Modi, Janakpur & the strategic geopolitical warfare

A little over 180 days into Prime Minister Narendra Modi's administration, not even his fiercest critic is able to find fault with the way he has gone around the globe strengthening India's soft power. Suddenly we have a PM who isn’t afraid of wearing Hinduism on his sleeves & is inspiring Indians as well as people outside India on the beauty, wisdom, knowledge & intellectual capabilities of ancient India.

So what is it about Narendra Modi that gives sleepless nights to enemies & visions of a wonderful future to his supporters?? The first generations of BJP leaders (Vajpayee, Advani etc) were deferential to the Gandhi dynasty, unable to break the shackles imposed by the mainstream media, happy with opposition role & unable to counter anti RSS/BJP narrative so assiduously forced on the Indian public by the Indian mainstream media. The elevation of Narendra Modi changed all this. Here is a man vilified & abused for 12 years; yet having gumption to stand & take on the minions of the Gandhi dynasty. For the first time, since independence, we have a Prime Minister who clearly abhors dynastic politics, isn't amused with special trappings enjoyed by the Gandhi dynasty and gives scant respect to privy purses, pleasures, & privileges established by Marxists & sycophants.

There is an active ecosystem thriving in India on Nehruvian antiquity & systematic national/international doles- a powerful cabal of NGOs, missionaries, activists, Naxals, communists, leftists & Marxists etc that have steered India's discourse since independence & so incestuous it is, no competing thought or ideology was allowed to flourish. RSS & Jan Sangh (earlier avatar of BJP) were systematically demonized & internationally vilified while this group. With the Gandhi dynasty as its fountainhead, they have steadily moth eaten India, its history, its past, its aspirations & its dynamic cultural heritage. This same ecosystem was spread to Nepal 1989 onwards with the help of administrations of Rajiv Gandhi, Sonia Gandhi & Scandinavian countries. There is now a similarly powerful cabal in Nepal surviving on Anti India propaganda with funding from US/Europe & China.

Nepal, if you all recall, was the world's only Hindu country before the country was declared a republic in 2008. The Congress led UPA was responsible for 12 point charter signed by the Nepali parties & the Maoists in 2005 in Delhi, which uprooted monarchy & imposed secularism in Nepal. Almost two decades earlier, in 1989, Rajiv Gandhi had forced a blockade, which resulted in collapse of absolute rule of the king & beginning of multi party system. While on surface, nothing seems wrong with this interference, it's important to note that, with multi party system, missionaries were allowed entry into Nepal for the first time in 1990. With missionaries came NGOs & with NGOs came the funds to balkanize Nepal. By 1996, Nepal was already starting to battle a Maoist insurgency.

Interesting thing about the Maoist insurgency was that only Hindu/Buddhist heritages were assaulted. Christianity was allowed to flourish; churches were planted in every nook and corner-none attacked, none run down & all allowed spreading unchecked. After 2004, Congress led UPA again started interfering in Nepal with its sole aim to abolish monarchy, collapsing of the Hindu state & a sinister design of balkanization under the guise of federalism. This was going unchecked until something unthinkable happened in May 2014- Narendra Modi was elected Prime Minister of India with a full majority.

Already the 2 day visit in August had international interlopers in Nepal worried. It was for the first time that an Indian Prime Minister had come to Nepal and won hearts of common Nepalis & India-Nepal bilateral relation kick started & was on an upswing. The relationship, Modi's personal interest in Nepal and the general feel good reached a crescendo when PM Modi announced visit to Janakpur & Lumbini (both in Terai & bordering India).

Janakpur is historically a very important pilgrimage site to Hindus- the town is named after King Janak of Ramayan, the father of Sita, consort of King Ram of Ayodhya. The Janaki Mandir in Janakpur is a palatial complex that hosts the annual Ram-Sita Vivah Samaroh, which is attended by devotees from all over India & Nepal. Janakpur today is neglected by the state & the town is dirty, with broken down infrastructure & resembles a ghost town, a far cry from its heyday when it enjoyed patronage from the King of Nepal.

When PM Modi announced his visit to Janakpur, the entire town went up in celebration. Finally, a world leader had chosen to visit it & someone no less than the Indian premier. Roads were cleaned, repaired, the town was painted- Janakpur got a complete makeover. Modi was scheduled to visit the Janaki Mandir and then give a speech at the local barah bigha ground. Everything was hunky-dory; only that it wasn't anticipated by cultural imperialists & foreign interlopers of modern Nepal and what PM Modi planned in Janakpur didn’t fit in the long term scheming they've planned for Nepal.

The opposition came in waves- from I/NGOs & missionaries financed by Scandinavian countries to political parties owing allegiance to China (China funds them through Pakistan), everyone on foreign payroll, started creating a ruckus. Print media was overrun with concerns of supposedly Indian hegemonic designs & with money power; a national consensus was attempted to show that the speech Modi was to give was against international norm & diplomatically a ruse to make Nepal a satellite state of Nepal. It failed miserably when Janakpur went on strike demanding PM Modi visit as planned and make the speech as was originally stated.

So why was the Janakpur incident blown out of proposition & the current good relationship between India & Nepal held hostage? Nepal is the gateway to pin down India effectively. One of the first tasks of PM Modi was repairing relationship with Nepal which had withered into oblivion during Congress/UPA rule. Nepal is strategically very sensitive to India's security concerns. Congress/ UPA methodically created upheavals in Nepal, allowing it to be infested by ISI & China also moved in taking advantage to encircle India from the North. Pakistan regularly sends jihadis & terrorists into India from Nepal, taking advantage of the 1700 kilometers of open & porous border. Madrassas have mushroomed along the India-Nepal border & the entire Terai belt of Nepal is used by China & Pakistan to bleed India dry.

Missionaries are also very active in Nepal and missionary NGOs launder money through Nepal to India to avoid stringent foreign exchange laws in India. Further, due to continued information/education & political implication of missionary activities in India, missionaries are training & financing poor Nepalis and sending them as bible proponents into India (as Nepalis don’t require visa/residency permits). Foreign missionaries also used to enter India from Nepal as tourists before 2012 using human mules to carry cash. This kind of infiltrating India has lessened considerably after the UPA government in November 2012 quietly relaxed the restriction of entry & stay of missionaries implemented on the recommendation of the Niyogi Commission in 1956, without informing or debating the issue in the Indian parliament.

This is why there is a cottage industry in India against Narendra Modi and this is why there is also an anti India cottage industry in Nepal. The active cabal in Nepal today-the foreign interlopers, missionaries & Scandinavian countries-forever scavenging on ethnic conflicts-are all on a tailspin with the rise of Modi & BJP in India. The discourse they’ve pushed Nepal into since 1990 can be easily unraveled if Narendra Modi & BJP continues to rule India. Janakpur is just one of the battlegrounds- as PM Modi grows stronger and India's relationship with Nepal continues to become better-a lot is yet to be fought and a lot more is yet to be understood.

Smt. Ekta Patro from Kathmandu