info from NEPAL - Land Seizures in Nepal-CPN-Maoist

Nepal remains semi-feudul country even after the declaration of the Republic and in the 21st century. Feudalist productive relation is not vanished yet. The most disappoint- ing thing is that the most expected agenda of the scientific and revolutionary land reform is being marginalized. Prachanda-Baburam clique have adopted a revisionist/reformist line to solve this problem. They are planning to increase production, to make production brigades. They want to develop the productive force of capitalism and hope to displace the feudalist production relation. This is merely a reformation and the agenda of bourgeoisie party not of the revolutionary communists. Revolutionary communists and the people of Nepal had a dream and faith that the last Constituent Assembly will solve the land problem of Nepal by applying the scientific land reform provision in the new constitution. Unfortunately neither the issue was well es- tablished in the CA, because of the hopeless parliamentarian leader of the party then Unified Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), nor did the CA itself remain more. Inversely UCPN (Maoist) had begun to kneel down, before the split, to the landlords. Even Prachanda and Baburam attempted to return the lands, seized during the People’s War period. Although they had tried to do this delinquency in their so called pocket district Bardia, people and the cadres stood against them making the shameless leaders to set back at that time. CPN-Maoist has been raising the issue of scientific and revolutionary land reform as a legacy of Nepalese Communist Movement, especially of the Great People’s War. Dur- ing that period, Party had seized large amount of lands, in assistance of the people, from the feudalistic landlords and distributed to the tillers as the program of Revolutionary Land Reform. Recently, CPN-Maoist has seized several acres of lands owned by neo-feudals, bu- reaucratic capitalists and compradors. We have reported some specific land seizure actions here with. 1. Seizing the land of CM of the Interim Government The revolutionary peasants of CPN-Maoist seized some 21.8 acres of land owned by Khil Raj Regmi, chairman of Interim Council of Ministers, among others, while captur- ing total 75 acres of land in Bardiya, western Nepal, in April 2, 2013. In a series of protests against the government demanding the formation of a new government led by political parties, CPN-M Bardiya chapter has clutched the land acquired by Regmi, his father-in- law Laxmi Prasad Updhyaya and a local landlord, Yubaraj Sharma at Khairi Chandanpur ward no 8 of Bardiya. Hundreds of local people were gathered at Khairi Chandanpur-8 while CPN-M Bardiya district secretary Drabya Shah and mid western command in-charge Aryal jointly placed the red flag of the party, All Nepal Peasants’ Association and All Nepal Squatters’ Association on the captured land. This action had done according to the central policy of the party. Dharmendra Bastola, politburo member of CPN-M stated that the action in Bardiya is a part of special counter regressive campaign launched by the party to oppose major parties agreement nominating the prime minister sidelining the political parties. He added, ‘’Capturing the land is symbolic oppose towards the move of four political parties which we have termed as a political coup since the formation of interim election council headed by the chief justice Khilraj Regmi has suspended some 25 articles of Interim Constitution, 2006.” The same land owned by Khilraj Regmi was seized during the 10 years People’s War too, which was forcely returned by Prachanda-Baburam. 2. Action on neo-feudalist and compradors of UCPN(Maoist) The revolutionary cadres of CPN-Maoist have captured land tracts owned by UCPN (Maoist) local leaders in Banke district, western Nepal. It is the bitter instance that the leaders of UCPN(Maoist) have changed their class character. In the past they were in- volved in such action which they are facing today. People and cadres of CPN-Maoist led by the party’s central committee member IP Kharel captured some 30 bigha land owned by two local Maoist leaders and placed party flags on the plots. The squad seized 16.8 bigha land owned by UCPN (Maoist) Banke in- charge Prakash Subedi and his wife Purna Subedi at Fattepur VDC-3. Similarly, the land registered in the name of UCPN (Maoist) Tharuwan state committee member Sukai Lal Burma and his wife Urmila Devi in ward no. 7 of the same VDC was captured too. Purna Subedi is the central committee member of UCPN(Maoist) and was the vice chairperson of the former Constituent Assembly. 3. Another feudal with the communist cover also looses land CPN-Maoist cadres has captured the land belonging to Ninu Chapagain, PBM of UCPN(Maoist) with other feudals named Gayatri Chapagain, Nabaraj Chapagain, Tika Chapagain, Shanti Bahadur Basnet, Mahendra Basnet, Dambar Bahadur Basnet and Kosh Bahadur Basnet of Bhojpur District in Mulpani VDC on April 6. Before this action Party had captured 932 ropani of land belonging to Shadananda Sitaram Guthi in Keurepani, Mulpani and Mulpani and Tungecha VDC on March 18. 4. Lands recaptured in Kailali district. CPN-Maoist cadres seized 60 bigha land belonging to Dev Bahadur Malla at Kai- lali’s Dododhara and Tulsipur in Kotatulsipur, Kailali, western Nepal. A squad of 150 Maoist cadres led by area in-charge Kshitiz seized the land. They hoisted party flags on the seized land. “Our party has hoisted party flags in five kitta land,” Dododhara VDC in-charge Bikku Chaudhary said. Chaudhary went on to say that his party had seized the land after they came to know that UCPN(Maoist) leaders were selling land on commission basis. The land was under the control of the then CPN(Maoist ) since 1996. Chaudhary charged that UCPN(Maoist) had evicted the landless and freed kamaiya from the captured land and was selling it on commission basis. “We had settled landless people and freed kamaiya. It is not good to sell the same land on commission basis. We captured the land as per the party’s central policy,” Chaudhary clarified. Earlier, CPN-Maoist had seized 15 bigha land owned by Gajendra Chand at Kaila- li’s Lalbojhi VDC. Chand warned that more land would be seized in the days ahead. 5. Peasants captured Guthi (trust) land The landless people and the scattered people of Nawalparasi district, Midwest Nepal have captured 32 bigaha of land belonging to a Ram Lakshman Guthi in Gunar of Agyauli VDC-4. The land was captured by the group led by All Nepal Peasants Association (Revolutionary). All of these captured lands are distributed to the real tillers of the land. These are all symbolic actions to call for the revolutionary and scientific land reform in Nepal.