The monsoon this year arrived on time, and brought life-giving rain — irrigating paddy terraces, recharging groundwater, reviving springs, and increasing electricity generation.
But Nepal has to deal with either too much water or too little. On a clear April day before the monsoon, the hills of Sindhuli district were parched, and there were wildfires burning out of control. There had been no rain for the past six months.
And that has been the perennial crisis for Nepal’s farmers: that 85% of the rainfall occurs during just four months of the monsoon with little rain for the other eight months. 
The water crisis is related to the powerful changes sweeping the mid-hill region of Nepal. With better roads, higher incomes and more exposure, many residents now aspire to have the kind of water supply seen in urban homes. They want hot or cold water at the turn of a tap, showers and flush tank toilets. 
To meet this rising demand, many local and provincial governments are investing in large water supply projects often by lifting water from rivers hundreds of metres down the mountain. But these new systems may not be sustainable in the long run.
Many villages in Sindhuli are switching from local springs to piped systems, and even in rural homes, overhead tanks are becoming common.
But this new convenience comes with big challenges. Lifting water from rivers far below requires long pipes, electric pumps, and constant maintenance. These systems are costly, and the streams themselves often shrink to a trickle in the dry months. Big water-lifting schemes look impressive, but there is doubt if they can meet growing water demand.
A much more sustainable solution would be what some communities are doing: restoring old ponds or build new recharge systems. But those villages are exceptions, in most places traditional ponds and wallows are being filled up to be turned into sports fields, or make way for buildings.
Where there are new ponds, they are sometimes in the wrong places or without proper design. Roads and drains are not engineered properly and have increased landslides and erosion. Water management in hilly areas is not just about building things, it is about building in the right way, in the right place.
Traditional water systems were based on nature. They were not perfect, but they used the land wisely. Ponds used to hold rainwater and slowly refill springs which supported families, farms, and forests. 
Not everything worked well in the past, but we can learn from traditional water management practices. Across Nepal, some rural municipalities have launched campaigns to store monsoon runoff — either in tanks, ponds or by recharging the aquifers.
But not all efforts have been successful. Some ponds are built without any hydrological study. Some are rushed to meet deadlines rather than real needs. 
Now, the Muhan initiative hopes to revive springs to make households more resilient and help farmings. With the financial support of the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research, research is being done to understand how springs work and how they are affected by changes in rainfall, land use, and development. 
Instead of just building pipes and tanks, the project maps the entire springshed so we can understand the root cause of water shortage. In Sindhuli, the problem is not the amount of rain, but the loss of natural systems that store it and the social systems that manage water. 
Nepal’s towns and villages now face a major challenge: how to manage water all year round as demand rises with people’s living standards. Depending only on river-lift systems is not a sustainable solution. 
We need a mix of approaches that help store water from the rainy season to make it available for the rest of the year, whether by directly harvesting rainwater, restoring ponds, managing springsheds, or smart management of demand.
Rural Nepal is also seeing dramatic depopulation. Much of the outmigration can be stemmed if there is easier water supply for agriculture and household use. Across the mid hills, villages are emptying because springs are going dry. Government policy needs to catch up with the reality on the ground, and support solutions that work for people and nature. Every water supply plan should include recharge structures. Every road or building project should consider water flow and erosion. Local governments need more than budgets: they need training, tools, and data.
Ngamindra Dahal is with the Nepal Water Conservation Foundation, Kathmandu. Hemant Ojha collaborated in this piece and is associated with the Sydney-based Institute for Study and Development Worldwide.

