Last Updated: Saturday, 2 December 2006
Nepal's comrades tie a party knot http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/6199110.stm
By Charles Haviland BBC News, Nepal
The ceasefire between Nepal's government and the Maoist rebels appears to be encouraging fighters to get married - in dedicated Maoist style, of course.
[Guns and uniforms are part and parcel of the Big Day]
It is evening in the hills. The sweet smell of herbs fills the air and the shadows lengthen. In this small village, built on a hill, military men and women, mostly young, troop into a school.
Some wear camouflage fatigues, others garish T-shirts. Some carry rifles, others are empty-handed.
Surprisingly, this is a wedding party. Certainly, not one as you or I know it. In fact, once they get to the school, the first thing on the menu for these 60 or so Maoist soldiers is their usual military drill.
Village children stare from the rooftop as the troops get a lecture on marriage from their commander and hold a minute's silence for those they call their martyrs, all arms clenched in what the Maoists call their Red Salute.
Guns and flowers
The wedding venue is to be the school veranda. It is decked with pictures of the iconic figures of communism. But there is also a rough wooden table with garlands of mauve flowers and four candles.
[The marriage is to combine the strengths of two people for the good of the party
Maoist official]
Two grooms and two brides are sitting among the assembled company. They look deadly serious, and seem reluctant to get up as they are called to the podium amid rhythmic clapping and solemn drumming.
The two grooms are to make speeches. The first, Comrade Samjok, now with a shy smile on his face, a red and black T-shirt visible under his uniform, urges workers of the world to unite and wishes long life to the People's Army. Then he comes to the point.
"Comrade Anima and I have fallen in love and request a wedding," he says.
It is then the turn of the other groom, Comrade Sayjan, but his speech is read by a senior Maoist while he and his fiancee stand giving the Red Salute. Comrade Sayjan firmly holds his gun throughout - it's clearly a fixture for him.
Then at last the couples allow themselves the luxury of a big grin. Each in turn lights a candle. Bride and groom exchange garlands and apply red blessing powder to the forehead.
These are rituals from Hindu tradition - but there is of course no priest, no incantation or reference to religion. Instead, there are firm handshakes between bride and groom.
The drumming gets faster and young men in the crowd start dancing. Suddenly, as if unable to restrain themselves any longer, the two grooms leap up to join in. Comrade Sayjan's gun swings alarmingly on its neck strap as they do high kicks around the schoolyard.
Love and party
This is a rare moment of spontaneous fun in Maoist life. Like most Maoist activities, this double wedding is, in fact, Spartan and economical.
[The ceremony provides Maoists with a rare chance to party]
In these marriages they make a virtue, for instance, of outlawing the giving of dowry - a practice which in this part of the world has heaped misery on countless brides because their husbands' greedy families make ever more demands, often getting violent.
In these communist weddings, the wider families are not involved. And they are love marriages, not arranged ones. The spouses have, however, met within the party, which strictly controls the whole ceremony.
I talk to one of the couples, minutes after they've tied the knot. They are sanguine.
"I wasn't impressed by her beauty at first," says Comrade Samjok. "But we used to look at each other during the battle, and then to support and help each other."
In a matter-of-fact way, he says an emotional relationship developed - then the two of them fell in love, and proposed to each other.
His new bride, Comrade Anima, makes a wider reflection. "We know we can't be together all our lives," she says.
"It depends on the revolution, and where the party needs to send us. We'll cross whatever barriers there are between us. And even if we're not together physically, we'll be joined by our thoughts."
Honeymoon drill
A woman Maoist official says much the same.
[The wider families are not involved in the weddings]
"A wedding is not a matter of personal romance," she explains.
"Rather, the marriage is to combine the strengths of two people for the good of the party."
By sponsoring weddings in their ranks, the Maoists want to prevent their troops from eloping together - or leaving the party for an external lover.
They also use the marriages to help enforce their own ban on sex outside marriage. If there are some communists who believe in abolition of the family, they will be disappointed by these Maoists, who want to keep the family but with, they say, full equality between men and women.
The zeal to promote marriage seems to have grown since April when the Maoist ceasefire began.
There have been reports of mass marriages involving 15 or 20 couples at a time. Naturally, a considerable number of children have been born into the Maoist movement and many have been raised sharing the parental lap with a gun or, in the past, living among bullets and shells.
That is something which should end with the imminent move to lock up Maoist weapons under a peace deal.
In the mist, the morning after the double wedding, I saw the two newly-wed couples stony-faced once more, back at their morning drill. It was clear there would be no honeymoon for them.
>From Our Own Correspondent was broadcast on Saturday, 2 December, 2006 at
1130 GMT on BBC Radio 4.