As much as #8 hates 'who cares' and 'jange', he has fallen into the same trap of blaming the Indians for all our troubles and  inability to get out of this rut. yes yes, it's true our southern neighbours have meddled with our internal politics and have many times made decisions that has harmed Nepal. but this is also OUR OWN fault. since we have zero political and economic stability, we are absolutely voiceless on the international front. no one cares what Nepal thinks or wants. and having gundaa, spineless netas has worsened the situation. so let's stop spewing hatred agains our own people (Madhesis) or our bigger, more powerful neighbours. not going to help.

Just want to second the sentiment expressed by Dipendra Bahadur Basnet............I feel it too. Girja Koirala, ex King G and Pushpa Kamal - they all had the power to change a lot for Nepal.....all of them f***** it all up. 

We will need another revolution - either Nepali spring, summer or winter.........to possibily get somewhere........

But this is not only a problem in NT or in Nepal. People all over the world love to go off on random tangents, write page long rants and hate messages. It's everywhere - on youtube, on CNN's website, on BBC's facebook page. And the ease with which we can all hide behind anonymous identities (myself included) makes the situation worse. More comments like #1 and less of the rest would make this world a better place.

I agree with the columnist. Despite some flaws in his statistics, his main message is right on. Madhesh justifiably feels estranged from the country, and we need to work hard to make them feel like us. There are two aspects of this problem:

1. The Madhesi parties haven't done their jobs. Any Madhesi who looks at them must feel pretty depressing. Like the columnist pointed out, the Madhesis are president, vp, major ministers including vice PM, and there is really no one who should be fulfilling their demand. Why Madhesi ministers not working enough to uplift the districts they look after is beyond me.

2. Pahadiyas need to get rid of this "they came from south and got citizenship" mentality. I mean, come on, guys, you don't really know. We are also talking about people who are dying of cold in cold wave in Madhesh, and more likely these people are the ones trapped in poverty here since generations. Mithila has a long history; these people are bright people and has a proud history, and they have very old connection with the hilly states, so they are justified in being aggrieved.

3. However, there is one more part that doesn't make sense. Why Madhesh needs bigger state? How come an identity fight assumes a bigger name (Madhesh), when people in Madhesh are different from each other? Madhesi leaders themselves need to respect the heterogeneity. When they say it is "fight for identity", it looks fairly contrived argument to me. The fight is "for equity", for "more shares in national decision making"--and not for identity. The demand for identity is vague, and will work as a centrifugal force, and nothing more.

 Experience proves that  empowering the Madhesi politicians has not empowered the Madhesi people,and this is true for other communities as well.

The politicians want to hide all their failures and their corruption behind slogans, and by inciting the people to focus only on ethnic issues,as though that is the main problem faced by the people, and not the lack of jobs,security, water,electricity and list can go on.

The politicians primary aim is to be ministers and enrich themselves-those who cannot be ministers in Kathmandu want to be ministers in the many  new federal states that they envision, all at taxpayers cost.

It is understandable that people all over the country,not only Madhesis,are getting more angry at the political leadership, by their inability  to focus on the problems of the people.

So,if there is going to be a storm it will be not because of  ethnic reasons,but because even the basic needs of the people are not being addressed by the politicians .And it will be a much bigger storm than that envisioned by this writer, one that will engulf the entire country.

"There are hundreds of villages across 20 districts of the Madhes with no roads. There are villages right on the East West Highway that are not on the national grid. Few have drinking water and sanitation."

I think the same can be said about villages in the hills aswell.These are  national issues  not regional .if thats the reason for severing ties with the state,then do you think the villages in the hills should also severe their ties with state and merge with india.

"But the real challenge is still what it was three years ago: can Kathmandu convince half this country's population which lives in the plains that they are not second-class citizens?"

how do you propose we do that?arent madhesis getting equal privileges (if not more) in Nepal these days?if the situation was like you write it ,then how would both the president and vice-president be madhesis?

"Thousands of Madhesi youths have been denied education, and those who have gone to schools don't have jobs because they can't prove they belong to this land"

what????now its getting funny.do u urself even believe this?

Writing articles like this will only help widen the gap between the "pahadis"and "madhesis".and you my friend will also have palyed your role in it.