Nepal's royal bloodbath

KATHMANDU, Nepal – About the only thing the Nepalese people agree on about the royal massacre of last June is that no one believes the official explanation.

It was the bloodiest royal multiple murder since the Leninists killed the Romanovs at the beginning of the Russian communist revolution, and it seems everyone has an opinion about who was behind the killings and why. Ten members of the royal family eventually died after a shooting rampage during a family dinner.

The official version revolves around the "forbidden romance" that Devyani Rana had with the Nepal's Crown Prince Dipendra. The couple met while students in New Delhi, India. Devyani was a student attending Welhems boarding school for women. The prince, it is said, was madly in love with her. He took her on trips to see koalas in Australia and also to England. The prince attended Eton in the UK, a prestigious school.

It is well known that Prince Dipendra's mother, Queen Aiswrya, was not a fan of Devyani. The queen feared that Devyani, a Muslim with royal ties to India, could weaken the monarchy by making it unpopular with Hindus in Nepal, this at a time when Maoist rebels were threatening the nation with guerrilla war in rural regions. Last weekend, Maoist guerrillas killed 141 in terror strikes against Nepal.

The Himalayas of Nepal

At the roots of the disapproval were culture and religion.

The current ruling monarchy in Nepal traces its lineage back to the Kingdom of Gurkha. Gurkha rests about halfway between Kathmandu and the northern city of Pokhara. About the time of the American Revolutionary War, the Shan kings ruling in Gurkha conquered the sub-tropical Kathmandu Valley and established a throne there. In 1768, the ninth Shan king, Prithvi Narayan Shan, succeeded in doing what no other Shan king had done – he cemented Shan rule and extended it to the south and east.

Devyani is a Muslim. The prince, of course, was a Hindu – the official religion of Nepal. The lineage of the prince's lover includes royalty from both Nepal and India. In India, she descends from the Gwailor Mahrajas. Reportedly, the queen turned against Devyani because of her ties to royalty in India. Devyani's father is Pashupati Rana, a former foreign minister in the Nepal government.

The crown prince shot his parents, including his father, King Birendra, and seven others in his family before killing himself.

"After the shooting, Devyani became withdrawn. She returned to India," Canadian medical volunteer Anne Taylor told WorldNetDaily.

"She began to turn to drinking and drugs. It's very sad. I thought she was going to be another Princess Diana. She has the looks, charm, everything a princess should have."

Nepalese military intelligence officials interviewed for this story said that Devyani is really 27 years old, not 23 as has been reported.

Said one official, "It is well known the queen wanted her son to marry Shan royalty, from the same tribe."

The king's brother, Gyanendra, and the king's son, Paras, now have become the new rulers of Nepal. The question arises: Who armed the prince? And why wasn't Paras himself shot?

Says one Nepalese taxi driver, "Gyanendra is the key to this mystery. He is the one who initially said a gunshot mishap was responsible for the shooting. A hunting accident? It cannot possibly be so."

Many conspiracy theories sound outlandish. The most extreme centers around the Maoist rebels threatening the monarchy with guerrilla war.

"The Maoists might have used mind control on the prince or had some other secret details on his life they were threatening him with," said John McIntyre, a British writer currently in Nepal researching a book on the killings.

"We know the king promised to completely take away his financial support if he married Devyani. Others say the prince is still alive, like JFK on life support."

The prince did survive for three days after shooting himself in the head with a .38 caliber pistol, a time during which he actually reigned as king due to his father's death.

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