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Opinion

Water for Life

A Nepal-based <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/a-few-good-agents" target="_blank">ethical</a> migrant worker recruiter has created waves internationally to be only the second company worldwide to be certified recently under the International Recruitment Integrity System (<a href="https://iris.iom.int/" target="_blank">IRIS</a>). International Manpower Recruitment (IMR) was recognized for its high ethical recruitment standards. &nbsp;This comes as Nepal reels from news involving the misuse of <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/labour-mobility/revisiting-visit-visas" target="_blank">visit visas</a> by immigration officials, recruitment related <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/free-visa-free-ticket-policy-in-limbo" target="_blank">corruption</a>, <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/migrating-for-domestic-work" target="_blank">bans</a>, and vested interest groups which have overshadowed the role of migration as a powerful <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/migration-is-development" target="_blank">development</a> tool.&nbsp; IRIS is an initiative of the International Organization for Migration (IOM) to promote ethical recruitment of migrant workers. It is a bit like fair trade certifications for consumer products like coffee, tea or chocolate that assure conscious consumers that they are not complicit in labor abuses, even if it means having to pay a premium. Certifications like IRIS give responsible companies wanting to ethically hire Nepali workers more confidence that workers will not be cheated. It is remarkable that a <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/fee-free-migration-is-possible" target="_blank">Nepali recruiter</a> has been recognised as a global pioneer in obtaining this certification after a rigorous audit process. Only one other recruiter in Singapore has received this global certification so far, and a Kenyan company got it after Nepal’s IMR. All this is happening when the international labour market is <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/free-visa-free-ticket-policy-in-limbo" target="_blank">not yet ready</a> for ethical recruitment. Many employers still do not pay for the costs and fees that workers incur, unhealthy competition among recruiters persists, and individual brokers prey on workers. &nbsp;Complying with ethical practices therefore are not always generous, and can even threaten business sustainability of companies. IMR in Nepal has been one of the biggest recruiters in some years despite being ethical, but there have also been periods when the numbers have gone down to zero. The company was just recovering from Covid-19 impact when I first covered its work in this <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/a-few-good-agents" target="_blank">column</a> in 2021 titled ‘A Few Good Agents’. Just before the lockdowns IMR had lost business because Nepal <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/nepal-and-malaysia-rewrite-rules-for-migrant-labour" target="_blank">banned</a> the emigration of Nepalis to Malaysia, its primary destination market. Now, Malaysia has again <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/free-visa-free-ticket-policy-in-limbo" target="_blank">stopped</a> the intake of foreign workers. IMR has faced three big episodes of business downturn after it decided to become fully ethical in 2018. During such times when they sent very few workers—59 in 2019, 166 in 2020, and 75 in 2025 so far—traditional recruitment in which workers pay fees is always convenient and a profitable fall back option. There are many hiring companies looking for Nepali workers, but do not abide by the ‘employer pays’ principle. And many workers are desperate to migrate overseas even if it means by paying unjustifiably high recruitment fees.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250611080648_dc1079727ad0567a9cf457e8014e325b08cb54766bdf6f145021168237824985.jpg" data-media-id="editor_11" data-image-id="20250611080648_dc1079727ad0567a9cf457e8014e325b08cb54766bdf6f145021168237824985" data-rendition-name="original" width="4032" height="3024" loading="lazy" alt="Valuing moral migration NT"> </figure>  But ethical recruiters cannot fold to the pressures of business downturns, no matter how easy or tempting. To stay undeterred, what is required is commitment to ethical standards. The IRIS certification to Nepal’s IMR is a reward for precisely that: commitment. But how will this well-vetted stamp translate to jobs for Nepali workers? In theory, we can be hopeful that certifications like IRIS can help responsible hiring companies separate the wheat from the chaff since the industry is full of unethical players globally.&nbsp; It also may not always be practically feasible for employers to conduct their own due diligence as it can be time consuming, costly, and they may not be familiar with the Nepal market. The cost of not doing proper due diligence can also be damning for the reputation conscious brands.