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An Open Letter To Upendra Yadav
An Open Letter To Upendra Yadav
Siddhi B Ranjitkar
Honorable Upendra Yadav: President of Federal Socialist Party
I am writing ‘honorable’ before your name not sarcastically but you are really an honorable person, as you had been the kingmaker in the past and now you have been playing a really vital role in creating chaos in the Nepalese politics. Not all politicians really could do so. Some of your colleagues particularly Rajendra Mahato had earned more bad honors than good ones. Mahant Thakur had difficulty even keeping his head high on camera. Other leaders I did not know.
I came to now you after the elections to the Constituent Assembly in April 2008. Your United Democratic Madheshi Front (UDMF) won 84 (I hope I am correct) slots in the CA. That number was enough to make you a kingmaker at that time, as the majority-seat-winner. CPN-Maoist could not really do anything without your support or the support of other two main political parties such as NC and CPN-UML. These two political parties had been vehemently opposing the agenda of the Maoists.
I did not know what hidden agenda you had at that time. You wanted to make Permananda Jha a vice president. You did not ask for even the presidential position for him. It was surprising to us at that time why you did not bid for the first position rather opted for the second position.
First, you approached Prachanda: Chairman of CPN-Maoist for the second position for Mr. Jha in exchange for supporting the presidential candidate of the CPN-Maoist. Prachanda had bluntly rejected your offer stating on camera that he could not disappoint his candidate for vice-president supporting your candidate.
Through the media, I knew that you had been a schoolteacher in Biratnagar. At that same time, you had been supporting the underground activities of Maoists. So, you had been wearing two hats: one of a teacher, and another of Maoist. I did not know whether you were really a Maoist or a teacher. Probably you were both at that time.
You clearly knew that CPN-Maoist’s candidate for the president was Ramraja Prasad Singh. He was a Madheshi, too. He had a political background of risking his life for stating he was fighting for republic in his manifesto made public at the time of the graduate constituency elections held in early seventies when Nepalese could not even dream of such a thing when the most despotic man called Mahendra was in power. Singh went to underground for saving himself from the torture of the autocratic rule of Mahendra. At that time Nepalese were so curious to learn what Singh had written in his manifesto people were ready to pay a handsome amount for the manifesto. So, Singh deserved to be the first president of the democratic republic of Nepal.
You knew all these things. I was just recasting it for refreshing your memory of the recent past political events.
Then, you went to NC and CPN-UML leaders making the same offer that you had made to Prachanda. Leaders of these two parliamentary parties were very happy to welcome your proposal. Then, you formed an alliance with these two political parties disregarding the political feelings of other Madheshi leaders because they knew that NC and CPN-UML were not empathetic to the Madheshi people’s demands unlike the Maoists.
In the first round of the elections, your candidate Permananda Jha got elected to the vice president but another Madheshi candidate for the president Dr Ram Baran Yadav failed to receive the sufficient votes indicating other Madheshi lawmakers did not vote for Yadav. So, other Madheshi lawmakers were against your unholy alliance with NC and CPN-UML. Probably, you did not care about it, and you went ahead with your agenda probably believing that other Madheshi lawmakers would follow you. However, this was how you sow the seed of disintegration of your Madheshi People’s Rights Forum (MPRF), and breakup of the loosely knitted front called UDMF.
You must have noted that the NC and CPN-UML leaders also did not trust you wholeheartedly. So, the top leader of NC Girija Prasad Koirala did not want to be the candidate for the president nor other influential leaders, too. Ultimately, the second echelon leader Dr. Ram Baran Yadav took a chance, and became the candidate for the president. He got elected in the second round elections after a lot of horse-trading among the lawmaker voters.
I would like to remind you that after the Madhesh movement, UDMF had reached an eight-point agreement with the then Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala. He did not take the eight-point agreement seriously to enforce it, as he had seen that the Madheshi leader like you Mr. Upendra Yadav had not been serious about it. Other NC and CPN-UML leaders had been deadly against enforcing the eight-point agreement. After the elections to the president, vice president, to the Speaker and the deputy speaker, Girija had to leave the office of prime minister but he did not.
One Madheshi leader Hridesh Tripathy on camera told that he opposed the alliance among the UDMF, NC, and CPN-UML. He even said that the NC candidate for the president: Dr Ram Baran Yadav was Madheshi in the name only. In other words, these guys would not meet the Madheshi demands.
Once you Mr. Upendra Yadav had been the unopposed Madheshi leader. You had boasted that you had led the UDMF to winning such a large number of slots in the CA. That number of slots had made you able to put Permananda Jha in the office of the vice president. What benefit you made from making Mr. Jha the vice president, I did not actually know but my guess was you must have made a large financial gain otherwise you would not place the eight-point agreement on the back burner.
