| Username |
Post |
| suva chintak |
Posted
on 09-Jan-03 03:54 PM
Sajhabasis,
Those of you who follow the Nepali newspapers will find the attached letter to the editor in the recent issue of The People's Review from Kathmandu interesting. Here is one critical response to Mr. CK Lal's prolific columns in The Nepali Times and the Himal magazine in Nepal.
Sir,
The following is my reaction to CK Lal's opinion published in The Nepali Times No. 124 "Musharrafship".
Name-calling as elite intellect
Lal's towering reputation built on alternatively bashing Nepal's monarchy and Pakistani polity is only matched by his cavalier disregard for basic facts. Without regard to historical and constitutional differences, he makes a blanket comparison between Gen. Musharraf and the Nepali King. Should we be surprised if Lal declares in his next installment that the October 4 decision was after all an ISI grand design?
Who can match the redoubtable Lal in name-calling? Anyone who holds a different view point or interest position is quickly dismissed as 'donor collaborator', King's 'collaborator', 'high-priest', 'reactionary' or such other derogatory slurs. Just because some of his views are congruent with the Maoists and the Indian state, how would he feel if others similarly labeled him as the 'Indian collaborator'?
Rather than reason and facts, Lal will posture from the high horse of cliched generalities like 'democracy' and 'human rights.' For example, he claims rather pompously that 'democratic rights and human rights are intrinsically intertwined. It is impossible to have one without the other.' This is fine ideological rhetoric, but how does this statement fare empirically? England is said to have had the Magna Carta from the 13th century, but that did not stop her from abusing the human rights of Africans, Asians, natives, women and the Irish for the next seven centuries. The French revolutionaries proclaimed 'fraternity, equality, liberty' from the ramparts of Bastille in 1789, but they continued to treat the Haitians, Africans, Vietnamese, and the Algerians as anything but humans till recently.
Nearer home India is supposed to have 'democratic rights.' But that does not seem to ensure any 'human rights' for millions of people in Kashmir, Gugarat, or Bihar for that matter where the state, fascist thugs or land lord armies, independently or in collusion, regularly commit most brutal inhumanities. Few 'authoritarian' states can match this record of human rights abuses. If anything, the Indian 'democratic' regime appears to reward the perpetrators of ethnic cleansing with handsome electoral rewards, as was recently witnessed in Gujarat. Recall how Hitler won a landslide victory after his storm troopers began taunting the Gypsies and the Jews. But writing from the belly of mother India, Lal does not see these contradictions in his own neighborhood, he has to go all the way to Pakistan to find fodder for his biased intellect.
Lal goes on to label Nepal's monarchy as an 'ossified institution' without a shred of proof. If anything, the vociferous campaign by the Maoists, UML, and Nepali Congress to disrupt and discredit the King's visit to Biratnagar to attend a civic reception exposes the lie cultivated by 'elite intellectuals' like Lal who say Monarchy has no base or relevance in Nepal. Why are 'democrats' and 'communists' scared of the people meeting their King? Further, how does Lal see the so-called 'mass-based political leaders' getting us out of the insurgency quagmire if they themselves have been sleeping with the Maoists all along?
Finally, Lal accuses the government of being a dictatorship. Over the years Lal has been throwing every kind of invective against the Monarchy and the Army except for the four letter word and he seems to be doing just as he continues to be the standard bearer for the most prominent newspapers in Nepal. I can't imagine The New York Times, London Times, or The Times of India carrying such virulent attacks against their head of state and the armed forces, week after week. I have seen no greater tolerance of expression.
The public expects more accountability from its intellectuals, not just empty slogans and accusations. Or does Lal feel, as Mother India's prodigal son in self-exile, he is somehow above such trifles as facts and evidence?
Kshitz Basnet
(The above comments responding to CK Lal, columnist, The Nepali Times, by her reader, Kshitz Basnet, originally sent to its editor was refused to print. We, thus, chose to print the same-Ed.)
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| suva chintak |
Posted
on 09-Jan-03 04:21 PM
OOps,
This double posting was unintended, Sorry!
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| Free Thinker |
Posted
on 09-Jan-03 04:34 PM
The funny thing is the writer seems to be engaging in name calling too ... :)
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| khaja biscuit |
Posted
on 09-Jan-03 07:50 PM
CK Lal is to Nepali print media what Vijay Kumar is to Nepali television: all style and little substance, and name-dropping that's backed by little homework. Both will survive for a few more years until they start facing competition from others.
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| Zubin |
Posted
on 10-Jan-03 04:03 AM
C K lal's columns are fact but some find it hard to digest just because they see or find themself closer to the power centres of nepal politico. And remember, for many pahadi counterparts, madhesis are "Indian Collaborators" by their instictive rule.
