New Delhi
20 August 2005
Maoists waging a war against the Monarchy in Nepal have found
an unlikely ally in Madheshis, as people of Indian origin living in the Himalayan
kingdom called by the locals.
Launching a campaign for "full-fledged democracy", "equality in state structure" and
"honourable living conditions", Mr Rajendra Mahto, general secretary of Nepal
Sadbhawana Party (A) and a former member of Nepalese parliament, has said the
Madheshis "believe that the 'Constituent Assembly' be elected to formulate a new
Constitution so that the discrimination against more than half of country's 'Hindi
speaking Madheshi' population is removed and Maoist problem is also solved".
Mr Mahto has written letters to ministers in Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's Cabinet,
members of the Rajya Sabha and the Lok Sabha besides political parties and members
of civil society, seeking India's help to end the discrimination against his ilk, who
constitute more than a third of Nepal's population.
The letter contains a seven-point charter of demands including raising of a Madheshi
Battalion by the Indian Army, similar to the Gorkha Regiment, so that that compels the
Royal Nepalese Army (RNA) to lift an undeclared ban on recruiting Madheshis. The
excuse offered for not recruiting the Madheshis in the RNA is that they are not recruited
even by the Indian Army so to dispel that argument, he writes, a Madheshi battalion is
required to be raised by the Indian Army.
The other demands are: national language status to Hindi, national dress status to Dhoti
and Kurta, issue of citizenship certificates to Madheshis, establishment of a federal
structure of government based on geographical and cultural affinity, delimitation of
parliamentary constituencies on the basis of population and Constitutional provision for
reservation in every sphere of life.
Observing that the Madheshi population was politically, economically, socially,
culturally and linguistically discriminated against for centuries, Mr Mahto says the
discrimination "is at its peak today" because the Madheshis "are also fighting against
the King".
The 2000 census pegs the population of Nepal at 2.31 crore of which more than a third
are Madheshis, who live in the Terai region. There are only 41 Madheshis out of 205
members in the Pratinidhi Sabha or lower House of Parliament.
"For the so-called nationalists of Nepal, the real problems of the Kingdom are Hindi,
Hindustan and more than one crore Hindi-speaking people, physically resembling the
Indians," he adds.
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