Nepal's Supreme Court has ordered the government to legalise cannabis farming under a regulated system, issuing a mandamus that requires the authorities to create, within three months, the legal framework needed for the controlled commercial cultivation, production, processing and sale of cannabis for medicinal, scientific, agricultural and industrial purposes. A joint bench of Justices Dr. Nahakul Subedi and Til Prasad Shrestha delivered the order, observing that although the Narcotic Drugs (Control) Act, 2033 already permits the cultivation, production and use of cannabis under specified conditions, the government has failed for nearly five decades to frame the regulations and procedures those provisions require. The full text of the verdict, handed down on Jestha 4, 2082 BS, in May 2025, was made public only recently, as reported by Nepal Press.

The ruling opens the way for legal recognition of cannabis farming in Nepal on a regulated and licensed basis, and places a firm deadline on a policy question that successive governments have left unresolved since the country's narcotics law was enacted.

What the court has ordered

At the heart of the verdict is a mandamus, a judicial order issued when a court directs a government body to carry out a duty it is legally bound to perform. In this case, the bench concluded that prolonged state inaction had left a gap between what the law allows and what the administration actually makes possible, and it moved to close that gap through a direct command to the government.

The order directs the authorities to put in place:

  • a legal framework for the controlled commercial cultivation, production, processing and sale of cannabis;
  • rules that confine these activities to medicinal, scientific, agricultural and industrial purposes;
  • the complete framework within a deadline of three months.

Because the verdict specifies medicinal, scientific, agricultural and industrial ends, the system it contemplates is one of licensing and oversight rather than unrestricted sale. Recreational use does not feature among the purposes listed by the court, meaning the ruling is aimed at opening a regulated industry for marijuana, not creating a free market for the plant.

A law that has waited nearly five decades

The court's reasoning rests on a striking feature of Nepal's existing legal framework. The Narcotic Drugs (Control) Act, 2033, which dates to the mid-1970s, does not prohibit cannabis outright. The law already allows the cultivation, production and use of the plant under specified conditions. What the statute has always lacked is the machinery needed to make those permissions usable in practice.

According to the bench, that machinery was never built. In the close to fifty years since the Act was introduced, no government framed the regulations and procedures required to operationalise its provisions on cannabis. The practical consequence has been that an activity the law contemplates in principle has remained impossible to pursue lawfully in reality, since no licensing mechanism, approval process or regulatory structure exists through which it could be authorised. It is this failure, persisting for nearly five decades, that the justices identified and sought to remedy through their order.

Three months to deliver

The mandamus comes with a clear timetable: the government now has three months to create the legal framework the court has demanded. The verdict was delivered on Jestha 4, 2082 BS, corresponding to May 2025, but its full text was released to the public only recently, drawing fresh attention to an order with significant implications for the country's farmers and for its medicinal and industrial sectors.

Meeting the deadline will require the authorities to draft and adopt the rules, procedures and licensing arrangements that give legal effect to controlled cannabis cultivation and sale. Until that happens, the position on the ground remains unchanged: the Act permits specified uses in principle, but no process currently exists through which a farmer or a business could lawfully take part in the trade.

What the ruling could unlock

If the government complies, the verdict would transform cannabis farming in Nepal from a largely inaccessible activity into a licensed and regulated commercial sector. The court's order covers the entire chain from cultivation to sale and explicitly refers to commercial-scale farming, not merely traditional or personal use. The purposes it lists, spanning medicine, science, agriculture and industry, indicate the breadth of activity the justices expect the forthcoming framework to accommodate.

The bench's repeated emphasis on regulation also signals the shape of the system it envisions: cultivation, production, processing and sale permitted on a regulated and licensed basis, with the conditions written into law rather than left to administrative discretion.

For now, the responsibility shifts squarely to the government. The Supreme Court has defined the obligation and set the deadline; framing the rules that finally give legal form to cannabis farming in Nepal, within the three-month window, is the state's task to carry out.