In the narrow alleys and bustling courtyards of the Kathmandu Valley, one can still spot a few elders hunched over a hand-drawn grid, deep in concentration. Their fingers move small stones across intersecting lines etched on the ground—a scene that has quietly endured for generations. The game is called Bagh Chal, translating to “tiger’s move,” a traditional Nepali board game. As a child I remember playing with friends by drawing on paper as introduced by my father. We would roll paper and name them after tigers and goats.
Once a common pastime among both young and old, Bagh Chal is now fading into obscurity. “When we were children, everyone knew how to play it,” recalls a local resident. “We would draw the board on the floor or paper and play for hours. But now, I hardly see children playing it anymore.” With the rise of digital gaming and mobile entertainment, traditional games like Bagh Chal have lost much of their foothold.
Gopal Shrestha, nearly 90, reminisced about the days when he would play Bagh Chal carefree with anyone he found in the corners of the neighborhood. “The game is slowly losing its value, and I fear this generation might not be interested in it,” he said. But he remained hopeful and said, “Perhaps people can revive it by playing again, because everything comes back in cycles like fashion, culture, and traditions. Bagh Chal can be brought back if people take an interest in it.”
Bagh Chal is played between two players, one controlling four tigers and the other twenty goats. The board consists of a 5×5 point grid, with pieces placed at the intersections rather than within the squares. The tigers begin on the corners, while the goats are introduced one at a time. Before the start of the game, the twenty goats are placed outside the board, and the four tigers are positioned in the four corners. Players move alternately, with the goats always starting first. The actions made by the goats divide the game into two phases.
In the first phase, while all twenty goats have not yet been placed on the board, the only possible move is to place one of them at a free junction. In the second phase, after all goats have been placed, they may move from their position to any adjacent junction following a straight line. The tigers, throughout the game, may perform two types of movements: like goats, they can move along any line to an adjacent junction, or they may capture a goat on an adjacent point by jumping over it along a straight line and landing on the next free junction.
Jayaram Hada, a local resident of Bhaktapur, shared, “It’s refreshing to hear young people talk about these traditional games because not many are interested in them anymore. I often see my grandchildren glued to their phones and digital games, which aren’t good for their health either. Bagh Chal is such a strategic game—it sharpens the mind and keeps you alert.” He added with a smile that he would love to play again, though his aching knees now make it difficult for him to move around the corners of the courtyard as he once did.
Occasionally, the game can fall into a repetitive cycle of positions—often used by goats as a defensive tactic. To prevent endless repetition, an additional rule has been established: once all goats have been placed, no move is allowed that recreates a previously repeated position within the same game. The tigers win by capturing at least five goats, achieved by leaping over them into an adjacent empty spot, while the goats win by blocking all tigers so they can no longer move.
For the tigers, movement is allowed to any adjacent free point along the connecting lines. They can capture goats at any time, even before all the goats have been placed on the board, but only one goat can be captured in a single move. A tiger may jump over a goat in any direction as long as there is an open space to land, but it cannot jump over another tiger.
The goats, on the other hand, cannot move until all have been positioned on the board. When a goat is captured, it is permanently removed from play. Unlike tigers, goats cannot jump over any pieces, whether tigers or other goats. The game concludes when the tigers have captured five goats or when the goats successfully block all possible moves of the tigers. The game ends when either the tigers capture five goats or the goats completely trap the tigers.
Bagh Chal shares similarities with South India’s Aadu Puli Aattam (the Lambs and Tigers game), yet its identity remains distinctly Nepali—often played with stones especially on the floor. Today, some enthusiasts and developers have digitized Bagh Chal, creating mobile versions to introduce it to newer generations. But for many, the tactile pleasure of drawing the grid on the floor and playing under the open sky remains irreplaceable.
