NCCS Report of the Baglung Seminar on
"Participatory Democracy: Reducing Social Disparity in Nepal"

By Lok Raj Baral

Nepal Centre For Contemporary Studies with the support of the Friedrich Ebert Foundation organized a day-long seminar on Participatory Democracy at Baglung on 26th August 2002. More than 90 participants with varied backgrounds took part in the seminar. For Baglung and adjoining areas (Parvat and Myagdi) it was a major event. From morning to evening, all the participants took much interest in the emerging trends of Nepali politics. In fact, two themes--- nature and problems of participation and the issues obstructing consolidation were selected. Four resource persons two from the academic side and two from political field offered their written and spoken versions. The two young political scientists were Indra Adhikari of the NCCS and Lal Bahadur Kunwar of the Department of Political Science of Baglung Campus of Tribhuvan University.

The two politicians were Daman Nath Dhungana, former Speaker of the House of Representatives and Pari Thapa , a member of the dissolve House of Representatives from Baglung district. Thapa is a young leader of the People Front Nepal , one of the communist parties of the country.
Initiating the discussion on the subject of democracy, Professor Lok Raj Baral, Executive Chairman of NCCS, focused on the activities of the Centre whose major function is to analyze issues concerning democracy, governance, institutions, actors, security (both traditional and non-traditional), regional, international and bilateral relations. By undertaking a number of activities concerning eleciton, parties, parliament and leadership, NCCS also engages politicians for arriving consensus on certain key areas. By way of presenting his view on the consequences of democratization, he said that democratization also produces fragmentation of parties and institutions thus reversing the process of democratization itself.

Since the social sectors , particularly education, are not getting adequate attention or are on the sidelines, social and economic disparities would be further increased. Another crucial aspect for the consolidation of democracy is to locate sovereignty in a system rather than harp on the theoretical side of the issue. Professor Baral also made a distinction between Prajatantra and Lok Tantra as the former term tends to identify the subject culture which is generally prevailed in the traditional concept of absolute monarcy, while the latter refers to the rule of the people. Many participants appreciated this distinction showing their enthusiasm to embrace Lok Tantra as the spirit of democracy.

Presenting a paper on " The Position of Women in the Participatory Democracy in Nepal", Indra Adhikari of the NCCS first gave a theoretical background to the subject and said that participation in decision making process, human rights, civil rights, right to contest, participation of minorities, popular sovereignty, freedom of elections and political freedoms, openness etc. are some of the ingredients of democracy. From another point of view, active participation of oppressed, disadvantaged and minorities and women meets the essence of democracy. In democracy, two elements are significant--- participation and contestation. So participation here is understood from two angles-one is percentage of votes, the other one is the civil right of deprived and oppressed sections of society. Yet, given the representation pattern of many democracies, theses groups are left out thus making democracy as a mockery. Such exercises carried out in the name of democracy do not assimilate or accommodate inactive minorities. If the interests and views of the minorities, depressed and deprived sections of society are not taken into account during the formulation and execution of policies, such policy measures would only serve the interests of privileged groups or elites of various kinds.

Suggesting some points for making democracy substantive, Indra Adhikari said that election system should follow the principle of proportional representation, equity, not equality, should be the basis for broader representation, elimination of all laws that affect the development of different social categories or communities, improvement in the existing education system to make it progressive and professional, and formulation of policy to provide equal opportunities for all sections of society.

Coming to the issue of gender, Indra Adhikari presented a graphic picture of the pattern of representation of women in various tiers of the system showing that the participation of women is only a formality as no parties grapple with this issue with sincerity. Either in the parties' central committees or in parliament, women are less than 5 percent. In the dissolved House of Representatives (1999-2002), out of 205 members, only 11 members were the women. Concluding her thought provoking paper, Indra said unless women are not represented in the political decision making process or structure, how could they play effective role. So debate for effective representation of women at the centre of politics and power should be vigorously raised.

