from 1991 to 2000 and this process does not seem to be shortly arriving to an end, rather the
contrary. Kathmandu turned from being a medium-size town surrounded by mountains into a
metropolis in about three decades; it is easy to imagine how the management of a harmonious
growth of the city represents a true challenge.
I wanted to stress the idea of the shared spaces because my goal is to demonstrate that through an
analysis of space sharing and segregation, meant as physical spaces but also figurative spaces like
the access to education and work, it is possible to shed light on the main power relations among
social and ethnic groups in Kathmandu, thus deduce which are the basis of hierarchies that
guarantee the social control in the city.
The inspiration to consider the physical space as an indicator of social inequalities was drawn from
the Chicago School with Burgess’s diagram of the city and Charles Booth’s works on the poverty
maps of London.
4
I considered with particular interest the attempt to register maps of the city able
to reflect a lack of social cohesion that would normally be perceived subjectively, with no empirical
evidence. However, the contribution of the Chicago School to this research was necessarily limited
to a theoretic level, suggested more by an appreciation and recognition of merit rather than an
immediate effective use in my work. As Hannerz notes speaking about urbanism in the “west”: “the
entire imagery of urbanism in Europe and America was, of course, intertwined with industrialism
and capitalism”.
5
It is not essential to mention the entirety of elements that distinguish the
American and European contexts from Kathmandu, to understand that to a great extent I will have
to rely on local social scientists to prepare with an accurate background the writing of this research.
The intention is to combine a sociologic study of the city with an anthropologic matrix, considering
the anthropological approach as a research method ready to “define problems broadly,
“holistically”, rather than narrowly”.
6
I ascribe a particular value in the application of both ways to
conceive the social sciences, especially within a research that has the objective to investigate on
some of the main aspects of the common living among minority groups in a city.
For the same reason, the nature of this research will be more qualitative than quantitative,
complying nonetheless all the arguments I will propose with a descriptive part
7
and the scientific
evidence whenever possible.
4
Parker 2004:33-35
5
Hannerz 1980:74
6
Hannerz 1980:3
7
Although the description may seem a banal operation, poor in theoretical value; it is indeed the starting point of every
research activity, as Secchi points in his manual for urbanism and the studies of the city life. (Secchi 2000:140)
7
The hypothesis behind this research can be traced back to the following: how will public policies in
Kathmandu deal with the richness of all the increasing diversities present in the city’s social fabric,
after the end of an assimilative system?
The ambition of this research is to present the expansion of Kathmandu as a city that is composed
by a growing diversity. I will furnish elements to justify the assimilative nature of Nepali society
under the Monarchy and mark its change with the recent Maoist rise to power. I will consider social
tensions and ethnic claims as important signs that national policies have a crucial role for the
building of a harmonious society. Nonetheless, the scope of the research will be sufficiently wide to
allow a general vision of the main paradoxes and relations of power within the city and their
relation with some minority groups that I considered particularly meaningful to present. Finally, the
management of social tensions and ethnic claims should be seen as essential constituents for the
conception of a development policy both at a local and at a national scale.
Methodology
Concerning my approach, the choice and the argumentation of the topics will come with the greatest
possible objectivation. Still, it would be naïve to claim a neutral point of view from my part being
the observer. To limit what Luhmann defines as self-referentiality,
8
I will simultaneously make use
of primary and secondary sources for the development of this text.
Of particular inspiration has been the concept of participant observation in a qualitative research,
9
namely the attempt to combine a certain detachment (the observation) with a shared experience with
the local population belonging to the different social groups.
10
The main limit of such approach
clearly derives from the fact that being in a big city makes the observation more dispersive,
moreover the important need for scientific information could only be brought by the study of local
essays. As a matter of fact primary sources in this research constitute just a portion of the whole
source materials.
A rich variety of sources furnished me the key elements for the preparation of the work; I will start
introducing my secondary sources for their numerical superiority. The choice of these materials
corresponds first of all to the necessity of reducing the important gap of knowledge with the study
8
“Like the problem of complexity, the problem of self-reference reappears in the form of meaning. Every intention of
meaning is self-referential insofar as it also provides for its own reactualization by including itself in its own referential
structure as one among many possibilities of further experience and action. At any time, meaning can gain actual reality
only by reference to some other meaning; to this extent there is no point-for-point self sufficiency and also no per se
notum (i.e., no matter-of-factness).” (Luhmann 1995:61)
9
Fabietti 2004:27
10
Parker 2004:44
8
area that in no way can be assimilated to other parts of the world analysed in my studies. The books
of Nepal history and societies and ethnographic studies that I have been reading before the stay in
Kathmandu constitute a first basis in this sense. Another important branch of materials are those
books linked with the social research and method, independently of their study area. Indeed,
approaching some classical authors permitted me a certain acquisition of techniques. Finally, in
order to be able to work on up-to-date data, I have been collecting statistics, articles and other types
of documents mostly related to the present situation of caste/ethnic groups in the country.
