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Winning India Over
- Baburam Bhattarai’s visit to India secures its support for the peace process in Nepal but are the “hardliners” convinced?
- Barely a week after his return to Kathmandu, the more contentious aspects of a peace process that had begun in 2005 were resolved after a three-year long stalemate.
- The centrepiece of the deal is an agreement on integrating the former Maoist combatants into the Nepal Army
- Even then, the inking of the non-controversial Bilateral Investment Promotion and Protection Agreement (BIPPA) triggered an outburst of protest by the opposition UML
- Nepal already has BIPPAs with five countries (France, the United Kingdom, Mauritius, Germany and Finland) while India has 80 such.
- India-Nepal BIPPA provides for compensation to Indian investors in cases of losses due to war, armed conflict, emergency, insurrection or riots
- Ever since the new government was formed with Baburam Bhattarai at the helm of a coalition between the UCPN and the Madhesis, there has been a visible shift in the Indian establishment’s position vis-a-vis the Maoists.
- Maoists’ willingness to negotiate with the opposition and the strong public opinion in Nepal in favour of the Bhattarai-led government seem to have impressed many in the Indian establishment who have been disappointed with the stasis following the earlier security-centric geopolitical approach towards Nepal.
- Bhattarai has consistently insisted on using the possibilities for a progressive transformation in Nepal within the existing constraints – he said so clearly in his speech at his alma mater Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi
