Difficult times

The official visit of Nepals prime minister,Madhav Nepal,was a tricky exercise in management by Indias diplomats. Indias interests in Nepal are obvious. And India will welcome a centrist alternative to the Maoists or to the royalist rump. Since thats what,for better or worse,Madhav Nepal represents,India will want to do nothing to undermine him. Its in this fragile context that relations will have to move forward.

The joint statement at the end of Nepals visit had three focuses. First,various measures to enhance trade. Second,quest for effective controls on cross-border crime. Third,and most delicate,instructions to the two foreign secretaries to sit together and review the 1950 India-Nepal Friendship Treaty,the cornerstone of bilateral relations. Movement on each has different implications. The trade measures,for example,should serve only as a beginning. A trade treaty was signed; and Visakhapatnam was opened to Nepals trade. But it ill-behoves India to be stingy about access. Getting Nepals landlocked economy plugged into the worlds is very much in Indias interest. More should be done. On the second issue,the ball is somewhat in Nepals court. Extradition and pursuit of crime suspects (both regular and those of a political,terrorist nature) is necessary for India. But it will have to be very clear that any measures are of mutual benefit. From that perspective,plans to help Nepal upgrade policing infrastructure are well thought of.

And so to the 1950 Treaty. Like the similar 1949 treaty that bound together India and Bhutan,it is very much a creature of the immediate post-Raj era. In Nepal it is far,far from popular. It needs to be dragged into the modern era. Hopefully the reviewing by the foreign secretaries will be translated into redrafting as soon as possible. In 2006,India signed an updated friendship treaty with Bhutan,consigning the 1949 treaty to historys dustbin. This will need to be repeated with Nepal. But,again,Nepals fragile internal processes must be heeded. The peace process,the development of institutions and of a stable centrist consensus,is the ultimate aim.