In many countries of the developing world, the rural development (RD) is being contested. However, research on rural development gained relatively little about the contestation. In this context, the paper attempts to map out the debates and issues on rural development from the viewpoints of ethnic movements. Sharing a critical perspective, this paper argued that notion of RD has just ‘strategically’ led by the state though some outcomes have been achieved. Beyond the rhetoric of the development, the central proposal of this paper is that there are contested issues reflected from ethic movements’ claims and counter claims, which are to be analysed under the emerging discourse of “contested rural development”. The paper set out the current deliberations and knowledge gaps about rural development, and examined emerging issues of contestation. This paper draws reflections on other studies, practices and critiques taking Nepal as a whole “study region”.