Oct. 4 takeover by the monarch is exactly like that of musharraf, both were army head, so they could.
Maoists have some ground in nepal because few of their demands are genuine; however, their violence is despicable and self destructive.
Mr. basnet's accusation that Lal is India's self-exiled son is inflamatory. This is typical pahadi bigotry and supremacist thinking. Grow up boy! Open your window wide, clear up your head that just because you are basnet, you should be among "ruling elite" to supress the "intellectual elites" like C K lal.
C K lal......great going, keep it up......ur articles are true mirror of Nepal and helps to shape the international opinion.
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| Jhilke Kyailan |
Posted
on 10-Jan-03 09:16 AM
CK Lal....shaper of international opinion???....maybe that is going too far.
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| makar |
Posted
on 11-Jan-03 02:55 AM
It seems that Kshitz Basnet has well paying clients in Embassy of Pakistan as well as in Royal Nepal Army. Or may be she loves the sand-bitch position with one from the front and other from the rear? There is no other reason why she should try to defend the military rule in Nepal and Pakistan. Even an idiot can see that it is Musharrafship being played out in Nepal. Mr. C. K. Lal does get carried away once in a while, but his heart is in right place, which is contributing towards the transformation of exclusivist seventeenth century Nepalese society into an inclusive modern one. Free thinker is right, the writer should see the Ranga on her body before criticising C. K. Lal's lazy habit Jumra of using collective noun.
Please do not run down misguided, but otherwise honest, Nepalese writers like C. K. Lal. I mean who else writes even passable English in Nepal? Bigoted M. R. Josse? Forget it girl.Bear with kaja biscuit, once competition gets tough people like C. K. Lal will automatically be sidelined. Until then, for me, better Mr. C. K. Lal than Josse or Basnet. Peace, folks.
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| paramendra |
Posted
on 11-Jan-03 09:45 AM
Zubin and Makar make sense.
This IS Musharrafship!
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| baje1 |
Posted
on 13-Jan-03 10:09 AM
This has been printed in the latest issue of NEPAL TIMES.
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| suva chintak |
Posted
on 13-Jan-03 04:39 PM
Baje 1,
Yes, I saw the Nepali Times print. I agree with Free Thinker that Ksiztz Basnet also indulges in name calling of her own, even as she accuses CK Lal of name-calling! Pot calling the kettle black, uh?
Having said that, I also think MS Basnet has some valid points..especially about facts and evidence in the writing of CK Lal or any other Nepali columnists. I think it is a good thing for new people to challenge the writings of established personalities like CK Lal. If our laid back, self-assured, self-congratulatory intellecutals and writers know that there are some critical readers out there, it will make them more rigorous.
As someone said, Let a thousand flowers bloom.
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| Rastaman |
Posted
on 13-Jan-03 04:43 PM
See listen peopal. Learn from I. I neva call no one no names. it is just Them. You call them peopal. dont call no names. Cause how many names can you come up with? it is just them peopal. All them peopal putting I down. While Rastaman is givin love around.
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| Shaiva |
Posted
on 14-Jan-03 04:49 AM
shuv chintak,
That is precisely the point.This letter from Ms. Basnet has no facts, only innuendos. Take a look:
-When has C K Lal talked about ISI 'Grand Design' ?
-To my knowledge, CK Lal is the 'only' columnist who has opposed Maoists consistently. He opposed them even when all kinds of reactionaries and royalists were calling Maoists 'nationalists'. Where is the ground to even allege that Mr. Lal can be called either Maoist or Indian 'collaborator'?
-Quoting Magna Carta to disaprove the relationship between human rights and democracy is like telling that North Korea is democratic because it posseses missiles.
-Well, many people in Cuba do not have human rights, does that mean USA should ditch it too just because they are neighbours? Ms. Basnet has every right to detest Indians, but why make a public show of her dislike?
-Would any of the newspapers named by Ms. Basnet publish a letter so completely devoid of substance, and so full of hatred, in their pages? It is baffling why Kunda Dixit chose to give so much space to this trash. Is Ms. Basnet related to him? It is possible, because most Bahun Chhetris of Kathmandu are cousins.
Facts and evidences are sacred, but surely, as a public intellectual, Mr. CK Lal is free to present his observations in his column. Ms. Basnet is free to start an alternative column for Madise-bashing. However, both of them should be ready to face the consequences. That said, let me point out that CK Lal's columns are readable, even when I disagree with him on most issues, including his muted criticism of royal takeover. I think he should have denounced Asojtantra in much stronger terms.
Do I sound like Mr. Lal's lawyer? Someone please tell him to pay me..
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