Elections held in Nepal on 10 th April have resulted in a broad popular mandate for complete abolition of the monarchy. The Constituent Assembly that has been elected is expected to formally announce the abolition. This is a development of historic importance for the people of Nepal .

The people of Nepal have been waging a valiant struggle over many decades for putting an end to the monarchy, the lynch pin of the reactionary alliance of feudal-bourgeois and imperialist forces that have bled the country dry.

The Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) won over 30% of the popular vote to emerge as the leading party in the new assembly. The results of the elections show that the people of Nepal want real, substantial change. By and large they rejected parties and forces which had some connection with the old discredited system headed by the monarchy. Parties and forces who had campaigned on a platform of social and economic change, an end to discrimination against minorities, and for re-fashioning relations with other countries like India, have received the popular mandate. The results also show that the people expect that communists can and must lead the struggle for revolutionary change.

These were not just elections to put a new government in place. These were elections to establish a Constituent Assembly that would draft a new Constitution, a new fundamental law. Such a thing has not happened in South Asia before. The Constituent Assembly that drafted the Constitution of India, for instance, was elected under conditions of British colonial rule, with only a propertied and educated minority having right to vote. The Constituent Assembly in Nepal, on the other hand, has been elected based on universal adult franchise. All adult men and women enjoyed the right to vote for the Constituent Assembly. This is unprecedented and hence historic for the whole of South Asia.

The very fact that these elections were held with practically no disruption is significant. In the months before the elections, various bourgeois forces both within Nepal and globally had let loose a barrage of anti-democratic and anti-communist propaganda that it would be impossible to hold credible elections in Nepal. They had predicted high levels of bloodshed, intimidation and rigging. However the reports emanating from the teams of national and international observers have proved these alarmist predictions wrong. The masses of people, particularly women, participated vigorously in the elections, and revealed their conscious desire to elect a Constituent Assembly to chart a new course for their country.

The foreign imperialists and feudal-bourgeois forces within Nepal did not expect such a high degree of support for communists. They are not happy with the result of the elections, because it threatens the powers and privileges that they have long enjoyed in Nepal. The imperialist powers, the Indian state, and various imperialist agencies are adopting varied tactics to defend and strengthen their positions within the new situation. They are offering all kinds of aid, allegedly in support of “peace and development”, but with the real aim of making sure that Nepal remains enslaved to the imperialist system of domination and plunder. The imperialists and Indian ruling class are trying to manoeuvre with the various political forces in Nepal in furtherance of these aims.

The masses of people in Nepal and the communist and revolutionary forces leading them face major challenges ahead. Having won popular support for a revolutionary change, the task of the communist and revolutionary forces is to work out the appropriate way to move forward without losing the initiative or compromising the cause for which the people have fought. They have to apply the lessons learnt from the major revolutions in the 20 th century, especially the lesson that a proletarian democracy, or rule of toiling people, is required in order to wipe out medievalism and defeat imperialism and open the road to socialism. The communists of Nepal must ensure that the new Constitution of a Republic of Nepal places power squarely in the hands of the masses of toiling people. They should spearhead the struggle to innovate a modern political process, with mechanisms that ensure that people hold and retain decision making power in their hands, without handing it over entirely to elected representatives. They must organize to defeat and thwart the efforts of the imperialist powers and agencies to impose a western style bourgeois democracy on Nepal in the name of “good governance”.

People’s Voice calls on the working class and people of India to stand wholeheartedly in support of the people of Nepal and their heroic struggle to end their exploitation and open a new chapter in their history.