Newar Group: Himalayan Nation and Then-King Gyanendra

newar group: This year, as workers from the ethnic Newar group finished building and decorating a new chariot, they hoped for good times ahead, according to The Chronicle Herald. The 15-meter 48-foot tall wooden chariot, which began its annual monthlong procession on Sunday, is meant to please gods so they can provide for a generous rainfall, harvest and prosperity. Months later, in February 2005, then-King Gyanendra seized absolute power, and the Himalayan nation was in the grip of political unrest, an escalating communist insurgency and a dwindling economy. We have to build it strong so that it does not collapse. The Rato Machindra festival, in which Hindu and Buddhist devotees pull two thick ropes tied to the chariot though the narrow streets of Patan, a Kathmandu suburb, preludes the monsoon season in a nation where a majority of population still depend on farming. If anything happens to the chariot, there will be bad luck for the country, said Krishna Dangol, the latest in a generation of chariot builders. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.