Royal Family Of Nepal - Shah dynasty

[mybags]

1. DU, NEPAL - 22 JAN 2003 GERMANY OUT, AUSTRIA OUT, SWITZERLAND OUT ROYAL WEDDING BRINGS HAPPINESS TO NEPAL AFTER TRAGEDY OF PALACE MASSACRE. The King's mother Ratna Rajya Laxmi Devi Shah and queen Komal 401746/WSH www.ibl.se

2. DU, NEPAL - 22 JAN 2003 GERMANY OUT, AUSTRIA OUT, SWITZERLAND OUT ROYAL WEDDING BRINGS HAPPINESS TO NEPAL AFTER TRAGEDY OF PALACE MASSACRE. King of Nepal, queen Komal and princess Prearana 401746/WSH www.ibl.se

3. DU, NEPAL - 22 JAN 2003 AUSTRIA OUT, GERMANY OUT, SWITZERLAND OUT ROYAL WEDDING BRINGS HAPPINESS TO NEPAL AFTER TRAGEDY OF PALACE MASSACRE. King of Nepal, princess Prearana, Raj Bahadur Singh, queen komal 401746/WSH www.ibl.se

4. DU, NEPAL - 22 JAN 2003 ROYAL WEDDING BRINGS HAPPINESS TO NEPAL AFTER TRAGEDY OF PALACE MASSACRE. Gyanendra Bir Bikram Shah, king of Nepal and Queen Komal 401746/WSH www.ibl.se

5. DU, NEPAL - 22 JAN 2003 ROYAL WEDDING BRINGS HAPPINESS TO NEPAL AFTER TRAGEDY OF PALACE MASSACRE. King of Nepal, queen Komal, princess Himani, prince Paras, king's mother 401746/WSH Queen Ratna is actually King Gyanendra's stepmother. www.ibl.se

6. DU, NEPAL - 22 JAN 2003 GERMANY OUT, AUSTRIA OUT, SWITZERLAND OUT ROYAL WEDDING BRINGS HAPPINESS TO NEPAL AFTER TRAGEDY OF PALACE MASSACRE. prince Paras and wife princess Himani 401746/WSH www.ibl.se

7. DU, NEPAL - 22 JAN 2003 GERMANY OUT, AUSTRIA OUT, SWITZERLAND OUT ROYAL WEDDING BRINGS HAPPINESS TO NEPAL AFTER TRAGEDY OF PALACE MASSACRE. Princess Himani 401746/WSH www.ibl.se

Crown Princess Himani is photographed with her daughter Princess Purnika.

8. DU, NEPAL - 22 JAN 2003 AUSTRIA OUT, GERMANY OUT, SWITZERLAND OUT ROYAL WEDDING BRINGS HAPPINESS TO NEPAL AFTER TRAGEDY OF PALACE MASSACRE. Prince Paras and wife princess Himani 401746/WSH www.ibl.se

Crown Princess Himani reminds one of Princess Alexandra of Denmark in a way.


9. DU, NEPAL - 22 JAN 2003 GERMANY OUT, AUSTRIA OUT, SWITZERLAND OUT ROYAL WEDDING BRINGS HAPPINESS TO NEPAL AFTER TRAGEDY OF PALACE MASSACRE. Prince Paras 401746/WSH www.ibl.se

10. Crown Prince Paras www.ibl.se

[mybags]

1. www.ibl.se - Crown Prince Paras - Offering ceremony to King Gyanendra of Nepal at Narayanhity Royal Palace. June 2001.

2. www.ibl.se - Crown Prince Paras

3. www.klaus-maurer.com/crownprince_and_crownprincess1.htm
Crown Prince Paras - Crown Princess Himani - Princess Purnika (adorable) - Prince Hridayendra

4. www.klaus-maurer.com/royal_family.htm
from left to right: Crown Prince Paras, King Gyanendra, Princess Purnika, Queen Komal, Crown Princess Himani, Princess Prerana.
Center: Queen Mother Ratna and Prince Hridayendra

5. www.klaus-maurer.com/king_from_nepal3.htm
King Gyanendra of Nepal

[iseestudio]

On third pictures above, the Crown Prince and Princess made a lovely family.

