The letter “z” is pronounced as ijjed, issed or sometimes zed and rarely zee in India. Coming to think about it, these variations are a function of geography, mother tongue-influence and social class. In Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, it is ijjed and that makes one wonder who would be calling themselves gen zee in neighbouring, poorer Nepal. Obviously, only the western educated, the wealthy or the Thamel crowd that caters to Western tourists; not the poor, unemployed, angry, frustrated young man who is waiting to catch a bus to Sitamarhi and then to Delhi to sell momos on the streets.
That seething youngster on the bus wouldn’t have a clue about “nepo babies”. In fact, only nepo babies use this term to attack fellow favourites of the entitled class. To see this phrase on a banner carried around as part of the anarchic violence is to identify a telltale sign of the well-heeled triggering a regime change, after failing to win elections. A viral video clip of a school kid adds to this doubt. A boy in expensive school uniform with a fake Western accent is attacking political parties over unemployment and corruption without probably ever having suffered lack of opportunity. His breathless schoolboy performance (now when seen during the violence) tragically ended up as a bad rehearsal for what happened later ––– cruel cops shooting down boys in school uniform. Then there are theories abound on social media about a Western-funded colour revolution bringing in regime change in Nepal.
Sudan Gurung, a 36-year-old activist at the centre of the tumultuous episode in Kathmandu, fits the bill. He used to run a nightclub OMG and became a “born-again” philanthropist after the 2015 earthquake, launching Hami Nepal, a non-governmental organisation (NGO). But the problem here is two-fold: Only a nepo baby can have a nightclub at the age of 26, whether he is in Kathmandu or Delhi. And if the nightclub is indeed in Thamel, then he ought to have very wealthy and hugely indulgent parents. Then again, only the blue-blooded can pull family strings to get multinationals like Coca Cola and Al Jazeera to support an NGO. That is how sickeningly nepotistic the Indian subcontinent is. But if Gurung had built his nightclub and his NGO with his own money and networking skills, then undoubtedly, he deserves to be the executive president of Nepal.
But the plot of a political upheaval unravels in its process and the identification of the beneficiary. Here, one can see that as in Bangladesh, the army let vandalism and violence play out before stepping in as an arbiter. A redux of the Bangladesh drama. It was army chief Waker-uz-Zaman, who announced Sheikh Hasina’s resignation on August 5, 2024, after the student protests. Two days later he invited the unelected Western darling Mohammed Younus as the new head the of the interim administration. The uncanny similarity gives away the plot.
According to news reports, Nepal Prime Minister KP Oli was asked to resign by army chief Ashok Kumar Sigdel as a precondition for restoring peace. Soon after ensuring Oli’s exit, Sigdel asked former Chief Justice of Nepal Sushila Karki to head the interim government. Nepal’s Constitution does not allow a former CJI to take up a post-retirement constitutional job. Someone’s South Asian playbook is in circulation. Elected representatives and the electoral process are getting discredited, while chosen individuals are being foisted on the nation after unconscionable violence by gen x, why or zee.
Is this a harbinger of regime change in India, as a social media influencer “followed” by a former armed forces chief, hopes? Or is it a Western attempt to contain China? Or is it both ––– containing China and threatening India. Though the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (Quad) between US, India, Japan and Australia was initiated in 2007, it became a coherent grouping only in 2017. China saw this as an attempt at containment and the Ladakh standoff of April 2020 was its response. Though India actively participated in the first-ever Quad military exercise in November 2020, it soon began diplomatic efforts to de-escalate and disengage. India did not want to play the proxy role offered by the West to clash with and diminish China ––– a role that could have destroyed its economy and security.
Once India stepped back from the Himalayan brink, governments in the Indian subcontinent began falling one after another, to be replaced by assets, proxies and tinpot generals. The first to go was Imran Khan in April 2022. He is still languishing in jail. In July 2022, the Sri Lankan government was forced to kneel down to violent street mobs in Colombo with the Prime Minister first resigning and then the President fleeing the country. Two years later, elected Prime Minister Hasina was replaced by the unelected Western favourite Younus. Now, a year after that, Nepal’s Parliament has been gutted as if those who are going to replace the current set of political leaders would all be lily white puritans.
Myanmar is reeling under a crippling civil war which offers immense potential for trouble against neighbouring countries. Pakistan’s army chief Asim Munir has already warned India that the next attack would come from the east. And now Nepal is on the boil. It can be read as a Western ploy to ring fence China, something that India failed. It could also be a two-pronged strategy because this line of containment faces both China and India.
Interestingly, the immediate trigger for violence in Nepal was a ban on Western social media platforms. Singapore’s Prime Minister Lawrence Wong had in a recent statement on US tariffs pointed out that the US export of software services far outweighed its import of goods. This is particularly true about social media services run by tech giants, which are a huge drain on national wealth, productive energy; and they can also be used to create political upheavals. The Nepal violence could also be seen as a warning sign to those who consider measuring the export surplus created by social media platforms against import of goods.
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