A few questions related to the importance and relevance of Bikram Sambat to Nepal and the Nepalese people.
By Maheswor Shrestha
Thought of the day
The 2063rd year of Bikram Sambat is approaching closer and we are going to welcome and celebrate its New Year day with certain activities.
The Nepalese people use more than one calendar and celebrate their New Year days accordingly. Nepal has a unique lunar calendar by its own name, Nepal Sambat. Its current year is 1126. We celebrated this year’s New Year day on November 2, 2006 with great pomp and jubilation. We also celebrate Buddha Sambat in honor of great champion of peace and non-violence. We celebrated New Year day of the Gregorian calendar on January 1, 2006 with great enthusiasm, by virtue of being Christians or influenced by the western culture or life style or just for merry making. Various indigenous peoples of Nepal of Mongol stock also celebrated Lhotsars (New Year days) with their traditional cultural activities, fun and feast. Now, it is the New Year day of the Bikram Sambat we are going to celebrate.
The festivals we celebrate and the special days we mark have great relevance and significance to our society. Nepal Sambat is said to have been introduced to mark the day when Nepalese people were relieved from debt. We celebrate almost all festivals and observe all rituals (from birth to even after death) according to this calendar. This calendar originated in Nepal and was named after Nepal. We can easily understand how important, relevant and significant this calendar is to Nepal and we Nepalese people.
The westerners, specially the western Europeans, had not only colonized and ruled over a major part of the world, they also took and are taking the lead in the field of science and technologies. They adopt Gregorian calendar. It is natural that most colonial people also follow the calendar adopted by their masters. Besides, this calendar is mathematically easy for use. Now is largely the age of computer science and information and communication technology. As the westerners have a near monopoly over them, it is natural that they integrate Gregorian calendar in the ICT languages. By default, the world has to learn to use this calendar. Moreover, present world, especially youth generation, is largely influenced by the western life styles. A great number of urban youth celebrate Gregorian New Year day with western style dances and parties. They do so not because they are the Christians or have adopted western culture but because this New Year day celebrations are more vibrant and thrilling to them.
Nepal is a multi-national, multi-lingual, multi-cultural and multi-religious country. Lhotsars are the New Year days of the people of Nepal of the Mongolian stock. It is good to see that by celebrating Lhotasrs, these indigenous people of Nepal are preserving their cultures and traditions despite grave neglect by the state.
As already stated, Bikram Sambat is the official calendar of Nepal. We are going to celebrate the New Year day of its 2063rd year on April 14, 2006 with certain official and informal functions. Overseas Nepalese people and missions also are known to be planning various activities and events to welcome this day. It is good to see people forget their woes and worries of their hectic life and have some joy and jubilation and even for a day.
But there are some questions relating to the importance, relevance and significance of Bikram Sambat to Nepal and the Nepalese people. It will be a wise action on our part to find answers to these questions as we plan to celebrate its new year day very soon. The questions are as follows.
1. Where did Bikram Sambat originate?
2. What does it have to do with the name and fame of Nepal ?
3. Does it represent any cultural or historical heritage of Nepal ?
4. Is its current status of official calendar of Nepal justifiable ? And lastly,
5. Why are we using this calendar and celebrating its New Year day after all ?
United We Blog 
Comments
30 responses to “Talking About Nepali New Year”
TOO LITTLE, TO LATE
Are all this really a priority right now?
The country is on the brink of a major political crisis …there has been unimaginable violence and bloodshed in the last week and you are concered with where the Bikram Sambhat originated. Would it have really killed you to google that?
Isn’t it a coincidence that bikram sambat and bir bikram shah dev? I had been curious for a while about the same questions you asked…
please be prepared – after victory there will be more battles, battles among the EGOs.
christel,
what victory are you talking about?
good questions. I would like to know the answers too.
A note to the author: your poor choic of words and phrases such as ‘stock’ or ‘these indigenous people’ etc. indicates cultural insensitivity and lack of academic properness. However, since it apears from your writing that it was mere ignorance rather than deliberate stereotyping, it may be beneficial for you to do some research on ethnography before writing.