I was wondering if they put eyeliner on the little Princess Purnika's face or it is her natural look. Or is it the culture to emphasize eyes even for little girls?

[Sean.~]

Deleted.

[Sean.~]

Deleted.

[Jenna1186]

Originally posted by mybags@Jun 7th, 2003 - 5:19 pm
www.ibl.se

DU, NEPAL - 22 JAN 2003 ROYAL WEDDING BRINGS HAPPINESS TO NEPAL AFTER TRAGEDY OF PALACE MASSACRE. King of Nepal, queen Komal, princess Himani, prince Paras, king's mother 401746/WSH

Queen Ratna is actually King Gyanendra's stepmother.

Hey Sean.~,

I belive Mybags already pointed out that fact,but thanks for the info just the same. :flower:

[Sean.~]

Deleted.

[iseestudio]

Thank you Sean.~ for the information. It's great to know and why they do it.

[iseestudio]

It's great to know why they do it. (sorry, forgot to check it before sent out the note)

Hundreds arrested at Nepal rally


Demonstrators say the king is acting undemocratically
Police in the Nepalese capital, Kathmandu, have arrested hundreds of people demonstrating against the king.
Leaders from five opposition parties who called the rally in protest at King Gyanendra's sacking of parliament were among those detained.

Six people were seriously injured when the sidebars of a police truck they were being taken away in gave way.

Public gatherings were banned last week for security reasons after peace talks with Maoist rebels collapsed.


Scuffles

About 10,000 people, including former Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala, took part in Wednesday's demonstrations in the capital.


Former PM Koirala led the rally
Up to 1,000 are reported to have been arrested.

Some were slightly injured in scuffles with security personnel.

Those hurt in the accident involving the overcrowded police truck include a senior leader of the Nepali Congress party.

'Undemocratic'

Opposition parties in Nepal have been protesting against the king since he sacked the elected government last October, dissolved parliament and assumed executive powers.

The parties say his actions are unconstitutional and undemocratic.

They are demanding either parliament to be reinstated, or an all-party government which includes their nominees.

The king, who was on a routine visit to Britain for a health check-up, returns to the capital on Wednesday.

Living On the Brink
As Maoist rebels spread fear and violence across Nepal, the establishment in the once booming capital watches its world fall apart
BY ALEX PERRY | KATHMANDU

On the empty balcony above the hushed courtyard outside his deserted restaurant in Kathmandu, Gautam Rana sets down a heavy scrapbook on a cocktail table and slides open its leather fastener. Inside, newspaper clippings written by society columnists, restaurant critics and travel writers from across the world document how, six years ago, Rana opened the most chic and elegant collection of boutiques, bars and bistros Asia had ever seen, in the restored outbuildings of his family's former palace. There is praise from British historians, a rave review from Bombay's most acerbic social commentator, write-ups in international leisure magazines and hundreds of photographs of a smiling, immaculate Rana presiding over concerts and book launches and hosting American millionaires at exorbitant black-tie fund raisers under white chiffon marquees. "The scene buzzes," wrote the London Evening Standard in March 2001, noting visits by Sting, Lachlan Murdoch and Steven Seagal. "By day, a sophisticated crowd of models and embassy wives shop for antiques and jewelry ... At night the mood changes—a private view at a gallery, jazz at K2 and dinner at Baithak, a small Nepalese-Mughal eatery with silver trays, Belgian crystal and peeling peppermint walls." But halfway through the scrapbook, the articles stop. The last is dated October 2002. Scores of blank pages follow. Rana leans forward, extends a languid hand from his linen sleeve and silently closes up his interrupted story. "It was fabulous, just fabulous," sighs the 45-year-old. "I could just weep when I remember those days."

The reason private jets no longer skim the Himalayas into Kathmandu is not hard to fathom. There is little glamour in the daily bloody shoot-outs between rebels and government forces that dominate the news from Nepal today. Squads of armed police and Royal Nepalese Army soldiers in armored cars and mine-clearing vehicles now guard every street corner in the capital. Gatherings of more than five people—even, Rana assumes, his famous parties—have been outlawed, and the city grinds to a halt every few days as armed police cordon off downtown blocks and break up protests against the crackdown. On the outskirts, the army raids house after house, making hundreds of arrests every day.

