#33 9 - 15 March 2001 20 pages Rs 20 KHURSANI SPECIAL 10-11 19 Under my hat RECIPES FOR DISASTER 20 RAMYATA LIMBU IN MADICHAUR, ROLPA EXCLUSIVE ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ ut here in the remote hills of mid- Western Nepal, it is difficult to Delhi sneezes… oimagine we are in the middle of a war Indian finance minister zone. This is an idyllic land: the clear, cool Yashwant Sinha did not to have Madi River flowing past ripening fields of a SAD—special additional wheat; cabbage plots watered by sprinklers; duty—in his budget proposal goats and cattle being herded to pasture; this year, but has introduced village women carrying gagris of water from the Today, there is peace. But it is a peace of acquiescence. another acronym that could still spring; children returning from school. It could be a sad story for Nepali be anywhere in Nepal. But this is Madichaur exports, especially in Ward No 1 of the Junkot Village manufactures Development Committee, and it is under using high Indian complete control of the Communist Party of raw material Nepal (Maoist). content. He will It wasn’t always this peaceful here. Till replace two years ago, the villagers were getting caught countervailing in the crossfire between the guerrillas and the duty charged on police, and the valleys reverberated with the LIMBU RAMYATA export prices with sound of gunfire and explosions. The Maoists a flat 16 percent had started systematically attacking the remote on the Maximum police posts, killing enough of them for the Retail Price police to withdraw to their fortified district Ruins of police chowki at Ghartigaon destroyed in a Maoist attack in March 2000. Fifteen policemen died. (MRP). This could headquarters in Libang, three hours’ walk lead to a cost away. Today, there is peace. But it is a peace of “Since the police chowki pulled out a year- slung over their shoulders watch a volleyball ones who lay ambushes along the village trails. difference as high acquiescence. No one actively in disagreement and-half ago, life has been peaceful,” says game between Maoist cadre and village youth It is also their job to interrogate strangers, and as Rs 20,000 per with the Maoists can survive here. Mansaram Pun, the pasal-owner. “We used to in the local school grounds. Members of the collect levies from villagers, businesses, ton of Nepal-made So the women cook and clean, collect be caught between the Maoists and police. We militia swagger around in camouflage uniforms teachers, and government officials. toothpaste water. The elderly stay at home taking care of were constantly in fear of our lives and police and captured police boots and belts, they “When we’re not on duty, we often lay exported to India. the grandchildren. There is a marked absence harassment. We couldn’t go anywhere.” smile, shake hands with villagers and talk. down our guns to help on community farms, Companies in Nepal that use of young men. They used to traditionally Today, Mansaram and his wife are left alone as “We were never underground from the with construction projects and give the raw material imported from migrate to “Kalapar” (India) from here for long as they pay their “tax” of Rs 100 a month people,” says 27-year-old Comrade Bidrohi as peasants a helping hand when they need it,” India would be hit the hardest seasonal work—there was never enough food to the Maoists, feed them, put them up, he raises his fist to a passing group of says Comrade Sujhav, as he prepares bamboo because the duty-drawback is to get by on what the arid fields produced. But attend Maoist gatherings and work schoolgirls in the widely acknowledged stakes with his khukuri to repair the roof of a low and is almost eaten up by since the fighting started five years ago, there occasionally on small bridge-building and communist greeting, lal salaam. “We are villager’s house. It is hard to believe that this transport and other unseen has been an even bigger exodus of young men. road-repair brigades. underground only from reactionary forces.” soft-spoken farmer leads an 11-member squad costs of moving goods in and Afraid of being victimised by the police or “Everyone in the village extends support in His comrades are high school drop-outs, semi- that has been trained to kill with his khukuri out of Indian border towns. recruited by the Maoists, most able-bodied cash or kind. You can’t be different. There’s literate farmers, disillusioned Nepali Congress in the name of the People’s War. “MRP could have a serious men have stayed away. Along the village fear. They have the guns,” says Mansaram. The and left parties supporters. They patrol the impact on our exports,” says trails, the children go to school clutching Madhichaur police post is abandoned, its rugged terrain that surrounds the village. If Æ Contd. on p2 Sandip Ghose of Nepal