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By Devendra Gautam
Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli is leaving for the Big Apple soon.
What for? You may be wondering—and aloud. For attending the United Nations’ 79th General Assembly.
What are his ‘other’ agendas? Nepal’s officialdom always keeps the core agendas of such engagements under wraps, but one of those tight-lipped mandarins at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has given some sketchy details. Per a September 9 report published in this weekly under the heading, ‘PM Oli wishes to meet Indian PM Modi in New York’, PM Oli, leading a 19-member jumbo team to the UNGA and also to the Summit of the Future, plans to hold sideline meetings with leaders of different countries.
By the way, a look into teams of ministers and self-styled ‘Rastrasevaks’ heading abroad for you don’t know what makes you wonder if these great guns are going a-hunting in the wilderness, in the manner of the Rana tyrants of the yore and their hangers-on.
Talking about sideline meetings on the cards, it’s a given that PM Oli will seek to meet his counterpart from Nepal’s next-door neighbour, with which we share very many doors that are open on our side, 24/7, to make room for a steady influx of people from the neighbour and the immediate neighbourhood. The report in question has also confirmed this desire, quoting one of those mandarins that hardly do the talking.
When one talks about Narendra Modi and his cohorts, their muscular Neighbourhood First policy comes to mind.
With or without that policy, India has been projecting her power, particularly in Nepal where a subservient political and bureaucratic leadership has been a constant for the last 40 years or so.
With cooperation from this leadership, Nepal, in the course of about 40 years, has lost her rights over the use of major rivers like the Mahakali, a corollary of the loss of rights over the two other rivers—the Koshi and the Gandaki in the 1950s—courtesy of two champions of freedom and democracy from a family. All this is because on both sides of the negotiating table sit officials that essentially represent the dominant party.
In the last four decades, the next-door neighbour, now the world’s fifth largest economy and the second largest military force with ambitions to become a global superpower, has been upping the ante and scaling the Himalayan heights of Nepal from the southern plains for harnessing Nepal’s water resources for her own good amid an increasing water scarcity in her Gangetic plains and much beyond.
Opaque and very controversial deals with the neighbour’s private and state-owned companies for the construction of the 900-MW Arun-III project, 450-MW Fukot Karnali project, 900-MW Upper Karnali project, 750-MW West Seti project and the 450-MW Seti-VI project show a dangerous determination on the part of the neighbour to scale the Himalayan heights of Nepal to fight a deepening water—and energy–crisis in her territories, at the expense of both short and long-term interests of Nepal and the Nepalis. This ambition will have severe ramifications for Nepal in terms of national sovereignty, including water sovereignty.
But a political leadership shorn of both short and long-term vision for Nepal seems least bothered about this aspect of our bilateral relationship that is far from equal, just and democratic.
A look into the contemporary history of Nepal shows that political parties of all hues and shades, namely the Nepali Congress, CPN-UML, Rashtriya Prajatantra Party, Nepal Sadbhavana Party, Janamorcha and the Maoist party, have been playing a critical role in the sellout of Nepal’s precious freshwater sources that are critical for her progress and prosperity.
PM Oli, for his stance against the illegal occupation of Kalapani, Lipulek and Limpiadhura, has been projecting himself as a patriot. Kudos to him for his role as PM and other political parties for the sovereign Parliament’s endorsement of the political map of Nepal that includes these territories, back in 2020. The onus is also on the government to find as to who all were involved in modifying Nepal’s old map by removing the above-mentioned territories.
But his role in the parliamentary endorsement of the treasonous Mahakali treaty (the Mahakali sellout), the sellout of Arun-III, Lower Arun, Upper Karnali, Fukot Karnali, West Seti and Seti-VI projects in the capacity of a key political leader, a minister and a PM has come under fire. Oli and other leaders involved in these sellouts should apologize to the people and the country, and work for the restoration of Nepal’s rights over her lifelines.
They should keep in mind that even their decades-long involvement in the democratic movement cannot whitewash these condemnable acts (to say the least) that will tremendously affect Nepal and generations of the Nepalis.
To the here and now. Even amid reports that the neighbour in question is not particularly happy with Oli, the latter seems willing to meet his Indian counterpart, per the People’s Review report.
Is he under considerable pressure from the kingmaker in the ruling coalition to have a meeting with Narendra Modi despite inclement weather?
Anyway, if this meeting materialises, what more will we end up losing as a nation to the emerging superpower? Some more projects like the 1061-MW Upper Arun project and the Budhigandaki project that can play a very crucial role in stabilising Nepal’s national grid by ensuring the supply of firm energy round the year?
At a time when the world is struggling to meet her burgeoning needs for freshwater and clean and green energy, at a time when it is in a state of flux and smaller, ill-governed, instability and corruption-plagued countries are facing existential crises, Nepalis should be ever watchful. Rather than allying with one party or another or one ‘charismatic’ political figure or the other, they should stand firmly for national interest and sovereignty.