Smearing red sandalwood paste on a line of worshippers gathered
outside the main pagoda of the Nepali capital's imposing Pashupatinath
temple complex, Hindu priest Raju Baje explains that the 400-odd shrines
contain all but one of the religion's 330,000 deities.
Through the smoke of funeral pyres are stone statues of roaring
lions, a giant bronze cow, endless wooden images of the divine and
framed pictures of the 11 monarchs from the Shah dynasty that ruled Nepal in the last 240 years - except the current king, Gyanendra.
The present ruler, says Baje, is a god who has been thrown out of his
own temple. "We consider the king a divine figure. He is the
incarnation of Lord Vishnu. But if we put a picture of him up it will be
ripped down. The people don't love him."
Today, Nepal's new constitutional assembly will hold its first
meeting and end the monarchy, a key part of a 2006 peace deal with
Maoist guerrillas who gave up the bullet for the ballot box on the
condition that the country becomes a secular republic. The civil war
lasted a decade and cost more than 13,000 lives.
The Maoists, who won last month's elections to become the largest
party in Nepal's assembly, say that the monarch will have an "honourable
exit", but the fall of King Gyanendra and the disappearance of the
world's last Hindu monarchy has been dramatic.
In the past few months the word "Royal" has been dropped from the
army and national airline. Gone from the national anthem are any
references to the king. The royal family, consisting of the king, the
queen, the queen mother, the crown prince and his wife and children,
left their pink-hued palace in the centre of the capital last week for
the last time.
There is little doubt that royal belts will have to be tightened. The
monarch's state salary of $3m (£1.5m) has been revoked and the royal
family's seven palaces are to be turned into museums. Even the queen was
forced to give up her retinue of beauticians.
After today's vote the king, who once ruled by divine right, will be
reduced to a commoner - albeit an extremely wealthy one with tea estates
and tobacco holdings in the 12th poorest country in the world.
The transformation from kingdom to republic still leaves unanswered the questions of what an ex-royal will be allowed to do.
The king still enjoys support from Hindu extremists and elements in
the armed forces, a small fringe perhaps, but enough for the politicians
not to go too far in humiliating the palace.
A previously unknown Hindu nationalist group, angry with the removal
of royalty, said it was responsible for a series of pipe-bomb explosions
that rocked the capital on Monday.
Bhekh Thapa, a former foreign minister under the king, says the royal
family will have to be "guarded" and probably have a "privy purse".
"This is a poor country with an large, uneducated population for whom
the institution of monarchy is a symbol of unity. You have to tread
carefully in dismantling it," he said. The Nepalese Maoists, said Mr
Thapa, cannot replicate what their ideological mentor Chairman Mao did
to China's last emperor, Puyi, whom he met in the mid 60s as a young
diplomat.
"I was introduced to this tall man in a plain cotton suit sweeping
the leaves in a palace in Beijing. The last emperor had been a keen
gardener and so Chairman Mao let him stay on to prune trees and plant
flowers. That could not happen in Nepal which is why our Maoists have
been calling for a dignified exit."
Unfolding tragedy
The fall of the house of Shah is a story of bloodshed, betrayal and
intrigue. For almost two-and-a-half centuries the monarchy persisted,
buttressed by the central role the king played in the national religion,
Hinduism.
Even when the palace ceded power to a parliament in 1990, the king
remained in charge, retaining the right to dissolve parliament and
control the army.
The sudden collapse of the monarchy in the span of a few years, say
even former royalists, is not a victory for communism but a failure of
the 60-year-old King Gyanendra. He was unable to win over his subjects,
suspicious of a monarch enthroned after the worst royal slaughter since
the Romanovs were murdered during the Russian civil war.
The beginning of the end for the Shah kings came in the summer of
2001 when then king Birendra and his family were assassinated in the
palace by the drunk crown prince who later turned the gun on himself.
Ten members of the royal family died.
Birendra's younger brother Gyanendra, a chain-smoking royal with a
penchant for astrology and expensive cars, ascended to the throne and
made no secret of his disdain for the parliament. He sacked the
government first in 2002 and then seized absolute power three years
later, saying only a strong leader could end the Maoist insurgency
raging in the countryside.
"Trying to restore the absolute monarchy was a disastrous error of
judgment, instead of negotiating with the Maoists and bringing them into
the peace process," said Lieutenant General Vivek Shah, King
Gyanendra's former military secretary. "This was his arrogance. He did
not listen to views he disagreed with."
Two years ago street protests forced the palace to concede to a
coalition of political parties and Maoist rebels, who joined hands to
oust the King. The popular dissent with his rule was exacerbated by the
perception the king was interested in enriching himself rather than his
subjects. This was a fatal flaw in a country that presents a striking
picture of contrast between extreme poverty and vast wealth.
Public anger
"I used to suggest to the king: 'Why not convert a few of the royal
residences into hospitals and schools?' I thought it would improve the
palace's image," said Gen Shah. "But he took no notice. Instead he
bought a Daimler limousine for 50m rupees (£365,000)."
While the king's high-handedness never won the hearts of Nepalis, it
was the behaviour of his playboy son, Paras, which infuriated the
public. The crown prince was a regular on the Kathmandu party circuit,
carrying a gun and a bad attitude. He allegedly killed a popular singer
in a hit-and-run accident but was never charged.
"I once had to rescue him when he shot up a nightclub and attacked
some members of the public," said Gen Shah. "I arranged military
training to instil some discipline in him but he just never showed up to
the classes."
The departure of the king leaves open the question who will be the
country's next head of state and what sort of political model the
country will adopt. The Maoists campaigned for a presidential system,
with their leader Prachanda as the candidate. The other smaller parties
would prefer a Westminster-type parliament with an eminent person
"selected" as head of state.
Diplomats in the capital say that the Maoist proposals have raised
fears of a communist takeover. "The Maoists like to compare their
suggestions to an American-style presidency. But in Washington the White
House is balanced by Congress," said one Kathmandu-based diplomat. "The
Maoists don't want that. They prefer to control things through a strong
centre. However, nobody wants to see a royal dictatorship replaced by a
communist one."
My comments:
This happened in 2000s. When the meaning of royalty has lost its very essence to the subjects, the end of the royal family is imminent. What can't happen to any royalty in the current world when a dynasty of royalty over 240 years collapsed and exit?
Hence i think that the Sultans of Malaya/Malaysia have to take the fall of the house of Shah in mind. Be just and fair to your subjects/people. Don't let the budget of PM Muhyiddin Yassin pass without any debate in the parliament. Don't let the budget of PM Muhyiddin Yassin pass without a scrutiny of the allocation to the nations of Sarawak and Sabah. Yes, I am a Sarawakian and I love Sarawak which is a nation in my heart but it has been debased through Criminal Breach of Trust/CBT or through very much back-door way to do amendments in order to plunder, exploit, oppress, suppress, rob and bully these two nations of Sarawak and Sabah at will.
I wonder why you as a Majesty allows such an unfair allocation to pass at will. I must tell you frankly that I despise and am intolerant any injustice done to my homeland, Sarawak. Enough means enough. To be frank, more and more Sarawakians are awakened now to understand how Malaya in disguise of Malaysia have colonised Sarawak and Sabah to enrich Malaya and Malayans especially the royals and those high-ranking political scoundrels.
Is the budget 2021 fair to other races in Malaya/Malaysia? Double check it, please. Remember, injustice brings curses which may lead the sultanate as a whole to collapse like the 240-year-old dynasty of Nepal.
L