In probably the first official statement on the present situation in Nepal during recent days, the Bharatiya Janata Party has totally rejected the demand of the Nepali Maoist leader Prachanda that the Indo-Nepal Treaty of Peace and Friendship, signed on July 31, 1950 at Kathmandu, be reviewed.
Shri Vijay Kumar Malhotra, Deputy Leader of the BJP in the Lok Sabha said on (November 19) that instead, efforts should be made to bring Nepal closer to India.
The Chairman of the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), Shri Pushpa Kamal Dahal, who is known more by his alias Prachanda, had stated recently that Nepal'sforeign policy so far was under the influence of the monarchy, and all treaties signed by the monarchical government with foreign countries should be reviewed.
The ten-article Treaty was signed between the last Prime Minister of Nepal Mohun Shumshere Jung Bahadur Rana and the Ambassador of India to Nepal Chandreshwar Prasad Narayan Singh.
In order to define relationship between the two countries following the withdrawal of the British from the Indian sub-continent. This had left a big gap in the relationship between the two countries which had an open border between them (which still exists).
A crucial feature of this Treaty is Article VI, which states: ?Each Government undertakes, in token of the neighbourly friendship between India and Nepal, to give to the nationals of the other, in its territory, national treatment with regard to participation in industrial and economic development of such territory and to grant concessions and contracts relating to such development?.
However, the outstanding feature of this Treaty is Article VII, which says: ?The Governments of India and Nepal agree to grant, on a reciprocal basis, to the nationals of one country in then territories of the other the same privileges in the matter of residence, ownership of property, participation in trade and commerce, movement and other privileges of a similar nature?
Mark the words ?on a reciprocal basis? which means if people of Nepal can own property in India (they own huge properties even today in Kolkata and other places in India). Indians too can do so in Nepal. However, this is not the case because in that case the moneyed people of India would have swamped Nepal and would have bought up or built the huge palaces in Kathmandu. This eventuality was avoided through an exchange of letters between the two signatories along with the Treaty.
Here is the text of that Letter.
Excellency, In the course of our discussion of the Treaties of Peace and Friendship and of Trade and Commerce which have been happily concluded between the two-Government of India and the Government of Nepal, we agreed that certain matters of details be regulated by an exchange of letters. In pursuance of this understanding, it is hereby agreed between the two Governments:
3. In regard to Article 6 of the Treaty of Peace and Friendship which provides for national treatment, the Government of India recognize that it may be necessary for som time to come to afford the Nepalese nationals in Nepal protection from unrestricted competition. The nature and extent to this protection will be determined as and when required by mutual agreement between the two Governments. (There are other clauses too in this Letter which are not quoted here)
Thus, no Indian is permitted to own property in Nepal although the reverse is not the case.
There have been demands from mostly the Leftists and Communists for a repeal of this Treaty from time to time, and whenever politicians of Nepal got an opportunity to attack India on real or imaginary threat from India, demands for repeal of this Treaty have been made in the last half a century. Prachanda is not the first Nepali leader to do so and it unlikely to be the last.
The Maoists might have conveniently forgotten that Prachanda had once said that they (the Maoists) would have to take on the Indian army. His deputy Baburam Bhattarai, had stated that Nepal would seek , under his programme of ?Satluj dekhi Teesta Samma? return of the territories ceded by Nepal to (British) India under the Sugauli Treaty of 1815 after the defeat of the Nepal Durbar in two wars against the British. For about three decades, areas like today'sKumaon, Garhwal and half of Himachal Pradesh in the west upto the banks of the Satluj and Darjeeling and Sikkim in the east upto the banks of the Teesta had been under Nepalese occupation. No Nepali has forgotten this.
It is, therefore, necessary for India to be extra careful in dealing with the Maoists instead of treating them as honoured guests when the terrorist tags had still not been removed from them. The intelligence agencies need to keep close watch on the activities of the Maoists in this country too.
Incidentally, would Shri Prachanda answer this very simple question? Since all the treaties and agreements were signed during the monarchical rule and they should be abrogated or re-negotiated, would he recommend the revision of the Panchsheel Treaty between Nepal and the People'sRepublic of China signed during King Mehendra'srule in 1956, the boundary agreement between these two countries or for that matter, the agreement for the construction of the Kathmandu-Kodari road signed by Dr. Tulsi Giri, the then Prime Minister of Nepal, in the presence of King Mahendra in Beijing on October 15, 1961.
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