KATHMANDU, OCTOBER 17
Chairperson of Janata Samajwadi Party-Nepal Upendra Yadav has made it clear that despite joining hands with the communist forces to create the Socialist Front Nepal, his party was a social democratic party very different from communist parties.
He wrote on his Facebook wall that his party was a social-democratic party and not a communist party.
"The JSP-N can never be a communist party and no oneshould have misconception about this party," he stated in his Facebook post.
Yadav, who started his political career from a communist party, said that the Socialist Front was a front comprising the JSP-N and communist parties.
There are four parties in the Socialist Front - Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal-led CPN-MC and Madhav Kumar Nepal led CPN (Unified Socialist) and Netra Bikram Chand's CPN and the Yadav-led JSP-N.
Yadav said the Socialist Front cannot be converted into a communist party or communist front at this stage.
Yadav said his party wanted identity-based federalism, good governance, equality, liberty, socio-economic justice and socialism by ending poverty, illiteracy, unemployment, socio-economic exploitation and inequality and discrimination based on class, ethnicity and gender and hence his party could not be a communist force. "No one should have misconception about this," Yadav wrote in his Facebook post.
Columnist Chandra Kishore said that Yadav's remarks were aimed at consolidating his vote bank in Madhes where doubts were raised about his party's ideological line.
"The CK Raut-led Janamat Party is trying to gain influence in Madhes and Yadav has realised that without dissociating his party from the communist forces, he cannot win the confidence of voters in Madhes," Chandra Kishore added. He said Yadav had been keeping mum on some vital issues that concerned Madhes or he was not vocal about the attack against federalism, republican order and secularism and if he continued to do so, it could cost him votes in the coming elections.
"A right-wing Hindu force is emerging in Madhes which could create rift between Hindus and Muslims in Madhes and that will ultimately weaken the Madhesi cause," he said and added that any political party that wanted to protect its vote bank in Madhes must strike a balance.
Political analyst Jay Nishant said that Yadav's statement could be a casual statement that did not require any serious pondering. If he seriously meant it, that was a huge political departure because his organisational structure and political behaviour were all influenced by communist ideology.
Nishant also said that even when Yadav dissociated himself from communist forces, it would not make much of a difference in the country's politics mainly because all forces - democratic and communist - acted in the same fashion.
"All parties concentrate their efforts in accumulating wealth and power to use them in elections," he added.
A version of this article appears in the print on October 18, 2023, of The Himalayan Times
