Bhojpur Districtभोजपुर जिल्ला

Bhojpur occupies the hills west of the Arun river in eastern Nepal, climbing from about 153 m in the valley floors to 4,153 m on its highest ridges — a sweep that packs five of Nepal's eight climate zones into 1,507 km². The headquarters town, Bhojpur bazaar, sits at roughly 1,595 m, and Salpa Pokhari, a small alpine lake on the old foot route toward Solukhumbu, is a local pilgrimage site. The district's nine local levels — two municipalities and seven rural municipalities — became operational in the May 2017 local restructuring.

The district is best known nationally for the Bhojpure khukuri, the broad, heavy version of Nepal's iconic curved blade. Local blacksmiths are believed to have been forging khukuris here since at least 1908, and the craft's fame was sealed in 1970 when blacksmith Singh Bahadur Bishwakarma presented one to King Mahendra during a royal visit. Dozens of villages, including Kot, Dalgau and Gogane, still produce blades for buyers as far away as the United States and Europe, though restrictions on charcoal-making timber, out-migration of young workers and thin government support have squeezed the trade.

Bhojpur is a Rai heartland — Rai people make up 36.3% of the population, followed by Chhetri (17.7%) and Tamang (10.8%) — and a textbook case of Nepal's emptying hills: the population fell from 182,459 in 2011 to 157,923 in 2021, an annual decline of 1.39%, among the steepest in Koshi Province, as households moved to the Tarai and abroad for work.