Evidence-based analysis testing Nepal's 'never colonised' narrative against historical treaties, correspondence, and frontier design from 1814-1923, examining its contemporary political usage from 2019-2025.
"…..this immense barrier would seem sufficient to limit the concerns of India; yet at this moment I am speculating on the trade which may be carried on beyond it, should the present war with the Gorkhas leave us in possession of Kemaoon [sic]. From that province there are valleys between the hills which afford passage of not much difficulty, and greatly frequented, into Tartary. The holding of Kemaoon would give to us exclusive purchase of the shawl wool, to be paid for in cutlery, broadcloth and grain".
"हाम्रो देश आजसम्म कसैका उपनिवेश बनेको छैन… हामी नेपालीले स्वाभिमानी भई बाँच्नु पर्ने कुरा पुर्खाले सिकाएका छन्… यसतर्फ हामी सबैको ध्यान जानु पर्छ।"
What the Governor-General (Francis Rawdon, Earl of Moira; later Marquess of Hastings) wanted in 1814 was not the daily headache of annexing the highlands but the commercial and strategic value downstream of them. His own journal cuts through rhetoric: Kumaon as a hinge to "Tartary" (the British phrase for Qing domains) and a monopoly on shawl-wool routes stands out as a primary lure.
Company paperwork from the war years presents a matching picture: Papers Respecting the Nepaul War (1824) collates proclamations, letters and memoranda used to justify policy—security along the Tarai, access to hill passes, and the need to regularise a fractious frontier.
British usage of "Chinese Tartary" in Himalayan writing of the era underlines the trans-frontier logic, not a desire to push the British Raj into the high Himalaya. The routes and markets beyond the crest mattered; permanent occupation of the crest did not.
Bottom line
Annexation was unnecessary to those aims; control by treaty, roads, residency, and recruitment was cheaper.
Drafted 2 Dec 1815; ratifications exchanged 4/16 Mar 1816 after the Anglo-Nepal War. The Sugauli instrument drew a new boundary and embedded levers short of annexation. Primary scanned copies exist in treaty collections and state papers.
We quote the operative phrases :
Art. VII (personnel restriction)
"The Rajah of Nipal hereby engages never to take or retain in his service any British subject, nor the subject of any European or American State, without the consent of the British Government." (Nepal News)
Art. VIII (reciprocal residency)
"It is agreed that accredited Ministers from each shall reside at the Court of the other." (Nepal News)
Taken together with the boundary and cession clauses, these provisions fixed the external perimeter and installed a permanent British presence at Kathmandu without turning Nepal into a "princely state". In British administrative jargon: control at arm's length.
Frontier design
The shift of Kumaon and western Tarai to Company rule gave Calcutta/Agra a clean line along the Kali/Mahakali and a lowland glacis. That is exactly the "barrier" logic Moira sketched—keep the heights autonomous, but own the approaches.
After Nepal's support to the British in 1857–58, the Crown (through the Government of India) restored four western Tarai districts—Banke, Bardiya, Kailali, Kanchanpur—by sanad in 1860. The deed (as printed in Aitchison's collections) is a clean title instrument returning revenue-rich lowlands to the Darbar. Buffer maintenance, not annexation, remained the policy.
The Treaty between the United Kingdom and Nepal signed at Kathmandu on 21 Dec 1923 (ratifications exchanged 8 Apr 1925; published as UK Treaty Series 1925 No. 31) states that the two governments "mutually agree to acknowledge and respect each other's independence both internal and external." This is the plainest formal recognition in British treaty prose.
Implication
By 1923 the British confirmed what practice had long implied—Nepal as an independent state conducting its own external relations—while retaining military and commercial cooperation (e.g., recruitment, transit understandings) outside annexation frameworks. (The Gurkha Museum - Winchester)
Internal politics mattered to every negotiation. Bhimsen Thapa's wartime management and post-war fall, later palace-Darbar oscillations, and—after 1846—the Rana regime's centralising bargains created a state that could trade concessions for survival. The 1860 restoration rewarded Rana alignment; the 1923 treaty crowned Chandra Shumsher's diplomacy.
The Grade-7 line—"हाम्रो देश आजसम्म कसैका उपनिवेश बनेको छैन…"—is civics in miniature. It portrays autonomy as inherited duty and calls for attention to it. Provenance paths: CDC e-library entries for Grade-7 Social Studies (Unit 2, Ch.4). We keep the quotation verbatim; a page-image will be added to the evidence pack.
How it gets used
Elected figures often fold that schoolbook notion into 21st-century politics. A vivid case was Kathmandu's mayor Balen Shah in 2023: after India's Parliament displayed an "Akhand Bharat" mural, he hung a "Greater Nepal" map in his office and publicly argued he was using his constitutional right to display a symbol of history and pride; the federal government warned that elected officials should stick to the constitutional map; he refused to remove it; the Kathmandu Metropolitan City later standardised the "constitutional map" for official use while the "Greater Nepal" iconography persisted in his personal branding. Whatever one's view of the symbolism, the episode linked schoolhouse pride to municipal theatre.
"The social media ban was lifted overnight, with all apps subsequently available to users in Nepal."
"Karki… will take oath… after violent anti-corruption protests forced Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli to resign."
