Challenges and Opportunities of Gender Equality Litigation in Nepal

The constitutionalization of an enforceable right to equality opens novel avenues to pursue gender equality claims and presents a new set of challenges for feminist activists. This article analyzes Nepal’s constitutional litigation for alleged breaches of the right to equality with respect to gender from the re-democratization of 1990 until the promulgation of the current constitution in September 2015. It makes one central argument: Nepal’s Supreme Court has played a pivotal role in advancing the rights of Nepali women by crafting — in an incremental way — a nuanced, contextually sensitive, constitutional meaning of gender equality. In this respect, gender equality jurisprudence has been central to the judicial construction of Nepal’s constitutional identity. Nepal’s extensive experience of gender equality litigation offers key comparative lessons — especially for deeply divided societies — on the accommodation of demands for social inclusion and the construction of social identities by constitutional means

Protection of Religious Rights in India

A full and practical assessment of protection of religious rights in the UK and internationally, including evaluation of international instruments, and comparative perspectives from the US, Canada, South Africa, Australia, India, Ireland

The Locus of Sovereign Authority in Nepal

The present paper investigates in a historical perspective the articulation of the concept of internal state sovereignty in modern Nepal’s constitutional domain by juxtaposing an analysis of the country’s various constitutional forms with a reading of the physical architectural structures hosting the main central state institutions (the capitol) in Kathmandu. The emphasis on the internal notion of state sovereignty with a focus on the formation of the modern nation-state seeks to illuminate the tensions underlying the transformation of the relationship between the state and the people in Nepal and the repeated failure to respond adequately to democratic aspirations and demands for inclusion

Ivor Jennings's Constitutional Legacy beyond the Occidental-Oriental Divide

Sir W. Ivor Jennings (1903–1965) was one of Britain's most prominent constitutional law scholars of the twentieth century. He is mostly famed for his work in the 1930s on English Public Law. In 1941, Jennings, however, moved to Sri Lanka, progressively becoming involved in both an academic and professional capacity with constitutional processes across the decolonizing world in the early stages of the Cold War. This article provides an alternative account of Jennings's constitutional legacy to those of existing scholars by combining orthodox accounts of the ‘Occidental Jennings’ with an analysis of the neglected ‘Oriental’ experiences of this influential intellectual. It examines the ambiguous relationship between constitutionalism and democracy in Jennings's constitutional work overseas, and the impact of his postcolonial work on his views on constitutionalism

The Rejection of Constitutional Incrementalism in Nepal’s Federalisation

The relationship between federalism and identity was the single most contentious issue in the drafting of Nepal’s 2015 Constitution, and remains an embattled feature of the country’s post -conflict constitutional settlement. This article explains why ‘constitutional incrementalism’ – the innovative constitution-making strategy for deeply divided societies theorised by Hanna Lerner – was ultimately (and wisely) rejected in Nepal’s federalisation process. Historically a unitary state since its creation in the late eighteenth century, Nepal committed itself to federal restructuring in 2007, but profound disagreements endured over the set of institutional choices concerning the features of Nepal’s federal arrangements throughout the country’s latest constitution-making process (2008- 5). Constitutional incrementalism with its emphasis on deferral, ambiguity and contradiction was thought of in some quarters as a pragmatic and instrumental way out of Nepal’s political impasse. In the end, the 2015 Const itution expressly named the Provinces (even if by just using numbers) and demarcated their boundaries already at the time of its promulgation. Any changes to this framework can only take place now by way of constitutional amendment. This article explains why the incrementalist approach was rejected in Nepal’s federalisation process, and reflects on the conditions under which constitutional incrementalism may succeed in societies that present profound disagreements over the collective identity of the polity

Dominion Status and the Origins of Authoritarian Constitutionalism in Pakistan

The legal legacy of Dominion status in Pakistan (1947–1956) explains the rise, configuration, and normalization of authoritarian constitutionalism in the country. First, the article analyzes Pakistan’s Dominion constitution as both the constitutional framework to manage a difficult political transition and the juridical basis to frame the country’s new permanent constitution. It is argued that the adoption of an instrumental procedural approach to Westminster constitutionalism in Pakistan during the Dominion period led to the subversion of its substantive underpinnings from within. This approach had a critical long-term impact on the country’s constitutional developments and the framing of the permanent constitution, especially with regard to executive dominance. Second, the litigation over the governor-general’s dissolution of Pakistan’s first Constituent Assembly (1947–1954) illuminates the perils of New Dominion constitutionalism and the attempts by Pakistani constitution-makers in both Constituent Assemblies to frame a constitution departing from the Westminster model and to enshrine in the document checks and balances of a legal nature

Constitution Drafting as Cold War Realpolitik: Sir Ivor Jennings and Nepal’s 1959 Constitution

The present chapter explores the appointment, work, and legacy of the noted British constitutionalist Sir Ivor Jennings (1903-1965) as constitutional advisor to the Nepal Government in the late 1950s. Jennings visited Kathmandu for one month from 28 March to 24 April 1958. He was employed by the British Foreign Office (FO) upon the request of the Nepali monarch, King Mahendra Bikram Shah, to advise the small Commission charged with the drafting of the Constitution of the Kingdom of Nepal 1959 – the third constitutional document in the country’s history. In 1941, Jennings had moved to Sri Lanka, where he resided until 1955. While in Sri Lanka, he became progressively involved with constitution-making processes and constitutional politics in the decolonising world. This period of Jennings’ life, the body of literature pertaining to the postcolonial world that he produced, and his advisory work in decolonising countries is referred to here as the ‘Oriental Jennings’.1 It is argued here that his work in/on South Asia represents the core of the academic production and advisory work of the ‘Oriental Jennings’.2 Aside from Britain – Sri Lanka, India, and Pakistan were the countries Jennings was most familiar with and to whom he dedicated the majority of his academic writings.3 This essay maintains that Jennings’ constitutional advisory work in Nepal is crucial to understanding the progression of his thinking on constitutional democracy in both Asia and Britain

A step forward in disclosing the secret of stradivari's varnish by NMR spectroscopy

It is commonly thought that the varnishes used by the great violin-maker Antonio Stradivari may have a role in determining not only the esthetical features but also the acoustic properties of his instruments, and the idea of a "lost secret" is still widespread among musicians and violin-makers. Previous scientific researches on varnish samples of Stradivari's instruments revealed that they were generally made by a mix of linseed oil with and colophony or metal rosinates in different ratios ranging between 75/25 (oil/resin) and 60/40 (oil/rosinate). However, it is still not clear whether the mixture composition can be related to any structural and/or functional feature of the resulting varnish. To investigate this aspect, we prepared varnishes with different linseed oil/colophony (w/w) ratios and applied NMR techniques to achieve information about their chemical-physical characteristics. Here, we show that the two components strongly interact in the solid state and that only the varnish prepared from 75/25 (w/w) linseed oil/colophony mixture displays unique properties in terms of dynamic homogeneity unlike coatings with other compositions. Our results suggest that the so-called "secret" of Stradivari's finish could not be related to unknown ingredient(s) but to a specific oil/resin composition that provides the best performance