Prithvi Jayanti

In the mid-18th century, Prithvi Narayan Shah, king of the Kingdom of Gorkha set out to unify small kingdoms which would become present-day Nepal.[2] After his victory at the Battle of Nuwakot (1744), he headed for the Kathmandu Valley, where the three Malla kingdoms Bhaktapur, Patan, and Kantipur were ruling.[3] Shah went to a battle with the Kingdom of Patan over the town of Kirtipur, and in 1767 the town fell into the hands of the Gorkhas.[3] This posed a threat to Kantipur, subsequently, the King of Kantipur, Jaya Prakash Malla, requested assistance from the East India Company to stop the rapid expansion of Gorkha.[3]

Recently, Shah had also imposed a blockade on the kingdom which hurt the East India Company's trans-Himalayan trade with Tibet and China as they used the route that went through Kantipur.[4] The company accepted the request and sent Captain Kinloch who met Prithvi Narayan Shah's forces at the Battle of Sindhuli in 1767.[5] The battle proved to be disastrous for the company, Kinloch fled with approximately 800 soldiers out of almost 24,000.[4] After this Shah managed to conquer the valley and proclaimed himself as the King of Nepal on 25 September 1768.[6] After Prithvi Narayan Shah's death, the Unification of Nepal campaign was continued notability by Prince Bahadur Shah, Queen Rajendra, and Bhimsen Thapa.[7][8] At its greatest extent, the Kingdom of Nepal extended from the Sutlej River in the west to the Teesta River in the east.[9]

Posthumous painting of King Prithvi Narayan Shah

Prithvi Jayanti is also known as the Nepal Ekikaran Diwas (National Unification Day) or National Unity Day.[10][11] From 1951, Prithvi Jayanti was traditionally celebrated as a public holiday, however, it was abolished after the 2006 Nepalese revolution.[11][12] In 2019, the mayor of Gorkha Municipality proclaimed Prithvi Jayanti to be a public holiday in the municipality to "celebrate and honour Prithvi Narayan Shah and celebrate the day in his memory".[13] Other municipalities followed soon in Gorkha District to declare this day to be a public holiday including the Palungtar Municipality, the Ajirkot Rural Municipality, the Siranchok Rural Municipality, and the Bhimsen Thapa Rural Municipality.[14] Next year, Bidur Municipality, the capital of Nuwakot District, also proclaimed it to be a public holiday.[15] There is pressure from some Nepalese citizens, especially from the pro-monarchies to make Prithvi Jayanti a public holiday.[12][16][17]

In 2021, the Nepal Police and pro-monarchy supporters clashed injuring some, as they were trying to put garlands on the statue of Prithvi Narayan Shah in a restricted area outside Singha Durbar.[18][19] People are usually divided on celebrating Prithvi Jayanti.[10][20] Some feel without Prithvi Narayan Shah's unification campaign, Nepal would have been a colony of the British Empire.[10] Others say some people seeking the restoration of the Kingdom of Nepal and restoring the Shah's significance would "revert to an era where both caste and cultural dominance had the overt backing of the state".[20] In 2022, Rajendra Prasad Lingden, Chairman of Rastriya Prajatantra Party, sent a memorandum asking Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba to declare Prithvi Jayanti as a public holiday, and the party has also told they would start a nationwide protests if their request was not met.[21] The same year, Bibeksheel Sajha Party said Prithvi Jayanti should be celebrated as Nepal Day and supported idea of declaring it as a public holiday.[22] In 2023, Owing to pressure from the pro-monarchy Rastriya Prajatantra Party as RPP had proposed the Prithvi Jayanti holiday as a precondition for its support to the Pushpa Kamal Dahal-led government,[23] the government declared it as a national holiday.[1]