Note: Newar is also Mongolian by ethnicity, with deeply rooted mongolian culture as reflected in Pagoda style architects rampantly found in China and east Asia. By placing bahun’s gods in predominantly mongol-centric culture can’t alter the obvious mongoloid-physical stature. Attempting to do so is either foolishly ignorant or brain-washed by bahun-doctrine.
hey justice,
that phrase ‘of mongol stock’ really pisses me off as well. So what are we to call ‘chettri, bahun, thakuri’s’ of ‘Indian stock’? People should be careful how they write.
“You can fool some people sometime, but you can’t fool all the people all the time.”
Lincoln
Maheshowr,
Do ya know the answers of those questions or not, if yes, plz write them now. otherwise, we will find them one year later. The priorities of this year is to find out how to force the king to reliquinsh? how to bring the democratic system back right on track? and how to address the maoist problem after the establishment of democracy?
I dont mean to undermine the significance of your questions, they are all genuine questions. But this is not right time to put them in front of us when we are already baffelled by other more important questions.
Mr. Shrestha, can I advice you one thing?
You need more research ok.
Folks,
Visit one of the above link and read some facts about the Gyanendra [icd].If you make a mistake in typing the address, you can also get to the pages in the reputed free online encyclopedia by following these steps:
1. type “wikipedia” in the Google search bar
2. Click the wikipedia link
3. type paras or gyanendra in the search bar of the wikipedia page;
and follow the words.
There will soon be UN Trials concerning CRIMES-AGAINST-HUMANITY for those who:
#1)turned their backs and let the POLICE-RIOTS happen,Ie the Monarchy
#2)those who ordered the Police & Army to abuse and kill.Ie the rogue Palace Mafia and the RNA & Police Officersin charge…
#3)as well as those who carried out the attacks..
many many killing in nepal about democracy, and you are talking new sentences “Bikram Sambat” Bikram sambat not created by your father , if you respect to your greater then you can accept, if you distroyed that then some year after our children distroyed us so please respect to older then you can get respect by children…..you know …???
I have a question to the authorities who have been issuing and implementing Curfew order against ongoing peaceful public movement in Nepal! Do they know the meaning, norms, terms and condition and usages of Curfew? Do they know how it works? If yes then why they use it like a sort of state terrorism? Why the authorities proved, defined and developed the Curfew as a dictatorial tool of massive public suppressions and destruction. Please use your own brain before involve in such thing and do not create your black history that you people are a kind of terrorist, inefficient, incapable, corrupted, autocratic and salve people. I think you people have good brain but I do not know why you people are proving and behaving yourself as nonliving being. Please beware from the situation, think about your own future and learn something from the international cases, do afraid with the time which is not under you autocratic control. The international criminal court and our own society and court are not so far away from you. Therefore please help in peace process and restoration of Democracy in Nepal. Thank you.
These days not only celebrating New Year in Nepal but also in the south east Asian countries. Here in Thailand including Burma,Laos and Combodia, they are celebrating New Year or it is also known as Water Festival which is annual celebration day starts from 12-15 april.
Once every year we celebrate New Year by participating and performing various activities. New year brings us hopes and determination. We make possible efforts to carry out our resolve relating properly to the areas where we have been engaged.
We exchange good wishes and look for more beautiful things in our lives. Life is like the mighty ocean bearing precious jewels deep down the bottom. However precious and beautiful things are not within our reach because we do not know even to swim. so, there is no fear of dying in the sea!
On the occasion of the New Year, I wish you all peace prosperity and happiness. May no harm come to you and your way upward be smooth until dreams of life come true!
May peace prevail in Nepal and all the people live in harmony without suspicion fear!
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Well, well…
Being a frenchman of italian stock -uh-, I use the coloniser’s gregorian calendar that my ancesters imposed to the whole world…
The fact is that the ugly westerner who invented this calendar was… an egyptian mathematician.
