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Rabia of Basra, an eighth-century Sufi saint, was on her deathbed when Sufyan visited her. He asked if she needed any help. A peerless mystic, Rabia said she had given herself to God, so no help was necessary. He then asked if she desired anything. Rabia answered: “My desire is meaningless. I have given all my desires to God.”

Sufyan’s ego got a great jolt. The famed and powerful scholar of his time felt dwarf in front of a frail old woman. He fell to his knees, and said: “O God, forgive me! My devotion is not as strong as this woman’s.”

Rabia smiled, and remarked: “You don’t get the point. You are seeking forgiveness for yourself. Forgive God first, and you will be forgiven.”

Thus goes the story. Believing it or not is up to us. We can either draw valuable lessons from it or set it aside as a myth. A mind open to truth can find many gems of wisdom in this little story.

Perhaps the most obvious gem here is that of bhakti, or true devotion. Sufyan considered himself a man of God, but in front of the God-attuned saint, he saw his own meagerness. But still he couldn't get the point. What could be the point here?

Rabia told him to forgive God instead of seeking forgiveness for himself. For a true devotee, God is not different from yourself. When you consider yourself different from God, bhakti gets corrupted and trade begins. And the corrupted bhakta (devotee) pleads: "O God! Please do this for me. If you do this, I will visit your temple. I will make offerings to you."

For Rabia, God is not different from her. It's His desire that she desires, it's His plan that she is working out. If He has planned destitution and disease for her, why try to change? Since she has God with her, any outside help would be redundant. Why would God—the ultimate source of all help—need anybody else's help? If you have got the ultimate itself, what else would you desire?

Rabia's oneness with the ultimate is rare. And when you are in total unison with it, you know what works and what doesn't. You know the rules that govern this world. One such rule that Rabia was trying to tell Sufyan is that you leave aside your desires. You leave aside your selfish motives. You leave aside even the wish of forgiveness for yourself. Instead, you wish everything for God. When you are one with the ultimate and you wish something for it, you will find fulfillment for yourself, in higher degree, imbued with a higher potency. That happens with faultless devotion, or true bhakti, the way Rabia lived.

When the Soviets opposed Nepal’s UN membership in 1949, the country had to wait for six more years before it was admitted to the global body in 1955. The newly independent India, a de facto Soviet ally at the time, wanted to secure its hold over its traditional backyard. The Soviets also saw Nepal as falling under the American camp after the establishment of Nepal-US diplomatic ties in 1947. The small landlocked country thus became an early victim of Cold War politics. 

Nonetheless, back in the 1950s and 60s, Nepal wielded some influence abroad, whether under King Mahendra or briefly under BP Koirala. They were perhaps the only two leaders in Nepali history who could deal with their foreign counterparts as equals, betraying no inferiority complex. Koirala held his own against Jawaharlal Nehru and Zhou Enlai. His 1960 address to the UN General Assembly—where he held forth on ‘big power complex’, China’s UN membership, Algerian independence, among others—has not been matched by another Nepali leader since. 

Mahendra was also completely at ease chatting up head of Soviet Presidium Kliment Voroshilov or American President Dwight D. Eisenhower. His 1960 state visit to the US, with roadside crowds cheering his motorcade, and his address to the joint session of US Congress, were both unprecedented.

Perhaps it’s no accident that the two times Nepal has been a member of the UN Security Council (1969-70 and 1988-89) were during the Panchayat days. With the domestic population under the monarch’s absolute control, he could focus his attention outwards, contributing to a consistent foreign policy. The prowess of diplomats like Risikesh Shah, Yadunath Khanal, and Bhek Bahadur Thapa who were at his disposal would also be hard to replicate today.  

Prolonged instability after the 1990 democratic change—greatly exacerbated by the Maoist insurgency—did significant damage to Nepal’s international standing. As the newly liberated political parties fought for power among themselves, Nepal’s national interest was compromised, once again showing that only a stable country can successfully project is power abroad.  

As the head of a powerful government with two-thirds majority, KP Oli has some clout on the international stage. Under Oli, Nepal has generated more interest abroad than at any other time since 1990. Yet nobody takes him seriously. This again owes to political in-fighting in Nepal, even within the ruling NCP, and the country’s ad hoc foreign policy (the abrupt dismissal of Leela Mani Poudyal as Nepal’s envoy to China a case in point). Even among the ruling NCP, factions compete for ambassadorships. 

Nepal’s increasing proximity to China, to the exclusion of everyone else, is also doing damage to her carefully cultivated non-aligned image. In fact, Nepal is these days known more for having a government closely aligned to its communist brethren to the north than it is as a vibrant federal democratic republic. Nor does the country have a coherent foreign policy. It is still the norm to hand out ambassadorships based on personal connections. Unnecessary embassies have been opened abroad while the ones that needed strengthening have been neglected. The two-third Oli government cannot even pass a long-agreed foreign compact through a parliament it controls. 

On the 75th anniversary of the United Nations, it is worth looking back at the days when Nepal was both seen and heard in important capitals and forums.  

The market is flooded with excess liquidity. The banks and financial institutions (BFIs) don’t espy many areas of investment at a time the pandemic has made everything come to a standstill. As the BFIs have been unable to lend, the Nepal Rastra Bank (NRB) has mopped up excess liquidity from the market. But this is only a short-term solution while the country’s financial sector suffers from a chronic excess liquidity. Nepal’s banking sector appears to be increasingly biased to holding liquid assets rather than supporting productive investment through lending.

