In mid-January this year, the British government changed its policy and announced that Gurkha children of age 30 and under would now be allowed to settle in the UK. To the Gurkha Satyagraha Joint Struggle Committee in the UK and the Gurkha Ex-Servicemen Organisation (Gaeso) in Nepal, which have engaged in legal battles and street protests against the 2008 court decision, this relaxation in the British government’s policy is a cause for joy, albeit a subdued one.

“More than 20,000 children have already left for the UK. This slackening of age limit means that more will now be able to join their parents,” says Mahendra Lal Rai, general secretary at Gaeso.

One of the children leaving for the UK will be Subash, now 27 years old and eligible to join his parents who are already in the UK. His sister, however, will be left behind. She is 31 years old.

“Despite a string of remedies taken to right the historic injustice Gurkhas have suffered, the new British policy is still discriminatory,” says Mahendra. Gaeso and the Satyagraha Committee

have been demanding that the UK not separate children from their families

and allow children of any age of British Gurkhas to settle in the UK.

The UK government gave settlement rights to British Gurkha in 2004, but only to those retired after 1997, when Hong Kong was handed back over to China and the Gurkha headquarters were moved from the Asian city to Britain. Later, in 2008, it opened doors to British Gurkhas retired before 1997, but with conditions so restrictive that only a few hundred could be eligible. For instance, only those Gurkhas who had stayed in Britain continuously for three years or those who had served 20 years in the army could receive permission to settle in the UK.

A year later in 2009, the restrictions were lifted and any Gurkha who had served four or more years in the army could now settle in Britain. Their children, however, had to be 18 years old or under to join their parents. Subash’s father, who retired in 1971, left for the UK, but without his children. In January 2013, a British court order said that over-18 children could get residential visas in exceptional cases, if the fathers are able to prove that they would have settled in the UK had they never been denied that right and that their children would have been born in the country.

With this January’s decision, UK is now allowing Gurkhas’ children under 30 years of age to permanently reside in the country. But all hope is not lost for those over the age limit. Gaeso has already invited two lawyers from the UK to plan their next course of actions.

“For those children over 30, we will look into their stories and represent them in legal cases,” says Mahendra. “First, though, we need to figure out how many of these over-30 children will be left behind.”