It looks like the whole country is demonstrating on the streets. Ex-king Gyanendra has been attending rallies for the restoration of a Hindu monarchy in Kathmandu, teachers are on the warpath against federal control, striking doctors are protesting gang attacks on hospitals, activist Iih stood for 11 days outside Kathmandu City Hall protesting the mayor’s high-handedness. Meanwhile, on Monday in Birganj there was a different kind of street demonstration – for tolerance and harmony.&nbsp; The municipality took out the rally to douse communal clashes that flared up in Malangwa of Sarlahi district for four days this week, serious enough for a curfew &nbsp;to be clamped. &nbsp; In Birganj, businesses, intellectuals and politicians including Mayor Rajeshman Singh and Deputy Mayor Imtiaz Alam rallied for religious coexistence. Instead of saffron or green, they waved Nepal’s crimson double triangle. Read also: <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/borderlines/religiously-following-politics">Religiously following politics</a>, Chandra Kishore Madhes Province borders the Indian state of Bihar, and bonds of kinship, language, culture and trade bind communities in the two countries together. As India prepares for general elections next year, growing persecution of minorities there is starting to infect Nepal as well. Hindus and Muslims in Nepal have lived peacefully for centuries. My own ancestral home is in the village of Balara near Malangwa. My 80-year-old mother still lives there and remembers the Muslim woman who sold her glass bangles.&nbsp; Despite untouchability at the time, she was allowed right inside the house to fit bangles and give blessings to the family.&nbsp; Malangwa itself derives its name from Malang Baba, revered by both Hindus and Muslims. The frontier town is therefore a symbol of the age-old solidarity between the two communities. Its message: do not spread division and strife.&nbsp; Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/opinion/secularism-and-sectarianism/">Secularism and sectarianism</a>, Indra Adhikari  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20230929050940_e60a2fe1d15bd66a7181c733b2d10c42ad8a420a6e27a04301bfaac1418f6e1a.jpg" data-media-id="editor_2" data-image-id="20230929050940_e60a2fe1d15bd66a7181c733b2d10c42ad8a420a6e27a04301bfaac1418f6e1a" data-rendition-name="original" width="3000" height="2000" loading="lazy" alt="Page 1"> <figcaption>A rally in Bhaktapur on 24 September was attended by a flag-waving crowd, but in contrast, was for restoring Nepal's Hindu monarchy. Ex-king Gyanendra attended the event. Photo: SULAV SHRESTHA/DESH SANCHAR </figcaption> </figure>  I have just returned from Malangwa which is limping back to normal. But the clashes have opened new fears that the attempt to ignite religious tension could spread to other border districts.&nbsp; We know from other sectarian conflagrations that the initial spark is from rubbing religion and politics together to create friction. This is a volatile mixture, and can be fanned by exclusionary populism -- especially in the age of social media. Sadly, no religion has a monopoly on extremism, even ones that preach compassion. &nbsp; The strategy of religious zealots is to propel themselves to power by neutralising symbols of tolerance, and discredit those who stand for togetherness. The tactic is to weaponise social networking sites to drive a wedge, and divide society into ‘us’ and ‘them’.&nbsp; Economic problems, joblessness and disillusionment with politicians is prompting new forces to stoke religious animosity.&nbsp; Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/news/india-s-hindutva-politics-influencing-nepal">India’s Hindutva politics influencing Nepal</a>, Santa Gaha Magar The wind is blowing from the south this monsoon, and it is infusing ideas of majoritarian communalism. Let those who are fanning these flames be warned that they may well reap the whirlwind.&nbsp; The press should be playing a moderating check-and-balance role, but local media is itself spreading hate speech and extremism. In every crisis, there will be some brave souls who will act on their conscience. But we did not hear those voices amidst the extremist din in Malangwa.&nbsp; An ideological vacuum is turning Madhes Province into fertile ground for the religious right, and a laboratory against federalism and secularism. Nepal with its diversity cannot be a theocracy-- the state has to be a protector of all peoples and faiths. Secularism means the freedom of each Nepali to practice their religion.&nbsp; Such acceptance is anathema to those who want to mix religion and politics: they want us to distrust and hate each other. There is a lot of flag-waving going on, but at least the rally in Birganj showed that crimson is the new saffron and green. &nbsp; Read also:<a href="https://nepalitimes.com/editorial/faith-in-tolerance"> Faith in tolerance</a>, Editorial Chandra Kishore is a Birganj-based journalist who writes this monthly column Borderlines in Nepali Times. @kishore_chandra

