There is a famous saying: “People’s memory is short” and this saying has been proved in Nepal once more.

In 1988, the leader of Nepali Congress Ganeshman Singh had an audience with the then King Birendra. During the meeting he asked the King to accommodate the political parties and democratise the Panchayat system. The King listened to his plea attentively and assured him that a way would be found.

However, there was a division among the Panchayat leadership and a dominant section of the Panchayat stalwarts advised the King to ignore Singh’s demand, as he and his party had the support of only a handful of disgruntled intellectuals and the people were satisfied with the “reformed” Panchayat which elected representatives by universal adult suffrage. The reform-minded Panchayat leadership requested the King not to ignore the banned political parties’ strength and support of the people to the parties. This left Gangeshman Singh and his party with no option but to wage a movement against the Panchayat system. When the Nepali Congress announced a date to start an agitation against the Panchayat system, the King was again advised by the reform-minded Panchayat leadership to open a dialogue with the political parties with a view to considering the simple reforms as per their demand.

Once again the dominant group of the Panchas advised the King to ignore the question of further reforms in the system. According to them, the people were staunchly in support of the Panchayat system as it was already reformed after the 1980 referendum. The Nepali Congress combined with the Left force launched a mass campaign against Panchayat system, which made it collapse within two months. For thirty years the people had been deprived of any political organisation, and thus when the people woke up the old system toppled like a house of cards. The situation is quite different today. Having enjoyed full democratic rights for twelve years, the level of political consciousness of the masses has taken a great height. The number of educated youth has increased manifold and they want to participate in activities, which advance the people’s welfare.

However, the present government’s mindset is patriarchal in nature. It thinks that welfare of the people could be better taken care of by administrative activity and the movement of security forces. So it ignores the political parties’ strength and usefulness and in the name of curbing terrorism it denies the people its fundamental rights. In the last two weeks, over 2000 people have been injured and most of them have received head injuries. Half a dozen demonstrators have been killed and a hundred have been put behind the bars. The ministers have been repeating the same old version that was used during the last few days of the Panchayat era. They refuse to see the mass participation in the agitation, and are blaming infiltration of terrorists just as the ministers did during the last days of the Panchayat system by putting the blame on “anti-national elements.”

For the last three years, the civil society has been strongly urging a dialogue among all the three political forces — the monarch, the constitution-abiding political parties and the Maoists. They have been urging all not to ignore any of the political forces as without a consensus among them peace and stability cannot be obtained. They have been urging national harmony but the present government has opened fronts against other political forces. It has been using the security forces to repel the Maoist insurgents and it has started brutal attacks against peaceful demonstrators. Never in the annals of Nepal’s worst political phase was such callousness witnessed.

Although the King’s meeting with ex-prime ministers Bhattarai and Thapa had been taken as a sign of grave consideration by the King of the impasse, the people’s hope started wavering. This leaves them with no choice but to further escalate the agitation until the government is toppled. Largely the people have been in favour of a peaceful transformation. The parties have been persuading the Maoists to give up violence and join the mainstream politics, which is a praiseworthy effort. But the strategy adopted by the present government leaves no choice for the people to calm down.

Many more people would be killed and continue to get injured by brutal force, but ultimately people will take their destiny into their own hands. Let the powers-that-be be reminded of the country’s experience of the past 15 years only. The Panchayat government had ignored the demand of ordinary reforms and invited its own total collapse, there was no amendment to the Constitution but it was totally scrapped. If the popular voice is ignored the mass movement is bound to scrap the existing Constitution. The brutal suppression of the movement will add to the miseries of the nation. It will also ensure the demolition of many of the present structures of the state.

Upadhyay is a former foreign minister