The 240-year-old monarchy was abolished in Nepal on May 28, 2008 as the constituent assembly in an overwhelming vote proclaimed Nepal ‘Federal Democratic Republic’. The motion to declare Nepal a Republic was tabled by the Home Minister, Krishna Prasad Sitaula, and was passed by 560 votes against four. Only the royalist Rashtriya Prajatantra party voted against. The resolution also said that the King and the Royal family would no longer enjoy any rights or privileges other than those of the common citizens of Nepal. The constituent assembly also instructed the government to make sure that King Gyanendra Shah and the royal family to leave the palace within next 15 days. Thus the King and the royal family were accordingly made to leave the palace, rather unceremoniously. In another resolution the Constituent Assembly provided for the election of a president, who would remain in office till a new Constitution was framed.
Commenting on King Gyanendra’s exit, Nepal’s leading national daily wrote “we take joy and pleasure in congratulating all citizens of Nepal that Nepalese are no longer subjects of the Shah dynasty that fooled the innocent people for 240 years the king was reincarnation of Lord Bishnu”. The first and foremost credit for the Republic goes to the Maoists, the paper wrote, we did first agree with the violent methods the Maoists had adopted but “it would be unjust not to deny their role in bringing this day about”. The paper, however pointed to the hurdles that still confronted the Republic. Among them, he cited formation of a government and amendments to the Constitution and above all the drafting of the new Constitution and its approval by the constituent assembly.
The fall of monarchy, which was unthinkable a couple of years ago, was greatly facilitated by Maoists success in the elections to the constituent assembly. They had vowed in their election campaign to abolish it, even though other political parties were not as clearly committed to go along with them, and there were among them reservations of a political vacuum, if the King was not there as head of state. To retain ‘titular kingship’ was according to them the best option to pre-empt mass disorder and political uncertainty in the country. The Maoists electoral triumph set the pace for an early end of one of the oldest monarchies still in place.
In the elections concluded on April 10, 2008 the CPN (Maoists) polled 3,145,519 votes obtaining 36.60 per cent of the popular vote and secured 220 seats, while other competitors in the field were far behind, the Nepali Congress with 18.30 per cent votes and 110 seats and the Communist Party of Nepal (UML) with 17.14 per cent of the votes and 103 seats.
The abolition of monarchy was an epoch-making development in Nepal, but it took the newly elected constituent assembly less than two months to accomplish it. However, it is only the beginning of a new era and founding a democratic, federal republic on a firm footing is a tall order. According to Dr S Chandrasekharan, power-sharing or power balance is the key question. Maoist Supreme Prachanda conceded on April 21 that the constituent assembly was not the mission, but only the means to ‘collectively write a new constitution’. The popular mandate, according to him, did not give clear majority to any single party therefore it was necessary for all parties and the civil society to work together under ‘Maoist leadership’. Thus Chandrasekharan said that the ‘Maoists did not want to have parallel power centres, but agree to an accord on power sharing. Rival parties like the Congress obviously had no choice but to settle for power-sharing arrangement, but they were not agreeable to accepting Maoist leadership.
The interim Constitution, according to critics, suffered from two handicaps. The provision for consensual decision making is one impediment, since the anti-Maoist factions in the constituent assembly are reluctant to let the Maoists lead the government expressing the fear that if Maoist are allowed to take over the prime minister it would be had to dislodge them for the next few years. The other limitation of the interim Constitution is that it does not reorganise parties other than the Maoists and the seven party alliances, in particular the Tetran parties, which have a sizeable presence in the constituent assembly.
Monarchy until it was abolished in May 2008 was an all-power institution in Nepal’s politics. The first time, Nepal’s pro-democracy forces managed to lead a mass uprising against the King’s arbitrary functioning was in 1990, when anybody and everybody from lawyers, doctors, writers and journalists joined the agitation. And King Birendra was forced to compromise with the pro-democracy forces led by the political parties. In a proclamation on April 17, 1990, he lifted the ban on political parties and installed an interim government. However, the principal politicians of the day, Congress leader B P Koirala had advocated a policy of ‘national reconciliation between the palace and the people’. Thus, the 1990 constitution, which was enforced thereafter was a ‘compromise document, which gave substantial powers to the King. However, this was marked the revival of multi-party system after a lapse of 31 years. In the elections held under 1990 Constitution the Nepali Congress secured a clear majority and formed the new government. Close behind Congress 110 seats was the Communist Party (UML) with 69 seats.
The first democratically-elected government, in particular the ruling Congress miserably failed to give a good account of the performance, as its rule was marred from day one by corruption, intrigue and constant factional struggle. After losing a vote of confidence in the Assembly the Congress prime minister advised the King to call for fresh election. The November 1994 election produced a hung parliament. The Congress Party paid a heavy price for its infighting as the Communist Party bagging 88 seats emerged as the single largest party, which the Congress was 83 seats were pushed to the second place. In November 1994 Nepal witnessed the unprecedented spectacle of Communists Party coming to power, which could manage to survive only for seven month. Until October 2002, when King Gyanendra assumed all executive powers, a sort of musical chairs was played on the parliamentary scene for dumping the prime minister. From 1990 to 2002 --- nine prime ministers rose to power and disappeared without King’s intervention. However, King Gyanendra who had ascended the throne following the mass killing of the entire royal family in June 2001 had different ideas of how to deal with political parties and democratic forces. From 2002 onwards the King appointed three prime ministers one after the other. The king had made his intentions quite clear. He wished to call shots all by himself and use the palatable politicians as pawns in his grand design. However, to accuse the king exclusively for subverting the political process was a one-sided view of what went wrong with the return of multi-party democracy. The opportunity to act arbitrary was offered the King by the feuding politicians obsessed with greed for personal power. The politicians could not run a single party government full term, nor stick together to manage a durable coalition. Ironically of the 12th government in Nepal between 1990 and 2005 only three arbitrarily hired and fixed by King Gyanendra.
The King took the ultimate step in winding up the infantile democratic order when he on February 1, 2005 proclaimed a state of emergency in Nepal and promised that the new government led by him would restore peace and democracy in the country ‘within the next three years’. King Gyanendra, critics said, had taken a calculated risk to stage what was called ‘palace coup’ by waiting for an importunate moment to act when he believed by growing unpopularity of the political parties was at its peak. How secure was the King in his palace after the ‘coup’ opinions differed, particularly in the initial stages, when there was no visible opposition to his action. Nevertheless, critics pinned their hopes on the long-term repercussions of the ‘palace coup’, and predicted the masses would be not bear with ‘absolute’ monarchy for long.