Many foreign policy experts in India are quoted as saying that there is no alternative to dialogue on Kalapani. Those who don’t want to be quoted tell a different story. As Kalapani is strategically important to India, they suggest, Nepal should not ‘politicize’ it. 

In other words, Indian troops are unlikely to leave Kalapani. Says a senior Indian Ministry of External Affairs official, “As Kalapani is a tri-junction, China can use it to monitor our activities across the border. So Kalapani is far more important to us than other disputed areas such as Susta.” New Delhi won’t relent also because it suspects China’s hand in the current anti-India protests in Nepal.

Meanwhile, Nepal says it has ample documentary evidence to prove its ownership of Kalapani. The Oli government is busy working out how best to proceed. Once it makes a decision, Nepal will seek a high-level engagement with India. Nepal will make its case for Kalapani; as will India. There is no other way out of this than through a healthy back and forth. It is also about time this old sore in Nepal-India ties is removed once and for all.

But, heck, it won’t be easy. Arrayed against India’s ‘national security’ will be Nepal’s ‘territorial integrity’. These are not issues that lend themselves to easy compromise. Even if the top leaderships of the two countries are willing, a backlash from other stakeholders back home would be all but certain. Even though the state is also led by the BJP, the government of Uttarakhand where Kalapani has been placed will protest. Back in Nepal, anything short of complete removal of the Indian troops will be seen as a betrayal, and the NCP-led government is in no mood to give the opposition an inch of the ‘nationalist niche’ it successfully carved in the 2017 elections.      

That does not mean Kalapani is unsolvable. As the bigger power and the instigator of the current dispute, the onus is on India to make the first concession, however painful. If it does, India could quickly win back the goodwill of Nepalis, India’s natural religious and cultural brethren. Such a gesture will also make it easier for Nepal to negotiate. Given PM Narendra Modi’s strong hold in India, there is little he cannot do with a bit of clever statesmanship.

The knotty Kalapani mess unlikely to be sorted soon

“Demarcation of two short segments of our boundary with Nepal—Kalapani and Susta—is yet to be completed. Of these, Kalapani is strategically important, since it determines the tri-junction between India, Nepal and China,” said V.P. Haran, a former Indian ambasador to Bhutan and Afghanistan, at a 2017 discussion organized by the Indian Ministry of External Affairs at the Central University of Tamil Nadu.

Haran’s views reflect those of the Indian establishment, which argues that Kalapani is crucial for India from a security point of view and ‘it should not be politicized’. This essentially means India is not ready to withdraw its troops from there.

There are plenty of historical documents that show Kalapani is Nepali territory. As Foreign Minister Pradeep Gyawali says, “We have sufficient evidence that Kalapani is ours. Voting had taken place in Kalapani in the 1959 parliamentary election. The area was included in the national census of 1961. And the Nepal government had collected revenue from the Kalapani area in the same period.”

Yet Kalapani has been a bone of contention between Nepal and India for around six decades due to the presence of the Indian security forces there since (at least) the 1962 Sino-Indian War. Successive Nepali governments—whether royal or democratic—have requested India to remove its security camps from Kalapani, to no avail. It remains a political agenda for Nepali leftist parties; it is also an election agenda for the politicians of the Indian state of Uttarakhand whose map now includes the territory.

Earlier this month, India published a new political map which showed Kalapani as Indian territory, sparking controversy and strong protests in Nepal. Although preparations are underway to hold Secretary-level meeting on the issue, officials from both the sides have told APEX that it can only be resolved at the highest political level—if at all. “Several times in the past, the two sides have realized that the issue should be addressed and dealt with politically, so negotiations at a bureaucratic level cannot yield results,” says a former Indian ambassador, who recently served in Nepal, on condition of anonymity.

He says that although Kalapani and Susta have been political tools in Nepal, no Nepali politician has taken it up seriously with the top Indian leadership in recent times. “There is this tradition of just mentioning this issue in joint statements,” he adds.

Gordian knot

But even such political-level talks are unlikely to easily succeed. In the view of another senior Indian Ministry of External Affairs official who deals with Nepal, “As Kalapani is a tri-junction, China can use it to monitor our activities across the border. So Kalapani is far more important to us than other disputed areas such as Susta.”

