Pushpa Kamal Dahal, the chairman of CPN (Maoist Centre) and the immediate past prime minister, was accused of causing a split in the Janata Samajbadi Party Nepal (JSP-Nepal), one of his coalition partners.

JSP-Nepal was not only a coalition partner in the Dahal government but also one of the founding members of the Socialist Front Nepal, which was established on July 8, 2023, amid a special function in Kathmandu.

Dahal’s Maoist Centre, the CPN (Unified Socialist), led by Madhav Kumar Nepal, JSP-Nepal of Upendra Yadav and Nepal Communist Party of Netra Bikram Chand ‘Biplab’ had come together to form the Front.

As leaders held a meeting of the Front at the office of Unified Socialist on Tuesday, Yadav remained conspicuously absent. Meanwhile, Mahindra Raya Yadav of Nepal Sanghiya Samajbadi Party attended the meeting as the new entrant of the Front.

The JSP-Nepal chief boycotted the meeting as he held a serious grudge against Dahal. Former prime minister Dahal is not only accused of masterminding the split of JSP-Nepal but is also blamed for weakening the Socialist Front while in power.

Soon after the party split, JSP-Nepal chair Upendra Yadav questioned the Front's relevance. Janata Samajbadi Party, formed by a splinter faction of JSP-Nepal, however, has not joined the Front. The new outfit, which is led by Ashok Rai, has seven lawmakers in the federal parliament while the mother party led by Yadav has five.

CPN (Unified Socialist) leader and National Assembly lawmaker Beduram Bhusal, however, claims there is no ground to accuse Dahal. “It is true that despite being a member of the Front, member parties have taken arbitrary decisions favourable to their party,” Bhusal told the Post. “But this does not mean that Dahal had tried to foil the Front.”

Agni Sapkota, the Maoist Centre leader who attended the Front’s meeting on Tuesday, told the Post that the members, who had met after a hiatus, took stock of the changed political scenario.

“At the meeting, we concluded that the Congress-UML alliance can undermine the achievements in the name of constitution amendment, though their agreement is yet to be made public,” Sapkota told the Post. “We have decided to critically analyse every move of the newly formed government.”

Tuesday's meeting of the Front also constituted a four-member task force to review the Front’s journey and suggest a way forward. The task force consists of Khadga Bishwakarma from Chand’ party, Ganga Narayan Shrestha from Nepal Samajbadi Party, Pramesh Hamal from Unified Socialist and Dev Gurung from Maoist Centre. They have been given a 15-day timeframe to submit their report.

Meanwhile, detractors question the Front’s relevance. Manish Kumar Suman, a JSP-Nepal leader, said that the relevance of the Socialist Front ended after Dahal publicly accepted playing a role to split the JSP-Nepal. “Dahal is trying to activate the Front out of desperation after being ousted from power,” Suman said.

Soon after the JSP-Nepal split on May 5, Dahal, while speaking at a function of his party, had said he would do anything to remain in power, indicating his role in the party split. The JSP-Nepal was split on the pretext that some lawmakers from JSP-Nepal and Unified Socialist were approaching the then main opposition Nepali Congress to form a government while both the fringe parties were in the Dahal government.

But Bhusal said that the JSP-Nepal leaders might have provided such harsh assessment of the Front as they were in pain of party division, which is natural.

Socialist Front was formed with a spirit to strengthen collaboration between the left-leaning political parties. But Dahal used it for his political gain, Suman accused. “Only after being ousted from the government did Dahal try to activate the Socialist Front,” he said.

Dahal was ousted from the government after he failed to win the parliament’s trust after his coalition’s largest partner, the CPN-UML, reached a deal with Nepali Congress on July 1 to form the new government.

The Front was formed after years of discussion among some left-leaning political parties. However, Baburam Bhattarai, a longtime advocate of the socialist front, was later left out. Instead of Bhattarai, the Netra Bikram Chand ‘Biplav'-led Communist Party of Nepal was inducted into the bloc.

When formed last year, the Socialist Front had 54 members in Parliament. The Maoist Centre was the largest among them, with 32 seats, followed by JSP-Nepal, with 12 seats at the time, and Unified Socialist’s 10 seats. But now the Front only has 43 members, including Mahindra Raya Yadav, the chair of Nepal Sanghiya Samajbadi Party.

Bhusal, the Unified Socialist vice-chair, argued that the number of lawmakers does not affect the Front’s functioning. “The Front was established to strengthen collaboration between the like-minded left-leaning parties so it has nothing to do with the Parliamentary affairs,” Bhusal said.

The primary concept paper of the alliance says that the Socialist Front was established with “a basic commitment to federalism, democracy, republicanism, inclusion, and secularism—the five basic key features of the Constitution of Nepal.” Though the Front vowed to release the detailed concept later, it has yet to do so.

The primary concept paper released during the inauguration on July 8 last year also states ‘amending the constitution’ as one of its objectives.

However, the Maoist Centre, the leading force of the Socialist Front, is criticising the Congress-UML coalition government for including the constitutional amendment as one of its objectives.

But Maoist Centre leaders claimed the constitution amendment mentioned in their concept paper is different from what the Congress-UML alliance is trying to do.

“It is true that the primary concept paper released by Front last year also mentions the constitution amendment, but it is with the forward looking approach, but the objective of the Congress-UML alliance is different,” Sapkota argued. “We suspect they want to abolish the Proportional Representation system from the electoral system apart from other achievements, which would be a regressive move. We won’t let it happen.”

Krishna Pokharel, a professor of political science, echoed Sapkota. “The Socialist Front was advocating for enriching the constitution and making it more progressive by amending it, but the objective of the Congress-UML alliance is different,” Pokharel said.

Dahal harped on the idea of forming the Socialist Front after the dissolution of the Nepal Communist Party, considered to be the most powerful communist force in Nepal’s history, in early 2021.

During a meeting held on March 22, the Front's member parties decided to try to get the CPN-UML, the largest communist party, on board the Socialist Front. They floated the idea as Dahal at the time ditched the Congress and brought the UML on board the ruling coalition.

Now with the UML ditching the Maoist Centre and forming the government with Congress, the chances of their participation in the Front has ended for now. But then, the UML, the country’s largest communist party, was never so positive about the idea of forming Socialist Front.