Lever, copy-books under their arms past the tiny wooden beams used to dry clothes. No longer there is any DHURBA BASNET Nepal’s largest exporter of bazaar with its pasal, a tailor shop and threatened by government security forces, suspicious soaps and detergents. The branch offices of the district agricultural members of the Maoist militia are relaxed. movement of sellers of toothpaste would also office and the government veterinarian. Civilians in sarongs, young women with .303s police, they are be hit hard. Colgate-Palmolive is Nepal’s top toothpaste exporter. (For more on the budget: p 8) Government’s peace offensive ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ BINOD○○○○ BHATTARAI Human This was the first sign of life from a moribund government in a long time. It has become rights groups quite unusual to see the ruling Nepali Congress being proactive: and there it was the have named a NOC, NOC government meeting a longstanding Maoist precondition for talks by releasing the team of five Magar children and the hospital in Rolpa that never treated anyone. Nobody wanted to tell us why six names and whereabouts of their captured comrades as a prelude to releasing them. consisting of Padma Ratna Tuladhar, Daman Nath Dhungana, Sindhu Nath Pyakurel, tankers carrying diesel Suddenly, there are fresh hopes for talks again. “We’ve done everything needed to Sudip Pathak and Gauri Pradhan to facilitate peace talks. But no one has any illusions create an appropriate environment for talks,” Ram Chandra Poudel said on Tuesday. that the negotiations will be long and arduous, and will probably be accompanied by adulterated with over 50 percent “I’ve made the request, they now have to establish contact.” some escalation in violence. “I sense better preparedness in the government, which is a kerosene took three days to off- The 300-plus names on the list include those under preventive detention and in positive sign,” says Gopal Siwakoti Chintan, a human rights activist and lawyer. “At best load their fuel into the Nepal Oil jail. But conspicuous by his absence is well-known Maoist Danda Pani Neupane. The they may meet and agree on a code of conduct for conducting the insurgency and Corporation’s storage tanks government explanation is that those not on the list could be those arrested under counter-insurgency. Politically the two sides are still poles apart.” near the Tribhuvan International aliases, or unidentified rebels killed in ‘encounters’, or those killed by the Maoists Going by Prachanda Path, the Maoists now want an all-party interim government to themselves in internal purges. (The government has also asked that the rebels reveal rewrite the constitution. That would integrate them into the power structure, giving more Airport. But we found out the the whereabouts of 131 people abducted by the Maoists.) say in whatever happens thereafter. It is unlikely the government will agree to that NOC and tanker owners were The government move follows close on the heels of the announcement of the because it says Nepal’s constitutional monarchy and parliamentary democracy are non- haggling about the bribe. The Maoists’ new Prachanda Path doctrine that lays down a new direction in their revolution negotiable. While some see the demand for an interim government as softening of the government set up an inquiry that many saw as a mellowing of their previous hardline position. The government had earlier Maoist stand, the new Maoist doctrine adds an “armed mass struggle” to its commission on fuel adulteration to respond, and what better than to make public this list. For his part, Poudel admitted strategy. Some analysts read this as a classic Maoist “hammer-and-anvil” plan to spread he couldn’t figure out Chairman Prachanda: “We see confusion in Maoist thinking, they chaos and confusion in urban areas, forcing the government to spread its forces more to file a report in a month. Three have to be clear about their position for talks. Sugar-coated words alone will not do.” thinly. Adding an urban insurrection to its rural base areas would make a deadly months ago. Looks like Depending on how the Maoists respond to this government overture, the plan is to have combination that could be used as a bargaining chip to push through its demands for business as usual. p 8 informal meetings to iron out preliminaries like logistics, naming of delegates and constitutional change. deciding the agenda. That would lead to round two—of real political bargaining. The official toll: 1563 dead—1018 Maoists, 278 civilians, and 267 police personnel. world link as in issue 29 222 EDITORIAL 9 - 15 MARCH 2001 NEPALI TIMES VIEWPOINT What the Left can right rom relatively small beginnings on 13 DHURBA BASNET February, 1996, the Maoist “People’s fWar” has, to use their own phrase, “moved from peak to peak”.