Editor’s Note
Nepalese Monarchy has played a decisive role in Nepal’s history. Its alliance with India has shifted from being proximate to not being too healthy. Nepal’s proximity to China has often cast a shadow on its relationship with India. The article examines India–Nepal relations in the context of the Nepalese Monarchy and cultural, religious, strategic, and economic factors to finally arrive at issues of greater importance in sculpting a stable partnership ahead.
…………………………………………………………………………….…………………………….
Nepal, nestled between two of the world’s most powerful nations, India and China, has always had to walk a tightrope in managing its sovereignty, security, and foreign policy. Central to Nepal’s modern historical identity is its monarchy, the Shah dynasty, which began with the rise of King Prithvi Narayan Shah in the 18th century. Over time, this monarchy came to represent not just political power but also the preservation of Nepal’s distinct identity in a volatile region.
However, the monarchy’s relationship with India has been fraught with ambiguities, paradoxes, and shifting allegiances. Despite deep cultural, religious, and ethnic ties, the monarchy in Nepal has not always acted as a friend or ally to India.
The history of Nepal’s monarchy and its relationship with India is a tale of ambition, power struggles, cultural ties, and geopolitical manoeuvring. From the establishment of the Shah dynasty by King Prithvi Narayan Shah in the 18th century to the eventual abolition of the monarchy in 2008, Nepal’s royal institution has been a central player in shaping the nation’s identity and its interactions with its southern neighbour, India. While the two countries share deep cultural and religious ties, the monarchy’s role in Nepal-India relations has often been marked by tension, mistrust, and divergent interests.
There is a need to trace the evolution of Nepal’s monarchy and underline key issues in its relationship with India. The modern political unification of Nepal is credited to King Prithvi Narayan Shah (1723–1775), who established the Shah dynasty and laid the foundations of a centralised Nepalese state. A visionary king, Prithvi Narayan Shah recognised the vulnerability of small hill kingdoms in the face of growing European colonialism and regional fragmentation. His successful campaigns against Kathmandu Valley kingdoms like Malla and the annexation of strategic hill regions created a unified Nepal by the late 18th century.
Crucially, it was Prithvi Narayan Shah who saw Nepal as a “yam between two boulders”, India (then under British East India Company rule) and China (under the Qing dynasty). His strategic insight became the cornerstone of Nepal’s foreign policy. The monarchy would thereafter pursue a policy of cautious diplomacy, balancing relations with both giants while fiercely protecting its sovereignty.
However, by the mid-19th century, real power in Nepal shifted away from the monarchy. Following the Kot Massacre of 1846, Jung Bahadur Rana established the hereditary Rana Prime Ministership, relegating the Shah kings to ceremonial roles. The Ranas ruled Nepal as autocrats, aligning closely with British India. While the monarchy continued to exist, it was effectively a prisoner within its own palace.
Under the Ranas, Nepal isolated itself from global affairs, and modernisation stagnated. Despite the cultural and religious closeness between Nepal and British India, both being predominantly Hindu societies, the Rana autocracy remained insular, interested only in preserving and furthering their autocracy. The monarchy, meanwhile, bided its time, awaiting an opportunity to reclaim its authority.
After 1947, when India gained independence from British rule, New Delhi took a keen interest in reshaping its Himalayan frontiers. The birth of the Indian Republic coincided with Nepal’s internal turbulence, and India played a quiet but critical role in reintroducing the monarchy to real political power. King Tribhuvan, a figurehead under the Rana regime, sought asylum in the Indian Embassy in Kathmandu in 1950. India facilitated his safe passage to New Delhi, effectively signalling its disapproval of Rana’s autocracy.
In exile, King Tribhuvan garnered Indian support, culminating in the 1951 Delhi Accord. This agreement led to the downfall of the Rana regime and the restoration of power to the monarchy under a constitutional framework. India saw this as a strategic win, replacing an oligarchic and isolationist regime with a friendly monarchy that owed its re-empowerment to New Delhi. The monarchy was viewed as a natural cultural and civilisational ally, a Hindu kingdom with historical ties to Indian traditions, religion, and values.
Betrayal of Commonalities: The Monarchy’s Strategic Shifts
Yet, despite India’s pivotal role in rescuing the monarchy, the relationship soon began to sour. King Mahendra, who succeeded Tribhuvan in 1955, began consolidating power and adopted a policy of equidistance, often interpreted in India as a tilt toward China.Post-1962, this monarchy was responsible for moving closer to China while asking the Indian Military Mission to return to India, signalling Nepal’s intent to diversify its alliances and reduce its dependence on New Delhi.
The Indian Military Mission, set up in the 1950s to train Nepal’s armed forces, symbolised India’s security partnership with Nepal. Its expulsion in 1969, at the behest of King Mahendra, was a diplomatic snub that underscored the monarchy’s growing tilt toward Beijing. Nepal began to strengthen economic and infrastructural ties with China, most notably through the construction of the Kathmandu-Kodari highway, which linked Nepal to Tibet. This road, completed in the 1960s with Chinese aid, correctly continues to be perceived by India as a strategic threat, given its proximity to the Indian border.
