Nepal's Supreme Court has demanded that the government repeal discriminatory laws against homosexuality and replace them with legislation that would ensure equal rights to all LGBT citizens, including inheritance, property and marriage rights.

Sunil Plant is Nepal's only openly gay Parliament member. He told Press Trust India, "This is a landmark decision for the sexual minorities and we welcome it. The court ordered the government to form a seven member committee to formulate laws that recognize same-sex marriage in European countries, ending all types of discrimination against gays and lesbians."

Plant is also the founder of the Blue Diamond Society, an LGBT rights group that has reported a great deal of harassment against the gay community in Nepal in the past. For example, in March, the hospice the Society runs for gay men with HIV/AIDS was shut down because neighbors were complaining that they did not want it there. In a 2006 police raid, 26 transsexuals were arrested and held for weeks in a Kathmandu police station without being permitted to contact anyone. Last year, Maoist guerrillas captured two young lesbians and only released them when they had sworn to join the rebels.

However, the situation has slowly improved since May, when the Maoists overtook the monarchy and democracy was restored to the Nepalese government.