The need of the hour in Nepal is not clarion calls for street politics or revival of gun culture which had claimed 16,000 lives and pushed the country into the vortex of poverty. The need of the hour in Nepal is consensus and unity to resolve the political crisis and to ensure good governance with a government of national consensus and a constitution that guarantees federalism.

For close observers of Nepal Maoists the split doesn’t come as a surprise.  Vice chairman, Mohan Baidya, and hard core radicals like Ram Bahadur Thapa ‘Badal’, C P Gajurel, Dev Gurung and Netra Bikram Chand ‘Biplab’ have been logger heads with the ‘establishment’ represented by party supremo Prachanda and Prime Minister Baburam Bhattarai.   Within the establishment also, there are faultlines with Prachanda not seeing eye-to-eye with Bhattarai

One issue that gave big handle to Kiran group was induction of former combatants into the Nepali army.  Bhattarai went ahead with the ‘integration’ rejecting all objections since he saw the rehabilitation of the guerillas as the first step taking the peace process forward. He was also conscious of the fact that dogmatic pursuit for radical changes had triggered the fall of the first Maoist government headed by Prachanda.

Kiran can be expected to galvanize the erstwhile Maoist foot soldiers as he goes about rehabilitating himself as the head of Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist). If he succeeds in this mission, notwithstanding the big if, it will spell more violence targeted at non-Maoists. Since his core philosophy revolves round ant-Indianism, Delhi will have to be on guard against possible violence targeted at Indian interests in Nepal and exodus from Nepal.  

Already, Mohan Baidya has gone into an over drive saying that India has been ‘encroaching on Nepal’s territory’ and is ‘interfering in our economic, social and political affairs’. He has demanded scraping of Nepal-India Peace and Friendship Treaty of 1950, and withdrawal of permission to Indian companies to construct Upper Karnali and Arun Third hydropower projects.

More than the fall-out on India, what is of concern is the split’s impact on Nepal’s politics. Because, Kiran’s party has rejected two key Prachanda decisions -one accepting the “democratic republic” line in 2005 and two and signing the Comprehensive Peace Agreement in 2006. Both decisions are major mistakes of the Maoists, according to him, who claims that the objective circumstances are ‘favourable for a revolution’ and it is time to ‘create the subjective circumstances for revolution’.

Interestingly, Baburam Bhattarai became the Prime Minister last August with the support of Mohan Baidya ‘Kiran’. Today, for Kiran, Bhattarai along with Prachanda is a ‘neo-revisionists’ and agent of ‘expansionists’.

 Their fall-out was hastened by combatants’ issue, particularly handing over arms belonging to Maoist combatants to the Nepali army and their eventual induction in the regular army. On April 10, the government decided to hand over the cantonments where the combatants were housed to the Nepal Army.

Mohan Baidya was incensed and thundered that the entire process was ‘surrender and disarmament’. He is now charging Prachanda-Baburam combine with ‘sabotaging the achievements of Peoples War and Peoples Movement’ by dissolving the Peoples Liberation Army.

How the Nepalese Army (NA) will react to the emerging political situation? Will it stand by the caretaker government or do the bidding of President Dr Ram Baran Yadav. The issue sparked of an animated discussion after Unified CPN (Maoist) Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal  ‘Prachanda’ said publicly that the Maoist party had already won the confidence of the NA and the latter would not support President Dr Ram Baran Yadav if the latter decided to sack the caretaker Government from office.

Responding to these remarks, the Nepal Army has come out openly to declare that its will maintain its non-political character. It issued a rare statement on June 14 claiming that the institution would remain under the control and supervision of the Government and abide only by its legitimate directives.  The statement released by NA’s Public Relations Directorate said that since NA is a national army with a non-political character, it will remain under the control of the Government. The NA has also asked all concerned not to believe in rumours..

A Maoist party politburo member Hari Bol Gajurel has an interesting take. In an interview with a local TV channel, he said: ‘In politics no one supports the other without any political gains. India is no different. Look unity and disagreement are a dynamic process. We had good relations with India during 12-Points Agreement. We had the international support at that time. With India, the relation turned sour when Prachanda became the Prime Minister. ……’.

A close confidant of Prachanda, Gajurel is advancing conspiracy theories for the Maoist split, which was ‘a grand design’. According to him, the split was plotted by none other than Revolutionary Internationalist Movement (RIM) with its headquarters in the United States. “The Baidya group is anti-peace and anti-constitution. They had been trying for long time in coordination with RIM to split the party.”

It will be no surprise if more such conspiracy theories are heard in the days to come amidst demands for the resignation of Baburam Bhattarai’s caretaker government. The unfolding political upheaval has the potential of upsetting the parliamentary elections slated for later this year.