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Nepal's vice president ordered to retake oath
(Agencies)
Updated: 2009-08-24 11:34

KATMANDU, Nepal: Nepal's supreme court has ordered the vice president to retake the oath of office in the Nepali language or lose his job, a court notice said Monday.

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A case was filed in court last year after Vice President Paramananda Jha took the oath in Hindi, while the new president spoke in Nepali. Protests broke out in the streets and demonstrators called for a public apology and demanded that he retake the oath.

The order signed on Sunday by a panel of five supreme court judges said Jha has a week to retake it or he would be relieved of his position, the notice said.

Though Hindi is widely understood in Nepal, it is not an official language and is only spoken in the southern part of the country bordering India. Elected officials are required to take their oath either in Nepali or their ethnic language, which in Jha's case is Maithali.

There was no immediate comment from the vice-president's office, but in the past Jha has defended his action, saying it was an attempt to promote the inclusion of Hindi as an official language.

The president and vice president were elected last year after centuries-old monarchy was abolished and Nepal declared a republic by the Constituent Assembly.