&nbsp; Exports from several Malaysian manufacturing companies, for example, were <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/us-ban-on-malaysian-glove-exporter-affects-nepalis" target="_blank">banned</a> after forced labour allegations. UK scheme operators faced sector wide <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/low-hanging-fruit-in-uk-farms" target="_blank">reputation damage</a>, while also losing licenses. All this when there are reliable companies which could have conducted the same recruitment drives in a responsible manner, and there are desperate jobseekers who would excel at those jobs.&nbsp; With standards like IRIS, identifying the ‘few good agents’, will be easier. There is also hope that the business downturns for ethical actors will not come in such frequencies and last so long by making diversification to new markets and sectors easier. Now with certifications like IRIS, good recruiters can distinguish themselves with more authority.&nbsp; Diversification is often difficult as good actors in the space do not have the reach, network or other means to demonstrate that they are indeed a different breed. International certifications like IRIS bring more visibility to the end of the labour supply chain actors. The workers also need to understand what such certifications mean. All overseas opportunities in Nepal are advertised as ‘free visa free ticket’ to abide by the law and misused to an extent that no one takes it seriously.&nbsp; Certifications like IRIS and other ethical accreditations would help migrants identify reliable recruiters, rather than just <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/fee-free-migration-is-possible" target="_blank">relying</a> on familiar but fraudulent individual brokers who they trust more. <div class="embed-block"><div><div style="left: 0; width: 100%; height: 0; position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%;"><iframe src="https://cdn.iframe.ly/api/iframe?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fembed%2F-mh1uk3fvQc%3Fsi%3DUhdQFbVY_olM4bg8&key=87ca3314a9fa775b5c3a7726100694b0" style="top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; position: absolute; border: 0;" allowfullscreen scrolling="no" allow="accelerometer *; clipboard-write *; encrypted-media *; gyroscope *; picture-in-picture *; web-share *;"></iframe></div></div></div> The value of this stamp of approval cannot be underestimated. After exposes of malpractice, the Nepali recruitment industry in the past has been tarred with the same brush, for example employers have pulled out from the UK seasonal visa recruitment.&nbsp; This is not a positive outcome for job seekers deprived of good recruitment opportunities. With certifications like IRIS, journalists, activists and others can also be more constructive in their exposés by putting the spotlight on ‘alternate’, well-vetted players and good practices.&nbsp; If these expectations from international certifications can translate to practice and ethical recruiters like IMR see their businesses expand, it will have a positive spillover effect across the industry. A strong business case for ethical recruitment standards will inspire more actors to forego ridiculously high profits from the traditional worker-paid model and transition from traditional to hybrid methods, then from hybrid to ethical models. Already, there are a handful of professional recruiters in Nepal who are committed to ethical recruitment and have received other international certifications. A critical mass of ethical actors in the space would raise the standards of the Nepali recruitment industry as a whole. Recruiters serve an important purpose which is often easy to overlook amidst all the malpractices by linking workers from the remotest parts of Nepal to rewarding, jobs abroad. The positive spillover also goes beyond the recruitment industry to achieve larger development goals. For example, <a href="https://www.migration-lab.com/" target="_blank">Migration Lab</a> has partnered with IMR in two projects to send workers from marginalised communities including <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/migration-is-development" target="_blank">Musahar</a> youth and <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/quake-survivors-migrate-for-work" target="_blank">Jajarkot</a> earthquake victims to Malaysia at zero cost.&nbsp; These were <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-mh1uk3fvQc" target="_blank">piloted</a> to making migration accessible to those in the periphery, which <a href="https://documents1.worldbank.org/curated/en/099951004022532326/pdf/IDU-c2bf0781-1145-4639-8b64-321016ade046.pdf" target="_blank">it is not</a>. Migration is a powerful tool and using it strategically for good is possible, provided recruitment drives are free from the usual malpractice and abuse. We are still a long way from the practice where hiring companies and workers will actively seek out recruiters who are well vetted with internationally recognised certifications. But the fact that a Nepali recruiter has achieved a demanding international certification, and is the second in the world to do so, is promising.&nbsp; Upasana Khadka heads <a href="https://www.migration-lab.com/">Migration Lab</a>, a social enterprise aimed at making migration outcomes better for workers and their families. Labour Mobility is a regular column in Nepali Times.

