Democracy For Nepal

Friday, September 04, 2009

Awadh, Chitwan, Bhojpura, Mithila, Kochila = Madhesh

After the Madhesi Kranti of February 2007, the Maoists punished the Madhesi people for the uprising by breaking up their own proposed Madhesh state into five parts and foisting Pahadi Bahuns to look after each of them in that party's internal structure. That mistake has to be undone. One unified Madhesh state has to be created. Chitwan is part and parcel of the Terai plains. Biratnagar is part and parcel of the future Madhesh state.

Seti, Karnali

Seti-Mahakali, Bheri-Karnali. Why double names? Why not just Seti and Karnali?

The Idea Of A Dalit State

When D B Sagar B.K. spoke at this event in NYC not long back, he suggested the idea of a Dalit state. He said a big chunk of my proposed Khasan state had the Dalits as the largest group. So why not have a Dalit state? I agree. Why not?

Tek Gurung's Event At Yak
An Afternoon With Prdip Giri
A DaMaJaMaKha Panel

In The News

NWPP proposes Dang Valley as Nepal's capital NepalNews
Maoists propose dividing country into 13 states; UML, NC yet to table proposal three-states based on regional division – Seti-Mahakali, Bheri-Karnali, and Madhes and the rest based on ethnicity – Tharuwan, Magarat, Tamuwan, Tamsaling, Newa, Kirat, Limbuwan, Kochila, Sherpa and Bhote/Lama. ......... During CA elections, the party had proposed 11 provinces after splitting Kochila from Limbuwan and Abadh from Bhojpura. This time, the party has added Bhote/Lama in the western and Sherpa in the eastern mountains. The proposal has merged Awadh, Bhojpura and Mithila regions to call it Madhes province. ........ autonomous localities within the autonomous provinces based on ethnicity. Seti-Mahakali region will have two such localities, Bheri-Karnali two, Magarat three, Tamuwan nine, Tamsaling 12, Kirat five, Limbuwan eight, Kochila nine, Madhes four, and Tharuwan two. ............. protected regions for tribal groups such as Raute and Kusunda. ....... four geographical and administrative units. They are Ridhi, Tamakoshi, Narayani and Bijayapur. ............. the geographical and administrative units will be governed by the central government. ........ transform the existing 3,914 village development committees into 800 to 900 districts so that people will have easy access to the district headquarter.

CA committee finalises revenue sharing under federalism customs duty, value added tax (VAT), corporate income tax and personal income tax will be under the central government. ....... The provincial governments have been given the power to collect transport tax, land revenue, property tax and business tax. ........ Excise duty has been proposed to be shared between the provincial and central government while service charges, royalty from natural resources and penalties are proposed to be shared among all three levels of government. ....... entertainment tax and land and building registration charges are to be shared between provincial and local governments.

Tuesday, September 01, 2009

Zenni Optical: High Fashion Eyeglasses

Remember Zenni Optical during this back to school season when you are shopping around for glasses for your children. Do you have children who wear glasses? Do they sometimes break them or lose them? Or perhaps even often? Does that end up costing you a lot of money? Are you looking to be able to afford ($ 8 Rx eyeglasses) fashionable glasses for your children?

Monday, August 31, 2009

The UML Could Split

Image via Wikipedia

The UML is gearing for a split, it seems like. That is the impression I get.

Khanal and Oli show no signs of relenting. Both are gungho on their respective stands. And once the ball is set in motion, it is hard to stop it.

A split in the UML will lead to a certain fall of the Madhav Nepal government.

Increasing lawlessness in the country, political paralysis, Maoist intransigence: Nepal's peace process is going through a delicate phase right now.

My position is that we need to move towards a national unity, all party government.

Khanal, Oli factions hold parallel meets Republica

	UML under discipline crisis: Gyawali
	No constitution sans Maoists in govt: Gautam
	Rift in UML
	Oli fires back at Khanal
	Rift within UML deepening

Yadav praises Jha, flays SC Maoists ask him to resign
Gachchhadar could quit post to allow Maoists in govt “It was me who toppled the government after the Maoists began unnecessary debate on the army,” he said.
UML under discipline crisis: Gyawali

Tek Gurung's Event At Yak

An Afternoon With Prdip Giri
A DaMaJaMaKha Panel

Sunday, August 30, 2009

An Afternoon With Prdip Giri

I was excited enough to be a panelist on the event put together by Tek Gurung's organization. It was to be at Yak, Sunday, today, around noon. Then two days back I had an email from Somji, as in Somnath Ghimire. His organization was doing a tea reception with Pradip Giri, the email said. The event started at two. If I had not been a panelist with Tek's event, I would have skipped it, no second thought. But now I was in a dharam sankat. What to do? I shot an email to Somji. Start the event as late as you can, and keep it going for as long as you can. I will try and be there as early as I can.

