The Nepali House of Representatives (HoR), or parliament, took some bold steps to curtailed most of the powers enjoyed by the Nepali King Gyanendra over the period of first 100 days of its reinstatement.

The king reinstated the HoR through a royal proclamation on April 24, which was dissolved on May 22, 2002, after 19-day long people's movement with general strike and street protests against the king regime intensified through out the country.

However, the reinstated HoR drastically curtailed royal privileges, proclaimed itself supreme and also scrapped various ordinances introduced by the royal regime.

The HoR proclamation made on May 18 changed the "Royal Nepalese Army" into "Nepal Army" and His Majesty's Government into "Nepal Government" and deprived the king from all his prerogatives including the position of supreme commander in chief of the Nepali Army.

The parliament also deprived the king from his role of approving the bill passed by the parliament and also removed him as heads of various universities and trusts. Practically, King Gyanendra has turned into a civilian king with the parliament declaring that royal income and private property will now be taxable.

The other important decision the HoR took was to go for the Constituent Assembly election to ensure participation of all sections of society in the state mechanism which was one of the main demands of people expressed during the 19-day-long people's movement.

In an attempt to ensure guerrillas participation in the government, it also made a provision that even the non- parliamenterain can join the government.

The HoR deserves credit for the historic decisions, however, it is now being considered as an obstruction to the ongoing peace process.

The guerrillas are demanding to dissolve the parliament immediately, while the parliamentary political parties are in favor of continuing it until some reliable alternative to it is found.

The parliament, however, is yet to make concrete decisions on the issue of holding elections of the Constituent Assembly and finding consensus with the guerrillas for peaceful settlement of the guerrillas insurgency.

Holding the Constituent Assembly election was one of the main objectives of understanding that reached between the ruling Seven Party Alliance (SPA) and the guerrillas.

Interestingly, in its bid to declare itself supreme, the HoR neglected the role of National Assembly, the Upper House of the parliament.

Top leaders of various political parties said that Nepal made historical achievements during the first 100 days of the reinstatement of the HoR but had yet to do a lot more to achieve the goal of a fully functioning democracy.

"The achievements made so far during the first 100 days of the reinstatement of parliament is positive but we have not been able to do what we could," said Madhav Kumar Nepal, general secretary of Communist Party of Nepal United Marxist and Leninist, one of the largest political parties of ruling SPA.

Stating that the country is yet to have a new constitution through an elected Constitution Assembly, Nepal criticized the political parties for lacking vision and plans in future.

Source: Xinhua