I knew from the media as everybody did that Mr. Jha was fired from the job at the Supreme Court of Nepal allegedly for corruption. What a shame on you and your UDMF to put such a controversial man in such a highly prestigious position. Mr. Jha as the vice president behaved as if he were not a real Nepalese. He took the oath in the foreign language dishonoring the Nepalese national language. He disregarded to wear a prestigious outfit for taking the oath of office. That was what you must have taught him to do.
You became the foreign minister. You enjoyed all sorts of benefits coming with the ministerial portfolio but what the Madheshi people had gained from the Madheshi movement during which many Madheshi had sacrificed their lives; noting really, as you did not worry about enforcing the eight-point agreement. Consequently, the Madheshi people had not gained anything they were supposed to gain from the eight-point agreement.
Your colleagues had been highly skeptical about you. Some of them even thought that you might be the spy of the NC implanted in UDMF. Consequently, your party called MPRF split into a number of parties with the same name with a hyphenated new name such as MPRF-democratic and so on. Once an influential leader you had been then reduced to a level of an ordinary regional leader. Nobody listened to you.
Then came the second elections to a new CA, as the first elected CA dissolved for not being able to produce a new constitution. Every political party thought that each would make a good comeback. None did so except for NC and CPN-UML. Madheshi voters taught a good lesson to you and your colleagues, as you guys instead of working for enforcing the eight-point agreement you went on amassing a huge assets for yourselves and your loved ones.
You must know what the NC and CPN-UML would do for the Madheshi, nothing. Mr. Upendra Yadav, you lost not only the number of slots in the CA but also the voice in the second CA. Thereafter, NC and CPN-UML leaders were not for listening to your voice anymore. They correctly thought that the people had voted for their agenda. The result was the new constitution without addressing your concerns or without the things you had won during the Madheshi movement. The new constitution had been one step behind even the Interim Constitution of Nepal of 2007. That was what your achievement had been during the last seven or more years.
Now, already more than three months, you had been protesting against the new constitution and demanding to enforce the eight-point agreement causing the loss of more than 50 beautiful and young lives. Who ignored to enforce the agreement, the answer was you. For a personal gain you did so. When the Madheshi movement was fresh in the minds of the people and Prime Minister Girija Koirala was in a position to enforce it you should have hit hard to enforce it but you did not do that. Now, the political mandate had gone to the NC and CPN-UML mainly because of you guys that did no take the agreement you had with Girija Koirala seriously and did not try to enforce it on time.
Currently, you have been creating political anarchy going to India, and following the orders of the Indian ambassador not to mention Indian leaders. You needed to have a little bit of shame. How could such influential leaders as you guys of the sovereign country go to neighboring leaders begging for amending the already adopted constitution by the overwhelming majority? Is it the democratic system? If you were to succeed amending the constitution with the help of foreign leaders, soon after that another political force would come up to ask another change with another foreign power. Do you actually want to make Nepal the political playground of foreign leaders? I am sure that you are not really for that but you actions tended to show it.
Mr. Upendra Yadav, why don’t you stop all these politically meaningless protests and border closure causing so much of torture to the thirty million Nepalese, and make an agenda on going to the people convincing them of the need for voting you next time to amend the constitution for your liking? You knew that Nepalese would never forgive you for making so much of troubles for more than three months. Nepalese had been ready to fight with anybody for making their irregular lives regular.
You have been fighting the lost battle. You have been doing everything illegal that is not acceptable to anybody at the time when you have the legal and democratic means to fight for your rights or for even enforcing the eight-point agreement. Don’t think to achieve your objectives causing troubles to the common folks as Nepalese did when they did not have the legal and democratic means to do, clearly at the time of monarchy. Now, Nepal is a republic. Every citizen has the legal rights to fight for their better lives and equal rights on a par with all Nepalese.
Upendra Yadavjee, you had done a lot of good and bad things, now it is time to stop doing any bad thing. Prime Minister Oli had already warned you of taking legal actions against anybody violating the law. The time has come for the rule of law in Nepal.
Yadavjee: one thing I missed was you had voted for Sushil Koirala at the time of the parliamentary elections to the office of prime minister after the promulgation of the new constitution. The irony is that Sushil was the president of NC, and you knew that the NC had been against the Madheshis’ causes but all of you guys went to vote for him. Why did you do that? You did not tell us. Only Mahanta Thakur regretted for doing so.
