The Kathmandu Metropolitan City (KMC) has been sending police and staffers with excavators in tow in the Hattisar area, where Tukucha has been put through an underground tunnel, for the past few days. They have been digging the ground in private houses of individuals and companies, demolishing walls, and threatening and instructing the owners to remove the structures. Owners of the houses and the land have been saying they have not encroached the land, rather procured it by completing legal procedures, built houses in accordance to the designs passed by the KMC and acquired documents of completing construction. With documents and evidence in hand, they have been pleading with the KMC to have a look at those documents. But the police and KMC staffers deployed on the field with excavators have not listened to their pleadings. They have been evading the owners saying, “Don’t tell us, ask engineers, and those above us.” And threatening that the houses will be demolished if found above the tunnel through which Tukucha is flowing.
A team of police and staffers reached the residence of 82-year-old Sharada Manandhar at Hattisar with excavators on Monday, shut the compound gate that was open, and then brought the gate down with the excavator. She had rented a small truss-structure inside the compound to a coffee house for the past four years. That was an additional source of income on top of her government pension. The KMC ordered her to demolish the structure stating that it is above Tukucha and warned that they will run the excavator if it is not demolished. The tenant has vacated the coffee house after KMC’s threats.
The police and KMC staffers are not to blame for all this, and its main leadership—Mayor Balen Shah—is the one responsible. He doesn’t want to check the facts of Hattisar, nor is he ready to listen to the locals. Yogesh Mishra, a local, met Shah at his office armed with documents and evidence, and tried to brief him about the facts but Shah was uninterested in his efforts, Mishra claims.
The KMC has started to display the brutality of excavators instead of looking at the facts and evidence presented by the locals, and presenting its own evidence to show that the locals have encroached the land.
What is this attitude showed by the KMC leadership, its police and staffers? It is necessary to call and define this mentality for what it is. This is blatant thuggery. The state’s thuggery over the law-abiding citizens is an unpardonable crime in democracy. And this crime needs to stop immediately.
The facts that we have unearthed, our conversation with locals of Hattisar, and the documents and evidence they have clearly show that they have not encroached the land. This is ancestral property of some; others had legally procured the land only some time back and built houses there. The land there has been sold and procured at government offices for years. Those who have built houses and other structures have done so after passing the design through the KMC and taking permission from other bodies concerned.
The land in Hattisar was never under government ownership. The land was owned by local farmers when the then Rana prime minister Bir Shumsher decided to put the Tukucha flowing out from the southern wall of the Narayanhiti Palace inside a tunnel 130 years ago. Historical documents have proved that the Ranas had acquired the land at Rs 200 per ropani. They constructed the underground tunnel for Tukucha and built a spacious ground by filling the tunnel but they never brought that land under the state’s ownership. That land was eventually distributed among Bir Shumsher’s children. Some of the plots there are still owned by Bir Shumsher’s descendants. Others have been transferred to the current owners after legal transactions.
The most important thing is, the land was surveyed in 1975. The map prepared then does not mention Tukucha. Not many may have remembered the Tukucha that was sent underground more than 80 years earlier. The state may also not have deemed it necessary to keep Tukucha in the map.
To say that the owners should have known about the Tukucha that was never mentioned in government map, and accuse them of encroaching the land over Tukucha and building houses is sheer insanity. The KMC has been doing precisely that now. To try to remove the locals from there through threats and excavator terror without completing any legal process and provision of compensation is an unthinkable act by the state. The Constitution has granted inviolable rights to property for the citizens. The excavators sent by Balen Shah cannot violate that, nor can the state take an ax to the private property of citizens without paying appropriate compensation.
The land and houses are not just physical properties for the people. They are connected with the person’s and her family’s love, sweat and many memories, and self-respect. The place is beloved for every individual with special importance and prestige. Where does the KMC get the rights to deploy excavators on such places without their permission when they have not committed any offense? Which morality granted that? Those hurting the self-respect of citizens by deploying excavators are liable for punishment in rule of law. Our law also deems attack on others’ properties a punishable offense.
There seems to be a frightening tendency now. A few individuals seem to be happy when the state has attacked others' properties. It is the nature of the crowd to take sadistic pleasure at the sufferings of others. That is understandable. But another dangerous tendency can also be seen in the Nepali society now—not speaking and writing against wrong deeds of Balen Shah due to his popularity. The victims of Hattisar have met Kathmandu lawmakers and leaders of parties and briefed their grievances. But the leaders have expressed helplessness saying, “We cannot speak against Balen Shah at such times.”
Expressing their helplessness, the victims say, “Politicians don’t listen to us, the media doesn’t write about us. What justice would the court provide during such a time?”
Some state bodies appear hesitant to fulfill their responsibilities. For example, it has come to light that the Tukucha tunnel was built 130 years ago by Bir Shumsher. Many say it was an amazing example of engineering for that period. The fact that the great earthquakes of 1934 and 2015 could not inflict any damage to the underground tunnel also clearly shows how strong the structure was built. Therefore, it is our heritage of historical and archeological importance that shows the engineering technology of the Rana period. According to law, no structure older than 100 years can be altered or demolished. It can only be altered under the supervision of the Department of Archaeology. The law has given that authority to the Department of Archeology. But the department seems reluctant to fulfill its responsibilities. It has remained silent even when the KMC’s excavators have been digging up such an old heritage every day. It has not even bothered to go and inspect the sites of excavation.
If society starts bowing down to populism like this, then democracy will start losing its essence. Therefore, it is necessary to speak and write about this injustice meted out by the KMC to the citizens so that those who are facing injustice do not lose their hope for justice. A democratic society is also a society that puts faith in justice in each other. Those who face the wrath of the state are left alone only in an autocratic society, where everyone fears the state.
Thankfully, there is also a good side to a populist wave—populism is usually short-lived. And people in a democratic society will challenge it sooner or later.
What now?
First of all, the thuggery needs to be stopped. The KMC needs to bring the excavator terror to an end and stop threatening the citizens.
And the KMC should discuss the issue with a cool mind in its executive meeting, and take decision in light of the facts that have come to the fore. It should consider whether the Tukucha tunnel has to be demolished or not? The settlement of Hattisar has to be displaced or not? The cost for doing so, the return on the expenses incurred, and whether that can be justified considering other glaring priorities of the KMC?
There will be debate in the media and the civil society on what to do about Tukucha, and whether to revive it or not. People will put their own positions on different aspects of the issue. That is inseparable and essential in a democratic society. That will bring many aspects of the disputed issue to the fore, and help the decision-makers take decision. But the sovereign rights to take a call rest on them in capacity of the elected people’s representatives. The Constitution has provisions specifying what the local government, the provincial government and the federal government can do. Everyone should fulfill one’s responsibility accordingly.
If the settlement has to be evacuated, the KMC must hold friendly dialogue with the locals about compensation. They should not be treated like enemies. Both the sides should agree and move forward accordingly. The Government of Nepal should take decision in accordance to the Land Acquisition Act if there is no such agreement, and pay compensation accordingly. And move the works forward.
No government has the authority to ignore the laws, processes and regulations, and unleash excavators on an individual’s property taking a mob, threaten the citizens and oppress them. That is not accepted in a civilized and democratic society.
