Shree Kumar Maharjan, Ph.D. International Cooperation Studies

Shree Kumar Maharjan With the initiation of the tourism industry in Nepal, Religious tourism is playing significant role in development and promotion of tourism. Nepal is well known country for the living Goddess Kumari; having festivals more than days in a year; gods more than the people in a country and temples more than the houses, it is home of several religions of the world and has large number of shrines dedicated to various gods/goddesses and catering to different religions. Pashupatinath temple, Manakamana temple, Janaki temple, Lumbini, Changu Narayan, Macchendranath Ratha Yatra, Gosainkunda and Dakshinkali temple are well known religious sites of the country. Regular and frequent visit to these sites by different foreigners and domestic visitors plays important role in improving lifestyles of the surrounding communities and advertising of tourism throughout the historical movement in Nepal. Kirtipur is a small artistic municipality and an old settlement on a double hillock in

Shree Kumar Maharjan Background Ropai Jatra or Mela is a festival celebrated for planting rice in the farmers’ fields, in which group of farmers and other participants including tourists plough and levels the field using pair of bullocks, plant the rice seedlings singing traditional folk songs (called ASARE GEET in local language). It is celebrated on Asad 15 of nepali year (i.e., June 29) every year as a symbol of end of planting period in most of the areas. In recent years, it is gaining popularity in the various parts of Nepal, due to increased interests and participations of tourists and tourism organizations and addition of some interesting events and competitions on muddy paddy fields like Folk song competitions, planting rice competitions, Bull race competition playing with mud (HILO KHELNE in Nepali), serving traditional food items, playing PANCHE BAJA (traditional musical instrument) as a symbol of good fortune and several other entertaining games. This ceremony is important f