Upasana Khadka

Valuing moral migration

On 3 June I was woken up at 5:30am by a call from a Kuwait-based domestic worker. A common friend had put us in touch.
“Why are you up?” I asked Sharmila, knowing that it was close to 3 AM in <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/nepalis-in-kuwait-apply-to-return-home">Kuwait</a>. She had just got off work. Yet, that was the least of her problems.
It was her first day at this new house, where she had arrived at 9pm. Her previous employer had not been good, so with much difficulty she had been ‘returned’ to the placement office that had brought her to Kuwait.
This time, she was hopeful things would be better. At the placement office, where she waited for three weeks, there were around two dozen ‘khadama’ like her from Nepal and Sri Lanka waiting to get placed in other houses. The Nepalis, she said, had come either on <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/go-away">visit visas </a>through the UAE or through India to bypass the ban on domestic workers.
Sharmila herself had come via India. Regardless of which route they came from, they were legal since the Kuwaiti placement office that brought them are legally registered and workers had valid papers.
Meanwhile in Nepal, a ‘visit visa scandal’ has broken. The Centre for Investigation of the Abuse of Authority (CIAA) is investigating immigration officials, among others, over misuse of visit visas to facilitate human trafficking in exchange for big bribes.
There is <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/no-comment">social media outrage</a> in Nepal’s cybersphere, and calls for Home Minister Ramesh Lekhak’s resignation. That migrant workers travel on visit visas or via irregular routes such as India is well known. That there are ‘settings’ at airports with attached rates so everyone involved can get a cut is also open secret, and has always been.
A primary reason for the misuse of visit visas is the <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/migrating-for-domestic-work" target="_blank">ban</a> on <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/history-of-female-im-mobility-in-nepal" target="_blank">domestic workers</a>. To be sure, there are others who also use visit visas for short-term work since the government does not approve short-term labour permits no matter how lucrative the stint.
Nepalis traveling to countries like the US through unconventional routes, jobseekers keen to find employment in the destination country itself, or by recruiters who want to circumvent legal safeguards or because there are delays in paperwork.
The misuse of visit visas under the guise of tourism is a consequence of restrictive policies like the domestic worker <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/ban-the-ban" target="_blank">ban</a> ostensibly to protect them from abuse. And when there are massive profits involved, there is also little incentive to change. Persistent bans on overseas household work have lasted despite failure to contain migrants, and the unintended but predictable risks they put outgoing workers in.
In the government’s eyes, someone like Sharmila is non-existent as a migrant because she did not receive labour approval. Her agent is non-existent because she did not travel through a vetted recruitment agency in Nepal. Her employer is non-existent because they did not have to get the ‘demand’ attested at the Nepal Embassy.
All these details would have been well-documented had domestic workers been able to migrate regularly. Domestic or care work is already an invisible sector and the ban puts workers even more at risk from exploitation and abuse.
Meanwhile complicit recruiters and employers get a pass without any accountability. Only vetted recruiters who meet criteria that are stricter than that for regular worker recruitment should be allowed to arrange jobs abroad for domestic workers. Sharmila relied on an unauthorised individual agent who she never met in person, and who did not even turn on his camera when they had video calls.
The ban not only means that workers leave through irregular channels many are also inexperienced and unprepared. Talk to any <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/every-day-is-closer-to-pay-day" target="_blank">domestic worker</a>, especially new ones, and they will tell you how the first few months are the hardest. Modern home appliances are foreign to them and there are language barriers. As per the law, domestic workers have to go through mandatory training specifically designed for them which they are deprived of because of the ban.
“I have never taken care of babies in my life,” Sharmila said on the phone. “How will I take care of the children here?”
Women’s access to jobs, both in Nepal and overseas, needs attention. Sharmila, for example, said that she could not afford the Rs200,000 that was demanded for a cleaning job in the UAE. As an orphan, no one wanted to give her loans even at high interest rates. For her job as a domestic worker in Kuwait, she did not have to pay any fee.
