King Gyanendra of Nepal is paying the price for misreading the purpose of democracy. Instead of seeing it as a way to isolate extremism and increase the space for moderate political actors, he viewed the call for democracy as an attempt to usurp his powers. Echoing Bush’s statement after 9/11, he outlined the options for the moderates as: “either with the monarchy or with the Maoists”. The moderates chose the Maoists, thus creating an improbable anti-monarchy alliance, which has called for early elections and even an end to the monarchy. In September 2005, the Nepali Congress Party dropped its 60-year-old pledge to retain a constitutional monarchy.

With his “divine right” mindset, Gyanendra failed to recognise that procedural democracy offers plenty of room for authoritarianism. All he had to do was pop over to India to see our Laloos and Jayalalithaas in action. If he had continued his brother’s project of transforming Nepal into a democracy with a constitutional monarchy, he would have generated goodwill among the people. He could have backed a pro-monarchy party and continued to exert considerable influence on Nepal’s policies. Instead, he was greedy. Hence his response was to declare a state of emergency. He suspended all freedoms, including those of speech and expression, blacked out the media, and used the army to quash large pro-democracy demonstrations. These actions have increased the resistance to his rule, leading the chain of events inexorably towards Gyanendra’s worst nightmare: of being forced into exile.

Gyanendra misread what democracy actually does. First, it provides a way for people to voice their discontent and aspirations by electing their representatives. Election to institutions of democracy like parliament provides an alternative model to violent revolution. He could have continued down the path of democratising Nepal with a constitutional monarchy, initiated by his brother, Birendra, who introduced multi-party democracy in 1991. The Maoists are powerful because they provide answers and an alternative model to the woes of the predominantly rural and poor population. Instead of sacking the elected government in February 2005, the king could have allowed the democratic process to continue, and initiated moves to bring the Maoists into the fold. After all, the mainstream political parties had accepted 36 of the 40 demands of the Maoists.

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