Relevance Of BP’s Policies

Yuba Nath Lamsal

The Nepali Congress observed recently the national reconciliation day reminiscing and paying rich tributes to its founding leader and ideologue BP Koirala. Much has been said and written about BP and his reconciliation policy. But little has been done to assess and evaluate BP’s works and contribution from independent and realistic approach.

There are two extreme views on BP. A group of people and writers see BP as a super human being who does not make any mistake. This group of people finds no faults and weakness in BP. In their views, only eulogy can be seen which does not contain anything about BP’s weaknesses, mistakes and failures. This group consists of those who are either members of the Nepali Congress and its supporters and sympathizers.

There is another group of people that always find only negativities in BP Koirala. Their views are based on sectarian concept and ideological bias. This type of group consists of leftists, communists, ultra-rightists, feudal and ultra-nationalists, who have always tried to demonize BP grossly ignoring his contribution to political consciousness, democratic movement and patriotism in Nepal. Both of these are extremist views which have either not been able to understand BP Koirila and his political orientation properly or have deliberately tried to mislead the people about him. Both the views have done injustice to BP and his contribution to Nepal’s democratic movement and his patriotic orientation.

BP is, without any shade of doubt, a towering political personality of Nepal. In the political scene of Nepal, none has reached the intellectual and political stature of BP Koirala. There are always three kinds of people in the political leadership everywhere in the world. They are political bosses, leaders and statesmen. The first type of people belongs to a category of political bosses, who hardly rise above factional interest. The people belonging to the second are called leaders, who are concerned only with their own party, party members or supporters of the party. They never rise above the partisan interests. And the third category consists of statesperson, who looks at things from broader national perspective.

In Nepal we have mostly first types of people. Most of the people in the political parties who claim to be leaders are merely political bosses who behave like tribal and sectarian leaders. The political bosses are more concerned with the interest of a particular clique and supporters of this group within a party or organization and have got nothing to do with even their own party let alone the interest of the country and the people at large. Be it in the government or the parties, political bosses are running the show at present. This is the reason why factions and sub factions are being created in all parties in Nepal and parties are being split and re-split. All political parties of Nepal are either already split or are on the verge of fragmentation. The Madhesi parties have been split to almost a dozen small groups. The RPP, which was once a single entity, has been divided into three parties. The UCPN-Maoist has three distinct factions and all these factions are functioning as though they are separate parties. There are several other sub-groups within every faction. The factional fighting is also fierce in the Nepali Congress. Two factions—one led by party chairman Sushil Koirala and the other by senior leader Sher Bahadur Deuba—are visible and both the leaders and factions are at the loggerheads to eliminate the other. Similar case is with the CPN-UML. Although some efforts are recently being made from its leaders to patch up their differences and discourage factionalism, factional fighting is equally intense in the CPN-UML. Party chairperson Jhalanath Khanal and KP Oli have recently come closer turning the triangle power struggle into straight fight between the two groups. Madhav Nepal and his faction have already crossed swords against the Khanal-Oli group.

The ones that are in the political limelight at present are either political bosses or leaders. The number of political bosses is more than that of the leaders. There is none in the political spectrum of Nepal who can be called a statesman. Even in the past, we had hardly anybody who possessed the quality of a statesman. Only BP was close to the stature of a statesman. A statesman always rises above factions and parties. A statesman is concerned with the overall interest of the country and the people.

So far is BP is concerned, he is the tallest political personality and intellectual figure Nepal has ever produced. BP has two personalities. One is his literary personality and the other one is the political one. In literature, he is one of the top class writers of Nepal. As a political figure, his contribution is huge in Nepal’s democratic movement and diversification of Nepal’s foreign policy. Also BP is an ideologue who advocated political philosophy which, he thought, could be best suited in Nepal’s context. Politically, BP believed in democracy that guaranteed individual liberty, human rights and political activities. But he was opposed to capitalist political model because it denied the people equal access to resources and opportunities. He advocated socialist economic model that could ensure economic justice and equality and ultimately eradicate poverty and backwardness in Nepal. He, thus, borrowed the concept of democratic socialism, which was propounded by Germany’s Willy Brandt and followed by many in the world including some Indian leaders like Jaya Prakash Narayan.

Although democratic socialism was in vogue in different countries in the world, it was a new concept in Nepal when BP first advocated it. At that time, a communist party had already been established in Nepal and its influence was growing fast. BP had thought that if poverty and backwardness remained unaddressed in Nepal, the influence of communism would be stronger and the fate of Nepali Congress political ideology would come under threat. BP had also seen the growing influence of communist philosophy across the world. Even in our own neighborhood like China, communist revolution had succeeded and communist party’s rule established. BP’s democratic socialism was aimed at checking communist influence in Nepal.

Although BP advocated democratic socialism and also incorporated as his party’s guiding political doctrine, democratic socialism was never practiced by the Nepali Congress. Democratic socialism remained a showcase object of the Nepali Congress. Instead, the Congress after coming o power in 1990 adopted ultra capitalism.

BP was no doubt a greatest political personality. He was an ideologue, a great patriot, a man of high intellect and stature and also a visionary leader. But he had some inherent weaknesses, which failed BP in practical politics. BP always championed democracy and political freedom in Nepal but he could never see it in his life time. Even when he led the elected government in 1959, his premiership was short-lived because king ousted him from power by a bloodless coup. BP trusted every one easily. He trusted the monarchy too much. Even after he was ousted from power and put behind bars, he always championed monarchy. It was BP’s first weakness. BP was anti-communist and always saw threat from the communists, which was his second weakness. This anti-communist thinking always brought him closer to the monarchy and far from the leftist forces in Nepal. But monarchy never trusted him. Even when the communists proposed a united front and joint struggle against the monarchy, BP always rejected it, which gave longer life to the monarchy and the Panchayat system. Had BP agreed for a united front with the leftist forces and joint struggle, Panchayat could have been dismantled and democracy established even during BP’s life time. The united from and joint struggle became a reality only after BP’s demise. Ganesh Man Sing took the initiative for a united front and joint struggle in 1990 which overthrew the Panchayat regime and established multi-party democracy. Although Girija Prasad Koirala, too, was a staunch anti-communist until 1990s, he realized the necessity of the united front with the communists when the king again took over power and imposed absolute monarchy in 2003. It was GP Koirala’s initiative and leadership that the Jana Andolan II was launched which abolished monarchy and also initiated the peace process with the Maoists.

Against this background, BP and his contributions, policies including democratic socialism and national reconciliation and also his weaknesses and failure should be evaluated. So far as his national reconciliation policy is concerned; this was BP’s compulsion rather than his choice at that time because of his sour relations with the then Indian establishment particularly the Indian Congress and its leader Indira Gandhi. His closeness with opposition leaders like Jaya Prakash Narayan had annoyed Indian regime of that time and BP thought that it was better to face the wrath of Nepali government at home than the humiliation of the Indian establishment. Thus, BP returned to Nepal from his self-exile in India on December 30, 1976 with national reconciliation policy even risking his own life and liberty at home.