At night, a voluntary curfew envelops Kathmandu as its ancient alleyways and smoothed brick squares empty the moment the sun slips over the mountains. The fear is on everybody's lips: the Maoists are coming, the Maoists are coming.

The tableau of a country disintegrating in civil war is starkly at odds with Nepal's enduring image as an enchanted Shangri-la, a place frozen in time. Yet it is the country's backwardness, so charming to backpackers, mountaineers and jet-setters alike, that lies at the heart of the deadly turmoil. Though Kathmandu has enjoyed steady modernization, in the rugged hinterlands the time warp that shrouds the Himalayan kingdom—according to the Nepalese calendar it is currently the year 2060—preserves a system of feudal landlords, bonded labor and a medieval level of destitution. The Asian Development Bank estimates that 42% of the 26 million population lives below the poverty line—and Nepal's leaders have made scant effort to address the gap between the impoverished many and the privileged few. A Hindu god-king ruled Nepal as an absolute monarch until 1989. Under the current system—constitutional monarchy and parliamentary democracy—revolutionary ideology has taken hold. In a population living mostly in squalor, the most popular political parties are old-style communist, with a combined support of 44%, according to a June survey.

Of these, the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), or CPN(M), a renegade Maoist group, commands twice the backing of its nearest (royalist) rival. The CPN(M) forms the backbone of the Maoist rebellion that began in 1996, which aims to eject the monarchy and take the country into Stalinist isolation. The guerrillas have an attachment to an antique dogma that borders on the bizarre in the 21st century. Much to the embarrassment of the modern Chinese leadership to the north, they studiously model their uprising on Mao Zedong's Basic Tactics (1937) and On Guerrilla Warfare (1937). Their rhetoric is filled with an idealism and romance elsewhere found only in history books. "We want to turn this beautiful Himalayan country into an invincible red fort and a shining trench of world proletariat revolution," declared Maoist leader Baburam Bhattarai before the rebels took to the hills in 1996. "We are sure we will hoist the hammer and sickle atop Mount Everest one day."

But there's nothing romantic about the brutal rule the Maoists have instituted in the areas they control. Their use of torture and summary execution, their maiming of people with an education, and their targeting of any alternative authority—blowing up bridges, irrigation channels, post offices and schools—have earned them comparisons to Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge and to Peru's Shining Path.

The Maoists' latest campaign of fear, which began as soon as their supreme leader, Comrade Prachanda, called off a seven-month cease-fire on Aug. 27, has been characterized by their usual ruthless efficiency. By the night of Aug. 29, the rebels had shot dead a colonel on the doorstep of his Kathmandu home, gunned down a former government minister, firebombed the ancestral country mansion of the Finance Minister, robbed two banks and announced a three-day nationwide general strike. Some of these attacks bore a strong flavor of retribution. Fifty-two-year-old Kiran Basnet, the colonel shot in the chest and head outside his home, had been earmarked to take charge of the army's anti-Maoist battalion. Ex-Home Minister Devendra Raj Kandel, shot and wounded last Friday, was noted for offering cash for the heads of dead guerrillas. As for Finance Minister Prakash Chandra Lohani, whose mansion was set on fire, he had the simple misfortune of having been a government negotiator in the failed peace talks.

The message was clear. After years in the hills, the rebels are now operating inside Kathmandu and are able to strike at anyone, anytime, anywhere. Middle-ranking rebel commanders tell TIME they have a division of several thousand men in the Langtang mountains north of Kathmandu, which would give them a stranglehold on one of the capital's two road links to the outside world. They say they are now embarked on the final phase of Mao's revolutionary timetable: eliminating all enemies of the revolution, bringing a terrorized capital to its knees and, eventually, overrunning the city and seizing power. "We control all the countryside," gloats Maoist political officer Ram Lohani Chaudhray. "The government and most of the army hide in Kathmandu. But we have many fighters there. We have them holed up and we will wipe them out."

