By Gopal Sharma and Annie Banerji

KATHMANDU/NEW DELHI, Feb 3 (Openly) - Nepal will count LGBT+ people for the first time in its next census, a move that campaigners on Monday said could help sexual minorities gain better access to education and health schemes. The census - scheduled for June 2021 - will help end stigma and challenges that LGBT+ people face in accessing support and welfare schemes, said Dhundi Raj Lamichhane, an official at the Central Bureau of Statistics.

He said people would need to identify themselves and their family members as either "male", "female" or "others (sexual/gender community)". There will be no follow-up options to choose which sexual orientation they identify with in the census - a trial of which will be held in March.

The move will allow planning for social security and other rights, including government quotas, guaranteed to LGBT+ people in the constitution - which was passed in 2015 - Lamichhane told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. Read more via Openly