Gyanendra of Nepal

Gyanendra Bir Bikram Shah Dev (ज्ञानेन्द्र वीर विक्रम शाह देव; born 7 July 1947) is a monarch and the last King of Nepal, reigning from 2001 to 2008.

As a child, he was briefly king from 1950 to 1951, when his grandfather, Tribhuvan, took political exile in India with the rest of his family.

In November 1950, during a political plot, both his father and his grandfather King Tribhuvan, along with other royals, fled to India, leaving the infant Prince Gyanendra as the only male member of the royal family in Nepal.

He was brought back to the capital Kathmandu by Prime Minister Mohan Shamsher, who had him declared king on 7 November 1950.

Not only was Gyanendra crowned, but coins were issued in his name.

The Rana prime minister provided a 300,000 Rupee annual budget as expenditure for the king.

After opposition to the hereditary rule of the Rana prime ministers from India, a deal was reached in January 1951, and Gyanendra's grandfather King Tribhuvan returned to Nepal and resumed the throne.

The actions of the Rana regime to depose his grandfather and place Gyanendra on the throne were internationally not recognized.

Gyanendra studied with his elder brother King Birendra at St. Joseph's School, Darjeeling, India; in 1969, he graduated from Tribhuvan University, Kathmandu.

Gyanendra married his second cousin Komal Rajya Lakhsmi Devi on 1 May 1970 in Kathmandu.

They have two children:

He served as the chairman of the Advisory Committee for the Coronation of his brother King Birendra in 1975.

He is a keen conservationist and served as chairman of the King Mahendra Trust for Nature Conservation (later known as the National Trust for Nature Conservation) from 1982 until his reaccession to the throne in 2001.

His second reign began after the 2001 Nepalese royal massacre.

Gyanendra Shah is the first person in the history of Nepal to be king twice and the last king of the Shah dynasty of Nepal.

Gyanendra's second reign was marked by constitutional turmoil.

His brother King Birendra had established a constitutional monarchy in which he delegated policy to a representative government.

The growing insurgency of the Nepalese Civil War during Gyanendra's reign interfered with the elections of representatives.

Gyanendra again assumed the throne after many other royal family members, including King Birendra, were assassinated on 1 June 2001 by Gyanendra's nephew Crown Prince Dipendra, who was titular king for a brief period before succumbing to a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

These events and the ensuing investigation proved very controversial.

A two-man investigation team appointed by Gyanendra and made up of Keshav Prasad Upadhaya, then-Supreme Court Chief Justice, and Taranath Ranabhat, then-Speaker of the House of Representatives, carried out a week-long investigation.

After interviewing more than 100 people—including eyewitnesses, palace officials, guards, and staff—they concluded that Dipendra had indeed carried out the massacre, but they drew no further conclusions.

As his nephew lay in a coma, Prince Gyanendra was named regent; but after King Dipendra's death on 4 June 2001, Gyanendra resumed the throne.

During his early years on the throne, Gyanendra sought to exercise full control over the government, citing the failure of all the political parties to hold an election after the parliament was dissolved.

In May 2002, he supported the popularly elected Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba when he dismissed the parliament elected in 1999.

In October 2002, he dismissed Deuba and consolidated his power for the first time.

After several delays in elections, Gyanendra suspended the constitution and assumed direct authority in February 2005, asserting that it would be a temporary measure to suppress the Maoist insurgency after civil governments had failed to do so.

During the years 2002 to 2005 he chose and subsequently dismissed three prime ministers for failure to hold elections and bring the rebels to a round table negotiation; he finally dismissed Deuba for the second time and took over as absolute ruler on 1 February 2005, promising that the country would return to normality within 36 months.

His elder brother King Birendra had negotiated a constitutional monarchy during his rule in a delicate manner in which he, as king, played a minor role in government.

Thus, Gyanendra's confrontational approach with the established political parties met with widespread censure.

When Gyanendra took complete control for the second time, on 1 February 2005, he dismissed Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba's government for failing to make arrangements for parliamentary elections and being unable to restore peace in the country, which was then in the midst of a civil war led by Maoist insurgents.

Gyanendra promised that "peace and effective democracy" would be restored within three years.

but the period of direct rule was accompanied by repression of dissent.

International organizations expressed grave concerns about the safety of journalists, following the king's decision to restrict civil liberties, including freedom of the press, the constitutional protection against censorship and the right against preventive detention.

In the face of broad opposition, he restored the previous parliament in April 2006.

He was deposed two years later by the first session of the Constituent Assembly, which declared the nation to be the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal and abolished the 240-year-old Shah dynasty.

Gyanendra was born in the old Narayanhiti Royal Palace in Kathmandu, as the second son of Crown Prince Mahendra and his first wife, Crown Princess Indra.

After his birth, his father was told by a court astrologer not to look at his newborn son because it would bring him bad luck, so Gyanendra was sent to live with his grandmother.

In April 2006, the seven-party alliance and the then banned CPN Maoist party in an underground manner staged protests and strikes in Kathmandu against King Gyanendra's direct rule.

The royal government exercised minimum restraint but declared a curfew to control the deteriorating situation, which was enforced with live firearms and tear gas.