We, in France, found it too religiously connoted at the time of Revolution, so a guy who had nothing else to do issued another one, called “calendrier républicain”, replacing the seven days week by groups of ten days called “décades”. Of course, the average worker found rapidly that it was better in good ol’ times when he could rest every sunday instead of every ten days… So it was quickly forgotten, fortunately.
If we seek even more in deep past, one can see that the division of time we still use nowadays comes from Babylon and Sumer civilisation, and the recent archeological discoveries proove that it extended far more than previously thought, actually from mediterranean middle-east to himalayan foothills… So you see, things are not so simple.
One other thing our calendars have in common is new year’s day : originally and till Middle Age it was fixed at Easter, that means today, and it was only displaced to end of december for two reasons : the traditional heathen new year of northern countries of saxon stock -it’s today’s special…- was always winter solstice and that was a way for christians to impose their beliefs, and also it was more convenient for mere calculation reasons.
It’s funny, because twenty years back, I remember that Sambat era was not at all an issue in Nepal, and that this calendar was only used by the government and Hindus.
Indians, who have been massively colonised in the past, have no such complex about using… the universal calendar.
Have a good day.
Stand up for your rights
Wish I could be with you all
Cyp aka Pascal Dai
One more comment plz, yes of course I will not forget my own traditional New Year as it is called Nepal Sambat and also the most importand New Year is Buddha Sambat or Buddha’s Birth Day(Vesak Purnima). As Mr.Shrestha mentioned already up there.
नव वर्ष २०६३/1126 Nepal Sambat को पावन अवसर मा सुख समृदि दिर्घायू तथा सु- स्वाश्थ्य को लागि हार्दिक मंगलमय शुभकामना व्यक्त गर्दछु ।
We are really a weak country, this is no suprise to us all here.
Look at what foreigners like Vandeveer cooly writes:
“There will soon be UN Trials concerning CRIMES-AGAINST-HUMANITY for those who:
#1)turned their backs and let the POLICE-RIOTS happen,Ie the Monarchy
#2)those who ordered the Police & Army to abuse and kill.Ie the rogue Palace Mafia and the RNA & Police Officersin charge…
#3)as well as those who carried out the attacks..”
Now turn on your Indian TV channels. Have you seen the news on Bangalore and the footage. The police have lathi charged, used smoke guns and fired bullets, the citizens are attacking cops, businesses and burning buses. In one day there were eight to ten people dead and hundreds injured. Why dont these foreigners make a huge hue and cry about human rights and the UN, and the police etc. etc. over in India.
Why? Because India will just bulldoze their propoganda, and twist the arms of their partners abroad then everything will be hushed up.
Imagine riots in a city like Bangalore – silicon city, 7% economic growth. And all because a film actor called Raj Kumar died of old age. Here, we are having a national crisis of immense proportions, if you compare the two countries and follow the examples set in Bangalore we should be having a full fledged civil war and genocide going on in here. These are moments to shun foreign interference and think as Nepalis and thank god that we are Nepalis all and not from Bangalore.
Oh, so if it’s ok to shoot people in Bangalore it’s ok to shoot people in Nepal?
Kirat,
Right on que. As expected you have replied. It is not alright to kill anyone anywhere. I am not supporting the riots and the killings, You missed the point. I am trying to show two things
1. Hypocracy on the part of how foreign powers, especially Indians themselves and foreign journalists handle things differently for different nations. As if to say, “Oh, it’s only Nepal, we can do whatever the hell we want there”.
2. It is to show these same people that Nepalis in essence are a peace loving people, and what better message is there for the world than peace.
cs,
Hypocrisy of the foreign powers is nothing new. I am glad that you are now aware of this. Please note that hypocrisy is like AIDS, knows no boundaries and is very indiscriminating. Are you sure you haven’t caught it? There is a cure for it though.
On your second point I think Nepali’s are as peace loving as everbody else, Indians, Chinese, Americans etc But like every people we Nepalis can quickly resort to violence too.
Isn’t blogging such and educational experience, cs?