Chandra Kishore

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Borderlines

Crimson, saffron and green

These are the forgotten Nepalis, who do not seem to matter to anyone in all three levels of government. Elected members of ward, municipal or provincial councils should be listening to them, but they do not.&nbsp;
The demand for federalism was first raised from these districts which were always treated as peripheral by Kathmandu. Yet, even after the provinces were carved out in 2015 to devolve decision-making, these families on the margins still do not count.&nbsp;
They are not powerless, they were never given any power. They are not voiceless, they are not allowed a voice.
The state does not need to move mountains to meet their needs. Their needs are simple: make the citizenship process easier, provide a hand pump in the village for safe drinking water, make sure the health post has a nurse, protect them from persecution from powerful castes.
Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/opinion/borderlines/fogbound-tarai">Fogbound Tarai</a>, Chandra Kishore
But the gap between Nepalis who have access to state services and those left out is widening. Grassroots democracy under federalism has not changed the fortunes of those at the grassroots. A new class of politicians is emerging who are riding identity-based provincial politics, but they have no time for the corner people who elected them.
The state’s legitimacy should stem from how much the perennially outcast, landless or Dalits are allowed to voice their concerns. Eight years after the Constitution, and two elections later, there has been no improvement in the condition of Nepal’s most underserved.
The problem of landless Dalits in the Tarai is different from others from this community in Nepal. Families are crammed inside mud and thatch huts come winter, summer or monsoon.
I ask them if the ward or municipality leaders they elected have ever visited, and they shake their heads. Provincial politics is just a proxy for Kathmandu’s bloated centralised system.
Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/feudal-federalism/">Feudal federalism</a>, Editorial
In these backwaters of the Tarai, political power comes out of the claws of excavators mining sand from rivers. Power is flaunted by hobnobbing with imported godmen, by ignoring the victims of loan sharks, or neglecting the neglected.
The Constitution guarantees freedom of expression. But that freedom means nothing to people not given the means to express themselves. Grassroots democracy was supposed to be the mechanism for them to be heard, but that channel has been muted by power brokers.
Local radio stations and media should have stepped in, but they are victims of self-censorship themselves. Media owners are hand in glove with the powers that they cannot hold to account. The social media sphere is too preoccupied with sharing selfies.
The local media should be the medium to amplify the concerns of excluded castes and classes, and be the solution. But it is a part of the problem. Local journalists are megaphones for the already rich and powerful, they have no time for those at ground zero.
Read also:<a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/opinion/borderlines/un-centralising-the-federal-structure"> Un-centralising the federal structure</a>, Chandra Kishore
These are families so deprived and abandoned they do not even have the resources or connections to march to Kathmandu to press their demands. Small people have small wants, but multiply these with the expectation of millions and it becomes a wildfire of outrage that can engulf those in the ivory towers.
A recent visit to the hinterlands of Madhes Province was a chance for me to hear about local governments engaged in local plunder. In paddy fields and roadside shacks, there was talk of corruption, extortion and a sense of abandonment. These districts in the plains used to be ignored by Kathmandu, now they are ignored by the local officials they themselves elected.&nbsp;
The movers and shakers of the Madhes regard genuine empowerment at the grassroots with suspicion, afraid that freedom will allow the anger to erupt one day.
And to distract public attention from this failure to address the needs of the neediest, politicians use aggressive intolerance and refuse to even acknowledge that the people they were elected to serve do exist. &nbsp;
Read also: <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/regular-columns/Analysis/how-decentralised-is-federalism,776">How decentralised is federalism?</a>, Kiran Nepal 
 
<a href="https://twitter.com/Kishore_chandra">Chandra Kishore</a> is a Birganj-based commentator who writes this monthly column Borderlines for Nepali Times.

The outcasts

Nepal’s poverty rate may have gone down, but hunger still stalks the land.&nbsp;
Here in the southern plains, paddy fields are parched due to a delayed monsoon, wells have gone dry and half-way through the rainy season only 40% of rice fields have been planted.&nbsp;
The eight districts of Madhes Province produce a quarter of Nepal’s rice, and the projected harvest shortfall this year has led to fears of inflation exacerbated by India’s ban on rice and wheat exports.
Covid, climate change and conflict have created a perfect storm of food insecurity. Record heat waves, droughts and storms have hit the northern hemisphere, and Russia exiting the UN-brokered grain export deal last week &nbsp;made the global fuel, food and fertiliser situation even more precarious.
Nepal’s carbon emission is negligible and the country is not involved in the Russo-Ukraine war, yet both crises have exacerbated food insecurity. And here in the Tarai, it is the most vulnerable families who are most affected.&nbsp;
Read also: <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/the-karnali-s-hunger-emergency">The Karnali’s hunger emergency</a>, Anita Bhetwal
“Who listens to us small people?” asks Nathuni Yadav in Dhanusa district near the Indian border, gesturing at yellowing seedlings on her cracked and sunbaked paddy patch that should be filled with water this time of year.&nbsp;
Better-off farmers have diesel pumps, but even these have gone dry because the water table has fallen on both sides of the border. It is not just the late monsoon and deficient rainfall that is to blame, over extraction of ground water and rampant quarrying and denudation of the Chure watershed are &nbsp;affecting the entire Nepal Tarai.
The northern areas of the district near the East-West Highway can still pump water, but farmers who depend on rain-fed agriculture have been badly hit.&nbsp;
Even border cities like Birganj with a population of 300,000 do not have water as hand pumps go dry, and there are reports of similar shortages in cities across the border in the Indian state of Bihar. The rain when it does fall, comes in brief torrents and not the usual longer light drizzles.
This year’s water crisis in the Tarai did not happen suddenly, there have been signs over previous years. Haphazard infrastructure, disturbance of the watershed and deficient rainfall reduced recharge of ground water, while over-extraction through deep drilling in Bihar and Nepal sucked up the remaining ground water.&nbsp;
Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/nepal-needs-to-plan-for-plenty-and-scarcity-of-water">Nepal needs to plan for plenty and scarcity of water</a>, Nepali Times &nbsp;
When Ram Baran Yadav went on a state visit to India as president, he had warned Indian leaders including the leaders of Bihar and Uttar Pradesh state that the destruction of the Chure would affect the Indo-Gangetic plains in Nepal and India.&nbsp;
This was the first time that a Nepali leader had raised this issue at such a high level in India. But neither has the Nepal government stopped stripping the Chure, nor has India curbed deep drilling for water. The Chure is a gigantic sponge that soaks monsoon water into the ground, but the little rain that falls now runs off its denuded slopes and the pumps lift what water is remaining underground.&nbsp;
The climate crisis is a water crisis, and access to water used to be determined by who bore deep wells for water. But even those with pumps do not have water, and the worst hit are the poorest families like Nathuni Yadav.
Nearly 53% of Nepal’s population now lives in the Tarai, which is also the country’s grain basket. The water crisis will affect food supply, which in turn will increase the push factor for migration. Dhanusha is already the district with the highest rate of out-migration and water scarcity will feed the vicious cycle – lack of food forces people to migrate, and because they migrate there is no one to grow food.&nbsp;
Bishow Parajuli, who till recently was the World Food Programme (WFP) representative in India, says food insuecurity needs short-, medium-, and long-term interventions.
Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/nepal-sets-ambitious-target-for-food-sufficiency">Nepal sets ambitious target for food sufficiency</a>, Ramesh Kumar
He says, “We need emergency response, especially to reach food to the most vulnerable populations. In the medium term we have to control food price inflation due to the Ukraine crisis and the Indian ban on exports, and in the longer term Nepal has no option but to re-farm fallow land, expand irrigation and increase agriculture productivity.”
Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal, who addressed the World Food Summit in Rome this week said all the right things about meeting the UN’s Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) to eliminate hunger by 2030.
But at the rate Nepal is going, zero hunger looks unattainable. Even without this year’s crisis, the proportion of children with wasting remained stalled at 12%, with Madhes and Karnali Province showing an even higher proportion of undernourished children at 30%.
The proportion of stunted children has dropped from 57% twenty years ago to 30%, but it is till double the SDG target of 15%.
Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/news/the-pandemic-of-hunger">The pandemic of hunger</a>

