Congress at a Crossroads

The Nepali Congress is standing at a crossroads today. A crossroads is where four roads meet, where all the options head or not, taking a turn or not, keep standing or not - are open. But the Congress's crossroads is a little different. Here, all four roads  are closed, and the party is holding a map and discussing “which road is closed?”

There was a time when  the Congress was not just the center of Nepali politics but the nucleus  of the Nepali consciousness itself. When the country went in search of democracy, it encountered the Congress. If it wanted freedom, it turned to the Congress.

If it wanted liberalism, it turned to the Congress. If it wanted pluralism, it turned to the Congress. Today, the Congress itself is wandering in search of the Congress. It is nowhere to be found. Congress is sometimes looked for in Sanepa, sometimes in Baluwatar, sometimes in the shadow of Budhanilkantha, but all that is found is “burnt banknotes alongside the minutes of endless meetings.”

Today, the Congress looks less like a political force and more like a long-running confusion project. Its top leaders appear to be pursuing PhDs on the same research question: “What do we do now?”

Its sub-question is, “Is it right not to speak or to speak?” Its subsidiary question is, “If you have to speak, who should you speak like? Like BP or GP? Like CP or KP?”

In the midst of this confusion, Gen Z arrived on the national scene as a revolutionary force—carrying slogans, questions, anger, hope, and disappointment. The streets heated up, power centers felt the pressure, and social media boiled over. But the Congress?

The Congress immediately called a meeting.

The meeting decided to call another meeting.

That meeting concluded that the situation was serious.

Another meeting added that further study was needed.

While the country was burning, the Congress went on study leave.

For the Congress today, protest feels like a risky investment. Support it, and the government is offended. Criticize it, and old alliances begin to crack. Stay quiet, and the people get angry! So, it does speak—but in a way that reveals nothing about what that speech wants to achieve. In other words, the Congress has invented a new form of silence. The safest policy, therefore, is chosen: not to be afraid, not to sink, not to rise. This is no longer politics, but position maintenance!

In today’s Congress, BP Koirala’s philosophy is no longer a guiding principle; it’s just decoration. Ganeshman Singh is no longer a living memory; he is a quotation for seminars. Krishna Prasad Bhattarai is no longer an ideal; he is a pair of dates on a calendar—of his birth and death anniversaries. In the Congress party office, photographs hang on the wall, but the ideas remain locked inside their frames.

At times, the Congress resembles a radical communist party. Sometimes it flirts coyly with hard-line  monarchists. Occasionally, it flips through the book of liberalism and asks, “Is this ours?” The party is in such a state that it needs a core committee meeting just to know what kind of party it is. The big men of the Congress speak in four-five different ideological voices at once, like the deity Brahma with four faces turned in different directions. Even power-sharing looks less like a division of responsibility and more like a partition of inheritance!

When it comes to leadership, it cannot be said that there is no leadership in the Congress. There are many in the leadership, so many that they block each other’s way. Everyone wants the front seat, but no one wants to start the car. Everyone is holding the steering wheel but no one is releasing the brake.

The youth ask, “Congress, where were you?”

The Congress replies, “We were in deep study.”

The youth ask again, “What will you do now?”

The Congress says, “A task force has been formed for that.”

The task force is the most successful invention of the Congress. The task force eats up time, exhausts questions, and kills decisions!

Even Girija Prasad  Koirala, who was mocked as a “head constable”, turned the decade-long armed conflict into the country’s new constitution. Today's Congress is making history by turning a much louder movement into silence- the safest chapter in history.

Congress has neither enmity with anyone nor friendship. It has photographs with everyone, but policies with no one. One expects it to open its mouth and say something finally, but even those without a voice speak more clearly than the Congress ever does. Let's not get confused about one thing – that the Congress and individual Congress leaders are different. Even if the Congress sinks, the Congress leaders do not. Because they have already figured out how to disembark even as the party goes under. What drowns in the end is only the Congress's ideas and its legacy.

Today’s Congress is neither the soul of the government nor the voice of the opposition. Neither a friend of the street, nor above the nation, nor the owner  of power.  It is sitting in a political waiting room, listening carefully to see if its number will come.

The country needs direction, the Congress is in dilemma.

The country needs a decision, the Congress has a disclaimer.

The country needs leadership, the Congress has a memory.

The country needs a hero to guide the future, the Congress itself is in darkness.

The people need a clear vision, the Congress is lost in illusion.

Isn't the Congress, which once provided a solution when needed, heading for destruction?

But the story doesn't end here.

One day the Congress called another big meeting. It lasted two days, then three days, then four. The tea was finished, the biscuits were changed, big speeches were made. On the final day, a senior leader stood up and said in a serious voice, “Friends, we are standing at a crossroads.”

Everyone nodded.

“What should we do now?” someone asked.

The leader smiled and said, “We will stay here. Because we are the four-star Congress. Four stars, four roads—that is a crossroads.”

At that moment, everyone felt reassured. Because the Congress finally decided: neither to go forward,  nor to turn back; neither to fight, nor to hide. To stay right at the crossroads. To exist like a statue standing at the crossroads.

And, history will record that moment this way, “Even when the Nepali Congress split, it did not truly split, even when it came together, it did not truly come together. It rather piled up like ballast. Yes, the Congress did not disappear at the crossroads. It settled there permanently.”

(This article was originally published in January 2026 issue of New Business Age magazine.)