If shifting frontiers were a constant trend in colonial politics, shifting beds were as much a part of life in court politics. What the dark corridors of power revealed may have fanned luscious tales across the boudoirs of Europe but the reality of what it concealed was a matter of grave ambassadorial concern. The concern, first of all, lay in the anonymity for they were hardly expected to perform with any degree of efficiency in the absence of accurate reports regarding shifts in the bed-power. Even if they had a go at a shot in the dark, they could hardly make a lasting impression in the lack of precise knowledge regarding undercover power. Wanton promiscuity posed a greater problem. They needed that extra burst of sustained energy to place some of these itinerant ‘femmes de chambre’ in posture recumbent or otherwise. Adequately endowed ambassadors plenipotentiary now found it relatively easy to get to the bottom of the truth for getting there literally meant peeling off clothes after clothes.

Lying and laying may not have had divine sanction but "in the best interest of the country" they were adhered to more faithfully than perhaps the virtues of not doing so were in the Biblical age. Commandments change with interest and Moses yielded to Machiavelli.

Machiavellis of the two opposing post-WWII empires operated much in the same manner. The intended targets being the new nobility and their domains that emerged on the fragments of the previous empires. The only difference being that they operated on a vastly greater scale of deviousness and ruthlessness. Devious to the limits of insanity and ruthless to the pit of inhumanity. When the Berlin wall fell so did the veil on, perhaps, the most infamous period of diplomatic history. On it, rose a ‘Commonwealth of Empires’ so powerful and so integrated that diplomacy was oriented away from the act of charming and seducing the courts to simply modulate the capricious nature of the mind, subjugate the rebellious action of the heart and patronize the esoteric needs of the body; all in the service of the Empire. Despite the mach-3 look, the art of genteel persuasion was no more the modus operandi. They had to bring their extraordinary influence to bear on the minds of the people to belie the delusions of democracy as a result of a corrupt, decrepit and debased party leadership or part thereof or the denial of basic sustenance of life or the impoverishment of the body. They also had to use their plenipotentiary powers to flay into supine submission the opposition - civil or non-civil - who dared to think otherwise. One day in the Life of Private Ambassador gives a rare glimpse of the Brobdingnagian- Delphic mix of political diplomacy devised by the CE for this century.

That day a VVIP of the ruling class of Lilliput (V) was to receive in audience the Ambassador of Brobdingnag (A). As the two met, V greeted A with: "Your excellency, to what do I owe this rather urgent call?" A sat down with slight unease, complaining: "Sir, I always feel ill at ease when addressed so formally and, if you insist, I prefer to be called Sexcellency." There was a moment of embarrassed silence, but two grown-up men as they were, they could not allow such a small deviation in the mode of address to disrupt the talk. V, in consideration of the request, asked: "What reasons can you possibly give for me to change what has by now become a force of habit?" Sensing that he was about to have his way A said: "Sir, ‘Your excellency’, belongs to the domain of public affairs and ‘Sexcellency’ to that of private." And attempting a self-deprecating humour, he continued: "Sir, since January, the latter mode is now a more common and popular form to address those appointed during the clean presidency of the 90s." As the distinction in his country always tends to get blurred by genealogical overlaps, V was very interested to learn of the practice elsewhere. Steadfast in his belief that the ways of his country from A ard - vark to Z ymotic were the only way, A continued: "Sir, the problem is one of cultural difference. Let me illustrate. When my president had his hands full of Miss Boobdingsky, the people did not give it a second’s thought but the moment he denied having his hands where many knew for sure he had, the people were outraged at the lie. Then began the process of impeachment. But here, when ministers lay their fist on bundles of unaccounted money the people turn a blind eye and only when they start spending do they vent their outrage by hurling socket bombs at houses and kicking the tyres of Pajeros. In short, infidelity is a private affair but lying about it is a public offence in my country. Lying about bribery is not criminal but spending it freely is a public offence in your country."

No foreigner need explain to him this apparent contradiction. V was a little suspicious for did A know or pretend not to know that a few ministers had been reprimanded, the opposition was literally going hammer and sickle against the PM asking for his resignation, the CIAA has stripped a minister of his passport and put behind bars a royal chief of an airline. We also have our own ways, V thought - cultural difference or not. As if in response to the thought A said in an authoritative tone: "Irrespective of what I have said, any threat, Sir, to the PM, his party or democracy - strictly in that order - will be deemed unconstitutional and hence an unfriendly act. No one need to be a diplomat to know that our foreign policy is premised on the notion that all third world political leaders are corrupt and if they go on resigning on moral grounds then not much of it will be left. That we cannot allow. Moreover, the opposition are reminded to take note of our policy that they can remove the PM only on the floor of the House. Morality is on the side of the party with the required number and opposing the moral is immoral. The opposition should withdraw their demand on immoral ground. This is how we see the constitutional way."

