With the Maoists winning a simple majority in Nepal, Hindu is all ga-ga over the victory- I doubt if Prachanda himself would have been this happy of the victory! Siddharth Varadarajan- the leading Maoist flag bearer of the South goes ballistic with his half baked analysis and a confused deluge on what India should do and should not have done.

He opens his rant with the usual "Oh-there-is-a-stampede-for-Maoists" in his article, where the surveys predicting the Maoists defeat were all bogus and commissioned by the "Who-else-but" the US. While he minces no words in deriding the Indian Government because it thought the Maoists will not win the elections, despite getting "field reports" about the ground swell of support for the Maoists. As can be expected, Maoist leaders are "Statesmen"- I thought that word was for people who had been Statesmen for a long career in politics and have proved themselves through their sheer character- somehow, yesterday's killers[The same who were accused of murders and forced child soldiers by Amnesty] become a "Statesman" today, just because they secretly warned India and not air their opinions in Public.

While pointing out the issues that the Maoist leaders face in the immediate future, the author comes to a wonderful, "Hanging-in-the-air-as-I-am-Confused" statement like:

But it is essential that the international community not send out wrong signals on the question of civilian control over the military.

Wrong signals?- What wrong signals can the international community send over the question of civilian control of army?-Does Siddharth want the Maoists to control the Army, since they control the Government- Will the Maoists remain Maoists even after forming the Government or would the Government be different from the Maoists?- I mean even in India we have a [theoretically] distinction between the party and the Government- don't we? We are not the autocratic China or Soviet Union to have the Party to be both the Government and a Political Outfit- or may it is in the genes of Communism!

While it is true that Maoists have come to political table, there still is no concrete evidence that they have abhorred the path of violence and the author wants India to counsel US to take Maoists off the Terrorist list- while I don't deny it can help or it should help, there must be concrete evidence that Maoists have finally shunned violence and have become a full fledged political outfit, which sadly is not yet forthcoming- read this piece from BBC.

But Siddharth betrays his own sense of "I-always-thought-so" dejavu, when he unwittingly says,

The internal political dynamics of Nepal first need to recover from the shock the electorate has delivered.

If there was a ground swell of support and the Maoists had always been expected to win as in the opening of the article, where is the shock that the electorate has delivered? Is it a shock to Siddharth himself?