Many migrants land <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/homes-away-from-home" target="_blank">good homes</a>, and they do not look at the agents as villains but as enablers who helped them bypass the ban. How else would they be employed and provide for their families? A bad migration episode does not deter many from retrying their luck again through irregular channels.
Instead of the ban, more concerted, proactive <a href="https://migrationpolicycentre.eu/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/1st_dilemma_4th_response.pdf" target="_blank">efforts</a> to manage this highly vulnerable sector rife with abuse are needed via stronger embassies, bilateral labor agreements, monitoring, pre-departure training and awareness campaigns, Regular communication, as well as <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/migrating-for-domestic-work" target="_blank">alternate</a> jobs both domestically and overseas.
This problem is not unique to Nepal. Sri Lanka’s <a href="https://www.wider.unu.edu/sites/default/files/Publications/Working-paper/PDF/wp2021-44-ban-on-female-migrant-workers-skills-differentiated-evidence-Sri-Lanka.pdf" target="_blank">restrictive policies on</a> emigration has encouraged informal and illegal activities involving lower-skilled <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/two-decades-of-debate-on-female-migration">female migrant workers </a>because they have to circumvent the policy. This has led to higher exposure to recruitment related vulnerabilities and <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/editorial/nepal-s-corruption-carousel">corruption</a>.
In a former diaspora-run paper called Sahayatra, UAE-based Dalbir Singh captured in 2007 the views of many UAE-based migrants regarding the government <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/lift-the-ban-on-domestic-workers">ban on domestic workers</a>. Migrants had a similar view: that domestic work sector should not be banned given that it puts workers in more vulnerability, but more protection is needed given the vulnerabilities in the sector.
The article noted that a river should not be blocked just because it floods. It was known 18 years ago and even earlier that bans do not protect domestic workers, and there is a long history of flip-flopping between bans of various kinds.
The last one was put in place in 2017 after a Parliamentary committee visited the Gulf and decided it was unsafe for domestic workers, regardless of gender. After a similar 2020 trip, the committee instructed the government to revisit the ban considering country-specific policies and several preconditions, which were still deemed restrictive, but better than previous rules. Implementation has been weak despite the proposal around <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/ban-on-female-migrant-workers-to-be-lifted" target="_blank">lifting</a> the ban starting with a pilot agreement with the UAE.
Will the latest ’visit visa scandal’ lead to constructive discussions around how to manage emigration better? Or will it just lead to a further clamp down on visit visa misuse by proposing bizarre alternates as has been done in the past? The most recent <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/history-of-female-im-mobility-in-nepal" target="_blank">proposal</a> that got quashed, for example, included a requirement to get "written consent from the guardian and local government for women under 40 to travel to the gulf and Africa.”
For <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/nepal-s-hard-working-students-overseas">Nepali youth</a> with a <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/push-factors-driving-nepalis-out">preference for overseas jobs</a>, there are enough vacancies and unfilled jobs in the world. They do not have to be compelled to become fake visitors, seek backdoor entry as students, rely on unauthorised agents, or even fight wars.
But for that we need to prioritise regular, safe pathways and responsible employers, and not create bottlenecks in the name of protection.
BANNING and UNBANNING
Timeline of Nepal regulations on overseas household work
1985-1995
&gt; Consent required from a guardian to go for foreign employment.
1995-2000
&gt; Women permitted to go for foreign employment in certain organised sectors (1997)
&gt; Ban on labour migration for women (1998)
2000-2005
&gt; Conditional ban provided women obtains security guarantee from Nepal’s diplomatic missions in countries outside the Gulf (2000)
&gt; Reapproval needed after visiting Nepal (2003)
&gt; Letter of approval from local governments and family members (2003)
&gt; Foreign employment for females in organised sector in Malaysia opened (2005)&nbsp;
2005-2010
&gt; Restrictions on female migrants to work in organised sector lifted (2007-2008)
&gt; Complete ban on domestic workers to Lebanon (2009)
&gt; Ban lifted for women to go to Gulf countries.
