Basnet Thar

What “Thar” means for the Nepali Chhetri

Thar is the Nepali word for the clan or family name that Chhetri, Bahun and other Nepali families carry as a surname. Many Chhetri thar are also given a Vedic gotra by their families; the thar and the gotra are separate things, and for high-caste Hindus in Nepal the gotra is exogamous.

Name and Origin

Basnet and Basnyat are two spellings of one name (बस्नेत and बस्न्यात); families write both. The sources read do not give a meaning for the name. For the Shreepali Basnyat of Gorkha, one family-history summary places the clan's earlier home in Saipal in the far west, citing Hamal's Military History of Nepal (1995, p. 182), and another traces the parent house to the Shreepali clan of Lamjung before the move to Gorkha. These are the accounts of the clan's own histories, and the two do not agree.

Historical Journey

The Basnyat family, as described in the standard histories of the Gorkhali state (Regmi, Shaha, Hamal, Pradhan), was a Khas Chhetri family of Gorkha. It was counted with the Shahs, Pandes and Thapas among the families that ran Nepal's politics and army before the Ranas. Shivaram Singh Basnyat commanded Gorkhali forces under Prithvi Narayan Shah and was killed at Sangachowk during the unification campaign. His son Abhiman Singh Basnyat was Mulkaji, chief minister, in the 1780s and early 1790s and is described as the first commander-in-chief of the unified state; another son, Kehar Singh, was a general who died fighting the Chaubise states in 1771. Kehar Singh's son Kirtiman Singh Basnyat succeeded as Mulkaji and was assassinated in 1801. The family's hold on central power ended in the 1840s, in the court purges that brought Jung Bahadur Rana to power. Only the Gorkha court branch is covered by these histories; Basnet families elsewhere in Nepal are not necessarily descended from it.

How the Thar Is Kept

Families of this thar are described as Tagadhari Chhetri, that is, thread-wearing. Accounts of the Shreepali Basnyat give the Vedic gotra as Bharadwaj, which matches the Bharadwaj gotra page on this site; as with every thar, a family should confirm its own gotra from its priest or family records. Because the name is a thar shared by many unrelated families, two Basnets are not necessarily kin.

Presence Across Regions

Notable Personalities