Madhesh as such doesn’t exist in Nepal
Raj Kumar Lekhi is the leader of the Tharu community. He is concurrently the General Secretary of the Tharu Welfare Society.
Lekhi’s society and some other Tharu organizations in support of some indigenous political entities agitated for some good thirteen days and forced the government to bow down and sign an agreement which now, claims Lekhi, secured and ensured the rights of the Tharus community.
The Tharus appear to differ with the idea of declaring Nepal’s entire Tarai belt as One Madhesh.
Tharus claim that there is no such place or special territory in Nepal which could be taken as Madhesh.
Lekhi claims that with the signing of the 6 point agreement with the government of Nepal in favor of the Tharu rights, a historic achievement has been accomplished.
However, Lekhi’s detractors opine that he and Laxman Tharu betrayed the entire Tharus and signed the agreement with the government without taking into confidence the mood of the Tharu community.
Lekhi and Laxman rebuke such allegations.
The Sunrise Post dated March 21, 2009, printed interview with Lekhi. Thanks Sunrise.
Below the excerpts: Ed.
TGQ1: Your Tharu community waged a movement for long in the recent days against the recently promulgated government’s Ordinance which assimilates your community in the category of the Madhesis. What were the gains of the said movement? Some even say that your agreement with the government is likely not to be addressed by the government. Your comments please.
Lekhi: The genuine demands that we had been voicing since long has been well addressed by the fresh agreement between the Tharu community and the government. The present agreement with the government now fully recognizes the distinct Tharu identity, linguistic pattern, tradition, historical and cultural practices and above all the political rights of the Tharus.
To be candid, the clause 1 of the fresh agreement clearly sates that the government henceforth recognizes the separate identities of the people living in the hills and the indigenous population including those of the Tharus. In effect, these people have their own and distinct culture and traditions and thus their demands have now been fulfilled.
What has also been agreed upon that by affecting effecting certain amendments in the interim constitution which caused immense damage to annihilate our separate identities by such an amendment will be corrected through yet another amendment? This means that the interim constitution will now again be amended in order to ensure our unique identity that we possess in abundance.
Be it known to all that neither we are the followers of Madhesh nor we are Madhesis. We are at best entirely different from others and are Tharus.
Well! We don’t claim that all of our demands have been met with for all time to come. However, still, the historical movement that we have had in the recent weeks has some way or the other addressed some of our genuine concerns.
Neither a movement of the sort what we have had can address all of our issues and concerns.
What we have talked this time is that we were neither Madhesis nor the inhabitants of what is called Madhesh. We have just wanted to sound that we are Tharus who possess a distinct identity and that we be not assimilated into any other ethnic domain. We just wanted to establish our historical roots and cultural patterns that are definitely different than others.
The fresh agreement has provided a sort of slap to all those who wanted to incorporate the entire castes and ethnic tribes into one particular community. The Ordinance which had damaged our separate identity and Madhesised the entire belt remains now shattered.
Some demands are yet to be addressed.
TGQ2: So when the agreement you think will come into effect? Why not you the Tharus raised this issue when the Interim Constitution was amended? You could have raised your reservations then? Why was the delay? Your comments please.
Lekhi: Well! The Constituent Assembly will resume its proceedings by March 29, 2009. The government at time of signing of the agreement with us has assured that the demands of the Tharus will be brought to the attention of the CA upon completion of all the needed and the required procedures as is demanded. The onus now lay with the government for the fulfillment of the agreements that has already been agreed upon.
What remain yet to be seen is how the parties take this and how the government convinces the political parties. How the lobbying is carried out by the government in this regard will be equally important to watch in the days ahead.
Indeed we have had raised this issue the day the first amendment of the interim constitution included the word Madhesh as such, however, our protest in this regard went unheeded.
The tragedy has been that unless some dozen vehicles are not burnt and agitation not sponsored the government in Nepal does not listen to the issues and concerns of the people.
Thus we were forced to do the same what others have done in order to get their demands addressed. And we did it and thus got our demands met with by the government.
TGQ3: Why your community is aggressive towards the Madhesh? Recently we have learnt that you have agreed to allow the government to write Tarai and Madhesh together instead of what was Madhesh only in the past? Will you explain please1
Lekhi: Yes! Indeed there are Madhesis in Nepal. Even in Kathmandu you can notice the presence of Madhesis. Like wise they are also in Pokhara and in Tarai as well.
But there is no such territory in Nepal which could be taken as Madhesh. Neither Madhesh was yesterday nor it exists today and at best nor would it come into existence in the future as well.
If Delhi houses some one million Nepali citizens, will then that allow the Nepalese to constitute a mini Nepal right there? It can’t be made so. This applies here as well.
To tell you frankly, there is no word as such which is Tarai-Madhesh in our agreement that we have signed recently. Albeit that was the proposition of the government at time of the agreement. We haven’t accepted the word Tarai-Madhesh in the agreement.
TGQ4: The Madhesi community after a prolonged agitation had managed to incorporate the word Madhesh in the interim constitution after the first amendment. Will now the Madhesh parties will so easily accept the use of the word Tarai ?
Lekhi: We just wanted to establish the unique and the distinct identities of the Tharus, Muslim and other indigenous people. The Madhesis while raising the issues concerning ensuring of their own rights tried to intrude upon to the rights of the others sects, ethnicity and tribes. We objected to their efforts at minimizing our exclusive and genuine rights. We have rebuffed their design by waging the prolonged agitation recently.
Who say what and does what should be not of our concern.
TGQ5: The Tharu agitation has come to an end. During the agitation some other political groupings also extended their support to your agitation. Will such a support continue in the future as well? Tell us why your society is being dubbed as anti-Madhesh? Your remarks please.
Lekhi: Those who supported us have their own demands. How they do it, it is their way to decide.
Yes! The Tharus have various organizations and all have their own identity and functioning style. But when it comes to the crunch, we all become one and fight in a united manner.
The Tharu Welfare Society, let me tell you frankly, does not believe in the armed movement. We don’t extend our support to those who raise weapons. We adopt peaceful means.
Definitely not. We are not against any particular caste or for that mater a community. Our fight is just to guarantee the rights of the Tharu community which has been denied by the State so far.
This is a wrong calculation and thus I refute such allegations.
Source: Telegraphnepal.com.np
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