Kathmandu, Sept. 3 -- Nepal's political headlines these days are mainly about therift between K P Oli and Madhav Kumar Nepalthat split Nepal's largest party, the UML. Somewhat sidelined is the role of Maoist chair Pushpa Kamal Dahal, who has been the behind-the-scenes operator.

Dahal went under the nom de guerre Prachanda ('Fierce One') during the insurgency, was elected prime minister in 2008, and resigned after trying to replace the Nepal Army Chief. He himself is the first to admit that peacetime politics is not easy.

Last month, he confessed tobeing under "tremendous stress"because most of the 49 MPs of his Maoist Centre party wanted to be ministers in the coalition government. He added that politics in Nepal does not move in a line...