2010-2015
&gt; Women allowed to migrate to any country including as domestic workers with a government target of 150,000 female migrants, mostly to Gulf countries (2011)
&gt; Age ban for women domestic workers less than 30 years to work in Gulf countries (2012)
&gt; Temporary ban on domestic workers in Gulf countries (20-14)
&gt; Age ban for women under 25 for domestic workers in Gulf countries (2015)
2015-2020&nbsp;
&gt; Women above 24 allowed for domestic work through select recruitment agencies if a separate bilateral agreement is signed (2016)
&gt; Ban on domestic workers after field visit by Parliament Committee (2017)
&gt; Ban lifted for current domestic workers to visit Nepal during holidays and remigrate (2019)
&gt; Parliament committee recommends country-specific approach instead of blanket ban (2020)&nbsp;

Labour Mobility

Revisiting visit visas

Israel’s ongoing war of annihilation in Gaza has wiped out hospitals, schools, homes, water, and food, reducing the Palestinian territory to a wasteland and leaving a death toll of more than 53,000 people. But an equally lethal campaign has been unleashed against the foundations of Palestinian society and identity.
The Israeli Defense Force (IDF) has targeted libraries, repositories, and institutions of Palestinian culture and heritage in a mission to eradicate the history, literary accomplishments, and political and social existence of Palestine as a place and people.
“The losses in Gaza are vast, incalculable, as we are still in the throes of a genocidal war that has already destroyed 70% of the Gaza Strip and killed or maimed 10% of its embattled population,” says Raja Khalidi, Co-Administrator of the Khalidi Library, an Arab public library founded by the Khalidi family in East Jerusalem more than a century ago. “So has the Israeli war machine in Gaza and the West Bank wrought indiscriminate destruction that threatens erasure of Palestinian written, architectural, and archaeological cultural heritage.”
In a recent report on the destruction of libraries, archives, and museums in Gaza since the conflict erupted in 2023, the solidarity organisation <a href="https://librarianswithpalestine.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/LAP-Gaza-Report-2024.pdf">Librarians and Archivists with Palestine</a> (LAP) stated that “the destruction of cultural heritage in Gaza impoverishes the collective identity of the Palestinian people, irrevocably denies them their history, and violates their sovereignty.”
“The greatest loss remains the normalisation of the daily massacres of Gazans, including children. Every Palestinian life is a record, a history. The Zionist war machine realises this and the targeting of children, in particular, is an attempt at destroying the future narrative of Palestine,” says Ahmad Almallah, a Palestinian poet who grew up in Bethlehem and now lives in Philadelphia in the United States.
Bordered by Israel to the east and the Mediterranean Sea to the west, Gaza comprises 365 square kilometers of land that is home to about 2.1 million Muslim and Christian Palestinians who have lived under siege for more than half a century. Many Palestinians fled to Gaza following Israeli dispossession of their villages and homes during the Al-Nakba, or the ‘Catastrophe,’ in 1948. Then the territory was part of Egypt. Israel subsequently seized Gaza during the Six-Day War of 1967 until 1993, when the Oslo Accords made way for it to be administered by the Palestinian Authority.
The Islamic resistance organisation, Hamas, then took power in 2005. Its launching of a <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/nepalis-confirmed-killed-in-hamas-attack">raid and attack within Israel in October 2023</a>, which resulted in the death of 1,200 Israelis with 251 taken hostage, triggered the current Gaza war. Since then, the IDF has sustained a relentless military onslaught leading to the obliteration of every facility for human habitation in Gaza and the escalation of a <a href="https://apnews.com/article/hamas-israel-gaza-crisis-hunger-palestinians-war-9caf8f6eb19efe038c1fd50aa1d2d8ec">humanitarian crisis</a> due to lack of food, water, shelter, and medical services.
