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Bhutan Penal Code
Arrests can be made only under legal authority. Exile,
stated
as a punishment in the 1953 Constitution of the National
Assembly,
and its 1968 revision, is not used as a form of
punishment, and
mutilation was abolished in 1965. Fines, according to
various
reports, ranged from the equivalent of US$10 to US$55, and
jail
sentences from seven days to one month were levied against
citizens
who violated a compulsory but not widely enforced 1989
royal decree
that they wear the national dress at formal gatherings to
preserve
and promote Bhutanese culture. With respect to
international
criminal law, in 1988 the National Assembly ratified a
SAARC
convention on terrorism, which Bhutan has consistently
condemned in
international forums. It provided for extradition of
terrorists.
The last half of the twentieth century was a momentous
period
in Bhutan's long historical development. The nation moved
from a
traditional system of governance to a de facto
constitutional
monarchy while retaining its firm Buddhist religious
basis.
Physical isolation was overcome with major road
construction and
advances in telecommunications that linked the various
parts of the
country and gave greater access to the outside world.
International
air travel brought tourism and greater amounts of foreign
exchange
needed for economic development. Having observed the
problems
encountered by other developing nations, Bhutan sought a
more
controlled economic and infrastructure development with
the
assistance of major foreign and international
organizations. Once
exclusively reliant on India for trade and aid, the
kingdom
broadened its import/export base and diversified its
sources of
economic assistance markedly during this period.
Despite these positive achievements, Bhutan faced
serious
political problems in the early 1990s. The Nepalese
minority in
southern Bhutan had been a source of serious ethnic
disturbances
and even terrorist acts, and its demands for greater
participation
in the political process had been on the rise since the
mid-1980s.
The threat to the indigenous population of gradually being
outnumbered by politically active immigrant Nepalese
raised for
Bhutan's leaders the specter of Sikkim's annexation by
India in
1974, when that kingdom's indigenous Buddhist people
became a
minority in their own country and lost political power.
The
question of how to modernize the nation politically
remained a
crucial one, and Bhutan's independence and sovereignty
hung in the
balance as the 1990s progressed.
* * *
The annual writings of Brian Shaw in the Far Eastern
Economic
Review's Asia Yearbook, Statesman's
Year-Book, and
Europa's The Far East and Australasia and Europa
Yearbook provide an excellent and up-to-date overview
of all
facets of Bhutanese history, society, economy, politics,
and other
sectors. Bhutan: The Early History of a Himalayan
Kingdom by
Michael Aris provides a detailed view of Bhutan's
historical
origins as derived from Bhutanese primary sources.
Bhutan's general
history is well covered in History of Bhutan by
Bikrama Jit
Hasrat. The Bhutan Planning Commission's Statistical
Yearbook of
Bhutan provides copious information on many sectors of
society
and the economy. Social and economic developments are
cogently
presented in Pradyumna P. Karan's Bhutan: Development
Amid
Environmental and Cultural Preservation, and his
earlier book,
Bhutan: A Physical and Cultural Geography, provides
key
information on geography. The World Bank's Bhutan:
Development
in a Himalayan Kingdom and Bhutan: Development
Planning in
a Unique Environment are excellent analyses of
economic
development. Articles by Sukhdev Shah and S.W.R. de A.
Samarasinghe
in Asian Survey also provide useful analyses of the
economy
of Bhutan. Political developments from the seventeenth to
the midtwentieth century are well presented in Leo E. Rose's
The
Politics of Bhutan. The weekly official newspaper
Kuensel [Thimphu] is a good source of current
official
information on government and popular activities. To keep
abreast
of subsequent publications on Bhutan, the Association for
Asian
Studies' annual Bibliography of Asian Studies
should be
consulted. (For further information and complete
citations,
see
Bibliography.)
Data as of September 1991
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