| Bam Dev: reform or resign! |
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No personal grudges against the Deputy-PM/Home Minister Gautam. Only suggestions for some reforms. In spite of his resolve to "combat crime", he hasn’t prevented one plague in our old "New Nepal": bandhs (strikes).
Return from Butwal recently (September 11) turned out a nightmare. Having no desire to become a highway-martyr to trucks not dipping their lights, I had planned to reach Kathmandu in daylight, around 5:30 PM. However, my plans went haywire at Gaindakot. Hundreds of parked vehicles indicated trouble. I inched my way to the Narayani Bridge. Three lads and eight lasses obstructed the highway with the bamboo barrier (used to stop vehicles for road-taxes), metal drums, big plastic jerry-cans, and ropes. I experienced "women empowerment" first-hand. These energetic, loud-mouthed lasses guided bicycles and pedestrians through narrow gaps. Rickshaws, motorcycles, four-wheeled vehicles couldn’t pass. When I tried to remove two jerry-cans to take my motorbike on to the bridge, a man with a green bamboo rod approached me. "Take off your helmet!" I reckoned he could smash my head easier that way. The striking dames counselled me, "The bandh will end at 4 PM. Why can’t you wait till then like all the others?" I told the man with the stick, "I wait not because I support you but due to compulsion." Later, I asked the girls enforcing the bandh, "Do you belong to the YCL?" Someone had killed a taxi driver in Kathmandu. He hailed from Chitwan. These lads and lasses were relatives. Why not appeal to the CDO? They had done so. The CDO himself advised them to block the bridge! I protested, "The Maoists killed my brother, but I didn’t disrupt traffic to make thousands suffer." This infuriated the girls. The stick-carrying man threatened to "thrash anyone who argues with us!" Backing off, I went to a phone-booth. To my surprise, a contingent of policemen lived about 150 yards from the bridge. I approached the gate of the compound, and asked the guard if I could meet the inspector. He inquired why. "I will ask your boss to arrest the strikers and lift this ghastly bandh!" He replied, "This isn’t our business. We don’t belong to Narayani Zone!" About thirty western tourists walked across the bridge and the barrier. They had left their heavy luggage in the vehicles that had brought them from Kathmandu. They hired a small bus to take them to the wild-life resort nearby. Some of them sitting on the roof shouted gratitude to their Nepali helper, "Thank you, Dipak!" Others hadn’t that fortune. About fifty Indian women pilgrims walked half a kilometre uphill to the adjoining jungle to urinate. Rickshaw drivers mourned they would go hungry that night. Even the striking chicks complained, "We haven’t eaten anything since morning!" Four in the afternoon struck after ages, then the horrific traffic jam. I would arrive home only around 9:30 PM! The bandh had totally irritated me. A bit before Malekhu, a bamboo barrier went down for the Rs 5 road tax. I muttered, "The government has no right to demand tax if it can’t control hooligans obstructing the road four hours!" After Gajuri, policemen stopped me to see my licence. "You guys can’t prevent a bandh; you just do the easy bit," I retorted. At Thankot, the cops looked at my bags to check if I carried drugs. "Smugglers don’t use the highway for that," I reminded them, "they have the jungle-paths!" The bandh in Siraha continues for its eleventh day (Sept 15). Giving pep-talks, Bam travels the country; but can’t control the Maoists causing havoc there. I had cautioned that any party joining the government led by Maoists would end up as their slaves. Now the Maoists have two vassals: UML and MRPF. UML’s Gautam can’t do a thing because the Maoists, the culprits in Siraha, can always use the "Shaktikhor treatment" (meted out to Ram Hari Shrestha). MRPF’s Upendra Yadav too finds himself helpless in Siraha for the same reason. Bam better initiate reforms for his own survival. Reform 1: Regard the obstruction of the highway by anyone a crime affecting thousands. If Bam can’t annihilate bandhs, he better pack up and leave as he did under a Koirala government. Reform 2: Consider lazy, do-nothing, card-playing policemen living near the bandh sites as criminals too. They should immediately arrest the strikers or face discipline. (Baudha police became a model to emulate. Some months ago, a simple lathi-charge at the "bandhwallas" cleared up the Baudha-Chabahil road.) Bam should fire policemen refusing to confront strikers, and he can start with the inspector at Gaindakot. Reform 3: Assure enough decentralization so that police at Narayanghat don’t wait for orders from Kathmandu to open up a blocked highway. Otherwise, the much touted federalism means nothing. Reform 4: Sack the CDO who encouraged the youths to obstruct the Narayani bridge. Bam should award a medal to the Baudha police-inspector. We already had two jokers as home ministers. The monarchical sycophant, Kamal Thapa, with liberty from his boss Gyanendra to squander even 5 million rupees daily, guaranteed his master reading time in Nagarjun. The ever-smiling Krishna Prasad Sitaula, proving powerless in front of the Maoists, assured NC a heavy defeat during the CA poll; and now can go to as many pilgrimages as he wants. If the bombastic Bam Dev can’t even introduce reforms to prevent bandhs, he better resign before he entrenches UML further in the Maoist ditch. Published on September 17 in TKP Newer...
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Last year, I encountered bandhs four times during travel: Adam Ghat, two places beyond Lahan, and Charaali on the way to Ilaam. Male hooligans at Adam Ghat disrupted my journey by three hours. At Charaali, lads threatened to burn my motorbike. 
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