The Maoists, Nepal's largest party and now in the opposition, Wednesday said Jha should quit instead of knuckling down.

Maoist supremo and former prime minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal Prachanda criticised the Supreme Court judgment. However, he and his party are not supporting the choice of Hindi for taking the oath of office and secrecy.

Instead, they are saying that Jha should take his oath in his mother tongue - which is Maithili and spoken by the largest number of people in Nepal after Nepali - or any other `people's language', like Bhojpuri or Awadhi.

Hindi is regarded in Nepal as the national language of India.

Though it is spoken widely in the Terai plains, the argument is that it is not the mother tongue of Terai, which predominantly speaks Maithili, followed by Bhojpuri and Awadhi.

Both the council of ministers as well as President Ram Baran Yadav have urged Jha to take the oath again in Nepali.

If he heeds the advice, the vice president will keep his job but lose his face since he had challenged the Supreme Court order, saying he could not be compelled to take the oath again in Nepali.