For Kathmandu's businessmen and socialites, the news that the Maoists are shifting the battlefield from the hills into the city's streets comes with the alarming realization that their wealth and lifestyle, already cramped by civil war, now mark them as targets. Their anxiety increased when the guerrillas announced last week an assassination list of 217 "VIPs" that they wished to add to the toll of 8,000 lives already lost in the seven-year conflict. "The rebels are planning an urban guerrilla war in Kathmandu," says a Royal Nepalese Army colonel. "For me, it's part of the job—I'm on patrol from the moment I leave home, like I'm living in the jungle. But for the people, it's a very different deal." Says Internet-and-media magnate Sanjib Raj Bhandari: "Things are bad and will probably get a lot worse. As bourgeois and capitalist businessmen, we'd better start worrying."

Rana, the aristocrat-cum-bistro entrepreneur, is doing just that. "Suddenly people are thinking, 'Oh, my God.' We are all frightened to live our normal lives. Even to have parties—how can you enjoy yourself when you never know when someone is going to throw a bomb over the wall?" Rana says he tries to keep his usual routine, but has taken to using personal bodyguards. Nor is such insecurity confined to Kathmandu's élite. "Most people are aware that Kathmandu is going to be the battlefield," says Devendra Ale, a manager at the Center for Victims of Torture, which treats casualties of the Maoists and of the security forces. "There is fear everywhere in Kathmandu." Yubaraj Birodhi, a reporter with Kantipur Today magazine who campaigns for the release of scores of journalists detained for suspected Maoist sympathies, says, "Nobody knows what will happen. We don't even know whether democracy itself will survive."

The rebels used the cease-fire's seven-month lull to rearm, recruit and retrain, but nobody expects them to try to march en masse into Kathmandu. Even though they number an estimated 500 commandos, 8,000 regular troops and 20,000-40,000 ragtag militiamen, they would still be no match for Nepal's 68,000 soldiers and 57,000 armed policemen—not in a conventional war. But in a campaign of hit-and-run, the army, stretched thin across the country, cedes the advantage. "The worrying thing for us is the high degree of skill and expertise (the Maoists) have in the art of explosives and ambushes," says Colonel Deepak Gurung. "We've been very surprised."

With significant outside help, the army has also been brushing up its skills and upgrading its weaponry. Up to 50 U.S. special-forces trainers are now pushing 20 battalions of 700-800 men each—a quarter of the entire army—through a 12-week counterinsurgency program, according to a Western diplomat. Washington has also supplied the Royal Nepalese Army with 5,000 M-16s, with another 5,000 due; Belgium sold Nepal 5,500 machine guns, and Britain and India have lent military advisers.

The stationing of so many well-armed troops in Kathmandu Valley has made some in the capital complacent. This week the Miss Nepal 2003 contest will go ahead as planned in Kathmandu. And in a bizarrely bold move, a new city-center nightclub, called Platinum, aimed specifically at Nepal's high society, is also due to open this month. "A lot of people still believe the risk is not real," says Bhandari, the media mogul. "There's a degree of denial. History tells us there are always parties and merriment just before regimes fall."

This surreal failure to face reality is not confined to Kathmandu's socialites. By common consent, Nepal's politicians have been misgoverning the country since 1989: they've squabbled over who should be Prime Minister (there have been 13 in 13 years) and have failed dismally to tackle the aching poverty that gives the Maoists their popular support. The situation was aggravated by the enthronement in June 2001 of King Gyanendra who, rather than displaying some sorely needed sensitivity after much of the royal family was gunned down by a drunken, lovesick prince, has sacked two Prime Ministers and suspended Parliament. Many feel that the Americans, too, are having trouble facing facts. There is now the small but distinct possibility that Washington has backed the losing side in a conflict of only marginal relevance to its war on terror. And allegations that the army captured and executed 19 Maoist leaders last month have again raised questions about Washington's commitment to a force that regularly faces accusations of human-rights abuses. "There's a growing feeling that the Americans may have overextended themselves," says a European diplomat.

There is one reality no one can ignore, however. After a brief holiday as a modern city, Kathmandu is suddenly in danger of rejoining the rest of the country in the Dark Ages. Hotels, tourist stalls and restaurants are shutting down and aid donors are shelving vital infrastructure projects. Life in the capital is being ravaged by Maoist extortion rackets, oppressive policing and a slew of paralyzing protests and strikes. The economy is in recession for the first time in memory, and the possibility of Nepal becoming a failed state is now openly discussed in diplomatic circles. "It could all go up in flames," wrote the Nepali Times in a business commentary last week.

