The most uncertain part of the uncertainty over 28 May is not that we won't have a constitution (we will probably have a stopgap draft and extend the CA's term by six months just to buy time). The real danger will be how to manage the expectations of people who are impatient for change and progress.

If you really get down to it, except for the politically-inclined in the capital and the district capitals, the majority of Nepal's couldn't be bothered whether a constitution is written by 28 May, or of what kind. Talk to the tens of thousands waiting cheek-to-jowl to apply for jobs in South Korea and the common refrain is: "Who cares?"

What a majority of Nepalis want is to be left in peace, to earn enough at home so they don't have to sacrifice their dignity and pride to work in dirty, dangerous and difficult jobs in the desert. They want to earn enough to feed their families, send children to school and have affordable health care.

The delayed constitution-drafting process opens up a pandora's box of issues from ethnicity-based federalism to state structure, and leaves them in open-ended limbo. Most countries have ethnic groups with grievances, but they have institutions to manage them and address long-standing injustices and discrimination. We are now having to deal with the demands of 103 ethnic groups and 93 languages at a time of acute political volatility, instability and public apathy.

The risk is that in a vacuum of a constitutionless polity, virulent multi-ethnic violence will replace the class war that ended in 2006. All the precursors are in place: political fluidity, the lack of visionary statesmanship, joblessness and dissatisfaction especially among the youth, lack of opportunities, cynicism and hopelessness about the future, and an unresolved peace process that is now just a ceasefire.

It is plain to see that power, resources and salaried government jobs are monopolised by a few ethnic and caste groups. The Maoists articulated the grievances of the marginalised and successfully channeled it for recruitment during the war. In the 2008 elections, they channelised it again, this time to get votes. Most Nepalis who don't know about how Lenin and Mao used ethnic autonomy not to devolve power but to centralise it through totalitarian state systems were easily duped.

Now, identity politics has become too hot even for the Maoists to handle. All four militant-minded ethnically-defined groups that exist today splintered off from the Maoists because they didn't find the party radical enough. There could be more. The Bahun-dominated Maoist leadership can't put the genie back into the bottle and donor-supported ethnic pressure groups have replaced political parties as sabre-rattling agenda setters. A morally-bankrupt political class is swayed by those who have the most radical slogans. By default, the agenda for identity politics today is being set by NGOs not by the elected representatives of the people.

It is imperative for the main political parties to analyse where ethnicity-based federalism will take us. This needs to be sorted out in the Constituent Assembly, not in the streets with strikes enforced by violence and terror. Is the instability at the centre just going to be multiplied by 14 with added sectarian and communal flavour? Already, we see overlapping territorial claims over proposed provinces. Ethnic groups themselves have split into sub-groups, all clamouring for their own province.

Maybe it is just as well we don't have to decide all this in a hurry before 28 May. A delayed constitution is better than a fatally flawed and undemocratic constitution.

Read also:
Lost to the land, ANURAG ACHARYA
Who cares?, DAMAKANT JAYSHI