The slump in demand for credit is one reason for excess liquidity in the financial sector. The NRB pulled $600 million through reverse repo auction on a cumulative basis in the first month of fiscal 2020/21, up from $300 million in the corresponding period in fiscal 2019/20. Borrowers are shying away from credit because the BFI lending is conservative and does not encourage new ideas and project concepts. Normally, this is the season that potential borrowers start processing loans, but this tendency has significantly decreased thanks to the pandemic and restricted economic activities.

The NRB statistics show 79 percent of BFI loans in the first month of 2020/21 has been approved against collateral such as land, building, or current assets such as agricultural and non-agricultural products. This shows our financial sector is not project-financing friendly. There is minimal investment from BFIs in new business ideas and projects with no assets to use as collateral.

The NRB should encourage the BFIs to be more supportive of new ideas that they can support with loans, and not to discourage individuals and firms from approaching BFIs when they need additional funds. Alternatively, the NRB also needs new instruments to manage excess liquidity effectively and strategically. Given the nature of our remittances inflow and country’s peg to Indian currency, ad hoc mopping of the liquidity may not be sufficient, nor would it provide the level of predictability needed for effective market functioning. In the current scenario, it would be wise to lend to small and medium enterprises (SMEs) that could generate jobs and utilize resources.

The government claims the economy is still on right track despite months-long lockdown and restrictions on economic activities. We have to be cautious about how these numbers are crunched. Private sector credit has gone down significantly as the pandemic limits economic activities. SMEs consider access to finance a major bottleneck for their growth in Nepal even in normal times. They have been under added pressure from ad hoc lockdowns and restricted economic activities. There is also a huge gap between urban and rural populations in terms of their access to finance. All these issues reinforce the need to expand financial sector and make it more output-oriented. This can be done by lending to SMEs and enterprising individuals.

The NRB has had a deprived sector lending policy since the 1990s but it is not working. The country currently needs investments in services and ideas. The whole idea of deprived sector lending is to help people have funds even if they do not have assets for collateral. But it is not working that way. The BFIs are doing collateral based lending regardless. This is also not serving the supporting sectors that are breaking new frontiers.

Covid-19 has changed the entire outlook of the economy. In these times, extending credit to firms and individuals with solid ideas should be the new normal. It is best to let money circulate through the veins of nation’s economy than let it stagnate in bank vaults.

Are you disillusioned by the naked pursuit of political power in Nepal? Have you lost faith in our institutional bodies, like the Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA), or even the judicial system? Do you feel hopeless with the corruption in government systems and the brazen impunity with which it is conducted?

If you answered “Yes” to these questions, fear not, you are at the right juncture in Nepal’s history. You may not know it yet, but your disillusionment, loss of faith, and sense of hopelessness are the weapons that will help complete Nepal’s unfinished revolution.

This September, Nepal celebrated the fifth anniversary of its constitution. With its federal structure, devolution of power, and the embodiment of rights, the constitution offers a vision of an inclusive nation. But can it deliver on our aspirations?

Nepal’s constitution is young. Many laws are yet to be written. Sensitive issues, like citizenship, equal rights for women, and institutional discrimination against Madhesis, are still far from resolved—even the pathway to resolution remains unclear for now. But these are still early days. It is important, perhaps, to let the constitution run its course.

At the same time, efforts to consolidate democracy around Nepal’s young constitution is being undermined by the erosion of public trust in institutions, widespread disillusionment, and despair.

What erodes public trust?

Nepal’s transitional justice process underpinned both the Comprehensive Peace Agreement that ended the civil war in 2006 as well as the constitution that followed. Despite the establishment of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and Supreme Court judgements, Nepal’s transitional justice process is in shambles. The commission has investigated approximately 6,000 cases. But no charges have been filed. There is no sign of justice, no visible effort towards reconciliation.

Nepal’s constitution has been written in blood. Unless the wounds are healed, it is hard to imagine it can confer the legitimacy that Nepal needs to move forward.

Nepal’s constitution devolves authority from the center to the provinces and local governments. These early years, however, have helped centralize political authority. Constitutional bodies, and institutional authorities, like the Army, President, parliament, and judiciary, have failed to push back against an increasingly belligerent executive branch. The safeguards against the concentration of political power through opposition parties and civil society has failed to coalesce.

Governance failure is discrediting institutions, not individuals. As government falters, the Prime Minister is not to blame. He is still considered successful for having outwitted everyone else to retain power. Instead, we blame, and lose faith in, government institutions.

Over the past decade, Nepalis have been routinely bombarded with daily instances of failures in governance, corruption, and abuse of power. All of this has added to the feeling of disillusionment and hopelessness. In despair, we put our hands on our heads and say, “if only we had better leadership”.

That is exactly when the next phase of Nepal’s revolution begins.

To utopia

The disillusionment, despair and hopeless may not be accidental. They result from an orchestrated campaign to discredit existing institutions and undermine the constitution. The next phase of Nepal’s revolution will not be fought with guns and bullets. Our disillusionment and hopelessness will naturally draw us to leadership that can deliver, even if that means some rules must be amended and rights infringed.

That may sound absurd. But consider this. In the middle of the pandemic, top leaders of the ruling communist party descended into a long-drawn publicly visible tussle for power. This feud is imposing a huge national cost—distracting the government and undermining the effectiveness of its response to the crisis.

Even the most vulgar political opportunist would know that the pandemic would be a bad time for a publicly visible battle for political power. These leaders represent some of the sharpest political minds in the country. They have decades of political experience. Did they really engage in the fight only for political power at such a time?  

If like most Nepalis you believe they did, that leaders really squabbled for nothing more than political power while ignoring the national damage it was doing, then you have questioned the value of this constitution.

As we celebrate five years of the constitution, the challenge for us is on how to retain faith in our institutions and constitution even as we remain disillusioned with the political leadership it produces.

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