When we look to these brilliant movements launched by Nepalese people, the credit of success of the 1990 movement goes to the extra-ordinary leadership, organization and guidance given by the Supreme Commandar of the movement, Ganesh Man Singh and to an important extent to the leaders of two other political forces which responded to and supported Mr. Singh’s call. They are Tulsi Lal Amatya, President and Ms. Sahana Pradhan, working president of United Left Front and Sambhu Ram Shrestha main guide of United National People’s Movement, significantly all four of them belonging to Newah Community. Of course the nineteen day long second people’s movement of 1962-63 was launched jointly by the Maoist Communist Party which was engaged in 10-year long “People’s War”and seven parliamentary parties (mainly Nepali Congress and UML-Communist Party)which were launching 4-year long Gandhian Satyagrah movement (later supported and joined by Madhesi Parties), yet the fury of the movement was felt in Kathmandu Valley, the native land of Newars, in Terai, the land of Madhesis and Tharus and in the hilly regions of indigenous people.
After the success of the second people’s movement our country is said to have entered the transitional phase in Nepalese people’s liberation movement. In the words of Maoist leader Pushpa Kamal Dahal “the weapon controlling the state power has fallen on the ground from the hand of the oppressors, but it is yet to see whether the people will sieze hold of it or the oppressors themselves will re-capture it.” This assesment of transitional phase is only half truth. As a result of the second people’s movement the interim constitution was promugated, the election of Constitution Assembly was successfully held, monarchy was abolished and Nepal has been declared a “secular federal republic”. All these are certainly positive gains but although monarchy, the institution heading the old feudal order is gone, feudal forces are still maintaining firm grip on all patterns of society and organs of state power. Likewise, although Nepal has been declared a secular state, in practice all the vestiges of Hindu State structure persist. Hindu monarchy is gone but all the religious ceremonies which were earlier presided by the King is now being practised by the elected president, thus in fact substituting Hindu monarchy by Hindu republic. Added to this a strong movement is being launched for revival of Hindu State in Nepal with the active support and intervention by expansionist conservative Hindu political power centres of a neighbouring country. On our own part too, even after declaring Nepal a secular state, we are still governed by a code (Muluki Ain) based on the ancient Manu Smriti, a conservative code( conservative even when compared with other Hindu Smritis) which imposes Hindu values, ideals and laws on all other non-Hindu indigenous communities and even Hindu communities with liberal trends.
Transitional phase really means a phase in which we pull down and bid good-bye to old Nepal and build a new-Nepal. We are talking of firmly establishing and institutionalizing democracy in which all the people are their own masters. The essence of democracy is liberty and equality, and equality really means equal treatment between one citizen and another, which urgently demand equality not only between one individual and another, but also between one community and another, between one religion and another, between one language and another. In a multi-lingual multi-religious, multi-cultural, multi-racial country, Nepal, any previleged position for one particular language and one particular religion amounts to domination of one particular community over the rest of the population. Hindu religion as the state religion, Khas language (Nepali language) as the state language and Aryan culture as the culture of Nepal which was imposed by Prithvi Narayan Shah after his expansion of
Newah Organization of America July 14th, 2015
