Sources: The Hindustan Times/EIANS, The Hindustan Times/Reuters and Nepal public holidays. In our post of August 30, we had reported how the Government of Nepal had promised that public holidays would be given on Muslim festivals, following threats by the Madhesi Janadhikar Forum (MJF) to disrupt the upcoming general elections, if Muslim public holidays were not added to Nepal's list of public holidays (our news post of June 30).In that same post of August 30, we had ventured the forecast that it is most likely that these new public holidays will in fact be allowances for Muslim civil servants to be off work on the day of the main Muslim festivals.
The first test of the government's promise to observe Muslim festivals as public holidays was this past week-end on the occasion of the Eid al-Fitr (End of Ramadan), scheduled in Nepal, for Sunday, October 14 (a normal working day, as the weekly day off in Nepal is Saturday).
On that day, Reuters reports that all government offices, banks, schools and colleges remained open, while EIANS reports outrage in the Muslim community that the prime minister's office had not issued any public message, extending greetings to the Muslim community. By all accounts, it would seem that our forecast was correct and that the government did not make good on its earlier promise.
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