Even the ex-envoy acknowledges that “withdrawal of troops from there will have an adverse effect on our national security, so the issue should not be politicized and exaggerated.”

Nepali politicians and officials, however, dismiss such logic, and argue that India cannot occupy Kalapani for the simple reason that it belongs to Nepal.

The Indian security establishment started taking Kalapani even more seriously after the Doklam standoff in 2017, not least because of some troubling noise from China. In August 2017, when the Doklam crisis was at its peak, Wang Weni, Deputy Director General of the boundary and ocean affairs department of the Chinese ministry of foreign affairs, had said, “India has many tri-junctions, what if we use the same excuse [that Indian troops used to enter Doklam, a territory claimed by both Bhutan and China] to enter the Kalapani region between China, India and Nepal…?” Soon after this statement, media reports in New Delhi indicated that India had increased its vigilance in areas around Kalapani.

‘Nepalese encroachment’

Following the protests in Nepal over the 2015 India-China bilateral statement on trading through the tri-junction of Lipulekh in Kalapani, the Indian side had informally floated a proposal before Nepali leaders to resolve the Kalapani issue with land swaps. India has adopted the same formula to settle border disputes with Bangladesh. Nepali leaders, however, rejected the proposal as Kalapani is purely Nepali and not disputed territory.

Kalapani is a political agenda in India as well. The ex-Nepal envoy believes Indian politicians are ready to resolve this issue but there is a public perception in India that Kalapani is Indian territory—even as Nepalis strongly believe India has encroached upon their land. “Given this scenario, finding a solution will be very difficult and time-consuming. It is a highly emotional and sensitive issue that top politicians of the two countries need to tackle prudently,” the former ambassador advises.

This sensitivity has often been reflected on the floor of the Indian parliament. On 26 July 2000, then member of Lok Sabha and current Chief Minister of the state of Uttar Pradesh, Yogi Adityanath, questioned Jaswant Singh, then Indian Minister of External Affairs, about reports of the efforts to resolve the Kalapani issue amicably. Singh replied, “There is a difference in perception between India and Nepal on the boundary alignment in the western sector of the India-Nepal border, where the Kalapani area is located.” Singh said the Indian government was aware that some people might exploit such differences in perception between two friendly neighbors.

On 7 December 2000, some members of India’s Rajya Sabha asked Ajit Kumar Panja, then Minister of State for External Affairs, again about media reports on talks between India, Nepal and China to settle the Kalapani dispute. In response, Panja doubted the veracity of such reports.

Then, on 6 December 2007, border issues were again discussed in the Indian parliament. Pranab Mukherjee, then Minister for External Affairs, pointed the finger at Nepal: “The shifting of course in Susta region of the Gandak River, the mid-stream of which formed the boundary as per Treaty of Sugauli of 1816, has resulted in claims/counterclaims by both sides in this segment. Government is constantly monitoring the situation with a view to prevent encroachments by the Nepalese side.”

Dragon dragged in

Some Indian officials and scholars claim that the issue of Kalapani has been complicated after Nepal tried to bring China into the matter. Says Nihar Nayak, a New Delhi-based expert in Nepal-India relations, “Officially, Nepal brought the issue before India after the signing of the Mahakali treaty in 1996.” India at the time assured Nepal that the issue would be resolved through a joint technical committee, which was formed in 2002. Six years later, the issue was once again discussed between then Indian External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee and his Nepali counterpart Upendra Yadav. “Reportedly, on both occasions, Nepal indirectly hinted that China should be included in the negotiations,” adds Nayak.

But foreign secretary Madhu Raman Acharya says he is unaware of Nepal ever seeking Chinese assistance to resolve the issue. “In fact, China says it is a bilateral issue that must be resolved between Nepal and India,” he told APEX. China has remained silent and Chinese media have largely ignored the recent Kalapani dispute.

“I don’t know why China should be dragged into the matter if the dispute is between Nepal and India,” says Bhaskar Koirala, Director of the Nepal Institute of International and Strategic Studies. “I believe the issue should be resolved by Nepali and Indian experts in a technically sound manner. There is no need to stage demonstrations in front of the Indian embassy. That is a wrong approach.” 

