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The newly-elected government of Nepal on Friday, May 30, issued a formal notice to King Gyanendra directing him to vacate the royal palace within the next two weeks. An official from the palace, on grounds of anonymity, has revealed that King Gyanendra is now preparing to shift to his own private palatial house in Kathmandu.
The moment the news of the Nepal government’s order spilled, the Nepali TV channels began airing the previous night’s footage of trucks being driven out from King Gyanendra’s palace. The formal command to withdraw from the royal palace came two days after Nepal's newly elected lawmakers, led by former communist insurgents, pronounced the Himalayan country a republic. It was on Friday morning that the order was delivered to the royal palace, informed Home Secretary Umesh Mainali.
He further revealed that by mid-day the king was still in the palace, while his daughter-in-law Hemani had shifted to a private house on the north of the city sometime after mid-night. The official from the palace further informed that the king would shift to Nirmal Niwas, a high walled house in Kathmandu where he stayed with his family before becoming king in 2001.
