¹ ‘Gorkha’ refers to a hill principality west of Kathmandu where the kings of the Gorkha kingdom conquered and annexed neighbouring states to form the modern nation of Nepal during the eighteenth century. It is important to note that the term ‘Gorkha’ (or its Anglicized version ‘Gurkha’) is mainly used by outsiders to refer to Nepali men who enlist in British regiments. In their self-representations and during my interviews, the term lāhure (otherwise also spelt as lahuray or lāhore) was used as a descriptor. The term commonly used for a Nepali sipāhī (solider) who serves or has served in a foreign army is lāhure, a word derived from ‘Lahore’ in Pakistan, where the enlistment of Gorkha soldiers into the Khalsa army of Maharaja Ranjit Singh began in the early nineteenth century. See, for example, Hutt, Michael, ‘A hero or a traitor? The Gurkha soldier in Nepali literature’, South Asia Research, 9:1 (1989), p. .CrossRefGoogle Scholar Chene, Mary Des, ‘Relics of empire: a cultural history of the Gurkhas, 1815–1987’, PhD thesis, Stanford University, 1991, p. Google Scholar.

² Enloe, Cynthia, Ethnic soldiers: state security in divided societies (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1980), p. .Google Scholar

³ See, for example, Whelpton, John, A history of Nepal (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005CrossRefGoogle Scholar); ‘Nepal urged to join Commonwealth’, The Himalayan, 19 January 2016, https://thehimalayantimes.com/kathmandu/nepal-urged-to-join-commonwealth, [accessed 30 September 2022].

⁴ Chene, Mary Des, ‘Soldiers, sovereignty and silences: Gorkhas as diplomatic currency’, South Asia Bulletin, 13:1–2 (1993), p. .Google Scholar

⁵ There were two Anglo-Nepalese wars (1814–1816) between Nepal and the British East India Company, during which time Britain began recruiting Gurkha troops. For further information, see Mujumdar, Kanchanmoy, Anglo-Nepalese relations in the nineteenth century (Calcutta: Firma K. L. Mukhopadhyay, 1973).Google Scholar

⁶ Ware, Vron, Military migrants: fighting for your country (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁷ Nepal: future of the Gurkha troops employed in the British and Indian armies; Tripartite agreement between the governments of Nepal, United Kingdom and India, 1947, DO 35/2462, The National Archives, United Kingdom (hereafter TNA). See also Omissi, David, ‘A dismal story?: Britain, the Gurkhas and the partition of India, 1945–48’, in The Indian Army, 1939–47: experience and development, (eds) Jeffreys, Alan and Rose, Patrick (Farnham: Ashgate, 2012), pp. 195–214Google Scholar.

⁸ The Kukri—The Journal of the Brigade of Gurkhas, No. 1, May 1949, pp. 3–43 (accessed at The Gurkha Museum, Winchester, United Kingdom).

⁹ ‘Permanent Gurkha guard for Brunei’, The Straits Times, 10 December 1963. Malaysia and Gurkhas for Brunei, 1963–1964, CO 1037/246, TNA. See also Leifer, Michael, ‘Decolonisation and international status: the experience of Brunei’, International Affairs (Royal Institute of International Affairs), 52:2 (1978), pp. 240–252Google Scholar. Menon, K. U., ‘A six-power defence arrangement in Southeast Asia?’, Contemporary Southeast Asia, 10:3 (1988), pp. 306–327CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

¹⁰ Harper, Tim and Amrith, Sunil, ‘Sites of Asian interaction: an introduction’, Modern Asian Studies, 46:2 (2012), pp. 249–257CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also Harper, Tim and Amrith, Sunil (eds), Sites of Asian interaction: ideas, networks and mobility (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

¹¹ In 2008, the Social Science Research Council made a call to seriously consider ‘inter-Asian connections’ to encourage research on the shared histories and global connections of Asian pasts, present, and futures. This initiative was aimed at creating exchanges and dialogues between different regions of Asia. For additional and varied perspectives, see Chen, Kuan-Hsing, Asia as method: toward deimperialization (Durham: Duke University Press, 2010)Google Scholar; Ho, Engseng, ‘Inter-Asian concepts for mobile societies’, The Journal of Asian Studies, 76:4 (2017), pp. 907–928.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

¹² See, for example, Mika Toyota, Brenda S. A. Yeoh and Liem Nguyen, ‘Bringing the “left behind” back into view in Asia: a framework for understanding the “migration–left behind nexus”’, Population, Space and Place, 13 (2007), pp. 157–161.CrossRefGoogle Scholar Here, the authors make a compelling argument for the need to explore the experiences of those ‘left behind’, and call for a new research framework that explores the ‘migration–left behind’ nexus in an integrated manner.