Due to remoteness of the area, a very limited and clearly insufficient choice of texts was available
on sale in Europe. Most of the books come from local bookshops in Kathmandu for the great
selection of essays on the country available in it. Some books were bought in India through online
shops, others were found on the dusty shelters of the main library of the national Tribhuvan
University in Kathmandu. The Internet was useful for the completion of the sources with precise
factual data that could not be found elsewhere.
Having to rely mostly on Nepali or Indian essays dealing with Kathmandu, I should recognize the
limit in the scientific value of some of these productions. In spite of their university background, the
contents of some documents were not exempt of stereotypes and insufficiently demonstrated
assumptions. Nevertheless, whenever they constituted the only window on the subject, they had at
least the merit to propose hints for further reflections.
Coming to the primary sources, they are composed by the personal observation of a three-month
stay in Kathmandu and by the working out of two interviews. Concerning the interviews, the
content of the questions has been presented to the promoters of this research before their actual
accomplishment. The first interviewee was a Tibetan political refugee working as a teacher in a
primary school with dominance in number of Tibetan-origin pupils. The contact with this person
took place thanks to the help of a Nepali employee of the NGO I have been working in; the
interviewee was a person of his own acquaintance. The second interviewee was the vice-director of
a mosque located in a central position in Kathmandu, in this second case no intermediary helped me
with the contact: I headed for the mosque that I perceived to be as one of the biggest in the city and
proposed my interview that has been positively received.
9
Chapter 1. Origins of the Kathmandu Mosaic
Where does one’s identity come from? It is not only his nationality, nor only his religion, language
or ethnic group. It is certainly to a great extent the result of any individual history that constitutes
one’s personal growth and development, but this could not be scientifically studied. What I mean to
present in this chapter is a description of the main cleavages that compose the tesseras of the
Kathmandu mosaic. I will hence have to go through all these identification items to shed light on
what I deem to be the most delicate points for a common pacific living in the capital of Nepal. It
will happen that the same group of people could be inserted in more than one set at a time; this is a
natural consequence of the many-sided ways in which one’s life can find its place in the society.
The task looks to be a difficult one, according to who is considered to be one of the most important
Tibetologist and expert of Nepali history and religion “the ethnographical study of Nepal, despite
the many researches undertaken, is still one of the most complex in the world.”
11
Culture and Identity
Culture and identity are two concepts closely related to the ethnic reference in the title of this
research. Nonetheless the definition of these terms constitutes a challenge in the social sciences for
its difficulty: the existence of an unfinished evolution in these concepts demonstrates how their use
can give origin to a number of ambiguous interpretations.
“Culture” in particular refers to a certain group of shared items in a community that can barely be
circumscribed into any precise limit
12
and, most importantly, is a whole that undergoes an endless
process of change through new negotiations. Subsequently the very meaning of an expression like
“multiculturalism” is subject to several criticisms, according to Zoletto this concept is developed
out of a double mistake: to consider individuals completely or predominantly determined by a
culture and societies expression of a single culture before the arrival of external immigrants.
13
However, it would be equally improper to consider the individuals as completely independent from
the communities they belong to, these communities represent powerful social structures.
14
On the
other hand every community is composed by individuals and the building of one’s personal identity
11
Tucci 1962:76 in Bista 2004:xx
12
Olivier de Sardan 1995:71
13
Zoletto in Aime 2004:24
14
Bourdieu in Crespi 2003:80
10
passes also through the personal experience of any single citizen. No individual can be considered
as a pure “social product”.
15
In the building of one’s identity not all of the reasons given to justify one’s group belonging are
necessarily true. Two processes in particular, the invention of the past and the reverse filiation, are
commonly recognized to be unconsciously used for the invention or strengthening of group
identities. The true filiation of the concept of reverse filiation is to be granted to Gerard Lenclud,
16
according to which “the tradition is a continuous process of fatherhood recognition”. Nepal and its
communities are clearly not exempt from these processes.
17
This work will focus on social identity more than on personal identity, as noticed by several social
scientists: the creation of social identities is always the result of choices throughout restless
processes of socialization, re-socialization and negotiations of social bonds.