Grain drain

Nepal’s Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal’s three-day official visit to India starting Wednesday is being keenly watched in Kathmandu and these borderlands of the Tarai.
Relations between the two asymmetric South Asian neighbours at the moment are neither ‘chilly’ nor ‘warm’. Things have got a lot more cordial since UML Prime Minister K P Oli was replaced by a Maoist-Nepali Congress coalition led by Sher Bahadur Deuba in 2022.&nbsp;
The visit comes as Prime Minister Dahal tried to keep his shaky 9-party coalition intact, by even getting a presidential pardon this week for an MP convicted for the killing of policemen in Kailali in 2015.&nbsp;
Disillusionment with Nepal’s three mainstream parties has manifested in the rise of the independent RSP, while the RPP is trying to promote ex-king Gyanendra as a symbol of national unity, stability and the revival of a Hindu kingdom, hoping to ride the Hindutva wave in India.
Indeed, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s aggressive Hindu-right agenda is having a ripple effect across the border. Despite his BJP’s defeat in the Karnataka polls earlier this month, Modi seems to be on a roll because of India’s buoyant economy.
It has become somewhat of a tradition for a new prime minister in Nepal to fly to New Delhi on his first pilgrimage to pay his respects to rulers there, even if it is someone who is prime minister for the third time.
Questions have been raised about whether Dahal should necessarily &nbsp;follow this practice, but Dahal nevertheless cancelled what was to be his first visit to China in March to attend the Boao Forum in Hainan.
Dahal has to finely balance the need to appease Indian leaders to extract concessions on river projects, air routes, infrastructure assistance, while at the same time playing to the gallery back home by not kowtowing too much.
The chronic problem in India-Nepal relations has been a trust deficit in both capitals about each other. What does Nepal expect from India, and what does India want to do in Nepal? Bilateral relations should not depend on which leader or party is in power in New Delhi or Kathmandu, it should have continuity and be determined by what will benefit citizens of both countries.&nbsp;
In 2014, India had appeared to change its approach to Nepal by appearing magnanimous during Prime Minister Modi’s first visit, but the goodwill he built collapsed with the blockade and bilateral relations chilled as non-political actors started directing policy.
It will not work if one set of leaders in Nepal sanctifies India, while another vilifies it. This might serve their immediate political interest, but will do long-term harm to mutual ties. Leaders are also fickle and erratic in their stance: Prime Minister Dahal is the same person who during the conflict threatened to wage a ‘tunnel war’ against India.
Dahal’s visit to Delhi also comes at a time of heightened geopolitical tension in the region with growing Sino-US polarisation, India’s involvement in the Quad and the danger of Nepal being forced to choose sides between its neighbours. Nepal will need to deploy all its diplomatic skills to play its role in this new world stage.
India’s rulers may also need to ponder why the traditional close ties with Nepal have become frayed. True friends talk things over, and it is in the interest of both neighbours to rebuild trust. New Delhi strategists appear sanguine that whatever the noise on social media, its tactics in Nepal are working.&nbsp;
But many Nepalis still feel that India acts like Big Brother and pushes its weight around, promises a lot and delivers little. Dahal needs to take this up at the highest levels during his visit and obtain tangible results to reboot relations to at least 2014 levels.
Nowhere is the people-to-people relations between India and Nepal felt as keenly as in the Tarai. The open border, close cultural and family links and trade bind the two countries together.&nbsp;
However, even here there is a feeling that India is unfeeling. Every year, poorly-designed road, railway and flood control embankments in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh inundate Tarai towns. Every monsoon the Kathmandu media suddenly becomes ultra-nationalistic, laying all the blame on Indian state governments.&nbsp;
The Indian media also whips up anti-Nepal feelings by holding Nepal responsible for ‘unleashing water from its dams’ even though Nepal does not have any dams to let water out from and the border barrages are controlled by India.
Indeed, the national media (and increasingly social media posts) on both sides of the border are largely to blame for undermining the friendship between the people and governments of the two countries. Media should instead focus on evidence that embankment-building worsens water-logging in farms and towns on both sides of the border.
These floods are bound to get worse if the deforestation, sand mining and quarrying of the Chure Range resumes. Nepal will not just be exporting boulders and aggregates, but also increased sediment that will worsen floods and further lower the water table in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh.&nbsp;
In 2010, President Ram Baran Yadav raised the issue of Chure conservation during his visit to New Delhi, but the demand in India for raw material to feed its construction boom is so great that Nepali contractors with political patronage want to plunder the fragile Chure ecosystem.
Even when relations between New Delhi and Kathmandu were strained in the past, there was a belief that people-to-people bonds were strong. That narrative is now increasingly frayed. Indians and Nepalis are needlessly harassed by each other’s border security.&nbsp;
Nepal-India relations have always been defined by how well or badly governments in their capitals get along. Rather than Indian or Nepali people, leaders of the two countries determine the state of relations.
How well neighbouring countries get along is determined by geography, history, culture, trade, politics, religion. And those factors have kept ties across the border stable all these years, but Nepalis in the Tarai are asking: does New Delhi determine its policy towards Nepal by seeing how they will be affected, or by maintaining its influence on the movers and shakers in Kathmandu?
The marriage of Ram from India and Sita from Nepal are often cited to prove how close Nepal-India bonds are. The Buddha was born in Nepal but got enlightenment in India. But when leaders talk about Janakpur-Ayodhya, or Lumbini-Bodh Gaya, they seldom take into account the people who live there.
Bilateral relations should not be limited to periodic summits between the leaders of India and Nepal, they need to translate into action on the ground that makes the lives of the people of the borderlands more convenient and sustainable through better connectivity and environmental safeguards.&nbsp;
Chandra Kishore is a Birganj-based political commentator. His monthly column BORDERLINES appears in Nepali Times every month. &nbsp;@kishore_chandra