¹³ ‘Bravest of the brave’ is a phrase that is widely used in British military publications, and various Gurkha cemeteries bear this quote as an epitaph that has become synonymous with the Gurkhas. Lionel Caplan highlights that this phrase first appeared in the Preface of a Nepali dictionary published in 1931 by Gurkha officer Ralph Turner. See, for example, Caplan, Lionel, ‘“Bravest of the brave”: representation of “the Gurkha” in British military writings’, Modern Asia Studies, 25:3 (1991), pp. 571–597CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also Turner, Ralph, A comparative and etymological dictionary of the Nepali language (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1965Google Scholar); MacMunn, George, The martial races of India (England: Taylor and Francis, 2013Google Scholar).

¹⁴ See, for example, Stoler, Ann Laura, Along the archival grain: epistemic anxieties and colonial common sense (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2009Google Scholar); Burton, Antoinette (ed.), Archive stories: facts, fictions, and the writing of history (Durham: Duke University Press, 2005Google Scholar).

¹⁵ Thomson, Alistair, ‘Life histories and historical analysis’, in Research methods for history, (eds) Simon Gunn and Lucy Faire (London: Edinburgh University Press, 2012), p. .Google Scholar

¹⁶ Ibid.

¹⁷ Thomson, Paul, ‘The voice of the past: oral history’, in The oral history reader, (eds) Robert Perks and Alistair Thomson (New York: Routledge, 1998), pp. 29–30.Google Scholar

¹⁸ Caplan, ‘“Bravest of the brave”’, pp. 571–597. See also Caplan, Lionel, Warrior gentlemen: ‘Gurkhas’ in the Western imagination (Providence: Berghahn Books, 1995Google Scholar).

¹⁹ See, for example, Adshead, Robin, Gurkha: the legendary soldier (Singapore: Asia Pacific Press, 1970Google Scholar); Cross, J. P. and Gurung, Buddhiman, Gurkhas at war: eyewitness accounts from World War II to Iraq (London: Greenhill Books, 2007Google Scholar).

²⁰ Hutt, ‘A hero or a traitor?’, pp. 21–32.

²¹ See, for example, Forbes, Duncan, Johnny Gurkha (London: R. Hale, 1964Google Scholar); Farwell, Byron, The Gurkhas (London: A. Lane, 1984Google Scholar); Leathart, Scott, With the Gurkhas: India, Burma, Singapore, Malaya, Indonesia, 1940–1959 (Edinburgh: Pentland Press, 1998Google Scholar); Harclerode, Peter and Reynolds, David, Gurkha: the illustrated history (Stroud, Gloucestershire: Sutton Publishing Ltd, 2003Google Scholar); Parker, John, The Gurkhas: the inside story of the world’s most feared soldiers (London: Headline, 2005Google Scholar); Bullock, Christopher, Britain’s Gurkhas (London: Third Millennium Publishing, 2009Google Scholar).

²² Bayly, Christopher and Harper, Tim, Forgotten wars: the end of Britain’s Asian empire (London; New York: Allen Lane, 2007Google Scholar); Hack, Karl, Defence and decolonisation in Southeast Asia: Britain, Malaya and Singapore 1941–1968 (Richmond: Curzon, 2001Google Scholar); Hack, Karl and Rettig, Tobias (eds), Colonial armies in Southeast Asia (London; New York: Routledge, 2006Google Scholar).

²³ Gellner, David, ‘Warriors, workers, traders, and peasants: the Nepali/Gorkhali diaspora since the nineteenth century’, in Routledge Handbook of South Asian Diasporas, (eds) David Washbrook and Joya Chatterjee (New York: Routledge, 2013), pp. 136–150Google Scholar.

²⁴ Subba, Tanka and Sinha, A. C. (eds), Nepali diaspora in a globalized era (New York: Routledge, 2016)Google Scholar; Gellner, David and Hausner, Sondra (eds), Global Nepalis: religion, culture, and community in a new and old diaspora (New Delhi, India: Oxford University Press, 2018Google Scholar).