18
The growing
instability of cultural reference models is indicated to be the main cause of this process,
19
it is in
fact by emphasizing the in-group/out-group differences (that tend to be blurring) that one can be
reassured about his social identity.
20
An interesting theory on the building of one’s identity comes from Castells, he furnishes an
important theoretic basis useful in this research, in particular when we will be confronted with
examples of legitimating identity
21
(the high caste and the Royal families), resistance identity
22
(the
Dalits) and project identity
23
(the Lhotshampas, the Mongol National Organization).
15
Crespi 2003:140
16
Aime 2004:38
17
An interesting example is the theory of the invention of the Buddhist identity among Tharus and Magars, see Chiara
Letizia’s article “La costruzione di un’identità buddhista in Nepal: l’esempio dei tharu e dei magar” in Malighetti
2007:45-74 or Gellner 2005:56-75
18
Roy 2003:50
19
Berger, Bell, Gallino, Sciolla in Crespi 2003:143
20
“La rinascita delle forme più inaspettate di sentimenti comunitari e il loro sfruttamento politico e/o religioso. […]
Tutto ciò che richiama un qualche senso di appartenenza, basato per lo più sulla condivisione di una intensità
emozionale, sembra avere una straordinaria presa nell’età contemporanea.” (Giaccardi & Magatti 2003:150) “Solo
accentuando la separazione tra il Noi e il Voi e tracciando confini netti, in un’epoca in cui le frontiere vengono di
continuo valicate, è possibile cercare di dare forza a identità che non possono che essere fragili e parziali.” (Giaccardi &
Magatti 2003:153)
21
“Identidad legitimadora: introducida por las instituciones dominantes de la sociedad para extender y racionalizar su
dominación frente a los actores sociales, un tema central en la teoría de la autoridad y la dominación de Sennett, pero
que también se adecua a varias teorías del nacionalismo.” (Castells 1998:30)
22
“Identidad de resistencia: generada por aquellos actores que se encuentran en posiciones/condiciones devaluadas o
estigmatizadas por la lógica de la dominación, por lo que construyen trincheras de resistencia y supervivencia
basándose en principios diferentes u opuestos a los que impregnan las instituciones de la sociedad.” (Castells 1998:30)
23
“Identidad proyecto: cuando los actores sociales, basándose en los materiales culturales de que disponen, construyen
una nueva identidad que redefine su posición en la sociedad y, al hacerlo, buscan la transformación de toda la estructura
social.” (Castells 1998:30)
11
If in some ways “Ethnicity is a key element of cultural identity”,
24
it is certainly not the only one.
Thus I will also propose some other criterions that are recognized to constitute one’s personal
identity: the religious faith, the language, the nationality and citizenship matter for example.
25
Moreover due to the specific case of Nepal, it is of particular importance to consider also the caste
system and the political beliefs as possible identity-building frameworks. Still, even with all these
fragmentation in the criterions, the result will be partial and approximate. What composes one’s
identity cannot be summed up with a list of exterior labels. Even recognizing that the social
environment has its important role in the construction of one’s identity, the individual component
remains essential.
The caste/ethnic group matter
Talking about a social group in itself is not an easy task. It gets even more difficult if the field of
such a research is the Indian subcontinent, as in both India and Nepal there is a very strong
subdivision of the population on a basis that we wouldn’t consider elsewhere: the caste. The caste
cannot be considered as nobility ranking, but its concrete consequences on the people may be
brought back to a similar definition. The caste does not properly correspond to an ethnic group
subdivision, although many authors refer to it this way
26
or to both of them with great
interchangeability. Caste/ethnic group in Nepal remains a blur distinction:
“The 1991 census has recorded 60 caste and ethnic groups while the National Ethnic Groups
Development Committee has identified 65 such groups. On the other hand, 103 caste/ethnic groups have
been listed in 2001 census. […] In Nepal, there are more than 100 caste/ethnic groups with distinct
language and culture.”
27
In this case the difficulty and the challenge for an exterior observer is to operate in a country in
which he can confide on a very little shared “culture” with the object of his analysis; culture that
should be considered here in a wide sense that would include the history of its population and of its
thoughts, the religious beliefs and the revolutions. It is for example undeniable that the
Enlightenment and the French Revolution belong to the European history and have caused a certain
change in people’s feelings towards hierarchy and religion. Once again, having chosen a radically
different contest, very little can be taken for granted in the development of this research.
