Nepal has drawn inspiration from India: Ram Baran Yadav

KOLKATA - Nepal President Ram Baran Yadav Friday said his country’s “democratic struggle has drawn inspiration from India”, particularly this eastern metropolis.

“Nepal’s democratic struggle has drawn inspiration from India, particularly from Kolkata. The first conclave of Nepali Congress was held in this city. We have drawn inspiration from India. The seeds were sown here,” said Yadav here while addressing the 177th foundation day of the Calcutta Medical College, his alma mater.

Yadav, a former physician, was a leading light of the Nepali Congress, which is one of the largest political parties of Nepal.

The roots of the Nepali Congress go back to a low-profile meeting that took place in south Kolkata’s Bhowanipore in January 1947. The two-day general convention, which has today become part of Nepal’s history, was held at the Khalsa School that is now known as the Khalsa English High School.

Many leaders of a popular movement in Nepal in the 1950s lived in exile in Kolkata.

Yadav also reminisced about his four-decade-old association with Kolkata and Calcutta Medical College - where he was a student of medical science in the early 1960s.

“I was born in Nepal but I have spent 10 years of my life in Kolkata - first in Calcutta Medical College then in the School of Tropical Medicine. I feel like I am back home,” Yadav said as the fully packed auditorium burst into applause.

Yadav, who obtained his MBBS degree from the Calcutta Medical College, followed by a diploma in clinical pathology from the School of Tropical Medicine here, saw West Bengal’s Maoist insurgency - called the Naxalite movement - grow and reach its peak in the decade he spent in the city from 1968.

“After 33 years, I have come back to this city but I can still speak in Bengali. It feels great. I had friends here. Forty three year ago I had the opportunity of studying at this pioneer institute,” said Yadav, a commoner who replaced Nepal’s King Gyanendra in 2008 as the head of the nascent republic.

Yadav, while referring to the ongoing political crisis in Nepal, told media persons on the sidelines of the foundation day celebrations: “Everything is going on well. We are in the peace process. If there is a problem, we will come out of the problem.”

A political crisis continues to grip Nepal more than seven months after prime minister Madhav Kumar Nepal resigned — the country’s parliament has failed, despite 16 rounds of vote, to find his successor.

The parliamentarians have also failed two deadlines set by Yadav earlier this month for an all-party government — and now the South Asian nation’s warring parties will slug it out again next month during a fresh round of prime ministerial election Feb 3.

The ongoing crisis makes it doubtful if Nepal will be able to proclaim a new constitution by May 28, a task it should have completed last year but failed due to the political turmoil.