A few days ago, C P Gajurel, a senior Maoist leader released recently from Indian jail, has given a foreign policy statement of the Maoists who are going to join the interim government in the near future. He expressed his party’s commitment to the five principles of peaceful co-existence as the very basis of its foreign policy, the traditional stand of Nepal.

He assured that his party would keep equidistance between India and China and also praised the role of India in getting together the SPA and the Maoists, which heralded a new era in Nepal bringing about unthinkable qualitative change in the Nepali polity. Gajurel’s statement has irked some intellectuals and succeeded in drawing their comments.

Some commentators did find fault in the foreign policy for not adhering to the equidistance policy between southern and northern neighbours. Some observes feel that Nepal hardly has a foreign policy. If it has any it is an India-centric policy connoting both anti- and pro-India. During the last six decades, the politics of Nepal has been overshadowed by India. King Tribhuvan went to India in 1950, many communist and Nepali Congress leaders organised and carried out their political activities from India. It was the political climate of India, which suited them. It was easy for them to slip into Indian territory at any time.

Nobody went to Tibet or China for getting support there. Even the physical geography does not suit the equidistance policy, as most of the rivers flowing from the Himalayas are southbound. There are no snow-covered peaks and high mountains in the southern parts of the country to make the life of the people hard to live.

It is difficult to say which kings were closer to China or which political leaders are pro-Indian. However, we can recollect that King Mahendra got Indian Army posts on Tibetan borders in Nepal withdrawn under Chinese pressure on the one hand, but on the other, to please India he got an armed treaty signed secretly with India in 1965 by the then foreign secretary Y N Khanal. We cannot forget that the entire portion of King Birendra’s regime before the people’s movement of 1990 was devoted to seeking recognition from some one hundred and twenty-five nations for his proposal for declaring Nepal a Zone of Peace.

India did not accept it and the result was obvious. The very motive behind the proposal was to restrict India diplomatically from helping Nepali leaders to organise anti-monarchy or pro-democracy movement from the Indian soil. He was obviously right. Had India not helped the Maoists and the SPA to unite, the out-dated monarchy would have existed till now.

Ironically, Gajurel’s announcement of equidistance policy between India and China has been stretched out to the open border dispensation with India. It is a truism that Nepal-India border is open for all Nepalis whether they live in the Terai or hilly regions of Nepal. Comparatively, the number of hill people working in India is many times more than the people of the Terai region, known as Madhesis.

Hence, economically hill people benefit from India more than the Madhesis. It is due to the high mobility of the hill people, their hard life and their economic deprivations. Their economic deprivation ultimately gave rise to the Maoist insurgency in those areas.

No doubt, the Madhesis are benefiting from the open border dispensation. So are the people of Nepal living on high altitude areas near the Tibetan border. Are not the people of both sides of the border sending their cattle for grazing on the other side? Are they not conducting trade with each other? Can the people living at high altitude regions across the borderland be forced to have blood relations with the Tibetans? Can all the physical conditions of both northern and southern parts of the country be equal? Neither Mount Everest can be shifted to south nor rivers like the Koshi be made to flow north upward. If these can be done, these will indeed facilitate the equidistance foreign policy by Nepal for which some people living in Kathmandu are craving these days.

If open border is a problem for having equidistance foreign policy towards India and China, let the Maoists start supply of arms and ammunition to the Naxalites in India (which will be very easy when they will be in the government shortly), the border will be closed by India. Will the closed or restricted Indian border aggravate or solve problems like killing of innocent boys at Lahan and burning of houses at Nepalgunj under the protection of the police force?

It is high time the government immediately took up the burning issues that have been dumped for 238 years and ignored during the last fifteen years and start a serious dialogue to calm down the explosive situation before it is too late. Armed suppression is no solution and dialogue has no substitute.

Prof. Mishra is ex-election commissioner