Problemananda Jha and search for a solution

I am honestly tired of asking myself why on earth this man called Parmananda Jha is behaving the way he is. Well it is none of my concern why someone is this way or that way but this guy's stubbornness is creating ground for confrontations in my country where too many people have nothing to do and so many are looking for something to do, why not it be causing destructions, for in the rule of a namesake government life is not promoted and thus starts searching for its identity in ways that can often become destructive for life itself in the long run. Thus jobless youths tired of asking themselves what they are good for, what they are worth and what they at all can, often go all out for potentially harmful confrontations. Amidst such a background it is at least irresponsible what Mr. Jha is doing.

It is an issue but...
...again, it is indeed an issue whether regional languages should be listed under official languages of a country. That said it is a very complicated issue. If we call all the regional languages of Nepal official languages, then we run into the next question of whether we give all languages a status equal to the Nepali language. That will include things like whether we should start having official documents in all the languages, for else one document that originates from the Terai might be in a language that is not understandable to a hilly area (or vice versa), thereby limiting the movement of people for reasons of employment and otherwise. Such practice will potentially cause regional identity to be promoted, and this will lead to our country being a collection of smaller population groups that fail to mix up with each other. Given the strong interest of giant neighbours in our country, social groupism would be very fertile ground and if such things happen further I would not negate possibilities of parts of our country being found under the maps of another country in the textbooks of the future.

Now one might ask why not have different languages within the same country and mix up with each other. After all India survives as a nation although regionalism is immensely strong there, why should it not be good for Nepal? As long as regions survive as more or less stable economic subunits of a nation, the problem usually does not manifest and social integrity maintains itself but as the economy sways (and it does in the free market economy model) latent social conflicts manifest themselves and such things can become mighty ugly. We have heard of the Maharashtrians chasing away poor Biharis who had moved to Mumbai for jobs!

Then in face of the talks of a federal structure, I believe it is important that we drop language demands at least for now. I believe so because raising the issue of language at the same time of the issue of how to divide the country into states might confuse us and we might end up with language-based states. The problem with this is that because regional languages have a strong geographical component, dividing the country based on language will be equivalent to dividing based on geography. We might then have the Terai constituted of a few states, some valleys might become states, and the hills will be the rest. Now the hilly areas of Nepal are seriously underdeveloped. Not that they do not have potential but ours being a poor country with a corrupt administration, we have virtually no infrastructure for the people in the hills, agricultural activity in the hills is limited in terms of possibilities and production, and because of lack of essential infrastructure like means of transport, electricity etc. 1. hardly any jobs are placed in the hills 2. noone likes to go and work there. Therefore having states that are constituted of hills alone will potentially produce big differences between states in terms of economy and social aspects dependent on it. One might argue that in a federal system the central government will be there to take care and minimize such differences between states. We don't believe, do we, that political leaders of the current mindset and it's products will be able to rise up above their own regional issues and think at a national level? I mean look at the responses of political parties and individual leaders to the Jha issue. People have spoken against the court's decisions and even doing so they simply escape just like that...

Let's give it all together a serious thought, eh?

As if there are no more imminent issues in the war-torn country with failed governnance and an ever growing anarchist mentality, we are really giving too much attention to the Jha issue.

And then still it is an issue. Jha is still the vice-president and we need to figure out how to get away with this problem. No point going about as he and his supporters have been doing. A political solution is needed that is legally sound too. Now that is the tricky part. The Supreme Court has spoken and Jha seems not to listen. Can we ask the Supreme Court to reverse its decision? Theoretically the Parliament could discuss the issue and come up with an amendment of the constitution. In that way the tension would be diffused. But then that is not how we want our constitution to be, malleable to demands of a stubborn VP or unreasonable groups, is it? Even if we think of the amendment as a potential way out it is not likely that there would be consensus required for a change in the constitution. Therefore the court's decision cannot change and Jha will have to retake his oath if he wants to stay VP. Else resign on moral grounds and work from outside for gathering support on his issues.

Jha has however been saying that he won't take the oath again. And there is some political backing that he has got. It is nonsense what they are doing and I can think of no good motif to what's going on, but it is the way it is and if the VP does as he is saying, namely not resign and not retake the oath, we run into a weird crisis. In that case the VP would be a criminal of the law but then with the backing he has and the potential of conflicts we need to find a solution. To me there is one way out of this by which all parties can escape without losing dignity and that is for the VP and political parties to sit together with the government and for the government to promise to start discussions for making regional languages official in the next constitution, and that in such a situation Jha retakes the oath in Nepali and we move towards problems like the diarrhoes, landmines, illiteracy, high crime rates etc.

If Jha did not resign and did not take the oath, a confrontation might take place. Of course such real confrontation would also produce a result. But it's ugly isn't it? And then why should some heads that were in fact not a part of the problem in the first place get hurt. More importantly such confrontantions leave traces for the future propagating further confrontational sentiments.

Hope
Let's hope Mr. Jha is not an agent operating for foreign interests. Let's hope he understands the seriousness of the issue and that he retakes the oath in Nepali and helps avoid a confrontation whose preparations he has been fuelling. Let's hope he realises he has been on the wrong side of nationality with his stubbornness at such a crucial time. And no I don't expect him to state it in open that he made a mistake. It is enough if he realized silently for himself and changed him for the better. After all we want to respect our VP and have him beyond regional issues.

raktim.nepali@gmail.com