Ideological conflict in Congress: To be power-oriented or organization-oriented?

The debate within the Congress continues on the ideological document of Chief Minister Gagan Thapa and Vishwaprakash Sharma. Those documents were passed by the general committee meeting held last February to be finalized by the central working committee meeting.

Speaker Deuba and most of his party leaders seem to want to guide the party's policy with the current coalition and the acquisition of power in the future. Leaders of the other party including Shekhar Koirala, General Minister Dwaya Thapa and Sharma are in favor of moving forward by connecting the party's policy with the sentiments of the grassroots workers.

Due to this ongoing conflict within the party, the central committee meeting held since July 23 has not reached a conclusion. Thapa included in his document that no alliance should be made before the election and the 'Exit Policy' proposed by another General Minister Sharma for leadership development has been seen as the main difference within the party .

President Deuba and his party leaders are against both these proposals. Sharma's proposal is not practical and there is pressure to remove it from the document. According to Thapa's document, the issue of electoral alliance is also a strategic issue, and the establishment party has taken a stand that it should not be made into a policy agenda.

Although there is support of two-thirds in favor of the leadership in the central working committee, Deuba seems to be in favor of finding a solution through consensus as the public opinion of the workers is strong towards Thapa and Sharma. That is why he has called a meeting of five top leaders including two deputy chairpersons Purna Bahadur Khadka, Dhanraj Gurung and two general ministers Thapa and Sharma to reconcile the proposals of both the general ministers.

Deputy Chairman Dhanraj Gurung claimed that a meeting between the top five officials of the party will be held on Tuesday to find a solution. "There should have been a discussion with Majja before the General Committee meeting." But at that time no one took it seriously. Many did not even seem to have studied the document . The document presented by the Central Working Committee to the General Committee has now been made a subject of discussion as a personal proposal of the Deputy Chairman and the General Minister. This has gone wrong,' said Gurung, 'We have to make policy based on the principles of the party.' He said that although there is no big problem regarding the alliance, in the case of 'exit policy', it will be amended because it conflicts with the principle to some extent. General Minister Sharma brought the 'exit-policy' in the General Committee meeting last February so that the President will be elected once, the Prime Minister twice, the Minister three times and the MP four times. It was passed by the General Committee after making the final decision by the Central Working Committee.

Since 2004, since 2004, the party has been led by one face, the Prime Minister is only one person, and the public opinion has started turning away from the Congress. Most of the members of the Central Working Committee are in favor of removing Sharma as it is not practical. In the ongoing meeting of the Central Committee, leaders including Bimalendra Nidhi, Krishna Prasad Sitaula, Vijay Kumar Gachchdar objected to the word "Bahigarman" and said that it should be removed from the document.

There is a provision in the constitution that a person who has been the president twice cannot be a candidate, so the party constitution cannot theoretically hold that the president should only be once. They are of the opinion that the proposal that the Prime Minister should be allowed to be the Prime Minister only twice and the Minister three times in the country is not practical as the government is changing within 9/10 months.

Chief Minister Thapa is not in favor of eliminating the purpose of pre-election alliances. He also agrees that some changes can be made in the language. In the general committee meeting last February, the leaders including the leadership tried to remove the topic of pre-election alliance from Thapa's document. However, after Thapa said that he would rather resign as the General Minister, but not remove the issue of alliance, the issue of alliance was entered into the General Committee on the signal of Chairman Deuba.

The organizational proposal presented by Thapa includes the policy of not entering into an alliance before the election, even though it is possible to form a coalition after the election. Due to the limitations of our electoral system, when no party has won the majority, it may be natural to make certain common policies and programs after the election to coordinate for government operation, but considering the fact that the pre-election coalition culture was not a regular political situation in democracy, but a forced situation, we We resolve that the Nepali Congress will never again create a situation where its voters cast their votes on the election symbols of any other party by forming a pre-election alliance in the future periodic elections,' said Thapa's proposal.

Central member Ramhari Khatiwada says that since most of the members have opposed the election alliance of General Minister Thapa and Sharma and the 'exit policy', it may be difficult to reach an agreement on keeping those issues in the document.

"If there is an opinion that exit policy should not be kept, since the issue of electoral alliance is also strategic, it should not be made a political issue of the party," Khatiwada said, "The party convention will be held before the 084 election". Who will be the chairman from the convention, what office bearers will come. What kind of strategy will the chairman and the central working committee who will be elected at that time say? What a situation. You have to take a decision after looking at everyone . There is an opinion that right now the issue of alliance should not be made a policy opinion of the party.

leader Shekhar Koirala is in favor of not forming a pre-election alliance brought by Thapa. The meeting of the other parties called by him on Sunday took the squeeze to support the issue of the alliance of the document presented by General Minister Thapa . The meeting of the Koirala side reached a point where the language could be amended so that the purpose does not die. The conclusion of the meeting was that the subject of another General Minister Sharma's 'exit-policy' was unreasonable.

Gobind Pokharel, a central member close to Shekhar, said that although there was no problem with Thapa's proposal, Sharma's proposal was not practical. He said that by not using the word 'electoral alliance', a middle way solution can be found on the electoral alliance of another Mahantri Thapa by using the language that 'no vote will be created on the election symbol of any other political party' in the periodic elections.

'After seeing this, it was not even a matter of making an electoral alliance or not, the intention of not joining an electoral alliance does not die, Shekhar Koirala said the same,' Pokharel said, 'The issue of the exit-policy of the other Chief Minister Sharma is also related to the sentiments of the workers . But most of them were of the opinion that it is not practical when the government changes in 7/8 months and the minister changes in a month and a half. Therefore, it can and should be done by taking into account the aspects of practical, constitutional and individual rights.'' are .

Although the document was passed by the Congress General Committee on February 10, Dahal broke the collaboration with the Congress on February 21 when Deuba promised to correct all party documents to continue the cooperation with the Maoists. The Congress, which concluded that Dahal was just making an excuse to change the alliance, remained silent on this issue until Dahal was removed from power.

After the power equation with UML, this issue has been raised again in the central working committee meeting which started on 23rd of July. The meeting held on the main agenda of finalizing the party documents passed by the General Committee has not been able to make a common opinion on the ideological point of view.

In the general committee meeting held in the capital from February 7-10, the policy of Deputy Chairman Purna Bahadur Khadka, the organization of General Minister Thapa and the contemporary political proposals put forward by another General Minister Sharma were passed to be finalized by the Central Working Committee. The meeting that started on July 28 was moved to September 7 to reach an agreement on the

document. In the meantime, the meeting has been called again for 12th of August as no agreement can be reached. Deputy Chairman Gurung claimed that in the next meeting, consensus will be reached on all the political and organizational documents of the party.