Bemused at this unintended Gramscian logic, V, in order to ascertain the official position, was about to ask: "Mr Ambassador, please..., when he was interrupted. "Pardon me, Sir for this rude interruption but I am not what you think me to be for I am what you least expect me to be." "Are you not the ambassador who presented his credentials to me a few years back?" "I can assure you, Sir, that the person carrying the letter of credence was, indeed, the ambassador. As your incompetent officers at the MFA never bothered to verify the number pertaining to social security card, driving license or credit card, there is no way to say with certainty that the one carrying was the same presenting it." "Surely, you cannot deny the passport." "The tricks of the trade we practised during the cold war, your MPs seem to have mastered to trick our allies Japan and Germany and others into accepting illegal workers."

Osho Rajneesh does not agree with the duel concept of mind. This type of dichotomous relation is what Freud established as ego, id and superego while opening the human window where he saw how lust and repression struggled for supremacy over other tender and sublime human emotions. This drive is a sequel of sex related desires that start not at puberty as understood by many but at infancy, he concludes. One of the pick-up lines "Your ego may be saying ‘no’, but your id is giving me a tongue bath" best demonstrates the conflict in the mind between what one is aware of and inherited psychological impulses. Anyone can differ with Freud because he is a most controversial man. And, at the same time, he is the most important scientist and thinker of the Twentieth Century as declared by a Time magazine poll four and half months ago. But Rajneesh is not anyone. He is one of the best brains that the world has ever produced. He describes this conflict in terms of used and unused portions of the mind.

When a child is born, his survival instinct forces him to concentrate because "a child’s unconditioned mind is a flux - a flux of sensations." And, this is how a process starts that Rajneesh calls "narrowing." In this process emerging out of an utilitarian need to sustain existence, his consciousness becomes narrowed shutting a major portion of the mind or declining to do what it is capable of doing. This is how a small portion of the mind remains in use while a major portion is unused. What is in use becomes self or his identity and the major portion not in use becomes alien to himself. "You become alienated to your own self; you become a stranger to your totality," says Rajneesh. The unused mind having greater potentiality comes in conflict with the used or conscious mind that guides his activities. This split or conflict aggravates further when one relies more on less and less and does not allow the greater potential to blossom. This becomes the source of frustration because the utilitarian mind takes the lead as an end in itself contrary to what it should have remained, as a means only.

This is where Rajneesh finds the need of a religious approach. It is no dogma, ritual or creed that he talks about. It is just realizing the inner realities of life. In other words, activating the unused mind or greater potential once the narrowing process becomes redundant after the survival phase. Here comes the need of deconditioning the utilitarian mind so that it becomes only as a means and allows the unused mind to blossom. It is accepting his own major portion of mind that he himself denied earlier for his survival. This is how life is to be started after the survival phase. And, this is exactly where most of us fail. This failure would mean to continue ‘narrowing’ in a constant struggle to sustain an individual ego, that is I, widening the conflict within. Even if most fail, that is justifiable but those who come to shape the destiny of the people cannot afford to fail. That is, they should not let this narrowing process to continue to such a breakaway level. But this is precisely what is happening in Nepal. The conflict is widening within the minds of the leaders.

Now let us bring in the super government. It is an epitome of how democracy is considered to be in proportion to the narrowing process of the mind. It was the constitution day celebration. Our prime minister rose to the occasion amidst all assembled there and complained about the functioning of the Supreme Court. To the utter embarrassment of the chief justice, among others, he went to describing the Supreme Court as trying to be a super government and suggested to it to help support the government. Most important here is that this serves as a window on the functioning of the highest democratic mind. This is the type of mind that considers all democratic institutions of check and balance should function as ritualistic institutions. They are to be lauded, exulted and praised to the seven heaven as and when it becomes necessary for public consumption. Rest of the time they must all remain dumb for the democratically elected government to do anything it likes, go wild or just plunder the nation. It all becomes a prerogative.

It is these types of minds that have caused peril of democracy and to our nation. They have devoured the strength of almost all democratic institutions reducing them to skeletons for ceremonial feasts. Public Service Commission is helpless. The minister who forged and openly flouted its decisions continues to remain minister. Instead of resigning as was expected, he filed a case against the Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA). The auditor general who looks into the income and expenditure of the government has at last publicly said that there is no need of auditing because the government never abides by financial acts, rules and regulations despite repeated pointing out of such violations and irregularities. Planning commission now more an extension of the Finance Ministry, recommending projects identified by different political pressure groups to be put in the finance minister’s budget. It has lost its capability even to prepare the mid-term evaluation reports.

Public corporations are the worst hit. They are reduced to each minister’s earnings. One time prestigious institutions like NIDC and RNAC are being squeezed to death. There is not even one public corporation that is not plundered. It is all because of the narrowing process of mind dipped in greed and callousness.