Nepal PM to India to reboot ties

On an extended visit to India recently, it was clear to me that the country has changed. There is an infrastructure building spree and the economy is vibrant. But underneath it all, there is an ominous undercurrent of intolerance, persecution of minorities and silencing of the media.
During the Ram Nawami processions on 30 March there were communal clashes in Bihar and elsewhere. Those taking part wielded knives and raised slogans inciting violence against other communities. Black-or-white media coverage of the events magnified the slant and hate speech.
Combining politics with religion is a volatile mix, and this has polarised the two communities in India as extremism by one side is met with retaliatory action by the other. There is a long history of Hindu-Muslim clashes in India, and some of it dates back to the divide-and-rule policy of colonial Britain. The bad blood of partition has not yet coagulated, and the riots following the Babri Masjid demolition and the Gujarat pogroms are still fresh in the collective memory.
Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/opinion/secularism-and-sectarianism/">Secularism and sectarianism</a>, Indra Adhikari
Despite our open border with India, these communal conflagrations did not affect Nepal much in the past. After all, Muslims have been living largely peacefully in Hindu-dominant Nepal even before it existed as a nation state.
But things are changing. Just like all the other things Nepal imports from India, some elements coming in from across the border are also importing bigotry and politically-instigated fanaticism.
This year’s Ram Nawami and Hanuman Jayanti processions in Madhes Province were laced with religious tension. They were much bigger than earlier years with more saffron flags, knives and swords on display. In Janakpur and Birganj, this exhibitionism of supremacy and an angry reaction from the other community could have easily turned violent.&nbsp;
Across the Tarai, car stickers, posters and flags now show the fearsome aspects of Ram and Hanuman instead of their benevolent avatar. Hanuman used to be shown lifting a chunk of the Himalaya to bring healing herbs to Ram wounded in battle with Ravana, or kneeling in supplication before his lord. But we are now seeing a fiercer Hanuman visage being imported from propagators of majoritarianism in India. There is a deliberate message in these depictions.
Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/tolerating-nepal-s-religious-tolerance">Tolerating Nepal’s religious tolerance</a>, Shekhar Khare
It is true what they say: gods reflect the personality of the humans who create them. It is when people use religious figures to propagate their political agenda that we push society to the edge.
There is now debate in India about this politico-religious fanaticism. We in Nepal have to be aware of what is happening in India so that the virus of intolerance does not spread across the border.&nbsp;
During the Covid pandemic two years ago there was an organised effort in India to blame Muslims for being superspreaders. Seeds of this were planted in the Nepal Tarai as well but, luckily, did not take root.&nbsp;
There is a danger of escalation on both sides of the India-Nepal border as hatred breeds more hate and various groups compete for a show of force on the streets. It takes only a spark to ignite this tinder-dry community at large.
Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/editorial/opium-of-the-masters">Opium of the masters</a>
Religious belief is a personal matter. Nepal’s Constitution gives every citizen the right to believe in whatever they want to. But when one group interferes with another’s right to worship as it sees fit, or when weapons are displayed threateningly and the visuals spread through social media -- that crossing the line.&nbsp;
With freedom comes responsibility. Unless the authorities in Madhes Province curb such threatening activity, Nepal will face tensions similar to the ones in Indian states during religious commemorations. Sacred observances will turn into festivals of fear and hate.
Nepal may have an open border with India, but the collective psychology of Nepalis is different than what prevails on the other side. Our traditional tolerance is now being disturbed by hate speech on social media platforms in India. This is creating a rift in Tarai society that could lead to violence.
The Nepali media has to be careful not to be a weapon of intolerance and fan the flames. There was a precedent for this in the 2007 Kapilvastu riots when FM radio stations were implicated.&nbsp;
Nepal’s municipalities need a strict code of conduct for religious processions. Hindu-Muslim religious harmony exists across a broad societal spectrum in Nepal. There are instances of joint religious observances. The Janaki Temple honouring Sita was built by Muslim artisans, and Muslims in many parts of the Tarai greet their neighbours in the morning with a friendly “Ram-ram”. Let no one disturb and distort this co-existence for narrow political ends.
Read also:<a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/saffron-surge-politics,3619"> Saffron surge</a>, Om Astha Rai