With so much invested in their homeland, Rana and Bhandari say they have little choice but to stay. "We still feel we have something to contribute," says Bhandari. Rana is more emphatic, arguing that as entrepreneurs, taxpayers and employers, individuals like he and Bhandari did more to bring Nepal into the modern age and alleviate hardship than any politician, diplomat or revolutionary zealot. "You know, I built this out of a cowshed," he says, gazing out over his empty, impeccably tasteful dream. "Everyone thought I was mad, and perhaps even more so now. But I wasn't, you know. I was a success. And for a time there, it was glittering."

——With reporting by Yubaraj Ghimire and Campbell Spencer/Kathmandu

Soldiers die in Nepal violence

Two soldiers have died in an encounter with suspected Maoist rebels, Nepalese security officials say.

Fresh protests erupted in the streets of Kathmandu on Monday (photo: AFP)

Violence and protest have spiralled in Nepal in the past fortnight, after Maoist guerrillas fighting to abolish the monarchy called off a seven-month old ceasefire.

The authorities responded to a string of bomb attacks in the Kathmandu region on Monday by imposing a night curfew on the capital's outlying districts.

About 1,000 people were detained on Monday when they defied a ban on public meetings and marched in protest against Nepal's ruler, King Gyanendra.

King away

The government soldiers were killed on Monday during an operation to flush out left-wing insurgents from a village stronghold in Rolpa district, in western Nepal, officials say.

Few other details are available.

On the political front, the demonstrations against King Gyanendra on Monday were the fourth time protesters have taken to the streets since the ban on public gatherings was imposed on 1 September.

Most of those detained were released shortly afterwards.

Supporters of the five major political parties in Nepal are calling for the King to re-instate the elected government he dismissed in October 2002.

King Gyanendra is out of the country at present.

Nepal rally sparks further arrests

Gatherings of more than five people are banned in Kathmandu
Police in Nepal's capital of Kathmandu have arrested more than 100 protesters who defied a ban and demonstrated against the rule of King Gyanendra.
Friday's arrests came a day after hundreds of opposition party activists were detained when they gathered in the streets and shouted slogans denouncing the king.

The BBC's Sushil Sharma in the capital says some party activists were arrested on Friday at various places before they could converge around the road junction that was the scene of Thursday's arrests.

A number of students were arrested at the interchange on Friday when they shouted anti-monarchy statements and burned copies of the act that had banned gatherings of more than five people.

Other reports from opposition party sources put the arrests on Friday at several hundred.

The government introduced the three-week ban in the capital saying the move was to maintain law and order following the breakdown of peace talks with Maoist rebels.

Upsurge in violence

An alliance of five opposition parties called the rallies to protest at the king's dissolution of parliament last year and assumption of executive powers.


King Gyanendra dissolved parliament last year

Arjun Narsingh, a spokesman for the centrist Nepali Congress party, the biggest of the five, said: "We will continue our protests until we succeed in forcing the king to concede our demand."

The parties want King Gyanendra to reinstate the dissolved parliament and form an all-party government including their own nominees.

Our correspondent says security is tight around Kathmandu with a large number of army and police personnel deployed around the interchange.

The Maoists called off peace talks last week and the government says it has intelligence reports that the rebels plan to infiltrate the protests.

There has been an upsurge in violence since the rebels announced an end to the ceasefire.

On Thursday, hundreds of party activists were arrested as a reported 3,000 protesters converged at the interchange.

The mainline parties planning the protest insist they had scaled it down in acknowledgement of the authorities' concerns over security - but have refused to stop protesting altogether.

"Long live democracy!" and "Down with the king's repression!" protesters had shouted as they were driven away by police.

Earlier on Thursday, upwards of 150 students were arrested at a college, student leaders said.

