The oath saga

The vice president´s "oath saga" continues to play itself out, further complicating the situation. As the Supreme Court´s mandatory deadline to Vice President Parmananda Jha to take his oath in Nepali nears, it has further polarized society. Five Madhes-based parties -- Madhesi People´s Rights Forum (MPRF), MPRF (Democratic), Tarai Madhes Democratic Party (TMDP), Sadbhavana Party (SP) and SP (Anandidevi) -- following a joint meeting the other day, concluded that there was no need for the vice president to take the oath in Nepali. The meeting also asked the vice president not to resign, something he was reportedly contemplating. Organizations affiliated to various ethnic fronts have also protested the decision of the apex court, saying that it tramples on the linguistic rights of people and they have submitted a memorandum to President Dr Ram Baran Yadav. All these come a day after President Yadav and Prime Minister Madav Kumar Nepal met the vice president and requested him to take his oath in Nepali as ordered by the Supreme Court.



The Supreme Court is partly responsible for the mess that we are in over this particular issue. Agreed that the interim constitution does not allow oath-taking in a language other than Nepali and that there was no way the SC in its verdict could have approved of the vice president´s oath in Hindi. But the SC had the choice to defer the verdict, keeping in mind the sensitivity of the issue and also the obtaining political and social reality wherein the upcoming constitution would have to accommodate the linguistic rights and aspirations of various ethnic groups. But the SC ignored this reality twice. It first decided to nullify the vice president´s oath-taking and in its second ruling, issued by a full bench, ordered him to take the oath in Nepali within seven days. There was no need to set the deadline. It should actually have avoided the second verdict as the first one had already raised enough of a storm.



Despite the damage done, we have to find an amicable solution to the current row that has the potential of evolving into a social and political crisis. Since the cabinet has already decided to amend the constitution allowing people to take oaths of office in their preferred languages that should take care of the linguistic rights of various communities. The focus should now be on how to find a middle ground that would allow the vice president to remain in office and at the same time not create a wrong precedence of people in the highest offices of the land violating the constitution and ignoring an order of the Supreme Court.

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