The Royal Nepal Army may be still standing by King Gyanendra, but for many of its jawans, the movement sweeping Nepal has come home. In protests against the King here and in other parts of Nepal, wives of armymen are joining in.

On Saturday, hundreds of women wearing black headbands marched in the heart of Simra, the industrial town in southern Nepal, rejecting the King’s offer to the seven-party coalition to form a government. Among them were at least half a dozen women whose husbands work in the RNA.

‘‘My husband is doing his duty and I am doing mine. This is a mass movement, how can I stay indoors when everybody is on the road?’’ said an unfazed Chitra Gurung, as others cheered her on. Her husband is a junior officer posted in Kathmandu. Standing beside her was Chamin Kharel, whose husband is a jawan. ‘‘I love my country and I am here to save it,’’ she said.

Initially, the army wives only lent outside support to the agitation. But as the movement spread to teachers, intellectuals, students, they realised that ‘‘everyone except them was marching on the roads’’, said Hari Thaparia, a Nepali Congress party leader.

Now a day in the week has exclusively been fixed in Simra for family members of army and ex-army persons to protest. It makes many pro-democracy agitators hopeful that the next to join in might be the armymen themselves.

‘‘We hope that the army

will revolt now. They are already waving hands in our support,’’ says Ramesh Kharel, a Communist Party leader.

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