Lal Bahadur Kunwar presented a paper on the role of ethnic groups and dalit. Trying to make a distinction between clan, tribe, nation, he cited the categorization of Janjati from the Report of a Committee. He also stated that there is one/third ethnic population. However, in the parliament of the country, there were 3o in the lower house and 6 in the National Assembly (upper house). The number of Newar, though less in population size, was higher i.e. 12 and 8 respectively in lower and upper house. Such a picture is also evident in the representation of parties. Among the total members of central committees, only 15.15 percent came from the ethnic group, the rest were from the upper caste groups. Since it is almost a common phenomenon with low representation of ethnic groups at all levels, democracy has not changed it despite three general elections and two local elections held during twelve years.

The picture of dalit or suppressed section of society is more dismal than even the condition of ethnic group. Socially, they are outcasts, economically weakest, politically non-entity and nationally almost nonexistent. It is interesting to note that major parties like the Nepali Congress even encouraged to contest the election from the dalit community .In the dissolved House of Representatives, not a single dalit candidate out of 89 in all could win the election in 1999 parliamentary election. Kunwar has shown the actual representation pattern of dalit in a table one of his papers. He is of the opinion that more than 67 percent of the dalit have the problems of survival due to acute poverty.

In the pre-lunch session, representatives of political parties were requested to make short presentation on the theme of participatory process. Nepali Congress, Communist Party of Nepal (CPN-UML), Janmorcha Nepal and Rshtriya Prajatantra Party (RPP) representatives presented their views. Many party members appreciated the NCCS forum, as it was more serious about national issues, particularly for choosing Baglung for the venue of the seminar. Ram Bahadur Shrestha of RPP, Thamlal Nyure of Janmorcha Nepal, Hira Bahadur Khatri of CPN (UML) and Hari Prasad Shrestha of Nepali Congress were the party representatives. Sharing the view, all of them held political parties responsible for not addressing the issues of ethnic, dalit and gender representation in accordance with the spirit of participatory democracy. Welcoming Loktantra, instead of Prajatantra that smacks of subject political culture which is found in traditional monarchy, they said that democracy (Loktantra) in its true spirit has entered into the Western region.

The two speakers dominated the post-lunch session of the seminar -Pari Thapa of the People Front Nepal and Daman Nath Dhungana, the former Speaker of the House of Representatives. Thapa's paper was based on theoretical aspects but the NCCS Chairman urged him to be more forthright on focusing the current trends in Nepali politics especially pertaining to the regressive trends being highlighted by the politicians and other conscious sections of society. In Thapa's view, Nepali democracy lacks participatory elements as the traditional dominant groups basically dominate it. So unless such a structure is changed, participatory democracy continues to be a distant reality. Expressing his experience in parliament, Thapa said that no parties are serious about the issue as they are basically power seekers rather than the crusaders of progressive transformation.

Covering wide-ranging issues of Nepal's democratic exercises, Dhungana said that there would be no communism in the world as Chinese recent experiences themselves are suggesting change towards democracy. Grappling with the issues of Nepali politics, he wanted to bring about a change in the Constitution or opt for constituent assembly. Since the idea of constituent assembly never got a chance to crystallize since 1951 despite the spirit of the then change from Ranarchy to multiparty democracy, such idea could be revived now. Reforms in the election system, development of accountability culture, change in the culture of politicians in order to consolidate the gains of democracy are the prerequisites for participatory democracy. Urging the Maoists to shun the path of violence, he suggested that they could contribute a lot to democracy and their cause by participating in the elections. He also advised them for a ceasefire before August 29, 2002 i.e. the last date of the emergency rule. Dhungana blamed the political parties for being bereft of national agendas resulting in accumulating crises.

Summing up the discussion, Lok Raj said that participatory democracy demands the end of socio-economic disparity and participation in power structure by the less privileged section of society. Emphasizing on education, he cited Tony Blair who had said in 1996 election campaign that he had three priorities-education, education and education. If education sector remains neglected, all indicators of development and people's participation would be affected.
The Baglung seminar was notable because of the new resource persons and the enthusiastic participation of three districts-Baglung, Parbat and Myagdi. All the participants were happy for selecting Baglung as the venue of the seminar that could spread message of change for the better.