Nepal changes Pashupati rules

Ending the centuries-old monopoly of South Indian brahmins, Nepal’s government has issued a regulation enabling Nepalese citizens and others to become priests, including chief priest, of the famed Pashupatinath Temple here, one of Hinduism’s eight holiest shrines.

The regulation issued by the ministry of culture and state restructure allows any qualified person to become a priest irrespective of nationality, sources at the Pashupati Area Development Trust said. Now anyone, including Nepalese and Indian nationals, can apply for the jobs.

Local religious activists, however, said the decision was “illegal and impractical”.

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Nepal sets its calendar back by 8 centuries

Nepal’s former Maoist rebels, who came to power pledging revolution and progress, have now endorsed a decision to switch over from the existing calendar to an ethnic one that will take the former Hindu kingdom back more than eight centuries.

While the world ushers in the year 2009 in two months’ time, from Wednesday the Maoist-led government of Nepal will change over to the Nepal Sambat calendar according to which it would be year 1129 in the new Himalayan republic.

The change is certain to add to the complexities of a nation guided by its own peculiar cultures and traditions. Currently, Nepal uses the Vikram Sambat calendar, which was established by the great King of India’s Gupta dynasty, emperor Vikramaditya.

According to the Vikram Sambat calendar, it is now the year 2065, putting Nepal ahead of the internationally used Gregorian calendar by 57 years. However, Nepal will relinquish its progressive status, in terms of years, and go 879 years back officially from Wednesday following a long campaign by the rich and powerful Newar community of the Kathmandu Valley.

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Devyani unites Ranas, Rajputs

After her own marriage to a scion of India’s aristocracy, Devyani Singh nee Rana, once known as the girl for whom Nepal’s Crown Prince Dipendra allegedly killed his entire family, is now playing matchmaker between India and Nepal.

Devyani, who hit the headlines earlier this year when she campaigned for her father Pashupati Shumsher Jung Bahadur Rana in Nepal’s historic Constituent Assembly elections in April, is now unit ing the seniormost Rajput clan of India with the blue blooded Ranas of Nepal, who once ruled the Himalayan nation as hereditary premiers.

Preparations are on for one of the subcontinent’s most spectacular society weddings, where the groom’s procession will include an elephant, four horses and four camels. The groom, Virat Shumsher Jung Bahadur Rana, 27, is great-great grandson of Chandra Shumsher Jung Bahadur Rana, Nepal’s longest-ruling Rana premier.

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Nepal is declared a secular republic

Nepal on Wednesday scripted a new chapter in its turbulent history as the newConstituent Assembly abolished the 240-year-old monarchy and declared the country a "secular, federal democratic republic."

The 601-member body met at the Birendra International Convention Centre on Wednesday evening, and a motion was passed to declare the country the world's newest republic.

After a series of meetings, the Seven-Party Alliance agreed to table the motion at the first meeting of the Constituent Assembly, dominated by Maoists. It was passed by 560 votes in favour, with four members opposing it.

King, Gyanendra will become an ordinary citizen and will lose all his powers. He has been given 15 days to vacate his palace. May 28 will now be celebrated as Nepal's Republic Day.

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Nepal King set to lose his crown on May 28

Nepal's government announced on Monday that its new constitution drafting body would meet for the first time on May 28 when it is due to formally abolish the monarchy and declare the country a republic.

The Maoists, who scored a surprise victory in landmark elections last month, have vowed that the monarchy would be scrapped during the first sitting of the assembly.

The former rebels overturned all predictions in the April polls, winning 220 of the 601 seats in the constitutional assembly more than twice the number of their nearest rivals and pre-election favourites, the Nepali Congress.

"The Prime Minister has sent letters to all the participating political parties calling for the first meeting of the Constituent Assembly on May 28," Aditya Baral, adviser to Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala, said.

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Delhi forced to do U-turn on Maoists

On Sunday afternoon Mr Shiv Shankar Mukherjee drove out from the gates of the Indian embassy at Lainchaur in Kathmandu and headed straight to Maoist leader Prachanda's residence at Nayabazar. The Indian ambassador went there, of course, to congratulate the Maoist leader on his party's stunning performance in the recently concluded Constituent Assembly elections, but for Nepal watchers it heralded a major shift in New Delhi's dealings with the Maoists.

Lainchaur is only a few kilometers away from Nayabazar, but the Indian ambassador had not made the journey before. At least not since October 31, 2006, when he made his first, much-publicised, direct contact with Pushpa Kamal Dahal, alias Prachanda, and his deputy Baburam Bhattarai at the Indian embassy.Prachanda drew flak from certain quarters for visiting the Indian embassy regularly. In that sense, Sunday's meeting was a departure, and its significance was not lost on Nepal watchers.

Dr Ajai Sahni of the New Delhi-based Institute for Conflict Management is least surprised by the recent turn of events. The Maoist victory in the Constituent Assembly elections, he said, is a "delayed consequence of our own actions in the last one and a half years," he told this newspaper on Monday. "We engineered the Maoists to come to power, we emasculated the political parties by pushing them into a grouping with a rampant power like the Maoists,"

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