New Delhi, May 27 (IANS) The Maoists in Nepal do not favour an “open border” with India and want the unregulated cross-border movement to be reviewed. Baburam Bhattarai, the second most important leader of the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), has said in an interview with an Indian monthly magazine “Hardnews” that the current arrangement to have “open borders” that are “unregulated” is not to the advantage of either country.

“Open border is not a big advantage, not even to India,” Bhattarai told the magazine. He said the current arrangement was mostly misused by big smuggling networks.

Large number of people from the two countries, particularly those from Nepal, have free access to work in India because of this arrangement which flows from the spirit of the Indo-Nepal Treaty of 1950.

But the comments of the Maoist leader suggest that the new rulers in Kathmandu would perhaps like to review some of the provisions of the treaty.

Bhattarai also ruled out the possibility of disbanding his party’s youth wing - the Youth Communist League, while accusing the two main political parties in Nepal, the Nepali Congress and the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist-Leninist) of “subverting” the democratic process in the country.

Describing the two parties as “dishonest and undemocratic” the Maoist leader told the magazine: “The mainstream political parties don’t have any political or social agenda. They have no agenda of restructuring the State. They have no vision. No roadmap. We had a roadmap. We had a manifesto of socio-economic change.”

He said the demand for disbanding the Youth Communist League was yet another obstacle created by these political parties to block the Maoists from forming a government.

“They lost the elections. Instead of looking inwards they are manufacturing all kinds of false allegations. They did not have the agenda of the abolition of the monarchy either; they had no vision of socio-economic change. They had no objectives or vision.”

The Maoists, who have ended up as the largest political party in the wake of the April 10 Constituent Assembly elections, need close cooperation and support of the Nepali Congress and the CPN (UML) to form the next interim government and frame a new constitution for Nepal.

But Bhattarai told ‘Hardnews’: ” Most of them are very corrupt. That is why they were rejected by the people. Almost 60 percent of our winning candidates are young people. How can we throw away the youth who fought for us, voted us.”

Bhattarai said the Maoists would push for integrating their guerrillas into the Nepal army since this was “agreed in the peace accord.”

He described the armed struggle of the Maoists and their subsequent victory in the elections as a ” fusion of bullet and ballot.”