The Royal Family of Nepal

Nepal is located in the Himalayas between India and Tibet. It is the world's only Hindu monarchy. At the beginning of the 20th century, the king of Nepal had little real power. Instead the country was controlled by a family called the Ranas. Democracy was instituted in the early 1950s with the approval of King Tribhuvan Bir Bikram, who wished to end the rule of the Ranas. Tribhuvan became a constitutional monarch, but took control of the government. His son and successor, King Mahendra, grabbed more power and ended up an absolute monarch.

In 1990 Mahendra's son King Birendra bowed to pressure from his subjects and proclaimed a new constitution which returned the kingdom to democracy. The king remained the head of state. In 2001, the royal family was massacred by King Birendra's son Crown Prince Dipendra, who was apparently under the influence of drugs. Victims included the king and queen, their two younger children, and three of the king's siblings. The crown prince also shot himself, but lived long enough to be proclaimed king.

After King Dipendra's death, Birendra's brother Gyanendra became king. His son, Crown Prince Paras, is the heir to the throne. Next in the line of succession is Paras's son Hridayendra, who was born in July 2002. King Gyanendra suspended Nepal's democratically elected government in October 2002, but he says he is committed to the principles of democracy.

Anti-king protests in Nepal

By Sushil Sharma
BBC correspondent in Kathmandu


Thousands of protesters in Nepal have held demonstrations against King Gyanendra less than 24 hours after he appointed his own nominee as the new prime minister.

The new prime minister wants the opposition to join the government
The king appointed Surya Bahadur Thapa, of the right-wing Rastriya Prajatantra Party, in defiance of the major opposition parties who had their own nominee for the post.

The demonstrators shouted slogans against the king and blocked the movement of government vehicles across the country, stoning some of them.

Opposition parties have vowed to step up protests against the government.

They argue that Mr Thapa is no different from his predecessor, Lokendra Bahadur Chand, who came from the same party.

Mr Chand stepped down last week over mounting protests at King Gyanendra's assumption of executive powers eight months ago.

Five of the six parties that had members in the dissolved parliament are at loggerheads with the king because they say his move was unconstitutional.

The confrontation between the king and the major parties is likely to deepen and further prolong Nepal's political crisis


They have been demanding that the king either reinstate parliament or form an all-party government consisting of their nominees.

After Mr Chand resigned last Friday, they unanimously proposed a key leader, Madhav Kumar Nepal, of the left-wing United Marxist Leninist (UML) to succeed him.

Consensus pledge

The newly-appointed prime minister, Mr Thapa, 75, was sworn in on Thursday.

He has vowed to forge a national consensus and says he will persuade the opposition parties to join the government.

But the angry opposition parties have rejected such a suggestion.

They said their agitation will continue until their demands are met.

In such a situation, the confrontation between the king and the major parties is likely to deepen and further prolong Nepal's political crisis.

[Elise,LadyofLancaster]

According to the official website of the royal court of Nepal, Crown Prince Paras and Crown Princess Himani's new daughter has been named Princess Yubarajkumari.

[Sean.~]

That isn't a name. It is a title. The child has yet to be named.

Crown Prince Paras and Crown Princess Himani (dau. of the Raja of Sikar) have two other children. Their first daughter, Princess Purnka was born in 2000, while their son Crown Prince Hiryandra was born last year.

[Elise,LadyofLancaster]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=stor.../241/5lqra.html

[Elise,LadyofLancaster]

Nepal's Crown Princess Himani gives birth to second daughter
By AFP
Oct 18, 2003, 10:13

KATHMANDU, Oct 17 (AFP) - Nepalese Crown Princess Himani Rajya Laxmi Devi Shah, 28, has given birth to her second daughter, the royal palace announced Friday.

"His Royal Highness Crown Prince Paras Bir Bikram Shah Dev and Her Royal Highness Crown Princess Himani Rajyua Laxmi Devi Shah have been blessed with their second daughter on Thursday evening," a royal palace notice said.

Both the mother and the child are in good health, according to attending doctors, the notice said.

King Gyanendra has conferred the title of Her Royal Highness Yubarajkumari (Princess) on the newborn, the notice said.

The newborn is the royal couple's third child.

[Sean.~]

The new princess has now been named. Her name is Kritika Rajya (royal) Laxmi (after the godess Laxmi) Devi (meaning godess) Shah (name of dynasty).

Sean.~