While a ceasefire began on 19 January, disputes between Israel and Hamas about progress in hostage and prisoner exchanges led to the <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cq6yp5d5v9jo">ceasefire fracturing on 18 March</a>. The IDF resumed its offensive with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu further threatening to <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/israel-gaza-hamas-katz-annex-idf-palestinian-witkoff-rcna197434">annex parts of Gaza</a>.
This month <a href="https://www.unesco.org/en/gaza/assessment">UNESCO</a> reported that Israel had destroyed 107 important cultural sites in the Palestinian enclave, including historic buildings, mosques, churches, and museums. And last year, LAP detailed the damage and destruction of <a href="https://librarianswithpalestine.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/LAP-Gaza-Report-2024.pdf">22 libraries and archives</a>, including Gaza’s Central Archives, which contained valuable documentation of the enclave’s 150-year history. 
The Diana Tamari Sabbagh Library, which held tens of thousands of books, was also destroyed, as was the Omari Mosque and Library, which was built in the 7th century and held a major collection of rare books dating to the 14th century. Four university libraries in Gaza also suffered damage, including the Al-Quds Open University Library and the Jawaharlal Nehru Library of Gaza’s Al-Azhar University. Historical records destroyed in Gaza include those that proved Palestinian land and property ownership.‘
Several years ago, the occupation destroyed the National Library in Gaza, razing its towering structure to the ground. With its destruction, the dream of creating a repository for both ancient and modern Palestinian works was obliterated. The site that once promised to preserve a rich cultural heritage became little more than a platform for displaying political party flags and leaders’ portraits,’ Palestinian novelist <a href="https://internationaleonline.org/contributions/the-library-and-the-massacre-a-novelists-testimony-on-the-destruction-of-libraries-in-the-gaza-strip/">Yousri al-Ghoul</a> wrote in January.
The current conflict continues attempts to erase Palestinian history and identity that began during the <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-nakba-how-the-palestinians-were-expelled-from-israel-205151">Al-Nakba</a> when Palestinian homes and their contents were looted and destroyed.
“As a child of the first intifada in Palestine, even words, the raw material for books, were very dangerous toys to play with. The Israeli occupation banned using the word ‘Palestine,’ and children and teenagers caught inscribing the word on a wall were either shot dead or arrested and subjected to torture. But that didn’t stop Palestinians from writing the word and piling on it poems, literature, and personal and natural history,” adds Almallah.
Together with this loss, Palestinian writers, intellectuals, artists, and journalists have been killed, putting in jeopardy the continuity of knowledge and culture within society and its transmission to the next generation. Those who have lost their lives since 2023 include the writer <a href="https://www.all4palestine.org/ModelDetails.aspx?gid=7&amp;mid=121099&amp;lang=en">Abdul Karim Hashash</a>, who has written many books on Palestinian poetry and culture, and <a href="https://madisonrafah.org/meca-colleague-and-friend-doaa-al-masri-killed-in-gaza/">Doaa Al-Masri</a>, Librarian at Gaza’s Edward Said Library.
In 2016 the International Criminal Court identified the desecration of a people’s cultural heritage as a <a href="https://news.un.org/en/story/2016/09/541172">war crime</a> in a case about Islamist attacks on UNESCO-protected monuments in Timbuktu in Mali. Subsequently, in 1954, <a href="https://www.unesco.org/en/heritage-armed-conflicts/1954-convention">the Hague Convention</a>, an international treaty stipulating the protection of cultural property in armed conflicts, was established and has now been signed by 136 countries.
More recently, <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-67922346">South Africa</a> included allegations of cultural dispossession in the case it launched in 2023 of genocide by Israel in Gaza in the International Court of Justice (ICJ). It will likely take the court years to reach a ruling. But in January last year, it issued initial orders to Israel to prevent and punish acts and public incitement to commit genocide by its military, an order that Israel continues to ignore.
