India and Nepal share historical, cultural, and religious ties dating back to the era of Gautam Buddha. These ties continued in the modern era too, reinforced by the 1950 Indo-Nepal friendship treaty, economic and strategic compulsions, and people to people relations, commonly called Roti-Beti relations. However, from the past couple of years, Indo-Nepal relations are under severe strain with the Kalapani territorial dispute being the recent one in a long list of grievances Nepal has against India.

Reasons For Raising Nationalistic Fervor In Nepal

1. The rise of a new generation of Nepali youth and political elite who does not share the same emotional bond with India.
2. Nepal was the only officially Hindu state resulting from the Hindu empires from the 18th century to 2006 and was never colonized. But the promulgation of the new secular constitution in 2006 and the abolition of monarchy in 2008, led to resentment contributing to the rise of aggressive Hindu nationalism.
3. A substantial number of Nepali society believes that India is excessively interfering in Nepal’s internal affairs. The argument is that as long as India continues to meddle in Nepal, there will be nationalism which could lead to ultranationalism, and eventually even militancy.
4. There are internal differences in Nepal between the prosperous hilly regions and the less developed southern region. To reduce this difference Nepal is institutionalizing federalism.
5. However, a section of Nepal political parties who stand to lose their hold on power due to this development are using the anti-Indian sentiment to stir nationalistic fervour to foil the attempts of decentralization.
6. Nepal politics also have a very crucial role to play in this phenomenon. The current Prime Ministers’ domestic position was weakening for some time and the inept handling of the COVID crisis added fuel to fire. Under pressure, he utilized anti-Indian sentiment and nationalism to stir up the Kalapani issue.

Why India Is Perceived As Hegemon By Nepal

The rise of Anti-Indian sentiments and nationalism in India was mainly because Nepal is considering India as a hegemon and irked by its big brother attitude. Recent incidents between these two countries have contributed a lot to this sentiment.

1. Both Nepali Congress — often considered pro-India — and the Communists have decried the alleged “big brother” attitude of India.
2. Since the 1950s, India has treated Nepal as an extension of its own geographic reality, so much as those allegations of New Delhi’s intervention in Kathmandu’s domestic affairs have been raised at regular intervals.
3. India’s prompt response in the aftermath of the devastating Nepal earthquake was appreciated. However, the way Indian media presented the whole rescue effort as some kind of a favour bolstered the local antipathy towards Nepal.
4. The Pro India group enforced a blockade on the India-Nepal border, unhappy over the new constitution which it believed did not do justice to the people of the Terai plains. Nepal alleged this to be planned by India to create internal unrest.
5. Though Nepal is dependent on India for much of its trade and other infrastructure projects, as a sovereign nation, it is also free to chart its own foreign policy course. However, India’s staunch opposition to Nepal-China relations also is a cause of upset for Nepal.

Fundamental Reset In Relations

Apart from the rise of nationalism and India’s perceived hegemony, there are also other reasons for the downturn of relations between these two countries. India is unhappy about closer ties between China-Nepal. Nepal’s developing economy needs huge investments which China is providing, whereas there are extraordinary delays in the completion of infrastructure projects by India, the territorial disputes between the two countries all caused a downturn in the relationship which at this point in time needs a fundamental reset.

1. Though India has always claimed that two countries claim a special relationship, Nepal for a very long time has been alleging that the terms of the relationship are mostly one-sided.
2. In light of rising nationalism and anti-Indian sentiment, India needs to renegotiate the 1950 peace treaty incorporating changed circumstances.
3. Instead of bowing down to political opportunism and rhetoric, both counties should make diplomatic efforts to resolve the territorial disputes.
4. India should stop looking at Nepal purely from a security prism and be a part of the zerosum game with China and realize the changed ground realities.
5. Any drastic reset in relations will affect Nepal enormously in the form of ending visa-free travel, disbanding the Gorkha regiment, difficulties for students coming to study in India, etc.
6. Nepal should also understand these realities and address India’s concerns with regard to China. Nepal ensures that any of its developmental activities with China does not jeopardize India’s strategic interests.

India in accordance with its neighbour’s first policy must have deeper and meaningful engagement with its smaller neighbours, to understand their fears and concerns, and try to address them in a responsible way.

The Constitution of India has borrowed quite a few of its provisions from the constitutions of various other countries as well as from the Government of India Act 1935. It is acclaimed by Dr. B.R. Ambedkar that the Constitution of India has been framed after ransacking all the known Constitutions of the world as highlighted below:

• The part of the Constitution related to rights and duties of people i.e., the Fundamental Rights and Directive Principles of State Policy (DPSPs) derive their inspiration from the American and Irish Constitution respectively.
• The parts of the Constitution related to structure and functions of the State i.e., the principle of the Cabinet Government and relation between the executive and the legislature have largely been drawn from the British Constitution.
• The other provisions of the Constitution have been drawn from the Constitutions of Canada, Australia, Germany, USSR, France, South Africa, Japan and so on.

