No trifling matter

Inflaming public passion against an important neighbour is not the best way to regain the country’s lands.

To say the country’s territories and borders are sacrosanct is to state the obvious. Yet say it with enough passion and conviction and you will instantly get a sizable audience. Perhaps this is why political parties have started openly debating and trading accusations on the India-occupied Kalapani area in the build up to the November polls. The main opposition CPN-UML in particular seems minded to make the sensitive issue its central election plank. On Friday, two-time prime minister and UML chairman KP Sharma Oli, while addressing a mass gathering in Darchula district, which includes the occupied area, guaranteed that he would return to Nepal the land that currently houses Indian forces. A day later, Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba responded to Oli’s statement, saying that bilateral dialogue rather than electoral grand-standing is the need of the hour. Another former prime minister Baburam Bhattarai also took to social media, asking political leaders to refrain from politicising such a sensitive issue.