Its abrupt removal sent a coherent message: the monarchy wanted strategic autonomy despite the close cultural and religious affinity with India. While Nepal claimed this was a step toward decolonising its foreign policy, New Delhi saw it as a betrayal. India had restored the monarchy, expecting a long-term alliance. But the monarchy, keen to preserve its own power, feared India’s democratic influence and chose to pivot closer to China.
Religion and Culture: A Misleading Basis for Strategic Trust
India and Nepal share profound religious and cultural links. Both are majority Hindu societies with deep-rooted mythologies, pilgrimages, and traditions crossing modern political boundaries. From the shared veneration of Pashupatinath to the cross-border marriage traditions in the Mithila region, the connections are ancient and organic.
However, cultural proximity does not always translate into political alignment. The Nepalese monarchy, despite claiming the title of “Hindu Samrat”,often prioritised regime survival over regional cooperation. For example, while India’s Hindu right-wing groups have historically romanticised the idea of a “Hindu Nepal” under the monarchy, the monarchs themselves remained pragmatic, interested only in the continuation of their monarchy.
The Monarchy’s Decline and Its Legacy
The Nepalese monarchy’s relevance began to wane in the late 20th century as democratic movements gained momentum. The 1990 People’s Movement forced King Birendra to accept a constitutional monarchy, and the subsequent rise of the Maoist insurgency in 1996 further destabilised the institution. The infamous royal massacre of 2001, in which Crown Prince Dipendra killed most of his family, including King Birendra, plunged the monarchy into crisis. His younger brother, King Gyanendra, who ascended the throne amid this turmoil, tried to restore absolute rule in 2005 but faced widespread opposition.
In 2008, following a decade-long civil war and a popular uprising, Nepal’s monarchy was abolished, and the country was declared a federal democratic republic. It was evident again in the early 2000s when King Gyanendra assumed direct rule after a palace massacre in 2001 decimated the royal family. As Maoist insurgency surged, he sought military help from India and China. India, committed to supporting Nepal’s peace process, pushed for the return of democracy. Gyanendra, however, tried to circumvent this pressure by cosying up once more to Beijing. Beijing, at that time, used to refer to the Nepali “PLA under Prachanda” as anti-government forces. Thus, even at its lowest ebb, the monarchy viewed India more as a meddlesome neighbour than as cultural kin or ally.
India’s Policy Realignment: Beyond the Monarchy
By the late 2000s, India had correctly recalibrated its policy. The abolition of the monarchy in 2008, following a decade-long civil war and the success of Maoist rebels, was met with little resistance from New Delhi. Despite India’s historical preference for monarchies, it acknowledged the impracticality of supporting a royal institution that opposed its goals, choosing instead to collaborate with democratic forces in Nepal. It began nurturing ties with all major mainstream political parties in Nepal, including the Maoists, understanding that the power structure in Nepal had fundamentally changed.
In fact, many Indian strategic thinkers believe that clinging to the monarchy has limited India’s flexibility in Nepal for too long. By letting go of the “royal baggage,” India was free to explore pragmatic partnerships across the political spectrum, especially amongst its neighbours, who often accuse India of meddling in their internal affairs.
The shared Hindu heritage and cultural similarities between Nepal and India, clear in festivals like Dashain, the reverence for the Ganges River, and the influence of Sanskrit traditions, might have suggested a natural alliance. Nepal’s monarchy, as the world’s only Hindu kingdom until 2008, could have been a bridge to deeper cooperation. Yet, these commonalities were overshadowed by continued political mistrust and strategic differences. The monarchy’s alignment with China, particularly after 1962, exacerbated tensions with India, which saw Nepal as a critical buffer state against Chinese expansionism in the Himalayas.
The monarchy, therefore, is clearly no panacea for improving Indo-Nepal relations, even though there is a growing nostalgia in certain quarters, from both Nepalese conservatives and sections of the Indian intelligentsia, for the return of Nepal’s Hindu monarchy.
A study of the history of the Nepali monarchy clearly offers a sobering reminder that the monarchy was never a consistent ally to India. Despite being culturally close and having taken so much from India, Nepal’s monarchs often chose to keep a strategic distance from India. They always prioritised their own regime’s continuity and security over regional alignment. They flirted with China whenever they perceived that India’s influence loomed larger. While India helped restore the monarchy in 1951, it has received little strategic return from the monarchy or even the political forces it seeks to nurture in Nepal.
Today, the relationship between India and Nepal must be based on democratic engagement, mutual respect, and economic interdependence, not on misplaced romanticism about a royal past. Restoring the monarchy will not resolve the structural irritants in Indo-Nepal relations. These lie in border management, trade imbalances, political perceptions, and China’s growing presence, not in the absence of a king.
Ultimately, India must work with the realities of modern Nepal, a republic shaped by its own internal contradictions and geopolitical choices. For its part, Nepal must acknowledge that long-term cooperation with India, grounded in equality and trust, offers much more than transactional alliances with distant powers.
While the monarchy is a symbol of Nepal’s historical identity, it is not the key to solving the Indo-Nepal equation. That solution lies in the hands of people and leaders who can look beyond nostalgia and work toward a shared future.