For a party that reaped maximum political benefit from the 2015-16 border blockade, the re-emergence of Kalapani as a national issue could be a godsend for the ruling NCP, and its leader KP Oli. Despite some success in foreign policy, the two-third Oli government has underperformed, and fallen short of honoring its ‘Happy Nepalis, Prosperous Nepal’ commitment. The reign of mafias has tightened in virtually all sectors, impunity is sky high, and threat to civil liberties increasing. And the prime minister’s health is unstable, to put the finest possible gloss on it. To make amends, the PM has ‘fired’ all his advisors and is reshuffling the cabinet.

But there will be nothing like being seen as standing strong against an ‘expansionist’ India to reestablish his nationalist credentials. When the updated map of India showing Kalapani as Indian territory first emerged, the government seemed unsure of how to react. The foreign ministry mandarins were so terrified of speaking against India that the statement condemning the Kalapani encroachment was not even issued in English, an unprecedented event. But the government soon realized that it had much to lose by staying silent, and a world to gain by loosening its tongue.

To be fair, it is not just the ruling NCP leaders who have been crying foul about the Indian encroachment. The main opposition has come out as strongly against it and vowed full support to the government. If the problem is amicably settled in Nepal’s favor, or if the government is seen as raising it strongly even as India is unmoved, most of the credit will go to Oli and company, which they can again cash in on during the next general elections.

But there is also a danger. India is determined to keep Kalapani, given its high strategic value in monitoring the Chinese in Tibet. Nor can Modi afford to be seen as ‘losing’ such a vital territory to what many Indian strategic thinkers consider China’s ‘puppet government’ in Kathmandu. Even if he were willing, state politics in Uttarakhand, where Kalapani is now placed, rules that possibility out. In this situation, New Delhi will ignore Nepal’s demands up to a point. But when it has had enough, there is no guessing how it will react.

The best-case scenario for India is to maintain the status quo on Kalapani and wait for the noise in Kathmandu to die down. But until the next election cycle in 2022, there will also be no bigger political issue in Nepal for those in the government as well as the opposition. As Foreign Minister Pradeep Gyawali recently put it, the two-third government cannot fail in its most basic duty: maintaining the country’s territorial integrity. In this, the Oli government, boosted by the recent high-level engagement with China, has been emboldened to stand up to India. Otherwise, it would have been inconceivable for a Nepali foreign minister to label a decades-old issue of encroachment as Indian ‘bullying’.

With Nepal now its ‘strategic partner’, will China stand as firmly with Nepal on Kalapani as it does with, say, Pakistan on Kashmir? (Not inconceivable.) Or will India and China agree to settle Kalapani without Nepal’s consent, as they have seemingly done on Lipulekh? (More likely.) Small powers seldom win important geopolitical battles. Whatever the case, the sparks from Kalapani will fly for some time yet.

As Sam Cowan, an ex-British Army officer and a scholar with an intimate knowledge of Nepal, has pointed out, this is not the first time a political map issued in India has shown Kalapani as Indian territory. British India had first published such a map in 1879, he says, a map which independent India inherited. Successive governments of Nepal, whether the autocratic ones under Ranas or the democratic ones later, over many generations, ignored the inclusion of Kalapani in Indian maps. They had various favors to curry with the Indians, whether for themselves or for their country, and the de facto loss of Kalapani was apparently a price worth paying. 

So Cowan does not understand the fuss around the new map of India issued by its Home Ministry. He is right to an extent. But any real or perceived loss of a country’s territory, even a teeny bit, can be an explosive development in this social media-controlled, alternate-fact reality world. The Chinese take the cases of publication of China’s map without Hong Kong or Taiwan mighty seriously (and I speak from experience). The same has traditionally been the case with the Indians and publication of the de facto map of Jammu and Kashmir in international outlets. In fact, no government today can countenance any real or perceived loss of national territory. 

And just like the mainstream media elsewhere, Nepali media know how to whip up a good nationalist story, however old, to get maximum eyeballs. The old public suspicion of India does not help. After three blockades, Nepalis have come to instinctively mistrust New Delhi. Interestingly, the map now brought out by the Indian Home Ministry was strictly for domestic use and not an international map, as even Nepal’s survey department officials have clarified. Yet the uproar over it refuses to die down. 

