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Gurkha
(redirected from Gurkhas)

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Gurkha

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Women washing clothes outdoors, in the Gurkha region of Nepal.

Member of any of several peoples living in the mountains of Nepal: the Gurung, Limbu, Magar, Rai, and Tamang, whose young men have been recruited since 1815 for the British and Indian armies. They are predominantly Tibeto-Mongolians, but their language is Khas, a dialect of a northern Indic language.

Driven out of Rajputana by Muslim invaders, they conquered Nepal 1767–68. The East India Company fought them in 1814; the company obtained possession of the southern slopes of the Himalayas, but recognized Nepal's independence.

All ten regiments of Gurkhas served in World War I, on the Western Front, in the Middle East, and on the Northwest Frontier of India. In World War II they fought in North Africa, Italy, Burma, and Malaya. When India and Pakistan became independent 1947, four of the Gurkha regiments were assigned to the British army, mainly for service in the Far East; the remaining six went into the Indian army.



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? Mentioned in ? References in periodicals archive
 
The society, which has brought judicial review proceedings against the Ministry of Defence, said in a statement: "Whereas Gurkhas who are currently serving receive an equal monthly pension payment to their UK counterparts, about 24,000 Gurkhas (and their dependants) who served in the Army before 1997 receive an
woman who initially expressed her doubts and anxieties about the right to let Gurkhas settle in the UK in a letter to The Times?
It is unique in that it recruits Gurkhas from Nepal, which is a nation independent of the United Kingdom and not a member of the Commonwealth.
 
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