²⁵ Taken together, both the aforementioned volumes include wide-ranging chapters on the experiences of Gurkhas in the United Kingdom as well as India. For further insights in the context of the United Kingdom, see, for example, David Gellner et al., ‘Shrines and identities in Britain’s Nepali diaspora’, Diaspora: A Journal of Transnational Studies, 19:1 (2010), pp. 116–146Google Scholar; Pariyar, Mitra, ‘Overseas caste among military migrants: the migration and settlement of Nepalese Gurkhas in Britain’, PhD thesis, Macquarie University, 2016.Google Scholar For further insights into the context of India, see, for example, Subba, Tanka, Ethnicity, state and development: a case study of Gorkhaland movement in Darjeeling (New Delhi: Vikas 1992)Google Scholar; Samanta, Amiya, Gorkhaland movement: a study in ethnic separatism (New Delhi: Ashish Publishing House, 2001Google Scholar).

²⁶ Tam, Siumi, ‘Dealing with double marginalization: three generations of Nepalese women in Hong Kong’, Asian Journal of Women’s Studies, 16:2 (2010), pp. 32–59CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Tang, Wai-Man, ‘Entangled in big events: rise of heroin use among children of ex-Gurkhas in Hong Kong’, Substance Use and Misuse, 50:7 (2015), pp. 869–877CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed; Kiruppalini, Hema, ‘Riots, “residence”, and repatriation: the Singapore Gurkhas’, in Nepali diaspora in a globalized era, (eds) Tanka Subba and A. C. Sinha (New York: Routledge, 2016), pp. 259–273Google Scholar; Low, Kelvin, ‘Belonging and not-belonging: experiences of Nepali Gurkha families on returning from Singapore’, in Global Nepalis: religion, culture, and community in a new and old diaspora, (eds) David Gellner and Sondra Hausner (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2018), pp. 163–187Google Scholar.

²⁷ Farwell, Byron, The Gurkhas (London: A. Lane, 1984), p. Google Scholar.

²⁸ Nepal: future of the Gurkha troops employed in the British and Indian armies; Tripartite agreement between the governments of Nepal, United Kingdom and India, 1947, DO 35/2462, TNA.

²⁹ Ibid.

³⁰ Ibid. See also ‘Gurkhas’ H.Q. closes down’, The Straits Times (Singapore), 17 March 1948.

³¹ Ibid.

³² Movement of Gurkha personnel and families: policy on air trooping, 1959–1966, WO 32/18664, TNA.

³³ DO 35/2462, TNA.

³⁴ Ibid.

³⁵ Ibid.

³⁶ Ibid.

³⁷ Ibid.

³⁸ Ibid. For further insights on panipatiya, see, for example, Imy, Kate, Faithful fighters: identity and power in the British Indian Army (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2019), pp. 87–115.Google Scholar Kate Imy demonstrates that, historically, although individual soldiers did not necessarily ascribe to caste-specific beliefs about the kala pani, by the First World War pani patya had become mandatory and was institutionalized for Nepali troops but not for Indian Hindus. She demonstrates that the centralizing religious-secular proclivities of Nepal’s prime minister Chandra Shumsher Jung Bahadur Rana had an impact on issues concerning the social purity of Gurkha soldiers and their ability to reclaim their place in the nation once they returned home. For further insights on caste policies and practices of the Brigade of Gurkhas, see, for example, Pariyar, Mitra, ‘Caste, military, migration: Nepali Gurkha communities in Britain’, Ethnicities, 20:3 (2019), pp. 608–627.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

³⁹ Gregorian, Raffi, The British Army, the Gurkhas and Cold War strategy in the Far East, 1947–1954 (New York: Palgrave, 2002), p. .CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁴⁰ Throughout the late 1940s–1960s, there was a backlash from some Indian and Nepali political parties over the recruitment of Gurkhas by the United Kingdom. The Nepali National Congress operated from India during the late 1940s; at that time, their leader B. P. Koirala, through letters published in the Indian press in the early 1950s, exerted pressure for the withdrawal of Gurkhas from Malaya and alluded to the moral degradation of Nepali nationals fighting against an independence movement there. Copy of the Sunday Leader, 6 August 1948, DO 35/2462, TNA. Apart from the Nepali National Congress, other political circles in India, such as the Communist Party of India (CPI), objected both to the recruitment of Gurkhas and the role they played in Malaya during this period. See, for example, Negotiations for continuation of Gurkha Recruitment, 1958–1959, DO 35/8968, TNA.

⁴¹ Gurkha Troops Serving in the British Army—Service Provisions for Gurkha Officers and Men, DO 35/2462, TNA.

⁴² Negotiations for continuation of Gurkha recruitment, 1958–1959, DO 35/8968, TNA.

⁴³ Ibid.

⁴⁴ See, for example, DO 35/2462; FO 766/41; FO 766/40, TNA. On the one hand, from the perspective of the United Kingdom, the Gurkhas were not fighting against a national movement but a ruthless communist insurrection. On the other hand, from the perspective of anti-imperialists and pro-communist segments, the Gurkhas were viewed as ‘mercenaries’ furthering British imperial agendas.

