This week, taking the reading public's mental health into account, the Ass will try to desist from making any reference to the Baidya faction splitting off from the Mau Party. But that doesn't mean we are not going to poke fun at the split within the CPN (Matrika). Yes, Matrika the Yadav who claims to represent the original Maoist party has just suffered a vertical split as well between the Gruntled and the Disgruntled factions.

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This means we will have to update the glossary of Maoist parties that was carried in the last edition of this Backside column with two more Maobaddie parties, taking the total to 22. This is looking increasingly like a mass outbreak of binary fission in a gastric amoeba colony just before an explosive diarrhoea attack.

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It was bound to happen sooner or later that the friction developing between BRB and PKD has gone public. After the prime minister changed his mind about stepping down to make way for a unity government, Awesome couldn't hold back any longer. What really gets PKD's goat is that here he is defending his govt in front of farang envoys, and BRB is off at Ipanema. With no one of any public stature left in the higher echelons of the UML and NC, Com Chhabilal sees Com Laldhoj as his only credible challenger to be the top honcho. The question everyone is asking is: what made the prime minister say one thing before he left for Rio and another thing when he returned? But by calling the parties baying for his resignation "childish" at his airport press conf, the PM may have gone a bit far and insulted the intelligence and common sense of the world's children. If I was a child, I know I would take umbrage at this uncalled for and ageist remark.

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Extra kranti-curry comrades from the Comma Maoists need a place to work and have refused to move out of Paris Hill which is under command of the Hyphen Maoists. One Comma Comrade was overheard telling a Hyphen Comrade: "You take the South Block since you seem to love the sound of it, and we will stick to the northern part of the building." This is called the Two-Parties-One-Headquarter system of governance, which on the face of it, seems like a good way to save money. But, irked by speculation about the stature of their rump party, the Comma Communists are doing all they can to promote themselves as an important political force. They have made the right moves by calling on the Prez and trying to get him to declare them the third largest force and demote the Madhesi Morcha to the status of a regional party.

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Speaking of Shit-all Nibas, the Ass doesn't envy the Prez who has to meet an endless stream of political wannabes. The Eh-maleys come to pester him to kick BRB out of office, the Kangresis come to push for a govt under their leadership, Kiran Kaka comes to say hi, BRB pops in after Rio to brief him on what Mohan Man told him in Rio, then PKD insists on talking about sidelining BRB. And when that doesn't work, they all send the president SMSs at ungodly hours. The president is thinking of getting a new SIM card so they'll leave him alone.

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If you are among hundreds in KTM who this week received an email from the CoAS saying his wife had an accident and needed 2,000 pounds for treatment at a hospital in the UK and called him to commiserate, you probably know by now that it was a spam. In any case, as in-law of the owner of a supermarket chain, the Jarsap is not exactly hard up.

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The excitement was getting too much to bear for Lord Ram Chandra and he had to go and have his heart examined. Next time it may be his head. Anyway, Poudel Baje is hale and hearty again and all set to promote himself as the next PM. You have to give it to the guy for sheer persistence.

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This intelligence just in: the head of Nepal Television was removed ostensibly because he broadcast an opposition rally. But the real reason, it seems, was because the Disinformation Minister convinced BRB that he had to install a Madhesi as chief otherwise his party would pull out of govt. Prime minister must have thought: "They are already calling me a dictator, so might as well act like one."