24
Sharma 2008:1
25
Koopmans 1999:675
26
It may happen that in the same community people discuss whether to consider themselves as an ethnic group or as a
cast, it is for example the case of the Subba families. (Von Der Heide & Hoffmann 2001:101)
27
Karki 2005:105 Population Magazine vol.III
12
The “caste” term was exported from the Portuguese traders who arrived in India in the 15
th
century,
they referred with this expression to two concepts for the organization of the Hindu society: the
Varna Vyavastha and the Jat. The Varna Vyavastha was meant to allow a subdivision of the society
according to the different levels of spiritual pureness. The Jats are a further subdivision of the four
Varnas that take in consideration what are considered to be the characteristics and qualities of
certain lineages and eventually lead to the work division.
28
“This system ensured that the religious, political, financial and physical powers were all separated into
four different social classes. Due to this fair separation of political and intellectual powers, ancient Indian
society could not turn itself into a theocratic or autocratic society.”
29
The caste system was first implemented in the actual region of Nepal by Indian Hindu immigrants
in the fifth century; in 1853 the first Prime Minister of the newly united Nepal, Jang Bhadur Rana,
adopted the spirit of this Varna Vyavastha for the implementation of the first Code of the Nation.
30
Although since 1963, on the basis of equality before law, King Mahendra abolished the
enforcement of the caste system as a legal criterion, we will observe how this system has still a very
influent power on people’s lives, even in the growing cosmopolitan Kathmandu.
The Varna Vyavastha system has its theoretic roots into the Hindu concepts of dharma and karma.
Up to recent times in India it was uncommon to use the Hindu-non Hindu criterion as an identity-
making discriminant. Other criterions such as the caste (Varna), the lineage (Jat), the religious
community and the philosophical beliefs, were by far more punctual terms to create one’s identity.
31
The dharma term may have several possible translations but can be understood as the “duty” to be
accomplished in one’s life. Every human being has a dharma that can be normally considered the
way to lead a virtuous living. Specific castes have specific dharmas too and this causes a series of
strong social expectations to limit one’s actions and direct them towards what is considered to be
the caste right fulfilment.
The karma is the twin concept and less unfamiliar to western societies. According to this principle
one’s life conditions and luck directly depend on the actions done by the person in its previous
lives. On the same ground all the actions run in the present life will affect the faith of the future
lives.
32
Shedding light on these two concepts may probably help us to understand what seems to be
a fatalistic and apathetic attitude, especially in the people from lower castes.
28
Fabietti 2004:161
29
Varna Vyavastha: Origin of Caste System in India; Pankaj Jain
30
“The infamous Muluki Ain […] served to divide the society clearly in terms of a Hindu caste hierarchy.” (Riaz &
Basu 2007:71)
31
Narayanan 2007:92
32
Narayanan 2007:51
13
The Varna Vyavastha system, although its Hindu origin, considers also people belonging to the two
biggest religious minorities in Nepal: Buddhists and Muslims. It is indeed divided into four main
groups:
- Tagadharis are those designated to deal with the sacred aspects of life and to have
literacy. This influences still a lot the kind of professional activities that those
belonging to this caste are advised to take. This group contains the privileged
Brahmins and the Kshetriyas;
- Matwalis are those who traditionally are allowed to drink alcoholic drinks. Most of
the Tibetans are considered part of this group because of their Mongoloid “race”
origin. All the ethnic groups that may be related with the Mongoloid race are
considered, by this system at first, as inferior to the Indo-Caucasian ones;
- Non untouchables find themselves in an intermediate position. It is normally a
category created for foreigners, like Europeans (Mlechchas) and Muslims. But some
Nepali ethnic groups also belong to this group. This group does not have special
limitations in professional activities, the only limit that remains in the tradition is the
ban to serve water to a person from higher castes;
- The untouchables, composed mostly by the Dalits in Nepal, are the impure caste.
They represent the lowest category of the Nepali social structure and there is only a
limited range of jobs possible for them.
This subdivision of the Nepali society took for about a century a legal form into what the Prime
Minister Jang Bhadur Rana signed as the first Code of Nepal in 1853.
33
The Kshetriyas (Chhetri)
and Brahmins are proportionally more present in Kathmandu than other parts of the country: the
Kshetriyas population in Kathmandu for example reaches the 18,8% compared to the 5,65% of its
national share.
34
This concentration of Kshetriyas in Kathmandu could be easily explained by their
highest positions that they are allowed to take in the central administrations of the country.
35
As
33
Dastider 1995:27
34
Sharma 2008:90
35
Sharma 2008:15
14
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