90,000 CHILDREN AFFECTED BY SCHOOL CLOSURE ON ONE DAY Kathmandu, 19 May: The general strike called for one day in the name of undivided state or ethnic identity prevents around 90,000 children from their right to education, said DK Dhungana, General Secretary of the Private and Boarding Schools' Organisation, Nepal, RSS reports. Dhungana urged the bandh enforcers to be serious regarding the future of the school children and not to opt for bandh to pile pressure on authorities. Similarly, senior singer Komal Oli and Radhika Hamal said if the trend of accepting others' existence was developed the series of frequent strike would automatically end. Hamal was of the opinion that nationalism should untie all instead of creating division. Kamala Neupane, of PAV Media, Gopal Acharya of PABSON Kathmandu, right activists Subodhraj Pyakurel among others stressed for unity among all forces by considering the inevitability of federalism. Nnnn OPINION YOURS INCOMPETENTLY Kathmandu, 19 May: Pushpa Kamal Dahal, a.k.a. Prachanda, may be called the nation’s No. 1 “Mr I.” His outlook, style and approach all speak of the gigantic ego nursed. He outscores even the late Girija Prasad Koirala in this regard. The last three years have been far from smooth for the “revolutionary loktantrik” leader under whose leadership the ten-year Maoist war claimed 16,000 lives, Trikaal Vastavik writes in People’s Review. . In many ways, Dahal and Koirala share common traits. Highly self-centered, scheming and overbearingly vain, the Maoist supremo and the six-time prime minister had their ways in their respective parties for as long as the temperatures of disgruntlement did not reach a boiling point. Koirala chased away Nepali Congress founding members Ganesh Man Singh and Krishna Prasad Bhattarai in a humiliating manner. So much so that both Singh and Bhattarai publicly announced their dissociation from the party in the autumn of their lives. Today, Koirala is remembered more for his failures than the few positive points he possessed. He was the cause of the party’s when the splinter group was led by Sher Bahadur Deuba. Even when the two factions merged, there was never a heart-to-heart unity that was partly responsible for the debacle NC suffered in the 2008 general elections that saw Dahal’s party sideline the “oldest” party to a distant second place. Koirala did nothing to give a step-motherly treatment to the Deuba group. Dahal, like Koirala, saw himself as a one-man demolition squad, believing that he is the unquestioned leader of what he touted as the party destined to bring far-reaching developments in the country. But if wishes were progress, Nepalis would have overtaken not just the rest of the South Asians but the Europeans and the Americans long ago. When someone wishes that someone else wished that we progressed, we create a hitch-filled ditch never to be cleared in a cycle of crises and mutual recriminations. The situation will only leave us at the mercy of extraneous forces. Dahal has yet to recover from his heady days before being compelled to resign as prime ministerial, which he so painfully regrets to have had to vacate over the blunder he created in the Army Chief Katawal incident. It pains him immensely that he had to give away the post he came to enjoy so much to leaders of the third largest party in the parliament (Madhav Kumar Nepal and Jhala Nath Khanal of the UML) and his own deputy Baburam Bhattarai since autumn. Dahal has no one but himself to blame for the quick end that came to his government remembered for only the Katawal incident. He then shifted his winks and wrath alternatively at Baburam Bhattarai and Mohan Baidya, warming up to one and unleashing tirades against the other rotationally. The dirty linen washed in public was an audiovisual pleasure for rival parties and had demoralizing effects on the Maoist rank and file aching to find viable alternatives. Consequently, the actual height, weight and content of the Maoist organization came to be public knowledge causing a setback for the “truly revolutionary party.” The year 2068 B.S. saw Dahal’s image and reputation take nose-dive on a number of fronts. His own party cadres openly threatened the “leadership.” In party meetings, senior members were forthright in raising issues that pointed the finger of suspicion at the party boss who till sometime earlier seemed to be both infallible and unimpeachable. Issues of misappropriation of “billions” of rupees and amassing of huge personal fortunes were circulated within and outside the party and beyond the national borders. There were rallies and “dharnas” against the leadership and protest sit-in at the party office. Some other groups outside the party burnt effigies of the once much-hailed leader. When a few opposition cadres chanted slogans against him in the course of the 20008 elections, Dahal took note of it and mentioned it at a public function. These days either he is blind to criticisms against him or he does not have the nerve to defend himself against the frontal attacks. On the eve of New Year’s Day 2069 B.S. boasted that he had taken a bold decision on the integration of the Maoist combatants who had been placed in various cantonments to be fed, clothed and sheltered at taxpayers’ expenses. He said, “I have to say I took a big, bold decision.” For the “contributions” to the integration of the combatants, he did not give credit to anyone of his party colleagues or the organization, let alone leaders of other parties who doggedly pressed for so long to resolve the issue. He wanted to hog the credit for himself and hence the “I” did so. Were Freud living, he would have coined a special vocabulary to describe such trait. In making such claim, he characteristically did not take responsibility for the inordinate delay in settling the issue that was promised to be resolved two years ago. He wishes to bluff his way to “success” instead of tendering public apology for his foot-dragging for so long. For the integration that saw significantly far smaller number of volunteers joining the Nepal Army than those who opted for collecting the attractive lump sums of money and hastily return home. Dahal’s tone itself speaks a lot. Throughout he has been maintaining the “I,” confessing that the supreme boss is synonymous with the Nepal Communist Party (Maoist). Louis XIV in the first half of the 18th century France declared, “I am the State.” Two generations later, the basically homegrown French Revolution took place and sent tens of thousands to the butcher’s table, i.e. the infamous guillotine especially invented for dispatching to the gigantic blade anyone who was accused of being involved with the old regime. Dahal has also gained notoriety for his opportunistic role that changes tune without batting an eyelid and makes U-turns so abruptly and swiftly that all his political rivals have been left dazed, pained and they rue, within and outside party. They are now extremely cautious in dealing with the man who they say had waylaid them “many times.” On his death-bed, Girija Prasad Koirala complained to his coterie that “Prachanda is unreliable; he will do anything to get his way.” This may be the reason why NC chief Sushil Koirala takes a tough stance these days, realizing that “he [Dahal] never improves”. nnnn