New past for the sake of a better future : re-inventing the history of the Kirant in East Nepal

Abstract

In the Hindu kingdom of Nepal, official history was for a long time only the genealogy of ruling dynasties, and it focused mainly on national unification. This phenomenon reflects the domination of the Indo-Nepalese in the country, which was unified through conquest in the second part of the eighteenth century. Consequently ethnic populations, as well as low castes, were rejected for a long time as marginal and prevented from holding any kind of influential function, and also from writing a history of their own. With the democratic revolution in 1990, which has led to the emergence of freedom of expression, ethnic minorities now want their share of the cake, and they fight for social, economic and political recognition. While traditionally any wish to elevate one’s position in society implied a full adherence to the high caste model, now perhaps the only common feature of their claims is to question the Brahman domination in the country, the so-called Bāhunvād (‘Brahmanocraty’).1 The wishes of ethnic minorities are founded on claims of a common identity and culture, and one of the

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