By Devendra Gautam
My phone’s broken, perhaps as a result of my fiddling with it. The computer snaps every now and then, and so does my thought process. Surprisingly, I see no foreign hand in life’s little inconveniences like these.
Flickers of old reports come to mind, and I muster enough courage to write once again in this great city of well-known intellectuals for whom finding space in the glittering pages of leading publications appears almost effortless.
Before proceeding further, I request the enlightened readership to keep in mind that I am writing pretty much the old way — mostly by remembering what I read, heard, watched. While this escapade from cyberspace feels great to me, I request the enlightened lot to highlight factual errors, if any, even if it requires some serious reading.
We are not known as a country of serious readers, and if this writeup spurs a bit of reading—and thinking—in a bid to find out factual errors, what more can I ask for?
A trainload of questions
The ‘much-awaited’ cargo train has finally arrived in Nepal. The rail service is intended to improve freight connectivity between Kolkata (Calcutta in old parlance) and Nepal’s industrial city of Biratnagar. By the way, the city borrows its name from King Birat of the Mahabharat era, whose kingdom is said to have sheltered the Pandavs during the final year of their exile after they lost everything to the Kauravs in a fateful game of dice (dhyutkrida) played in Hastinapur.
Apparently, winner-takes-all statecraft is far older than the Great Himalayan Game.
The broad-gauge railway line may leave King Birat’s era far behind, yet it still relies on diesel traction at a time when many Asian economies are steadily expanding electrified freight corridors and high-speed rail networks.
Nepal’s business community, especially the importers, is understandably pleased, hoping that import costs will diminish along with many logistical hurdles associated with imports. One can only hope that the service proves economically sustainable rather than becoming another diesel-dependent undertaking requiring continual public support.
Probable commercial gains aside, has Nepal’s officialdom looked into other aspects of this train link?
Some of our self-styled visionaries have long cherished a dream of developing Nepal as a bridge connecting China and India, Asia’s two major powers.
The timing is significant. The train link also comes as China continues to pursue its vision of extending the Tibetan railway network towards Nepal, adding another dimension to the strategic competition for influence in the Himalayas and beyond.
Notably, both of our giant neighbours have signalled, through their joint understanding on trade and movement via Lipulek, that they are determined to pursue their mercantilist, geopolitical and geostrategic interests notwithstanding Nepal’s territorial claims. Nepal bases those claims over the Kalapani-Lipulek-Limpiadhura area on the Treaty of Sugauli (1816) and other official documents, including historical land-tax records.
Welcome to the great march towards the Asian Century — aboard a rickety bogie! While the journey appears predestined, the destination does not.
Development, for whom?
Despite the much-talked north-south connectivity, Nepal’s development path does not seem to align with the idea. For instance, a series of reservoir-based projects planned along the north-south Kaligandaki river corridor, including the Lower Badigad, may permanently inundate parts of the artery, casting serious doubts on the vision of Nepal as a land bridge between China and India. Worryingly, the projects might bring profound ecological changes to one of Nepal’s most culturally and environmentally significant river corridors, renowned as the source of Shaligram — naturally fossilised ammonites revered by followers of Sanatan Dharma worldwide.
Reservoir projects that significantly impact the Kaligandaki corridor may also undermine future transport alignments and the very geographical assumptions underlying the land-bridge vision.
Repeated media reports over the past decade have pointed to illegal trafficking in Shaligram ammonites from the river, with little visible enforcement.
While our visionaries continue to spin the land-bridge yarn, I seriously wonder if a powerful geopolitical and geostrategic player like India would want a rail connection with China through Nepal.
The railway, the land-bridge vision and large reservoir projects reflect a common assumption: that connectivity will be a major driver of prosperity.
On the contrary, connectivity may generate winners and losers in unequal measure.
That takes us back to Lipulek, a vital part of the Asian Century story — yet a no-go area for Nepal. Lipulek underscores the trust deficit threatening the very idea of Nepal as a land bridge between the two giants.
Shouldn’t we pause, acclimatise and think long and hard as the air grows thinner?
Development — particularly cross-border infrastructure — has assumed a formidable presence in public discourse, but what will its true cost be in terms of human displacement, loss of farmland and environmental degradation? Can a government struggling to manage its annual budget genuinely provide lasting rehabilitation for families displaced by such projects, or will many eventually be left to fend for themselves with inadequate compensation?
Geography alone will not turn a nation of barely 30 million people into an export powerhouse, however strategically it may be positioned between markets of nearly three billion consumers.
Splendid isolation appears a far cry, but it may not be a bad idea, after all, especially when the race for global supremacy is going full throttle.
In the 19th century, successive discoveries of rich deposits of gold and silver in the sparsely populated American West spurred gold and silver rushes, accelerating railway expansion, influxes of European settlers and a series of wars that dispossessed Native American nations of their ancestral lands.
Around the same period, the British denuded the Sal forests of Nepal’s Tarai for laying railway sleepers in their new colonial territories, known later as India.
Our government officials and geologists haven’t quietly discovered vast deposits of precious minerals, have they? If not, what explains this dash for rail when Nepal’s own domestic railway network remains, by and large, a figment of the imagination?
Advocates argue that rail lowers logistics costs, reduces dependence on road transport and improves industrial competitiveness. Those expected gains, however, should be weighed against strategic dependence, environmental costs and the long-term consequences of large-scale infrastructure projects on terrains vulnerable to disasters —manmade or otherwise.
Nepal’s political leadership and officialdom probably know the answers, but they are most likely to speak with sealed lips unless another opportunity for a public gaffe comes along, whether in Parliament or elsewhere.
Epilogue
As for me — a small-time columnist struggling to gain a foothold among a clique of larger-than-life figures of the opinion industry — the fact that the khukuri-wielding Nepalis, roaring with the battle cry “Ayo Gorkhali”, had absolutely nothing to do with Argentina’s latest football defeat at the hands of Spain is a source of no small solace.
Not every triumph, in the theatre of war or elsewhere, needs the imprint of Nepali bahaduri (bravery).
O tempora, o mores! How I yearn for splendid isolation even as the Asian Century, the American Century and the chequered legacies of older empires cast their long shadow on the high Himalayas and far beyond.
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