Dear Comrade

There is no doubt that you and your party have created history in Nepal after 12 long years of struggle. Nepal is at the cusp of a new phase in its history that we couldn't even have dreamt of three years ago.

Even royalists in this country now think the monarchy is too much trouble to keep. Your party played a role in bringing about this change. But you will soon find that perhaps waging an underground guerrilla war was perhaps the easy part. It is easy to reach the top but difficult to remain there, as they say.

First off, you should have no illusion that it was violence and conflict that brought us to where we are today. Your revolution was going nowhere militarily, violence was a dead end. The real tipping point came with the largely peaceful street protests of April 2006. It is hard to admit that, but be honest and acknowledge it.

You also need to know that struggle can't go on forever, struggle should have a purpose beyond just grabbing power. For Nepal it must be for peace, democracy and justice. But you keep repeating the tired old lines in your speeches: "Our immediate aim was to attain new democratic revolution but like any other Communist our final objective was also to establish socialism and communism."

What I understand by socialism is that people have food, education, health care and freedom from abuse by the state and other groups. Time and again you have said that the 21st century will "again be a century of revolutions". Do you really believe that, or are you saying it only for effect? Revolution for what? For the development and happiness of Nepalis or for more misery, pain and death? If the continued threats and violence by your cadre go on, there isn't much of a future left for your party.

You have said "sorry" many times. And last week you even visited a political activist beaten up by your cadre and said your party had changed its policy and you had directed your flock to desist from such acts. Who is going to believe you?

In another interview you say "a single appeal by us will bring the masses onto the streets again". Who are you trying to threaten? Why not mobilise your people against hunger and poverty? Educate people about cultural practices that confine women to the cowsheds. You tried to do it, but by the threat of violence. And you still haven't learnt that transformation doesn't happen by the barrel of the gun but by social mobilisation. It's been nearly two years, but you have failed in that time to re-educate your cadre that atrocities against the people do not bring change.

You told senior editors recently: "Had Lenin been alive for another five years, he would have allowed political competition. He would not have allowed the kind of repression within the party which was unleashed by Stalin." Finally, an admission of Stalin's purges. But why is Stalin's picture still on your wall?

You have said you can change the face of the country in 10 years. Yes, it can happen given the right visionary leadership, commitment and determination. But it won't happen if you continue talking about going back to the jungles, about "fighting for another 40 years" or threatening to unleash another uprising.