"Nepal can be a Hindu state only if we are committed to Hindutva." Those were the words spoken from the podium of a RSS Hindu extremist conference in Gorakhpur on 19 December by none other than Upendra Yadav of the Madhesi Janadhikar Forum (MJF). In November 2006, Yadav took part in a meeting in Raxaul of the BJP's fraternal organisation, Sima Jagaran Manch. The MJF was set up soon after the Gorakhpur meeting and included such personalities as Laxmanlal Karna of the royalist NSP as well as republican activists. There is now uneasiness about Yadav within the MJF.

"We can't deny that our Forum is slipping into regression," says ex-general secretary and current member of MJF, Jaya Prakash Gupta. Royalists have lately become prominent in the MJF and are given to spouting radical rhetoric. Sources say the Indian Embassy is worried about India being dragged into the controversy, and diplomats admit privately that the BJP could be involved. The JTMM's Goit faction is said to be supported by BJP's Raj Kishore Singh, while Jwala Singh is being egged on by Pappu Yadav. The fact that Upendra Yadav's appeal not to use violence is not being heeded seems to show the MJF is now out of the control of the leadership. Says madhesi activist Vijay Kanta Karma: "If the parties and civil society don't take leadership, this movement will be hijacked by reactionaries and could disrupt communal harmony."