Kathmandu, Oct. 18 -- Throughout the state visit to Nepal by Chinese President Xi Jinping last weekend, Marxism-Leninism-Maoism ideology was scarcely mentioned - even though both countries are governed by monolithic Communist parties.
The irony could have been lost on supporters of the Nepal Workers Peasants Party (above) that has traditionally governed Bhaktapur, who carried portraits of Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin and Mao during a rally to mark the party's convention just before Dasain.
While Nepal's politics still takes its inspiration from philosophers and leaders from the last century, the optics of the Xi visit was all geopolitical symbolism. Proposals about connectivity, the Belt and Road Initiative, trade and infrastructure - jus...