Religiously following politics

Borders do not just divide countries, they also join them. And few international borders are like the one between Nepal and India. Although the line on the map demarcates two sovereign nations, there is a shared history, culture and tradition that transcend the modern boundary. Culture has its own history and geography. While the state is busy managing and defending its frontier, people on both sides live in a borderless reality. Actually, all international borders should be like the one between Nepal and India. The boundaries among most European nations were erased with the Schengen agreement, but Europe itself has a hard border with those who are not members of this treaty kept out by Fortress Europe. Even the US-Canada border is not as open as the one between Nepal and India.&nbsp; The border pillars in the Nepal Tarai pass through rivers, farmlands and even cut across households. This frontier cannot erase the geography, religion, culture and lifestyle of the communities that live on either side that share surnames and family ties.&nbsp; It is to celebrate this trans-boundary bond that an annual मिथिला परिक्रमा circumambulation of the Mithila region is held. Pilgrims on this circuit travelled 107km in Nepal and 23km in India on the full-moon day of Phagu on 7 March. They start at the birthplace of Sita in Janakpur to the sites associated with Ram in Bihar state. Rajwati Devi, 78, has been doing the holy circuit every year for the past 18 years. It is an honour to accompany Sita’s डोली on foot with song and dance by day, and taking designated night stops, she says. For thousands of pilgrims like Rajwati Devi, the border does not exist. There are many festivals and traditions that bind Nepal and India, but the Mithila Circuit is perhaps the most meaningful in bringing together the peoples of the two countries on either side. The Purnagiri Mela in India’s Uttarakhand state is similarly significant. It is only after pilgrims from India pay their respects at the Sidhha Baba temple in the border town of Mahendranagar in Nepal’s western Tarai that their religious observance is said to be complete. For centuries, this pilgrimage has happened in March-April between two auspicious full-moon days. The most important cross border festival is, of course, Shivaratri, when hundreds of thousands of pilgrims from India join those from various parts of Nepal to congregate at Pashupati temple in Kathmandu.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20230327120340_0bf3a83e49528d26440e837756f4ab8f3d727e1cdedf688fc40f173440ecb756.jpg" data-media-id="editor_0" data-image-id="20230327120340_0bf3a83e49528d26440e837756f4ab8f3d727e1cdedf688fc40f173440ecb756" data-rendition-name="original" width="2250" height="1500" loading="lazy" alt="Nepal-india transboundary bonds 1"> <figcaption>A border pillar divides the village of Sirsiya of Parsa district in this view from India and Nepal. (Photo: Photo: Jiyalal Shah)</figcaption> </figure>  To be sure, every citizen has an attachment to their country. The importance of that sense of territorial belonging is not diminished by nationals of another country also sharing a link. Borders are geography, festivals like Mithila and Purnagiri are culture that has evolved organically over centuries before either of our nation states existed in their modern form.&nbsp; The Karatapur Gurudwara of the Sikhs fell on the Pakistan side of the border after partition in 1947. For the 550th birth anniversary of Guru Nanak four years ago, India and Pakistan overcame bilateral tensions to form a pilgrimage corridor for India's Sikhs to visit the shrine.&nbsp; If even India and Pakistan could agree on a transboundary matter, there is a lot Kathmandu and New Delhi can do to better facilitate cultural and religious exchanges between the people of our borderlands.&nbsp; Read Also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/news/people-to-people-at-india-nepal-border">People-to-people at India-Nepal border</a> Despite the open border between India and Nepal, travel, trade and communication can be streamlined even more for the people living on both sides. But their voices are rarely heard in bilateral meetings between Indian and Nepali officials when they discuss more ‘serious’ matters like hydropower, air routes or energy trade. There is still lot to be done to improve crossborder ties.&nbsp; One of the areas that needs urgent attention is the preservation of archaeological sites on both sides of the border. Ruins of ancients towns and monuments need to be excavated, relics like coins, religious objects that hold significance to both countries have to be preserved. These artefacts provide proof of the cross-cultural ties that existed before an international border divided us. Archaeologist Ashok Kumar Sinha from Bihar says the Indo-Gangetic plains that Nepal and India share has been settled since early human history, and has as yet undocumented sites showing the origin and evolution of pre-Buddhist cultures. There is a lot more India and Nepal can do to cooperate in archaeology. So far, most archaeological excavations have been done separately and in a largely ad hoc manner. This is a pity since the sites being explored are from a period when the civilization spread across the current territory of the two countries.&nbsp; The Simraungad kingdom spanned present day Bihar-Nepal, as did Kapilvastu. Mounds and buried ruins from ancient times lie waiting to be discovered so that we can trace back the origin of the Indo-Gangetic civilisation and the religions that evolved here. These site are common to India and Nepal, there is no point arguing about ‘our’ and ‘their’ here. Ram Sharan Agrawal, 78, is an archaeologist in Bihar and a strong proponent of joint excavations of significant sites along the border. But given the wave of ultra-nationalism on both sides, this may not be immediately possible. But it is precisely to dismantle populist nationalism that we need to dig into our past to find the common culture that unites us. Perhaps Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal’s forthcoming visit to India could be a start.&nbsp; Read Also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/police-track-india-nepal-elephant-trafficking">Police track India-Nepal elephant trafficking</a>