India is unlikely to give up Kalapani, which gives it a vital strategic advantage from which to closely monitor the movement of Chinese troops in the region. As Kalapani also falls on the route to the Kailash Mansarovar, an important Hindu pilgrimage, the Hindu nationalist government in New Delhi will be keen to retain it. Perhaps the most it will do is agree to keep the maps ambiguous while continuing to occupy Kalapani. If the push comes to shove, it might even agree to a land swap for Kalapani with Nepal. As an immediate sop, the spokesperson for Indian foreign ministry has said that there has been no change in status quo on the border with Nepal and all disputes will be settled through later negotiations. But will that suffice? 

It is a hard fact of geopolitics that the interest of smaller countries like Nepal are often compromised in the larger strategic battles between bigger powers like India and China. In the worst case, the big powers completely overlook the interests of small powers (cue: Lipulekh). The ongoing protests over the occupation of Kalapani is a diplomatic tinderbox for the communist government. It was the mother party of KP Oli that first officially informed India of its ‘illegal occupation’ of Kalapani back in 1996. The prime minister who came to power on the back of the 2015-16 blockade can ill afford to be seen as weak before the old hegemon on the eve of important by-elections.

As the UN Security Council deadline for the repatriation of all North Korean workers draws closer, a senior US government official says Nepal is making ‘good progress’ in implementing the Dec 22, 2017 Security Council resolution. As per the resolution, Nepal will have to repatriate all North Korean workers by the last week of December this year.

Speaking to media persons on the condition of anonymity, the US government official added that Nepal is on course to meet the deadline. “It is gratifying that Nepal government is taking steps and cooperating with both US government and UN officials to implement sanctions,” he said. In the second week of June this year, Mark Lambert, US special envoy for North Korea, had visited Nepal to take the stock of progress on Nepal’s part. During his stay, he had met lawmakers, government officials as well as ruling Nepal Communist Party Co-chair Pushpa Kamal Dahal.

According to Nepali officials, Lambert had expressed concerns over North Korean workers and the businesses they ran in Kathmandu. The ruling NCP, however, is divided over cracking down on North Korean activities in Nepal. Many in the party believe that as bilateral relation between Nepal and North Korea is on track, the activities of North Koreans in Nepal should not be restricted. But, as a UN member, Nepal is obliged to implement the UNSC sanctions.  

The US official also discussed the possibility of cyber-attacks by North Korean hackers to steal money from Nepali banks.  The Americans believe North Korean hackers have stolen at least $1.1 billion in a series of attacks on global banks over the past four year, of which $81 million was taken from the central bank of Bangladesh in February 2016. “As other South Asian countries may face the same problem we are ready to support their banks protect themselves from hackers,” the official added.

The UN panel on implementation of sanctions is investigating North Korea’s evasion of financial sanctions to illegally transfer funds from financial institutions and cryptocurreny exchanges, according to a UN report. According to it, such cases were reported in Bangladesh, Chile, Costa Rica, Gambia, Guatemala, India, Kuwait, Liberia, Malaysia, Malta, Nigeria, Poland, Republic of Korea, Slovenia, South Africa, Tunisia and Vietnam.  

A senior official at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Republic of Korea also pointed to possible cyber-attacks from North Korea as a major challenge other countries. On Nepal’s part, US officials say they are ready to help it enhance its cyber capabilities. 

Earlier, during his visit to Kathmandu in May this year, acting Deputy Assistant Secretary at US State Department’s Bureau of South and Central Affairs, David J Ranze, had taken up this issue with Nepal. Similarly, the same issue figured in Foreign Minister Pradeep Gyawali’s visit to Washington in December last year.  

The UN and the US are both concerned that North Korea nationals continue to work in several countries with the goal of generating funds for North Korean nuclear and ballistic missile programs. In order to monitor the status of sanction implementation, UN had formed an expert panel. 

After pressure from US officials, Nepal instructed nine companies with North Korean investment to close down and take back their investment after liquidation of their companies. Nepal has also informed North Korea that it is not going to issue any business visa to its nationals after October-end, 2019. 

Available evidence suggests many countries have not done enough to send back North Korean workers. There is also a tendency of changing the North Korean companies’ names to evade sanctions. 

For at least a year North Korea has been at the forefront of global discussions and media coverage in light of its recent engagement with the US, even though the engagement has not helped in the denuclearization of North Korea. Similarly, there have been several rounds of talks between North Korea and South Korea. The ongoing diplomatic engagement, however, has helped reduce tensions in the Korean peninsula.