Four Fasting Citizens: Satyagraha & the cul-de-sac of accountability The four individuals on fasts-unto-death in Nepal today are responding to the cul-de-sac of accountability the polity is in, and responding with extreme self-sacrifice in the only way they think will be effective. By Kanak Mani Dixit There are four individuals on fast-unto-death in Nepal today, even as the politicians put in responsible places by the people through the elections of 19 November struggle to form a government. The interim government is on its way out, and the responsibility for the demands made by the individuals fasting lies on the shoulders of the democratic parties (especially the Nepali Congress and CPN-UML) who have been given overwhelming mandate by the voters. All four citizens in fast are fighting for rule of law and accountability, according to the tradition of satyagraha used by Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi. Their demands are of the kind that would clear the cobwebs that have entangled our polity, created by years of constitutional derailment starting with the decade-long internal conflict and nearly eight years of transition – all of which weakened and polarised the political parties , civil society, bureaucracy, security forces and finally the judiciary. The four citizens are individuals who understand the depth of the crisis in the polity, the absence of rule of law, and have decided on their peaceful course of protest that is personally dangerous to their health and lives. The Triangular Fast The couple Nanda Prasad and Gangamaya Adhikary are fighting for justice in the 2004 murder by Maoists of their son Krishna Prasad. At a time when even the convicted murderer Bal Krishna Dhungel was openly walking about as member of the Constituent Assembly, they were on lonely protest without support of activists and unrecognised by the media, sometimes dumped at points outside the Valley by the police, at other times outside the gates of the Bir Hospital Emergency, and once taken to the mental asylum in Jawalakhel. They ended their first fast on the 47th day upon assurance by the government that action would be taken against the guilty. They restarted their fast on the belief that the state was floundering in the investigations, and today are being fed proteins intravenously on the 91st day at Cabin 16-17, Bir Hospital. (Civil/human rights activists, including this writer, have been urging the Adhikari couple to end their fast, the latest appeal being made on 10 January, after the welcome Supreme Court decision on transitional justice and following the government assigning a central police investigation on the Krishna Prasad murder. (See: ekantipur/the-kathmandu-post/2014/01/02/editorial/nepal-and-the-age-of-accountability/257716.html) Dr. Govinda KC has been involved for delivering health to the poorest for decades, shunning positions of power an income in the medical hierarchy. He used personal resources to follow disasters in Nepal and internationally, avoiding media coverage with a single-mindedness that is quite unique in a society that privileges those blowing their own trumpet. As the medical education in Nepal went into a tailspin of corruption, with high level corruption leading to poor quality of the graduating practitioners, Dr. KC decided to highlight the plight of the national centre of excellence that was his workplace, the Institute of Medicine at Maharajganj. His first fast brought about some positive changes in the appointment of the dean at IOM, which was supposed to put a brake on the corrupt practice of awarding affiliations. However, the dean has since resigned, the clock has turned back, and Dr. KC is back on his fast-unto-death. While this writer certainly does not agree with the action of closing down medical services countrywide in support of Dr. KC’s cause, this does not in any way diminish his battle, which is for non-corrupt medical institutions, autonomy in governance, quality in medical education, and medical service to the poor at affordable prices. (See also: Himal Khabarpatrika’s special issue on medical education in Nepal from a month ago.) Sharada Bhusal Jha is an activist from Mahottari Districct engaged in a single-minded anti-corruption pursuit, when others only mouth fine-sounding sentiments. Exposing herself to the goons and goondas, in a Tarai-Madhes which was made extremely dangerous and volatile through the politician-criminal nexus, she has fought locally before bringing her activism to the capital. Pushpa Bhusal has been especially alert to the corruption of the entire superstructure of representational government with the lack of elections in the local bodies for 16 years for the Village and District Development Committees around the country – and no elected representative at the helm for 11 years. Not getting a hearing despite her activism in the districts of the Tarai-Madhes, she took her fight to Kathmandu Valley, where she staged a hunger strike in early 2013. Today, she is once again on a unique hunger strike, at the Open Air Auditorium (Khula Manch), in solidarity with the Adhikari couple and Dr. KC. Her intention this time is to draw attention to the fight for accountability and rule of law, which is being fought simultaneously at the Bir and Teaching hospitals. The keyboard critics The battle for justice being waged the four citizens are very unlike the opportunistic ‘fasts-unto-death’ of politicians we have seen recently, who quickly seek excuses to start eating once they have managed to attract attention. This is also quite different from the ritualistic ‘relay fast’ done every so often by all kinds of activists, which can be said to be nothing more than a dieting exercise of moderate social value. It is true also that sometimes individuals on a fast-unto-death may be doing it unreasonably and illogically, but no one can doubt the cause of the four Nepali fasters, whose fight is for the highest ideals meant to get Nepal back on the track where there is constitutionalism and rule of law. This, after all, is the track that leads from human rights to accountability in government, to rule by law that among other things guarantees investments, makes economic growth possible, which then should lead to equity through watch-dogging by alert civil society. Fighting for different causes and in different location, most likely no knowing each other at all, Dr. KC, Gangamaya, Nanda Prasad and Pushpa Bhusal are engaged in lonely, individual crusades to extricate society from the deep well that it has fallen into. The social media is of course abuzz with critics of these citizens who are in a life-threatening fast for a cause. Among the commentators, are those who piously like to announce that fasting-to-the-death is nothing more than suicide, that it is both immoral and illegal. But these are easy positionings to take against individuals who are willing to give up their very consciousness and existence for a cause. There can be unreasonable people who go on a fast unto death, so the best way to ‘evaluate’ the ongoing four fasts is to understand whether their demands are urgent for the sake of society’s advance. On this count, there can be no doubt that the battle to cleanse the IOM, to bring alleged killers within the bounds of criminal procedure, to ensure clean government from the village council to the Singha Durbar – that these are urgent matters in the life and running of the nation-state. The correct reaction should be to take up the agitation, give it more strength, rather than denigrate the fasting individuals. And so each of us, rather than taking the easy path of being an armchair- or keyboard-critic, is required to add to the voice and raised fists of defiance: against rampant corruption that has swept society; for criminal procedures against the guilty; and for addressing the demands of those who take the extreme step of a fast-unto death. This writer is not in favour of fasting as a method for correcting wrongs in society – anyone who believes so would have to go without eating him/herself – but will respect the decision of those who believe that this is the last resort in a country where impunity is rife. The response of the non-fasting individual is not to over-intellectualise and waylay the discussion by dragging it towards a philosophical discussion on the appropriateness of ‘suicide’. Instead, we must each of us be active on the terrain that Nanda Prasad, Gangamaya, Dr. KC and Pushpa Bhusal are fighting – for accountability, against corruption, for the procedures of justice to be followed, and for a response from the political powers to their demands. This leaves the response to the demands by the four fasting individuals squarely on the shoulders of those in the Nepali Congress and CPN-UML preparing the take on the helms of government, and to each and every member of the Parliament that is to meet shortly. Democratic spirit This triangular fasting by four citizens – at the Bir Hospital, Teaching Hospital and Khula Manch – provides a barometer to the levels of impunity in Nepal and the inability of political institutions to respond at a time of chaos and befuddlement. The people of Nepal have spoken in elections, and the real burden of accountability has shifted to those who have been elected to the new Parliament/Constituent Assembly. However, we cannot wait for formation of government and sitting of the House. The lives of the individual fasting citizens hang on a balance. All of civil society must come to their side without delay, to understand their fight as one for the entire country, waged by four individuals of the finest democratic spirit. END
Posted on: Mon, 20 Jan 2014 23:55:01 +0000