Despite being an amalgamation of various constitutions from across the world, the Indian Constitution imbibes social justice, pluralism, and equality through its various provisions given below:

• Social Justice: Social justice denotes the equal treatment of all citizens without any social distinction based on caste, colour, race, religion, sex etc. It has been envisioned through the following provisions:
  • Equal protection of the laws under Article 14 and equality of opportunity under Article 16(4) requires affirmative action by the State towards the underprivileged by providing additional opportunities to them.
  • The DPSPs (Part IV, Article 36 to 51) constitute a very comprehensive economic, social and political programme for a modern democratic state, which aim at realizing the socialist and the high Gandhian ideals.
  • They embody the concept of a welfare state and seek to establish economic and social democracy.
• Pluralism: Pluralism serves as a model of democracy, where different groups can voice their opinions and ideas. Pluralism is ensured through the following provisions:
  • The Constitution provides for a federal system of government where it shares a considerable amount of power with states, thus providing room for fulfilment of regional aspirations.
  • It provides for a secular state as it does not hold any particular religion as the official religion of India. For example, Right to freedom of religion is guaranteed to all Indians by the Constitution under Articles 25 to 28.
• Equality: It means the absence of special privileges to any section of the society and the provision of adequate opportunities for all individuals without any discrimination. It has been the core philosophy of the Indian Constitution, which is reflected through the following provisions:
• The Preamble secures to all citizens of India equality of status and opportunity. This provision embraces three dimensions of equality- civic, political and economic.
• The chapter on Fundamental Rights contained in Part III of the Constitution (Article 14-18) ensures civic equality.
• Political equality is ensured through provisions like no person is to be declared ineligible for inclusion in electoral rolls on grounds of religion, race, caste or sex (Article 325) and adult suffrage (Article 326).
• Economic equality is guaranteed by DPSPs (Article 39), which secure to men and women equal right to an adequate means of livelihood and equal pay for equal work.

These unique characteristics of the Indian Constitution make it distinct and it is this uniqueness, which has guided India over the last seven decades on the path of development while preserving her unity and fraternity.

The Aspirational District Programme (ADP) was launched in January 2018 with the objective of rapidly transforming the 112 most backward districts across India and bringing them at par with the more developed regions of the country. Assessment of the ADP:

• Overall progress: 95% of 112 aspirational districts (ADs) have made significant progress in major indicators such as health, nutrition, financial inclusion, and skill development.
• Health and nutrition: Many ADs have surpassed the average state values in several indicators under the Health and Nutrition theme monitored under the programme.
  • Significant improvements have been made in institutional deliveries, Severe Acute Malnutrition and service delivery in PHCs.
  • A qualitative change in child nutrition is visible, vaccination among children has reached over 90 per cent.
  • However, all ADP districts lag in reducing the percentage of stunted, underweight children under five years. Also, 93 out of 112 ADs have more than 50 percent of anaemic women.
• Education: Schools demonstrated successful use of technology and innovation to deliver better quality education. However, despite significant improvements across learning outcomes, infrastructure, and institutional indicators, none of the districts were able to meet their targets.
• Agriculture and water resources: About 430 waterbodies in the 10 aspirational districts have been rejuvenated. However, despite a number of initiatives, this sector remains one of the most underperforming sectors of ADP.
• Financial inclusion: ADs have performed better than non-aspirational districts with regard to financial inclusion. This means more people have access to bank accounts, more have been covered under the fold of government insurance schemes and more can secure MUDRA loans in ADs. In aspirational districts, financial inclusion has increased from 30 percent to 90 percent.
• Skill development: Although some districts have performed well, a few others have not been able to meet their targets. At the same time, the absence of market demand for skills, or lack of suitable employment opportunities despite the training is forcing people to migrate to cities resulting in lesser uptake of skill development programmes.
• Basic Infrastructure: Several ADs have reported saturation in the basic infrastructure indicators like the percentage of households with electricity connection, percentage of habitations with access to all-weather roads under Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana, percentage of households with individual household washrooms, etc.
  • In this regard, 30 ADP districts have less than 50 per cent of houses completed under PMAY- Grameen.

For the ADP to make further positive progress, challenges such as disparities among sectors, disparities among districts, data discrepancies, adverse impact of competition, lack of human resources, inadequate focus on gender and the environment need to be addressed effectively.