4 The 1950 movement

The end came from outside as much as inside. India's independence removed the guarantee the Ranas had relied on; the Nepali Congress, formed in 1947, combined an armed rising with mass protest; King Tribhuvan's departure to the Indian embassy in Kathmandu in November 1950 turned a dynastic dispute into a constitutional crisis. The Delhi compromise of 1951 restored the king, installed a Rana as prime minister in an interim arrangement, and ended the hereditary premiership — but left the institutions of the old order largely intact.