A DaMaJaMaKha Panel

I showed up. The event was supposed to start at 11:30. Lunch for an hour, then the event. Instead the lunch started at 12:30. It might have been closer to one. Different cultures read time differently. Nepalis who are perfectly punctual to their America jobs will unfailingly show up late for Nepali events. Homesickness?

181 Photos From The Event
USNepalOnline Coverage

There are two camps in Nepali politics, the Maoist camp and the Democratic camp. Dr. Baburam Bhattarai is the obvious politician-intellectual in the Maoist camp, and Pradip Giri is that in the Democratic camp. I admire them both greatly.

I have liked Pradip Giri a long time now. It was great to finally be able to meet him in person.

He is versed in both the Western as well as the Eastern/Indian thinkers. And he is an original thinker. I find all that so very fresh. And it is great that he has also been a parliamentarian.

Somji and I concluded the day thinking we need to put together an event soon where Giri is the sole speaker and he gets a slot of three hours or so. Because the event started late, and so Giri's speech was as if cut short. Since there was another event on our heels at the same venue.

Friday, August 28, 2009

A DaMaJaMaKha Panel

(article sent to USNepalOnline)

I am honored to be a panelist for the United Nepalese Democratic Forum
event Sunday, August 30, at 11:30 AM at Yak in Jackson Heights. My
good friend Tek Gurung, the UNDF president, is hosting it. I have been
to many Nepali events in NYC the past four years. This might be the
first panel that has a DaMaJaMaKha presentation, as in Dalit, Madhesi,
Janajati, Mahila and Khas, and that is no small achievement. I can't
wait to show up and participate.

The topic for the discussion is New Constitution and Fundamental
Issues of Nepal. I think the number one issue is obviously federalism,
and there is the not so small matter of army formation.

On the army formation, I think it is for the parliament to discuss and
shape a Security Sector Reform bill. That bill will decide if Nepal
should have an army, if yes, how big, what should be the gender and
ethnic composition of that Nepal Army, how that composition has to be
achieved, and how to smoothen the transition of the leftover soldiers
from both the NA and the PLA into the private sector of the economy.
The US did that on a much larger scale after World War II.

On federalism it is a good thing that we have already decided we are
going for it. Now we have to work to decide on a map for it, and we
have to decide on the power distribution between the center and the
states.

I am for a eight state federalism: Tharuwan, Madhesh, Khasan, Magarat,
Tamuwan, Tamasaling, Newa and Kirat. Rapti to Mechi would be one state
Madhesh. That demarcation comes from the original Maoist map. After
the first Madhesi revolution, the Maoists decided to punish the
Madhesis by sending Chitwan off to a Pahadi state, and breaking up the
rest of the Madhesh into three sub states. That is not going to fly.

As for power distribution, there are a few key items on the agenda.
One, should we or should we not have a directly elected president? I
think we should. If no candidate gets at least 50% of the votes, a
second round election would be held between the top two candidates. We
need that arrangement for political stability, for a robust
federalism, and for a clear separation of powers between the three
branches of government. All budgets and bills will still have to be
passed by the parliament.

As for directly elected members to the parliament, half of those will
have to be from the Terai. So if we have 250 such MPs, 125 would be
from the Terai. And then there would be the indirect, proportional
election part to ensure a proportionate DaMaJaMa participation. This
is about one person, one vote. That is what democracy is about.

Writing a new constitution is not really that complicated. We have to
get it done and move on to the larger task of an economic revolution
for Nepal that will last a few decades. The country can be
fundamentally transformed for the better in 20 years.

(with John Liu, candidate for NYC Comptroller)

(at India Day Parade 2009, the largest Indian event outside India)

(at a Bill Thompson event, Bombay Palace, K Lounge)

(with Bill Thompson, first black NYC Comptroller, candidate for NYC Mayor)

(Madhesi Picnic, August 2009)

(an email from Madhav Nepal a few days before he became Prime Minister)

Tuesday, August 25, 2009

Breakup Of MJF Better For One Unified Madhesi Party

Don't take oath in Nepali: Madhesi parties Republica Madhesi People´s Rights Forum (Democratic), Madhesi People´s Rights Forum, Tarai Madhes Democratic Party, Sadbhawana Party and Nepal Sadbhawana Party (Anandidevi) participated in the meeting.

Now that the MJF has split into two, there is no one Madhesi party that is much, much bigger than the rest. And it is not like the MPs of the breakaway MJF faction are now working

Image by paramendra via Flickr

against the Madhesi agenda that got them elected in the first place. The Madhesi people have not lost any strength in the parliament. No strength has been lost for the work on the constitution.

Now you have two MJF factions and a TMLP that are all roughly equal in size. And you have two Sadbhavana factions that are relatively small. I feel like these five Madhesi parties are in perfect shape to attempt a unification at some point over the next few months.

Attempts have to be made over the next few months to do that work of unification.

Unification Of Madhesi Parties

At this point it is no longer obvious that if the Madhesi parties were to unify, who the leader will be. That might be a good thing for unification talks.

Madhes parties threaten to disrupt House over oath row Republica