Nepal sees seven New Year Days in 365 days!
Keshav P Koirala
Kathmandu, April 12:
Nepal, thanks to her cultural diversity, observes at least seven new years a year. It may sound unbelievable but it’s true. Nepalis celebrate the new year days of the Bikram Sambat, the Gregorian Calendar, the Tola Lhosar of Tamu Sambat, the Sonam Lhosar of Tamang Era, the Gyalbo Lhosar of Sherpa or Tibetan Era, the Nhoo Daya of Nepal Sambat and Lawa Sal of Tharu era, among others. And it is the Bikram Sambat New Year Day that we will celebrate tomorrow. Historians present conflicting theories about who introduced the Bikram Sambat. There were two kings by the name Vikramaditya after whom this era could have been named. One was the king of Ujjain of India and the other was the king of Vishalnagar, Nepal.
“Vikramaditya of Ujjain was surely not the founder of the Bikram Sambat as it is being publicised these days. This calendar was in use long before he was born,” said academician of the Royal Nepal Academy, Gyanmani Nepal. But what complicates the matter is that there is not sufficient historical evidence supporting the Vikramaditya of Nepal. Interestingly, the era got its name as Bikram Samwat only in 401 BS. Earlier, it was known as Malawa Gana Samwat. “However, some archives found in the Kathmandu valley have mentioned Bikram Sambat,” historian Nepal disclosed.
Mandeva Sambat, the then official calendar, was replaced by Nepal Sambat after 304 years of its practice in 879 AD and later in 1903 AD, the Nepal Sambat was replaced with Bikram Sambat. Naresh Bir Shakya of Nepal Bhasha Manka Khala (NBMK) said that the Rana rulers replaced the existing official calendar of Nepal Sambat with that of Bikram Sambat because the Nepal Sambat has 354 days in a year and that there is 13 months in a year after every three years, because of which they had to pay more salary to the government officials.
The BS New Year Day has religious and cultural importance too. People from the hills and terai worship Satya Narayan, Newars in Bhaktapur celebrate Bisketjatra and Tharus celebrate Seruwa to usher in the New Year.
Dr Samba Raj Acharya, professor of the eastern vedic Astrology at the Mahendra Sanskrit University, said, “The BS is a fusion of the lunar and solar calculations, which makes it different from any other calenders of the world.” According to Dr Acharya, BS is scientific and pragmatic one because it is a combination of both lunar and solar calendars.
(This was published in The Himalayan Times on April 34,2004)
Cyp
When people are weak, they live on glory of the past. A pure Hindu brahmin boasts of his Bikram Sambat, a Newar of Nepal Sambat, a mongolian Budhist of Lhoshar Samabat and some convertee Christians of Gregorian Sambat(calender). And so is nationality. A hungry person in Nepal hardly bothers of his nationality. He is ready to be converted to an Euporian, American, Australian or Japanese whereever out of Nepal. Not only poors but also do so descendants of rulers, of rich people and of well-to-dos. So, nationality is a word used to cheat the common people by rulers in my country. What for should they celebrate any Sambat(calender)?
so raj, you be of the ‘Indian stock’ as opposed to those of the ‘mongolian stock’?
Hey Raj & Kirat,
After mating for generations with our females, the stock breeding made us very… indigenous.
So therefore that is why we, happy buffaloes of all over this globe, make the best sukutis after having been thourougly mixed, fried, chillied and salted.
Better laugh than never.
Nevertheless, I wish you a very democratic new year 2063 BS and better food stocks than before.
Hey Cyp,
Humor keeps us sane. Yeah I just can’t stand categorizations such as ‘of mongol stock’ or ‘mongolian buddhists’ that’s why I lost it there. People can be so racists without realizing it. It’s a bit like your Marie Antoinette. I thought you did away with people like that!
Bonne Anne 2063!
By the way Cyp(of Italian descent)if all that stock breeding resulted in women like a certain Monica Bellucci I’m all for it! Mama mia!
I like this site =)
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