to the south or the Dhorpatan valley to the north which—by Himalayan standards—offers exceptionally easy east–west passage. The Kham Magar highlands may also have been left as a buffer between the easternmost Baise kingdom, Salyan, and the westernmost Chaubisi kingdom, Pyuthan. For the Hindu Brahmin, the intervening highlands, unsuited for rice cultivation, were hardly worth contesting. Kham people are considered to have existed in this Himalyan belt since 3000 years ago, much longer before the birth of Buddha as they believed in shamanism, while the Magars are historically mentioned after 1100 ADs by various foreign researchers. Kham civilization is said to have given "Pal" title to many of its inhabitants. As a matter of fact, Pal kings were the early rulers of Nepal during which Kham Magar were given the title of Pals at the end of their names. Underdevelopment After unification of Nepal coming Shaha king, official neglect, underdevelopment and poverty essentially continued through the 19th and 20th centuries. The main export was mercenaries for the British and Indian armies, or whatever other employment opportunities could be found for largely uneducated and unskilled labor. Norther magar also practice transhumance by grazing cattle, sheep and goats in summer pastures in subalpine and alpine pastures to the north, working their way down to winter pastures in the Dang-Deukhuri valleys. Despite unending toil, food shortages have become a growing problem that still persists. Food deficits were historically addressed by grain imports bought dearly with distant work at low wages. As some corrupted development brought schools, electricity, motor roads, hospitals and some range of consumer goods to specific surrounding areas, few benefits trickled up into the highlands and contrasts became even more invidious. Development introduced motor transport, which diminished porterage employment. Cultivating hemp and processing it into charas (hashish) lost standing as an income generator after 1976 when international pressure persuaded the national government to outlaw these recreational drugs and close government stores where those so inclined could freely purchase what was illegal in most of the world. But the Hindu government directly indirectly encouraged the drugs. Nepalese Civil War Despite adversity, the Magar people retained a robust oral history and a sense of past greatness, which created grievances and made them receptive to the Maobadi (Maoist) movement that opposed the Shah regime in the 1996-2006 Nepalese Civil War and even the multiparty democracy that the Shahs had toyed with. The Rolpa and