What would you get if Sushil were to get elected to the office of prime minister. Would he immediately enforce the eight-point agreement or correct the constitution, as you had desired? The correct answer would be no for both the questions. Then why did you mess up voting for Sushil? Did you simply following the order of the Indian ambassador in Kathmandu? What for? What did the ambassador promised you? You needed to answer all these questions if you were to get our votes in the next elections.
When Nepal had been taking a new shape you had been trying to distort it not with your power and strength but the muscle of Narendra Modi. Everybody knew that Nepal was shaping into a federal democratic republic. The basic document called “constitution’ was there to institutionalize the gains made by the various people’s movements including the Madheshi movement and the 10-year people’s war but now you had been trying to do was to twirl it into a cotton wick and burn it down. What for, you had been doing so, was it not just to help Mr. Modi to have his self-esteem intact?
For your information, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal called Modi 'psychopath’, according to the BBC NEWS of December 15, 2015. Chief Minister Kejriwal said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had sent the CBI to raid his office in a series of tweets. Kejriwal said the federal investigation agency had raided his office. He attacked Prime Minister Modi calling Modi a coward and psychopath that could not tackle him legally and politically but resorted to such a disgraceful act.
So, Modi sent you guys to Nepal not to let the country grow into a beautiful republic but to make his puppet so that he could play with it and enjoy how the puppet danced to his perfect tune. You could imagine how such a 'psychopath’ as the Modi had been would tune the puppet to make you dance if you were to win the political game Mr. Modi had been playing with us. Mr. Yadav, it would be in your interest to forget about doing anything now and return to the parliament and contribute to the growth of the country.
Who advised you to ask the establishments for coming to Madheshi for the talks with you? Only Modi could tell you such an irrational thing to do, as his mental balance was totally upset, and he had been quixotic. He disgustingly erroneously believed that he could win everything and everybody if not he would send his SSB, police or CBI or anybody you name to get everything done for him. Mr. Upendra Yadav, you had been mistakenly working on the order of Modi not for the people of Nepal but for the ego of the 'psychopath.’
Yadavjee, you must have known as a politician, the Delhi chief minister did not have absolute administrative powers over the state, as other CMs had in their States but the BJP-controlled federal government had the power over the state's police force, land, and law and order. That was why Modi could shamelessly intervene in the Delhi State administration, as Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal had been the foe of Modi because Kejriwal wanted to uproot the corruption in the Delhi State. Without corruption, Modi might be unable to run his administration and the BJP.
You had already committed a hell of mistakes following the order of the Indian ambassador and going to India only to meet the foreign minister, and getting the order from the honorable Indian foreign minister to go back and follow the rule of law. The greatest chance for you to win the political game now was to follow the rule of law, and go to the people and convinced them of the need for voting for you. It might take a long time for you to win the lost glory and power but that was the only way in the democratic country.
Currently, you have been fighting the already lost battle. If you were to continue the battle meant you were hammering a last nail on your coffin and digging the grave. It would not be long you guys would be buried forever. Never think of getting back to power, as the voters would no longer trust you with their votes.
India had wrongly done sufficiently for you disregarding the fallout of its erroneous and immoral political actions. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi enjoyed the consequences of his morally wrong actions of trying to intervene in the neighbor’s house. No doubt, Modi is the prime minister of the jumbo democracy. He was a chayawala (tea vendor) democratically elected man turned into the prime minister of the largest democracy in the world. His cadres wanted to make him a Hindu emperor but it was not working. He failed in Nepal, and he had been failing in India, too. His Hindu warriors should understand it otherwise they would make Modi: the head of the Hindu Taliban rather a laughingstock.
Yadavjee, one more thing I missed was you held the wedding ceremony of your son, and gave a big party when millions of Nepalese had been living in the tents not having sufficient water and sanitation after the devastating quake on April 25, 2015 and thereafter one aftershock after another every day for about six months. So, Upendrajee, you did not care about the common folks but for your son and for yourselves. How could you anticipate that Nepalese would vote for you?
Now, if you believe in democracy, you follow the constitution for amending it. Don’t be an anarchist, and put the innocent youths on the streets for shouting anything they like, and try to regain the political strength by the mob power. Probably, you lost the political ground for forever. Be realistic and work with the government rather than with the anarchists and psychopaths if you were to have favorable political status.
Dear Upendra Yadav, I had written a long letter to you. It would take your time but it would probably open your eyes if you like. Anyway your future is in your hands. We would vote for you if you were to work for all of us rather than for the Indian ambassador and Indian leaders and ultimately for yourselves.
God Bless you, my dear.
December 19, 2015