⁴⁵ The Parbate used to be printed by Shaw printing works at Robinson Road in Singapore, and was distributed to the various military bases in the Far East and beyond. See, for example, weekly Parbate issues published in the years spanning 1949–1971 (accessed at the Gurkha Museum, Winchester, United Kingdom).

⁴⁶ ‘Gurkha welfare’, The WVS Bulletin, No. 111, March 1949, Royal Voluntary Service, United Kingdom.

⁴⁷ Ibid. See also ‘The WVS with the Brigade of Gurkhas’, The Kukri—The Journal of the Brigade of Gurkhas, No. 1, May 1949, pp. 46–50.

⁴⁸ ‘Wives of Gurkha soldiers arrive’, South China Morning Post, 16 November 1953.

⁴⁹ ‘Lady Reading: Chairman of W.V.S. visits H.K’, South China Morning Post, 9 April 1953. In 1953, the dowager marchioness of Reading, GBE, chairman of the Women’s Voluntary Service, is reported to have toured the Far East to meet and discuss welfare matters with members of the WVS, visiting all the Gurkha camps. The welfare of the armed forces was among the various duties that the WVS undertook. They served Gurkha families, especially women and children.

⁵⁰ ‘Gurkha welfare’, The WVS Bulletin.

⁵¹ Pseudonyms have been used throughout this article to protect informants’ identities.

⁵² Personal correspondence with Tika Gurung, United Kingdom, 2019.

⁵³ ‘The Brigade of Gurkhas Recruit Training Centre’, The Kukri—The Journal of The Brigade of Gurkhas, No. 4, August 1952, pp. 81–87.

⁵⁴ Personal correspondence with Balhang Limbu and family, Nepal, 2019.

⁵⁵ Movement of Gurkha personnel and families: policy on air trooping, 1959–1966, WO 32/18664, TNA.

⁵⁶ Ibid. Archival correspondence reveals that the sea journey between Calcutta and Singapore took 11 days as against seven hours by air and that the bulk movement of Gurkhas was more cost-effective by air than by sea. At this time, the main challenge was to secure Air India, Cathay Pacific, and Malayan Airways as candidates to facilitate the movement of Gurkha families. During this period, the major development of the Biratnagar airfield in Nepal was also mooted.

⁵⁷ Ibid.

⁵⁸ Ibid.

⁵⁹ Ibid.

⁶⁰ ‘Gurkha families join fathers: settling down to English ways’, The Times (London, England), 7 April 1962, p. 5; See also ‘Gurkhas in my home’, The Birmingham Post, 7 December 1963. Digitized newspapers accessed at the British Library, London, United Kingdom.

⁶¹ Levitt, Peggy and Glick Schiller, Nina, ‘Conceptualizing simultaneity: a transnational social field perspective on society’, International Migration Review, 38:3 (2004), pp. 1002–1039.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁶² Here, I am referring to the transnational routes of Gurkha families serving in the British Army. The Gurkha Contingent in Singapore, which was established on 9 April 1949, continues to be an indomitable part of the Singapore Police Force under the Ministry of Home Affairs. Their migrant pathways in relation to British Gurkha families need to be adequately contextualized.

⁶³ Law, Kam-Yee and Lee, Kim-Ming, ‘Socio-political embeddings of South Asian ethnic minorities’ economic situations in Hong Kong’, Journal of Contemporary China, 22:84 (2013), pp. 984–1005CrossRefGoogle Scholar; ‘British withdrawal from Malaysia and Singapore and the reduction of the Brigade of Gurkhas’, https://www.gurkhabde.com/british-withdrawal-from-malaysia-and-singapore-and-the-rundown-of-the-brigade-of-gurkhas/, [accessed 30 September 2022].

⁶⁴ Empirical analysis gathered from visits to field sites; personal correspondence with Gurkha families who once lived in these camps; and further corroborated by archival records and publications procured in the United Kingdom, Singapore, Malaysia, and Nepal.

⁶⁵ Personal correspondence with Harka Limbu and Manisha Limbu, 2019, Nepal.

⁶⁶ Yeoh, Brenda et al., ‘Introduction’, in Asian migrations: sojourning, displacement, homecoming and other travels, (eds) Piper, Nicola, Hua, Shen Hsiu, Lorente, Beatriz P. and Yeoh, Brenda S. A. (Singapore: Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore, 2005), p. Google Scholar.

