LEGAL FRAMEWORK

The constitution declares the country to be a secular state but defines secularism as “religious, cultural freedoms, including protection of religion, culture handed down from the time immemorial.” The constitution stipulates every person has the right to profess, practice, and protect his or her religion. While exercising this right, the constitution bans individuals from engaging in any acts “contrary to public health, decency, and morality” or that “disturb the public law and order situation.” It also prohibits converting “another person from one religion to another or any act or conduct that may jeopardize others’ religion” and states violations are punishable by law.

The criminal code sets five years’ imprisonment and a fine of up to 50,000 Nepali rupees ($380) as the punishment for converting, or encouraging the conversion of, another person via coercion or inducement (which officials commonly refer to as “forced conversion”) or for engaging in any act, including the propagating of religion, that undermines the religion, faith, or belief of any caste or ethnic group. Foreign nationals convicted of these crimes may be deported. The criminal code also imposes punishments of up to two years’ imprisonment and a fine of up to 20,000 rupees ($150) for “harming the religious sentiment” of any caste, ethnic community, or class, either in speech or in writing.

The law does not provide for registration or official recognition of religious groups as religious institutions, except for Buddhist monasteries. It is not mandatory for Buddhist monasteries to register with the government, although doing so is a prerequisite for receiving government funding for maintenance of facilities, skills training for monks, and study tours. A monastery development committee under the Ministry of Culture, Tourism, and Civil Aviation oversees the registration process. Registration requirements include providing a recommendation from a local government body, information on the members of the monastery’s management committee, a land ownership certificate, and photographs of the premises.

Except for Buddhist monasteries, all religious groups must register as NGOs or nonprofit organizations to own land or other property, operate legally as institutions, or gain eligibility for public service-related government grants and partnerships. This includes preparing a constitution and furnishing information on the organization’s objectives as well as details on its executive committee members. To renew the registration, which must be completed annually, organizations must submit annual financial audits and activity progress reports.

The law prohibits the killing or harming of cattle. Violators are subject to a maximum sentence of three years in prison for killing cattle and six months in prison and a fine of up to 50,000 rupees ($380) for harming cattle.

The law requires the government to provide protection for religious groups carrying out funeral rites in the exercise of their constitutional right to practice their religion, but it also states the government is not obligated to provide land grants for burials. There is no law specifically addressing the funeral practices of religious groups.

The constitution establishes the government’s authority to “make laws to operate and protect a religious place or religious trust and to manage trust property and regulate land management.”

Public/community Hindu, Buddhist, and Islamic religious schools must register as religious educational institutions with local government or the relevant district education office (under the Ministry of Education, Science, and Technology). They must also supply information concerning their funding sources to receive funding at the same levels as nonreligious public/community schools. Religious public/community schools follow the same registration procedure as nonreligious public/community schools. Catholic and Protestant groups must register as NGOs to operate private schools. The law does not allow Christian schools to register as public/community schools, and they are not eligible for government funding. Hindu, Buddhist, and Muslim groups may also register as NGOs to operate private schools, but these private schools are not eligible to receive government funding.

The law criminalizes acts of caste-based discrimination in places of worship. Penalties for violations are imprisonment for three months to three years and a fine of 50,000 to 200,000 rupees ($380 to $1,500).

The country is a party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

GOVERNMENT PRACTICES

According to the local NGO SOCH (Society for Humanism Nepal), police arrested at least 20 individuals for cow slaughter in six separate incidents during the year. This compares with eight arrests in four incidents reported in 2022 by a different local NGO. For example, on May 8 in Bhume Rural Municipality of Rukum East District, Karnali Province, one Dalit and two Indigenous individuals were arrested under suspicion of distributing beef from a cow that reportedly died after falling off a cliff. On June 1 in Bakaiya Rural Municipality of Makwanpur District, Bagmati Province, five Indigenous individuals were arrested under suspicion of cow slaughter. On July 30, police arrested three Dalit and three Indigenous individuals from Letang Municipality of Morang District, Koshi Province, for allegedly selling beef from an ox. As of year’s end, the disposition of these cases remained unknown.

