No common wealth

During the early 1970s – before Bangladesh was born, or SAARC was incepted; before Sikkimisation and the many other events that are the signature tunes of Southasia in its present construction – India Meets China in Nepal, by the Indian journalist Girilal Jain was essential reading. This book appeared at a time when the 1962 Indo-China 'conflagration' was hardly ten years old. Today, no matter how the book's content appears in retrospect, the title alone is retroactively futuristic, as the two emerging Asian superpowers need to facilitate their bursting service, trade and commercial awesomeness at home in Asia. Nepal could virtually serve as the new pan-Asiatic Silk Route.

Where do I stand as a Southasian? When I climb to the terrace of the Kathmandu newspaper at which I work, I watch jetliners land and take off at the nearby airport. But very few of them are from Southasia itself; today, more traffic is generated from distant destinations. Even though the only international airport in Nepal is dismal rather than dynamic, I am virtually at the centre of things in Asia. I am in Kathmandu, practically in the middle of Nepal, and Nepal is dot-on in between South and North Asia. Kathmandu and Nepal could be that unique catalyst in Greater Asia, the Asian pivot. But alas, that is not to be. Therefore, let me forsake the greater dreams as sour grapes and settle myself, as I am, in the north of Southasia, and look at the rest of the region from Kathmandu.