Indian Interference in Nepal
By Ali Sukhanver 
Punjita Pradhan is a very well known journalist of Nepal. For the last four years she has been continuously in contact with me. A few weeks back when Nepal was passing through the ever worst phase of its life after the disastrous earthquake, I sent a mail to her to express my concern over the situation. In response to my mail, she wrote, ‘Such calamities are not new to us; we have all courage and determination to defeat them; please do pray for us.’ Before sending mail to Punjita Pradhan I was surfing the internet for the latest situation of Nepal after the deadly earthquake disaster when something very shocking rather dreadful revealed upon me. An article on the internet said, ‘The people of Nepal hate their Indian neighbors because Indians take Nepalese to be stupid hill dwellers who are always jealous of the progress Indians have made. Nepalese think of Indians as charlatans, frauds and cheats; they follow by the saying that a dead Indian can fool ten Nepalese.’ During my search, I got glimpse of a letter of protest and condemnation written to the Indian media by Sunita Shakya, a Nepalese woman. This letter was regarding the non-serious behavior of the Indian media during the coverage-activity of the earthquake disaster in Nepal. Sunita Shakya said in her letter, ‘When I saw your news and news reports, my heart cried and hurt more than those destruction caused by 7.9 Richter magnitude of earthquake. Like all the medical personnel are taught and trained for potential disasters in future, as a reporter, I hope there is some kind of training on how to report different events. Your media and media personnel are acting like they are shooting some kind of family serials. If your media person can reach to the places where the relief supplies have not reached, at this time of crisis can’t they take a first-aid kit or some food supplies with them as well?” Sunita further said, “Your reporters had a lot of time to grab the victim and bring to the camera to show the victim hurt badly on her head but how surprising, they did not have a minute to grab a piece of cloth to stop bleeding. I think you are a human before you become a media person.” A reader of this letter Sameer commented upon the letter in a very interesting way. He said, “India has several news channels, filled with sensationalism. I sometimes feel like they are selling me something like TV salespeople but then what they are selling is worse; Crap, Filtered, Adulterated news and this is the worst kind of Journalism”.
Whatever Sunita complained of regarding the behavior of the Indian media might be true but such a behavior is not limited just to the Indian media. Most of the media-men behave in the same way; they all are found craving for something sensational and astounding, so that they may win the attention of their viewers and readers. Such behavior is exactly according to the requirement of their job; they are hired for excavating the news, not for doing rescue work. Whatever Sunita said might be the result of the hidden hatred for India and this type of hatred is the most common and the most dominating characteristic of every Nepalese heart and mind. Anuvav is a very widely visited web page of Nepal. A few months back this web page published an article of Avishek of Nepal with the title, ‘7 Reasons some Nepalese hate India with a passion’. According to the writer more than half of the total Nepali population hates India and a huge portion of that group hates India and Indians with a passion. The reasons include border encroachment by the Indian government in Nepal, India’s unhealthy interest in Nepali politics and politicians, India’s unethical occupation on Nepalese lands, unfair river treaties between the two countries, India’s claim on the birthplace of Buddha, India’s domination depicted on films, TV, books, magazines, internet, and in real life and above all the bitter racism of India against the Nepalese.
The fact of the matter is that no Living nation likes or loves the interference or invasion of any other country or nation. Nepal is a land of brave and courageous people; they have their own individual identity and a long history of struggle and achievements; they are not a slave nation; how could they bear such an insulting attitude of India. The problem with India is that it cannot live without doing interference into its neighboring countries. From Sri Lanka to Nepal and from Pakistan to Bangladesh and even China, every neighboring country is facing lot of problems because of Indian interference. Pakistan is the ever-worst victim to this interference as India is criminally supporting the miscreants and terrorists in Balochistan, Sind and in other parts of the country. There must be some end to this unethical and immoral interference and the international authorities must take necessary action against such wicked attitude in the larger interest of the peace-loving countries like Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal and China. If we are serious in painting this world with colors of peace, security and a friendly atmosphere, we will have to put a check on the countries which have built-in hegemonic designs.
