes information in a quite
readable
manner. Dilli Raman Regmi's Ancient Nepal and
Medieval
Nepal are exhaustive accounts with large amounts of
original
material.
Ludwig Stiller describes the period of the Gorkha
conquests and
the consolidation of the Nepalese state in the early
eighteenth
century in The Rise of the House of Gorkha and
The Silent
Cry. John Pemble presents a straightforward analysis
of the
Anglo-Nepalese War in The Invasion of Nepal.
For relations between the British and Nepal later in
the
nineteenth century, see Ravuri Dhanalaxmi's British
Attitude to
Nepal's Relations with Tibet and China, 1814-1914,
Sushila
Tyagi's Indo-Nepalese Relations (1858-1914), or
Kanchanmoy
Mojumdar's Anglo-Nepalese Relations in the Nineteenth
Century. Affairs of the Ranas in the late nineteenth
century
are covered in M.S. Jain's Emergence of a New
Aristocracy in
Nepal (1837-58), Krishna Kant Adhikari's Nepal
under Jang
Bahadur, 1846-1877, and Satish Kumar's Rana Polity
in
Nepal.
There is no shortage of books on the fall of the Rana
regime
and the political changes that led to the king's dominance
by 1980.
Leo E. Rose has written books on his own, including
Nepal:
Strategy for Survival, as well as those with other
authors,
including the introductory Nepal: Profile of a
Himalayan
Kingdom (with John T. Scholz), The Politics of
Nepal
(with Margaret W. Fisher), and Democratic Innovations
in
Nepal (with Bhuwan Lal Joshi).
There also are a number of works that describe recent
developments from several Nepalese perspectives, including
Shashi
P. Misra's B.P. Koirala: A Case Study in Third World
Democratic
Leadership and Parmanand's The Nepali Congress
since Its
Inception. Hem Narayan Agrawal gives a straightforward
presentation of the modern constitutions in Nepal: A
Study in
Constitutional Change. For current events, the short
annual
country profiles of Nepal in February issues of Asian
Survey
can keep the reader up to date. (For further information
and
complete citations,
see
Bibliography.)
Data as of September 1991
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