On May 28, Chitwan District Court sentenced Pastor Buddhi Lal Chepang to six months’ imprisonment and a fine of 200 rupees ($2) for cow slaughter. He was arrested in Chitwan in August 2022 while distributing beef from an ox that reportedly died of natural causes. On August 3, Chepang appealed the case in Hetauda High Court, where it remained pending as of year’s end. He was released on bail in March.

On October 6, the Supreme Court upheld the 2021 decision of the Jumla High Court to imprison and fine Christian preacher Keshav Raj Acharya for proselytizing. He was sentenced to one-year imprisonment, fined Rs. 10,000 ($75) and released on bail in July 2022. As of year’s end, he had not served his prison sentence. Penalties for proselytizing are up to five years in prison and a fine of up to 50,000 rupees, if the proselytizing is deemed “forced conversion.”

As in prior years, human rights and minority religious groups continued to express concern that the constitution and criminal code’s ban on conversions could make religious minorities subject to legal prosecution for actions carried out in the normal course of their religious practices, and vulnerable to prosecution for preaching, public displays of faith, and distribution of religious materials, in contravention of constitutional assurances of freedom of speech and expression.

These groups also continued to express concern that a provision in the criminal code prohibiting speech or writing harmful to others’ religious sentiments could be misused to settle personal scores or target religious minorities arbitrarily. According to numerous civil society and international community legal experts, some provisions in the law restricting conversion could be invoked against a wide range of expressions of religion or belief, including the charitable activities of religious groups, or merely speaking about one’s faith. Political and academic analysts continued to state that discussions on prohibiting conversion had become political and that those seeking to capitalize on populist sentiments against conversion for political advantage had manipulated the issue.

Legal experts and leaders of religious minority groups continued to state the constitutional language on protecting religion “handed down from time immemorial” and the prohibition on conversion were intended by the drafters to mandate the protection of Hinduism. Christian religious leaders continued to state the emphasis placed on this language by some politicians who favored reestablishing the country as a Hindu state continued to negatively affect public perception of Christians and Christianity.

Leaders of the RPP outside of parliament continued their calls for reestablishing Hindu statehood, which was constitutionally abolished in 2007 in favor of a secular democracy, and advocated strong legal action against those accused of killing cows. In an article in online news outlet The Diplomat, Nepalese scholar Santosh Sharma Poudel said that while the RPP led the calls for a Hindu state, Hindu nationalism was growing throughout the country’s political system. According to Poudel, both of the previous two prime ministers, for example, despite coming from parties that officially embraced secularism, participated in high-profile public Hindu ceremonies in Nepal and India. Also, additional Hindu nationalist groups had arisen in recent years, and some formed common fronts to advance their cause. Even in the staunchly pro-secular Nepali Congress party, approximately half of its representatives supported a Hindu state in a 2018 signature campaign, according to Poudel. Leaders of the Hindu nationalist movement, he said, had tried to portray religious freedom and secularism in the country as “Western influences.” Civil society leaders said some external Hindu nationalist activists continued to influence politicians in Nepal to support reversion to a Hindu state.

Civil society leaders claimed what they characterized as right-wing religious groups associated with the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in India continued to provide money to influential politicians of all parties in Nepal to advocate Hindu statehood; they did not provide evidence of this assertion, however. According to NGOs and Christian leaders, small numbers of Hindutva (Hindu nationalist) supporters endeavored to create an unfriendly environment for Christians on social media and encouraged “upper-caste” Hindus to enforce caste-based discrimination at local political rallies. In May, RPP senior vice-chairman Rabindra Mishra said on social media that reports of the BJP funding political parties in the country were based “entirely on hearsay” and were “unsubstantiated misinformation.” He said, “As a responsible political party that believes in individual freedom, RPP does not involve itself in activities that create sentiment against any particular religion or group.”

