Author: Pushpa Adhikari
Publication: The Asian Age
Date: May 25, 2001
Nepal may no longer be a Hindu kingdom
if a bid by minorities to not register themselves as Hindus succeeds in
this year's census.
After three centuries of being huddled
under the "Hindu" umbrella, the janajatis or minorities and tribes are
demanding the right to freedom of their own religions and cultures.
In order to avoid enumeration as
Hindus, janajati organisations have been running a campaign in their communities
to create a consensus about responses to queries about mother tongue, second
language, religion and ethnicity.
Nepal has 20.3 million people, and
its minorities comprise roughly 60 percent. According to the 1991 statistical
year book, about 84 percent of the population is Hindu and hence Nepal
is a Hindu Kingdom.
'Unity in Diversity' has been Nepal's
common slogan for years to represent her in the global community since
unification under a single flag some 300 years ago. And as if to take this
slogan further, all minorities were compulsorily registered as Hindus in
the first census conducted in the kingdom in 1911.
The census is conducted in Nepal
every 10 years. Until the 1991 census, most janajatis were compulsorily
registered as Hindus with Nepali as their mother tongue.
This year, some five thousand supervisors
are working overtime nationwide to complete the first phase of the 2001
census to list data on family households by May 28. The first phase began
May 14. Supervisors are listing family heads, gender, family members, language,
ethnicity and religion at the initial phase. The second phase begins June
11.
According to a high ranking officer
at the Janajatis Mahasangh (the umbrella organisation of the minorities,
49 percent of the Limbus, 65 percent of the Rais, 57 percent of the Thakalis
and 96.5 percent of the Sunuwars registered themselves as Hindus in 1991.
As a result, census data reflected the fact that fifty to seventy five
percent of the janajatis were Hindu.
"But this time, the Thakalis, Gurungs,
Tamangs, Dhimals and others have decided to call themselves Buddhists.
That will change the percentage of Buddhists that so far stands at a mere
1.7 percent of the total population," he said. (IANS)