Nepal-India trans-boundary bonds

<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20230228150236/63fe11d19c7e80680e0da4f9jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="2048" height="1366"/><figcaption>Photo: SUMAN NEPALI</figcaption></figure>No one in the Tarai remembers the winter fog being this dense and lasting so long. They are used to summer heat and sultry monsoons, but not a ground-hugging fog so thick that the sun does not shine for days, sometimes weeks.There is no specific meteorological English term for the Indo-Gangetic शीतलहर, a phenomenon in which cold winter air saturates moisture at ground level. In the old days, the sun used to burn off the mist by mid-morning. But the spread of winter irrigation increased water vapour, allowing droplets to condense on tiny suspended particles in the soot and smog.People burning straw and buffalo patties in smoky fires to stay warm increase air pollution, thickening the fog further. The sun does not get a chance to heat the ground and the fog lingers for days on end. The people of the lowlands are just not equipped to deal with these intense cold waves.This murky miasma of winter is emblematic of Nepal’s current purposeless politics, with the 7-party coalition struggling to survive domestic and external efforts to dismantle it. The NC-UML rivalry over who gets to be the next president on 9 March is holding governance hostage.The coalition calculus has implications for the plains: CK Raut’s Janamat and the Tharu-based Unmukti Party in the western Tarai are also in the 7-party coalition, but neither is happy with portfolios.The media reports on the fog as a one-off event, not as a worsening trend. People are dying of exposure, but it is blamed on old age. It is not the cold that kills them, but poverty. Like all calamities in this disaster-prone country, it is the poorest who die first, neglected by society and state.This year’s शीतलहर fog has not been as severe as 2022's, but it has lingered longer. And now that the winter is nearly over, the government and the media will again forget about this annual disaster till next year.The fog closes schools, it affects crops, disrupts transport, and increases the incidence of respiratory infections and road accidents. People need to turn on lights in the daytime.“Commerce grinds to a halt, factory production drops, workers report sick,” Madhesh Province chair of FNCCI Ganesh Lath told me one foggy afternoon when Birganj was colder than Kathmandu.<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20230228150236/63fe11d59c7e80680e0da4fajpeg.jpg" alt="" width="395" height="550"><figcaption> </figcaption></figure>The people of the Tarai have been on a two-month hibernation. With the mercury now rising, they are stirring awake, but as usual the hardships will be forgotten until next winter.There is not much we can do in the short-term, but precautions and relief measures that can be put in place.With weather extremes induced by the climate crisis, the fog is likely going to be thicker and last longer in coming winters. More than 52% of Nepal’s population lives in the Tarai, and many parts of the plains have a lower per capita income than corresponding regions to the north.An entrenched caste system and gender ostracisation means that the ‘lower’ castes and women bear the brunt of cold waves. Those affected by monsoon floods in Kailali were still in makeshift camps when the fog persisted this winter, many of their children have pneumonia.<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20230228150236/63fe11d89c7e80680e0da4fbjpeg.jpg" alt="" width="2000" height="1333"><figcaption> </figcaption></figure>Almost every household in Madhes Province has someone working in India, the Gulf or Malaysia. Many villages have only women, children and the elderly, and they are the ones most at risk from the cold. The men are usually seen huddled around smokey fires, while the women work outdoors or in smoky kitchens.The provincial and federal governments need to prepare a hazard map of the Tarai for next year’s winter, and declare certain areas disaster zones. This is a calamity affecting more people than landslides and floods in the mountains.The Department of Meteorology and Hydrology must have localised forecasts, and there must be cross border cooperation. The fog knows no boundary, and some weeks this winter, it stretched from Peshawar in Pakistan to Chittagong in Bangladesh right across the Indo-Gangetic plains.Waiting till next December will be too late to save lives. Urgent action needs political will, which is in short supply in the present government dysfunction.