⁶⁷ Linda Yeung, ‘The SAR’s invisible migrants’, South China Morning Post, 16 June 2000. This newspaper article also sheds light on the social challenges that Gurkha children and other Nepalese have encountered as a minority ethnic group in the SAR (Special Administrative Region).

⁶⁸ Claire Taylor, ‘Gurkhas: Terms and Conditions of Service’, 12 June 2009, SN/IA/4671; ‘Immigration: discharged members of the Armed Forces’, 11 June 2009, SN/HA/4399; ‘Gurkha Pensions’, 12 June 2009, SN/BT/4375, all in the International Affairs and Defence Section, House of Commons Library; Djuna Thurley ‘The campaign for Gurkha pensions’, 8 September 2021, House of Commons Library.

⁶⁹ Ibid.

⁷⁰ ‘Britain opens door to 36,000 Gurkha veterans after policy U-turn’, The Times, 29 January 2009.

⁷¹ Jennifer Meierhans, ‘Gurkha veterans on hunger strike outside Downing Street’, BBC News, 11 August 2021; ‘Nepalese Gurkhas end hunger strike over UK military pensions’, Aljazeera, 20 August 2021.

⁷² Pratyoush Onta, ‘Dukha during the World War’, Himal Southasian, 6 December 2016.

⁷³ Personal correspondence with Padam Rai and Lilawati Rai, Nepal, 2019.

⁷⁴ Gregorian, The British Army, pp. 9–10.

⁷⁵ Personal correspondence with Tul Bahadur Thapa and Maya Thapa, United Kingdom, 2019.

⁷⁶ Manisha Aryal, ‘To Marry a Lahuray’, Himal Southasian, 1 July 1991.

⁷⁷ Personal correspondence with Shankar Limbu and Sita Limbu, Nepal, 2019.

⁷⁸ Ibid.

⁷⁹ Ibid.

⁸⁰ Personal correspondence with Dil Burathoki and Maya Burathoki, Nepal, 2019.

⁸¹ Levitt and Schiller, ‘Conceptualizing simultaneity’, p. 1009.

⁸² Amrith, Megha and Sahraoui, Nina (eds), Gender, work and migration: agency in gendered labour settings (London: Routledge, 2018), p. .CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁸³ Shrestha, Slesh A, ‘No man left behind: effects of emigration prospects on educational and labour outcomes of non-migrants’, The Economic Journal, 127:600 (2017), pp. 495–521.CrossRefGoogle Scholar Slesh Shrestha explains that Nepal is one of the poorest countries in the world, with more than half of its population earning less than US$2 a day and that the employment of Nepali man in the British Army is a lucrative foreign employment opportunity. According to him, the present value of the lifetime income from serving in the British Gurkha Army is estimated at around US$1.3 million, more than 50 times greater than the lifetime earnings of an average salaried employee in Nepal. See also Rajendra Dahal, ‘“Lahureys” prop Nepal’s economy’, Nepali Times, September 2000.

⁸⁴ David Gellner highlights that the Gurkhas used their pensions to invest in land in Nepal. He demonstrates that they no longer retire to their villages. Instead, they have settled in, for example, Kathmandu, Pokhara, or Biratnagar. This was evident during the period of my ethnographic fieldwork in Nepal as well. See Gellner, David, ‘Caste, ethnicity and inequality in Nepal’, Economic and Political Weekly, 42:20 (May 19–25, 2007), pp. 1823–1828.Google Scholar

⁸⁵ David Wallen, ‘Brunei to add more Gurkhas’, South China Morning Post, 10 December 1988. According to David Wallen, to resolve the manpower shortages in its armed forces, Brunei continued to recruit troops from Nepal. Gurkhas were formed into two battalions, a guards unit, and a reserve unit. By and large, the Gurkha Reserve Unit is made up of retired members of the Brigade of Gurkhas and they are under the direct command of the Sultan of Brunei, outside the command structure of the Royal Brunei Armed Force (RBAF). See also Roberts, Christopher, ‘Brunei Darussalam: consolidating the foundations of its future?’, Southeast Asian Affairs, (2011), pp. 35–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁸⁶ Keren Haynes, ‘The Gurkha’s toughest battle’, South China Morning Post, 31 January 1994. This article brings to the fore how adjusting to civilian life is not easy for the former Gurkha soldiers whose life has been in the army. It includes an anecdote about K. D. Pun who, in anticipation that he might fail to provide for his family, applied to join the Gurkha Reserve Unit in Brunei. If that plan failed, he intended to go back to farming.

⁸⁷ Personal correspondence with Govind Gurung and Kumari Gurung, 2019, Nepal.