KIRAN PANDAY
It's hard to see what else the Indian prime minister's special envoy to Nepal can do to untie the knot that Nepali politicians have got themselves into.

The fact that Shyam Saran was India's ambassador in Kathmandu and helped midwife the November 2005
12-point agreement between the seven parliamentary parties and the Maoists could mean he has a stronger sentimental attachment to his baby, and is therefore more committed to reviving the peace process.

It is now common knowledge that Indian intelligence sheltered and nurtured the Maoist leadership in Delhi during the war years. There are some in Nepal who say that India should clean up the mess it created. But that would be abdicating our own responsibility, and (more seriously) handing over our future political destiny to outsiders.

Indian operatives mollycoddled the Maoists, as they did the Tamil Tigers in the 1980s, to try to co-opt and control them. But the Maoists have become a pet that has outgrown its master. With the benefit of hindsight, Delhi probably realises it bit off more than it could chew. It now sees the Maoists as a threat to democracy not just in Nepal but India as well, and is in no mood to accept an unreformed Maoist party in a position of leadership in Kathmandu.
The slaughter of 11 more Indian police in a Maoist attack in Chhatisgarh on Wednesday is just the latest in a rapidly escalating war there that reminds us of the 2000-2001 conflict period in Nepal. The Indian insurgency is following a familiar pattern, and there are calls to deploy the army there, too.

The red carpet treatment India gave to Burmese junta chief Tan Shwe last week proves that despite talk of shoring up democracy in its neighbourhood, realpolitik is the name of the game. If the national interest, need for energy, or geopolitical considerations dictate hobnobbing with dictators, so be it. There's a whiff of a subcontinental version of the Kirkpatrick Doctrine here (we don't care if they are sons-of-bitches, as long as they are our sons-of-bitches).

What this all means for us is that instead of waiting for India, or anyone else, to rescue our politics and perennially look to Delhi for signals, we should put our own house in order. There is no point celebrating the fact that Nepal was never colonised in history when we hobble around on the regional stage with our tail between our legs. It is time to stop playing victim, something we are extremely good at, and make our own future.

By now Chairman Dahal must have realised that the only way he is going to get to be prime minister is by making a credible public undertaking that he is demobilising his fighters, dismantling his paramilitary and renouncing his goal of establishing a totalitarian people's republic through protracted war. His ultra-nationalism card and flirting with the ex-royals are just not working, they are backfiring on him.

There have been enough empty words and false promises, so this time the burden of proof will be on Dahal. He has, however, made his task even more difficult by refusing to reign in the violence of his cadres, and burning his bridges with Big Brother.

The future of the peace process, the new constitution and this country's long-term political stability needs the  Maoists to be on board as a demobilised and disarmed democratic party. This they must do to prevent their own self-destruction, and to prevent a collapse of the peace process.

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