{"id":13225,"date":"2024-04-27T22:49:28","date_gmt":"2024-04-27T17:04:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/?p=13225"},"modified":"2024-04-27T22:49:28","modified_gmt":"2024-04-27T17:04:28","slug":"in-landmark-move-nepals-govt-circular-allows-same-sex-marriage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/in-landmark-move-nepals-govt-circular-allows-same-sex-marriage\/","title":{"rendered":"In landmark move, Nepal&#8217;s govt circular allows same-sex marriage"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Kathmandu: The government has issued a circular to all local bodies to register same-sex marriages.<\/p>\n<p>The sexual and gender minorities have welcomed the move as a significant step towards equal rights for the communities.<\/p>\n<p>As per the decision taken at the Deputy Prime Minister and Home Minister level, all the local registration authorities have been requested to issue a certificate after keeping a temporary record of marriage in a separate registration book.<\/p>\n<p>The government&#8217;s circular responded to an application filed by Mayako Pahichan Nepal (MKPN), a non-governmental organisation advocating for the rights of the sexual and gender minorities, requesting making marriage involving sexual and gender minority couples easier.<\/p>\n<p>In compliance with the order of the Supreme Court, the Department of National ID and Civil Registration has asked the issuance of a marriage registration certificate to the people from the communities.<\/p>\n<p>Accordingly, on November 29, 2023, Dordi Rural Municipality in Lamjung district acting on a circular by the Department registered the same-sex marriage involving Maya Gurung and Surendra Pandey, making Nepal the first country to legalise same-sex marriage in South Asia and second in Asia behind Taiwan.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/WhatsApp-Image-2024-04-25-at-3.38.54-PM.jpeg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft  wp-image-13227\" src=\"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/WhatsApp-Image-2024-04-25-at-3.38.54-PM-225x300.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1157\" height=\"1543\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Although the local level registered the same-sex marriage, there were complaints that other local levels were reluctant to do so requesting a separate circular from the Department. To sort out the problem, and make rainbow marriage easier, MKPN filed an application with the Ministry of Home Affairs requesting the issuance of a circular to all local levels across the country to register same-sex marriage.<\/p>\n<p>It may be noted that on the initiatives of Sunil Babu Pant, Asia&#8217;s first openly gay former parliamentarian of Nepal, and the MKPN Executive Director, Bardia&#8217;s Badhaiyatal Rural Municipality registered the marriage of a lesbian couple, Suprita Gurung and Dipti Shrestha, making Nepal the first country to do so in South Asia.<br \/>\nPant thanked Deputy Prime Minister and Home Minister Rabi Lamichhane for taking this landmark decision of issuing a circular in this regard.<\/p>\n<p>After 3 months of follow-up, the Ministry of Home Affairs finally issued a circular for marriage registration involving the minority couples through the Department, he said, expressing the hope that it would be fruitful in easing the registration of rainbow marriages.<\/p>\n<p>On June 27, 2023, the Supreme Court gave an interim order to register same-sex marriages with temporary records.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Kathmandu: The government has issued a circular to all local bodies to register same-sex marriages.<br \/>\nThe sexual and gender minorities have welcomed the move as a significant step towards equal rights for the communities.<br \/>\nAs per the decision taken at the Deputy Prime Minister and Home Minister level, all the local registration authorities have been requested to issue a certificate after keeping a temporary record of marriage in a separate registration book.<br \/>\nThe government&#8217;s circular responded to an application filed by Mayako Pahichan Nepal (MKPN), a non-governmental organisation advocating for the rights of &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[20,8,621,490,3,2065],"tags":[1316,2076,1086,540,157,457],"class_list":["post-13225","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current-issue","category-human-rights","category-news","category-slider","category-society","category-top-stories","tag-home-minister","tag-mayako-pahichan-nepal","tag-same-sex-marriages","tag-sexual-and-gender-minorities","tag-sunil-babu-pant","tag-supreme-court"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13225","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13225"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13225\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13228,"href":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13225\/revisions\/13228"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13225"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13225"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13225"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}