Kathmandu, Nov. 17 -- From the 1950s onward, almost all political parties in Nepal have marched under the banner of socialism-some treating it as a stepping stone to communism, others as the ultimate goal of liberal democracy. From the Nepali Congress's early call for democratic socialism to the communist parties' countless versions of people's socialism, all promised justice through state control. Both groups opposed the monarchy, yet remained deeply hostile toward each other.From Campus Battles to National Paralysis

I witnessed this firsthand in the mid-1970s and early 1980s, when I was a student and Nepal's campuses had become battlegrounds for students representing these two camps-the communist and the liberal-democratic-often clashi...