Fogbound Tarai

<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20230208140216/63e3a0b79c7e80680e0d704djpeg.jpg" alt="" width="1400" height="807"/>Nepal’s 2015 Constitution took two elections and more than a decade to write. Even then, it did not address a groundswell of identity consciousness and demands for autonomy.Some of these were overlapping claims for ethnic, linguistic, religious, cultural and geographical belonging. During this sometimes-volatile process, the one factor that moderated the discord was the move towards inclusivity.There is a Maithili saying in Nepal’s plains “चले थे हरि भजन को, ओटन लागे कपास”. It means ‘No matter how lofty your goals, keep yourself busy with the small details.’Eight years after the Constitution was promulgated, and after the second elections under the federal system, we are still trying to make federalism work. It is a work-in-progress.It is not enough for Nepal to be declared a ‘federal’ republic. The essence of federalism is to include Nepalis who have historically been excluded in the political process. The people want devolution that grants their province autonomy to make their own decisions.Read also: <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/regular-columns/Analysis/how-decentralised-is-federalism,776">How decentralised is federalism?</a> Kiran NepalYet, even after the November 2022 elections in which a sizeable section of the electorate cast protest votes against established parties — and despite affirmative action provisions in the Constitution — provincial governments are anything but inclusive. All seven provinces recently nominated Chief Ministers, but where are the women? Where are the Dalits and the Indigenous people?The movers and shakers in the provinces already have access to the corridors of power at party headquarters in Kathmandu. It is the people at ground level, those kept out, and those without connections who want grassroots government.The process of putting together provincial governments directly reflects the wheeling dealing and patronage at the centre. This means governance will once more be a challenge, and without it there is no hope for the neglected and left-behind.It is not just the Madhes that needs federalism. Having an autonomous local government brings representatives closer to the people — no matter which province. Party cadre also get to practice the exercise of power and show accountability.Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/feudal-federalism/">Feudal federalism</a>, EditorialBut by far the most important function of federalism is that it is effective in delivering appropriate and locally relevant development with accountability.But November’s election threw up people’s representatives who do not like federalism, and some who want to abolish it. One cannot just turn federalism on or off with the flick of a switch. It does not work like that.The exclusionists reject principles and ideas of devolving decision-making to local governments, and want a shortcut to political power for themselves and their cabal by trying to make a self-fulfilling prophecy that federalism is an expensive white elephant.Rejecting devolution is rejecting democracy. After all, democracy is not just a state governing mechanism, it is a social ideology, even a philosophy of national life.The Constitution has tried to put the country on track to true devolution to provinces, but dog-eat-dog politics has been derailing this exercise.Read also: <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=13361#.Y8yt4-xByrc">Ethnicity-based federalism?</a> Keshab Suryabansi MagarThis week is the anniversary of the Madhes Movement that allowed Nepal to move towards federalism. The second Movement was mediated by India, and in the third, it started showing who is boss.Indeed, India’s role in Nepal’s political evolution is hardly hidden. But lately, one sees a drop in interest in Madhesi sentiments not just in New Delhi but even in Patna or Lucknow.Recent political undercurrents are eroding the gains of the Madhes Movement. The relationship between Madhesi leaders and their electorate is being eroded fast, and unless there is new commitment to the cause, it could see a complete reversal.That is because there is now no relation between what is promised at election time and what is accomplished. An anti-incumbent wave is also sweeping the plains. Those who espoused extremist views, took up arms, or were separatists have decided that a middle political path is a better alternative.Those who used to be moderates have therefore had the rug pulled from under them. There is now only one kind of politics in the Tarai: one that reflects the interests and aspirations of citizens.Read  also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/opinion/safety-valve-politics/">Safety valve politics</a>, Chandra KishoreConservative forces are trying their best to roll back the gains of the Movement, and within the Madhes the big national parties are also elbowing their way into the fray. Both will ultimately undermine the Madhes agenda.What the Madhes wants is respect for its language and culture, genuine inclusiveness, sustainable development, streamlined access to state services. But the comforts of power have made Madhesi politicians status quo-ists, they are wallowing in the political muck of their own creation.In the coming decade, Madhesi politics is set to change. A new post-1990 generation is coming of age which has seen both struggle, and its futility. The new generation is aware of the factors keeping the region back, it has understood the geography of Nepal and the place of the plains in it.This new generation has a very clear idea about the political-economy of the borderlands. Their slogans are different, and so is the way they look at politics.The Nepali nation state is now at the crossroads. It cannot look back, it must forge a more progressive path ahead. For that, friends of federalism must work to make the provincial political structure deliver. And the pre-requisites are inclusiveness and good governance.Chandra Kishore is a Birganj-based political commentator. This is his second monthly column BORDERLINES in Nepali Times.  @kishore_chandra

Un-centralising the federal structure

<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20230112100132/63bfd47a9c7e80680e0d30aajpeg.jpg" alt="" width="960" height="640"/><figcaption>Photo: GOPEN RAI</figcaption></figure>Just as outmigration of Nepali youth is a safety valve that lets the government off the hook to find jobs for them at home and the money they send home is the country’s economic lifeline, this year’s elections served as a political safety valve.Economic frustration can easily turn into political unrest, and the election of various independent, excluded and previously outlawed individuals has helped release some socio-political tension.There were many ups and downs with implementation of the 2015 Constitution, but it did channel accumulated grievances through political representation for those left out in the past.To be sure, the established parties still hold sway. Proof of this was the election of Sher Bahadur Deuba as leader of the Nepali Congress (NC) parliamentary party, which paves the way for his sixth term as prime minister.But the elections in 2022 also allowed Nepali voters to vent their fury, and bring in the likes of Balen Shah in Kathmandu and Rabi Lamichhane in Chitwan.Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/government-of-the-leaders-for-the-leaders-by-the-leaders/">Government of the leaders, for the leaders, by the leaders</a>, Shristi KarkiThe polls have even provided new political space for former Madhes separatist C K Raut, and for the indigenous Tharu community of the Tarai to carve a separate political identity for their Janamat Party.Just the presence of these personalities and parties will not be enough to bring meaningful change, but their representation is the first step in righting past wrongs.The Constitution may be flawed and incomplete, but it has recognised Nepal’s ethno-cultural diversity to a limited extent. There is a difference between diversity and division. Nepal’s ethnic, linguistic, and religious mosaic is in fact our nation’s social capital, our cultural wealth.The role of elected representatives now is not to try to meld, but manage this medley. Nepalis are now politically astute, and cannot be pushed around. The goal of the new Parliament must be to broaden this awareness so it translates into inclusive and equitable progress.Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/opinion/caste-vote/">Caste vote</a>, Chandra KishoreDeuba defeated Gagan Thapa to lead the NC party by the vote count, but he lost at the moral level. Gagan has rightly gauged the national mood for generational change not just within the NC but in the other old parties. He has shown that internal party democracy is necessary to safeguard Nepal’s democracy.Unlike Deuba, there were no rivals for Pushpa Kamal Dahal and K P Oli from within their parties because they sidelined all potential adversaries long ago. But the Maoist and UML parties are already feeling the aftershocks of Gagan Thapa’s challenge to Deuba. Many young turks are thinking: if he can do it, so can we.The rise of the RSP and RPP in November elections also show that there is a socio-political churning afoot in Nepal. There is disenchantment in a section of the electorate with federalism, republicanism, and secularism — the three pillars of the 2015 Constitution.  The rout of Madhes-based parties which were at the forefront of the federalism struggle was a rude awakening.Nepal now needs a stable government that can deliver. But the NC needs support from smaller parties, which means more backroom deals. A NC-UML coalition, on the other hand, would make them too dominant and drown out new voices.The Nepali people in their wisdom have sent a strong message to the established parties: you may continue to be in power, but your days are numbered. Voters also reaffirmed their trust in the democratic system to give voice to those historically deprived of it, and the main parties will disregard this at their own peril.Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/in-with-the-new-out-with-some-of-the-old/">In with the new, out with (some of) the old</a>, Anita BhetwalChandra Kishore is a Birganj-based political commentator. This is his second monthly column BORDERLINES in Nepali Times. @kishore_chandra

