Health of Nepal-India ties

Both KP Sharma Oli and New Delhi must rethink their approach to improve bilateral relations.

Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli is in a fix. His dogged stand against the 2015-16 Indian blockade earned him considerable political capital which he spent to become prime minister three times. In the blockade’s aftermath, the brand of anti-Indian politics Oli championed was popular, and so he fulminated against the ‘big brother’ with abandon. He mocked the Indian national emblem, claimed Lord Ram was born in Nepal, and it was under his watch that the whole Kalapani region was included in the official map of Nepal, and then in the national charter. Again, Oli rode the nationalist fervour to extract political benefit from all these initiatives. Yet in time he has also come to a sobering conclusion: The anti-India sentiment has its limits, and can even be a liability if you want to lead Nepal’s federal government for any time. He now realises that India can make life difficult for him: By using its leverage over the Nepali Congress to sow division in the ruling coalition, or by fanning pro-monarchy protests, or by fueling suspicions that it won’t do any business with Oli, a doubt that makes him politically vulnerable.