Analysis
A digital-era trigger (platform blocks) fused with pre-existing anger over corruption. The state's lever wasn't annexation, it was information control—echoing older habits of constraining space without formal capture.
"Agreed to re-open… Pulan-Gunji…"
"Limpiyadhura, Lipulekh and Kalapani… are inseparable parts of Nepal."
Analysis
Frontier design still does the heavy lifting. Nepal asserts Sugauli-anchored claims; the practical control remains disputed. The language of sovereignty is clear; the on-ground status is not.
"The Federal Parliament of Nepal's decision to ratify the $500 million compact…"
"MCA-Nepal signs US$154.5 million contracts… 180 kilometres of high-voltage transmission lines."
Analysis
The interpretive declaration nationalises the narrative (no military linkage; Constitution prevails) while implementation frames the compact as grid sovereignty (export capacity, cross-border link).
The 1950 Treaty of Peace and Friendship affirms "complete sovereignty, territorial integrity and independence" of each state (Art. 1) and mutual information on serious frictions (Art. 2). (Official MEA page carries text.) (MEA India)
Constituted 2016; finalised 2018; as of 2024–25, Nepal repeatedly signalled readiness to "receive" it, while India indicated it would take it up at an "appropriate time". Multiple public references confirm the limbo. (Rising Nepal)
"Nepal was always ready to receive it…"
"Indian side has maintained that it will be accepted at an appropriate time."
Analysis
The 1950 text is often invoked as either overreach or anchor. The unresolved EPG exchange keeps the narrative hot, but the legal baseline (mutual sovereignty) remains unchanged.
We sample official/primary outlets and wire reports for dated usage:
"Countries can be big or small, but their sovereignty is equal."
"mutual respect, sovereign equality, territorial integrity…"
"assault on… sovereignty"
"safeguard 'sovereignty, territorial integrity and independence.'"
Analysis
These are emblematic lines: sovereignty is the common denominator from left to right. "Never colonised" appears far more in campaign speech and media than in formal manifestos; we find few official PDFs using that exact phrase. No evidence found in inspected 2022 manifesto PDFs for that precise claim; sovereignty/independence language is routine.
Platform blocks → reversals (Sept 2025) already noted above. Government orders cited "registration" and "safety" rationales; bans were lifted after lethal unrest.
ETA/IT Act/defamation cases (2024–2025): we found public debate and prior-year cases around online speech, but no verifiable 2024–25 prosecution specifically tied to "nationalism/sovereignty" slogans in authoritative dockets we checked within the time available. No evidence found; RTI to the Attorney General's Office and Nepal Law Commission for case lists.
Analysis
Control through the info-sphere—licensing and platform compliance—has become the modern "residency" lever. It shapes the space of politics without rewriting borders.
Counterargument
"Sugauli was coercion; Nepal lost two-thirds of its territory; this is colonial domination by other means."
Response
Coercion is plain, but the form mattered. Sugauli yielded residency, recruitment and boundary change without incorporation into British India. The same British system that annexed Awadh and satrapised scores of states stopped short here and later recognised Nepal's internal and external independence in 1923. This is a different—though not benign—category of control.
Counterargument
"Recognition in 1923 changes nothing; the Raj still dictated Nepal's choices."
Response
Influence persisted, but treaty language and subsequent practice (Nepal's own legations/foreign relations) mark a hard legal shift. The British resident's status changed to envoy; Nepal opened a legation in London by 1934.
Counterargument
"Gurkha recruitment proves dependency."
Response
It proves durable manpower interdependence from 1815–16 onward, instituted by policy and re-affirmed across regimes, not by annexation. Today it is a tri-state arrangement (UK–Nepal–India) with Nepal as consenting party.
Counterargument
"The new 2020 map 'solves' the west."
Response
It restates Nepal's position domestically and constitutionally. On-ground control remains contested; diplomacy—not unilateral cartography—will settle Lipu-Lekh/Kalapani.
We privilege primary scans (treaty series, Aitchison, official portals) for the 1814–1923 core; for 2019–2025 we prioritise official notices and reputable wires. Where a contemporary quote rests on a press summary, we cross-check against an official page when available.
We do not find evidence of annexation of Nepal by the British. We do find a firm pattern of constraint via treaty tools, residency, recruitment, and frontier redesign that served British aims—security of the plains and access to trans-Himalayan trade—without the costs of rule. The 1923 treaty formalised recognition of Nepal's full internal and external independence in explicit terms.
This history still shapes politics. The same "pride" line taught in schools animates municipal symbolism (Balen's "Greater Nepal" display) and national rhetoric about Lipu-Lekh, the MCC compact, and platform regulation. The lever has changed; the logic—control without formal absorption—has not.
v0.2 - 25 Sep 2025
Removed RTI reference; streamlined sources section
v0.1 - 25 Sep 2025
Initial release with 2025 protest timeline, MCC milestones, Balen case study
FIRST DRAFT — Evidence Pack Pending RTI
Version v0.1 • 25 Sep 2025 • Kathmandu (NPT)
This is a first-draft publication released for transparency. All quotations are from primary sources cited in-text. Some sections await RTI responses and may be updated. Factual corrections are welcome at [email protected].