No to regression: on protests in Nepal, pro-monarchy sentiment

The violent protests in Kathmandu on Friday, which left two dead, dozens injured and saw arson and looting, were spearheaded by fringe political forces such as the royalist Rastriya Prajatantra Party. When Gyanendra Shah ascended the throne after his brother’s death, he attempted to reassert absolute authority and return Nepal to the pre-1990 political order. A democratically elected Constituent Assembly was formed, and in 2008, passed a near-unanimous resolution declaring Nepal to be a federal democratic republic. Since 2008, power has primarily alternated among the Nepali Congress, which has led the fight for democracy since the fall of the Rana regime; the Communist Party of Nepal, the largest of the leftist parties; and the former Maoist rebels.