Perspective (Spotlight Weekly)

Unity in the time of Crisis

By Bindu Chaudhary

When war takes momentum, it is difficult to bring an end to it because the reasons and the justifications keep on changing and adding overtime. When people are already in fire and find themselves in the do or die situation, it needs just anything to find yet another reason to upsurge violence. After years of war, people may even lose sight of what the exact reason for war was, or why they were fighting at all in the first place.

Nepal is under war. What comes in our mind when we think of war is not justice but injustice; not happiness but unhappiness; not security but insecurity; and not life but death, bloodshed and chaos. The "leaders of war" always remain protected, while risking, maiming and killing people who they claim to be fighting for. Encouraging violence to satisfy their own vested interest, to prove their superiority, or to justify their self-proclaimed noble mission is nothing but the mere act of selfishness.

The people’s war in Nepal claims the innocence of war by saying that it is just a defense, a counter violence of the people who have been suppressed and oppressed by the State for years. When war involves killings, suicide and helplessness; when it means taking away innocent lives; or turning deaf ear towards the scream of the innocents; or using, abusing and killing our own children; scaring people to leave the country for safety and livelihood; or to make the existence a world of horror without end… how can war be justified? It is a good beginning that makes a good ending.

The country has now become so weak, so disunited, illusioned, vulnerable and fragile that even perpetrators from outside the country feel free to grab our throats anytime and kill us within a matter of days? It is true, a house divided against itself cannot stand. Nothing could have prepared us for the unexpected suddenness and trauma of the killings of our innocent brothers in Iraq, when we were already busy crying over the dead ones in our own nation killed by our own people.

Nepal is a country cursed by Sati. The Sati wife of Bhim Malla cursed Nepal to be forever subjected to corrupt and mischievous rulers before she immolated herself on her husband’s pyre who was sentenced to death under the most torturous circumstances. Similar curse was cast by the Sati wife of Bhimsen Thapa who was induced to take his own life because of the most heinous palace plots hatched against him. However, “Sati le saraapeko Desh” cannot be used as an armor to siphon off ones responsibilities, wipe ones hands off and sit passively, watching the country becoming a graveyard.

If we do not have a strong back up and support, when we are busy attacking one another, and when the country itself is in the situation of a pity, it takes only a few days to end the story like this. How easily could the government turn its tail away saying that it could do very little as the Nepalese had entered Iraq illegally? What a shame! And is this the kind of response one would expect when the innocent lives were pleading the government for help, and they had nobody to hear them out? Take the example of our neighboring country India, whose government was successful in bringing back their three captive citizens safe from Iraq, who were under hostage since July 21.

Nepal suffers from a total moral meltdown. Yet another bitter truth is that we do not stand a voice in the outside world, for it is the unity that gives voice and power. There is no trust in the government, or the security, and neither one another- leaving the nation enraged, scared, disintegrated, voiceless, grieving, and in shock. People are disillusioned and scattered for their own safety, security and livelihood. Once a peaceful nation in the world, today people are dying without their thirst for peace getting quenched up.

We have lost so much in the past ten years that we have gone 20 or more years back from where we stood before the insurgency. Nepal could have boomed too, as India and China did in the past ten years, but we were busy destroying- destroying whatever little we had. After years of war, we seem to have lost vision, and we don’t know what direction we are heading towards and why. We are in need of a strong leader with a sharp vision to get Nepal back on the track and the people who choose peace for violence. A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, so it is never too late to take a step ahead.

Given the passion that the killing of our brothers in Iraq has inflamed, the thundering cries for revenge was one of the most visible effects in the streets of Nepal. I agree, the anger and frustration is genuine, but the challenge today is not igniting revenge hysteria and create more fear among people, or lose sight of what we had come on the streets for- either to show our support to the families of those deceased; or for non-violent protests; or to destroy our own little remaining infrastructure and attack press vehicles, shops and publication houses? Instead, the challenge is whether we are able to channelize our negative energies and destructive sentiments into a positive and constructive one; whether we, the people of Nepal, irrespective of any political or ideological affiliation, are able to celebrate unity and be supportive and strong in the time of crisis like this, and beyond…for a chain is only as strong as its weakest link.

(The author is a social worker, presently a freelance journalist in the USA)