Religious leaders stated the requirement for Christian NGOs to register annually with local government authorities placed their organizations at political risk. Civil society organizations reported religiously affiliated organizations, including several with long histories of work in the country, had difficulty renewing their registrations. During the year, multiple religiously affiliated organizations reported lengthy delays, onerous requests for changes beyond those necessary to meet the requirements of the law, and lack of transparency when renewing or registering their organizations. Some of these organizations said they were reluctant to provide more specific examples due to fear of government reaction.

Police surveillance of Tibetans and the number of security personnel monitoring Tibetan cultural and religious celebrations continued to decrease, according to members of the Tibetan community. The government permitted Losar celebrations in March and celebrations honoring the Dalai Lama’s birthday in July, both including display of his portrait.

Muslim groups continued to say that several municipalities at the local government level prioritized funding for Hindu temples rather than other development needs of the community. They stated local authorities continued to look the other way when Hindu neighbors encroached on the properties of minority faith groups, including Muslim graveyards.

Protestant churches continued to cite difficulties gaining access to land they had bought several years prior for burials in the Kathmandu Valley under the names of individual church members. According to the churches, local communities continued to oppose burial by groups perceived to be outsiders but were more open to burials conducted by Christian members of their own communities.

Citing local Christian leaders, Christianity Today reported in March that the government did not fulfil the commitment made to hunger-striking Christian activists in 2011 to provide public land for Christian burials in the Kathmandu Valley. Catholic churches in the valley did not participate in the protests and acquiesced to cremation of their dead, to avoid conflict with Hindu neighbors, but some evangelical churches insisted burial was necessary and continued to be frustrated by opposition from Hindu groups and lack of support from the government. Dilli Ram Paudel, the general secretary of the Nepal Christian Society, said “We bought private lands at many places on our side of the valley to bury our dead, but the villagers objected to it. They said that having a cemetery near their village with the dead buried there made them fearful of ghosts. Every time we would try to bury someone, we would need police protection to do so.” Many Christian communities outside the Kathmandu Valley said they continued to be able to buy land for cemeteries, conduct burials in public forests, or use land belonging to Indigenous communities for burials. They also said they continued to be able to use public land for this purpose.

The government continued to permit Hindu, Buddhist, and Muslim groups to establish and operate their own schools. The government provided the same level of funding for registered religious schools and public schools, but Christian organizations continued to state the law prohibiting private Christian schools from registering as public schools was discriminatory. Although religious education is not part of the curriculum in public schools, some public schools displayed a statue of Saraswati, the Hindu goddess of learning, on their grounds.

According to the Center for Education and Human Resource Development, which is under the Ministry of Education, Science, and Technology, the number of registered gumbas (Buddhist centers of learning) increased to 92 from 61 in 2022. There were 110 registered gurukhuls (Hindu centers of learning), compared with 79 in 2022.

According to the Center for Education and Human Resource Development, 1,063 madrassahs were registered with district education offices, compared with 1,014 in 2022. Some Muslim leaders stated approximately 2,000 full-time madrassahs continued to be unregistered. According to religious leaders, many madrassahs, as well as full-time Buddhist and Hindu schools, continued to operate as unregistered entities because school operators hoped to avoid government audits and having to use the Center for Education and Human Resource Development’s established curriculum. They said some schools also wished to avoid the registration process, which they characterized as cumbersome.

In August, an online news service based in Kathmandu said government security agencies were examining more closely the funding sources for some madrassahs along the Indian border due to concerns the funding was tied to the Lashkar-e-Tayyiba, a U.S.-designated terrorist organization. According to the news story, government authorities were concerned the organization’s influence could “radicalize” some madrassahs. Police acknowledged that the flow of funds to Nepal-based Islamic organizations such as Islamic Sangh Nepal was not transparent.

Many foreign Christian organizations had direct ties to local churches and continued to sponsor clergy for religious training abroad.

The government allowed Christians and Muslims time off from work to celebrate major holidays, recognized Eid al-Adha and Christmas as public holidays, and continued to recognize Buddha’s birthday as a public holiday.