Safety valve politics

<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/2022120710128/639058939c7e80680e0ce1adjpeg.jpg" alt="" width="3000" height="1947"/><figcaption>TIME FOR CHANGE: A rickshaw drives past Birganj's iconic clock tower on Thursday morning, as the plains districts bordering India prepare for a lacklustre elections. PHOTO: JIYA LAL</figcaption></figure>An election is a political process that allows citizens to select the most honest and efficient candidates to manage the country for a given period. It is also a public process that affects a nation’s social psychology.With days to go before the 20 November elections, party strategists, media pundits, and even strangers in buses are obsessed with the arithmetic of elections. This win-lose analysis distracts us from the social polarisation, communal friction and competition for natural resources that underlie the polls.Elections alone do not ensure democracy. Social media now provides unprecedented immediacy and amplification to manipulate public opinion.This election is a battle of two coalitions at the federal and provincial levels. Amidst the cacophony, young independents are trying to find a voice. The slogans have added a new vocabulary to the Nepali language and the country’s social ecosystem in an election devoid of ideology or agenda.Voter apathy is high because unholy alliances have turned yesterday’s foes into friends, and few candidates talk about their everyday concerns like jobs, inflation, education and health. Unlike previous elections, very few Nepalis working in India have returned home to vote.Read Also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/dejected-voters-reject-polls/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Dejected voters reject polls</a>, Anita BhetwalMore than half of Nepal’s population now lives in the Tarai. And across the plains, there is little mention of the Madhes Movement for autonomy. The past five years have given the people of Madhes Province little to celebrate, as their leaders sway with the political wind to switch allegiances to Made-in-Kathmandu coalitions.The JSP and the LSP cannot rely on block votes from traditional loyalists in the plains anymore. So, the ballots could go to those who dole out cash, spread lavish feasts, or appeal to caste allegiance.Even though candidates are not directly using caste as a basis for votes, it is an unspoken strategy at the hustings. Even more than in previous elections, and just like in Bihar across the border, political parties are falling back on caste vote banks because of the absence of party ideology. Political analysts have to factor in caste in poll forecasts.Because the coalitions are not fighting about principles and livelihoods, the real competition is more about caste and cash than in previous elections in the Tarai. Raising the caste issue allows candidates to mask their incompetence and duplicity.Even though traditional politicians are relying on caste, feasts of rice and raksi, or handouts for votes, there is an undercurrent of deep disillusionment – especially among younger voters here.Read Also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/voters-cynical-about-electoral-alliances/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Voters cynical about electoral alliances</a>, Namrata SharmaI ran into 80-year-old Digambar Chaudhari in Rautahat who has seen many elections in his time. He told me: “The caste vote banks are not as solid as before, not everyone can be bought with cash.”At a tea shop in Siraha, I heard a catchy election slogan: “जातपर न भातपर ,मोहर लगाऊ विकासके बातपर” (Vote for development, not for caste or rice curry). In another roadside stall, we heard “पैसा, सेकुआ आउर दारू, इसबके मारी झाड” (Let’s sweep away all cash, roast meat, and booze).Manju Bhattarai, 36, sees the election as an opportunity to reject candidates who are buying votes: “We can change things by being responsible voters.”We do not know if these four vignettes represent the larger Tarai picture, but conscious voters are determined to make their ballots count. Politics usually impacts the social structure of a society, but we may be seeing a changed social milieu affecting politics this time.Watching door-to-door campaigning in these borderland towns, I noticed voters were not as passive as before. They engaged directly with candidates, cross-questioning them. Some were Dalits who earlier would have assured a party middleman of their community’s votes in return for cash or food.Read Also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/depending-on-independents/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Depending on independents</a>, Shristi KarkiMany voters, especially from poor and marginalised communities, are not just listening anymore. They are asking candidates how they plan to fulfill their promises to improve their lives in the coming five years.Chandra Kishore is a Birganj-based political commentator. This is the first of his monthly column BODERLINES in Nepali Times. @kishore_chandra