Click to play videoDang (Nepal): It was eight years ago that Sushma Chaudhury lost her husband who was a landless farmer. He was forced to stop paying taxes to the wealthy landlords following a Maoist diktat. But soon after that, masked gunmen killed him and ten others in broad daylight.
"He went to the field that morning. Then someone came and told us that he was killed by the landlords,” Sushma said.
This is not a lone story. Thousands of poor Nepalese have suffered because of the decade-long red war waged by Maoists in Nepal.
"The Maoists come to us and demand food. If we refuse, they torture us. It's really difficult for us to live now," a displaced villager, Bhupendra Bahadur said.
With the rise of Maoist insurgency in Nepal, many wealthy landlords have been killed or have left for safer places and all that remains of their homes are ruins.
With half of Nepal under Maoist control, the cost of 'red' governance was also imposed on civilians, who often pay dual taxes, to the Maoists and the government. But the Maoist leadership denies this.
"We don't decide anything. It's the people themselves who decide on these affairs, all decisions are always collective and speak of popular opinion,” Central Committee Member, Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), Santosh Gura Mangar said.
Now, that the King has stepped down and Nepal's finally moving towards democracy, issues like the costs of rebuilding Nepal loom large on Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala's government.
Despite being branded an expansionist power by the Maoists, India's financial aid will go a long way in giving shape to Nepal's future.
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