“The international community has failed Palestinians, it has failed Gaza now. It has not done anything to stop the genocide and the massacring of children. I don’t expect they will do anything to save our books. But despite all Zionist attempts to silence them, we are witnessing Palestine becoming part of world heritage; Palestine is now everywhere,” says Almallah.
In the meantime, there are important institutions in the region taking action to ensure the tactics of erasure will not succeed. In Jerusalem, the <a href="https://www.khalidilibrary.org/en">Khalidi Library</a>, which is home to a rich collection of thousands of books and Islamic manuscripts representing an Arab literary heritage over many centuries, is a testament to cultural resilience. It also conducts extensive manuscript conservation, restoration, and digitization work and has been a pillar of vibrant Palestinian scholarship, thought, and writing since the early 20th century.
Khalidi emphasised that, looking ahead, in any reconstruction plan for post-war Gaza, “the first task will be for competent organisations, such as UNESCO, to launch a proper survey of the destruction of cultural heritage in Gaza… then ensure the future preservation and restoration or digitisation of salvaged collections.”
<a href="https://www.ipsnews.net/2025/05/palestinians-call-out-israels-mission-to-destroy-their-history-and-cultural-heritage-in-gaza/">Republished</a> under an arrangement with Inter Press Service (IPS).

The loss of an identity

With just under two months remaining till the end of the current fiscal year, the<a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/nepal-government-changes-again"> Nepal government</a> this week is set to announce its budget for the year 2025/26.&nbsp; Nepal’s budget has grown steadily over the past decade, from Rs618 billion in the fiscal year 2014/15 to Rs1.79 trillion in 2022/23. But this upward trend tells only half the story, as the total expenditure has consistently fallen short of the planned budget.&nbsp; Short of flamboyant promises and populist schemes, successive Nepali governments, regardless of party, have consistently failed to utilise the allocated budget. This year, Nepal spent just 36% of the allocated development budget. Such recurrent underspending diminishes the government's ability to simulate the<a href="https://www.econlib.org/library/Topics/Details/aggregatedemand.html#:~:text=What%20Is%20Aggregate%20Demand%3F,%2C%20services%2C%20and%20capital%20goods." target="_blank"> aggregate demand</a> and slows economic growth.&nbsp; The country’s current annual average total expenditure shortfall is just over 20%, largely due to bureaucratic and institutional inefficiencies that continue to hamper budget implementation. Furthermore, poorly-made project proposals, shoddy planning, slow-moving procurement activities, quick turnover of technical staff, and inefficient inter-ministerial coordination contribute to a limited capacity to administer development across Nepal.&nbsp; This has led to a culture of frantic, &nbsp;last-minute budget spending on Nepal, with <a href="https://internationalbudget.org/wp-content/uploads/Nepal-Budget-Credibility-and-the-Sustainable-Development-Goals.pdf" target="_blank">40</a>% of the allocated development expenditure spent on the final month of the fiscal year, leading to a misuse of resources and poor project results. These inadequacies are compounded by the lack of coordination between federal, provincial, and local governments, especially as capacity constraints at the subnational level have been a long-standing issue. Experts express particular concern over provincial and local governments, where staff are often short on technical skill and administrative know-how required for budget implementation.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250528030544_6eb2a05152532fbffd1ec32f130b0d030baf2b46963be269b68bc50417d1a814.png" data-media-id="editor_3" data-image-id="20250528030544_6eb2a05152532fbffd1ec32f130b0d030baf2b46963be269b68bc50417d1a814" data-rendition-name="original" width="512" height="485" loading="lazy" alt="Budget NT"> </figure>  For instance, provincial governments spent just 34% and local governments spent 24.4% of its budget in the fiscal year 2022/2023, which suggests a persistent deficit in planning, implementation, and resource management. &nbsp;&nbsp; A breakdown of the recurrent and capital expenditures reveals even deeper dysfunctions and gaps between the allocated and actual spending of recurrent and capital expenditure. Recurrent expenses are government spending to maintain <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/comment/nepals-uncivil-servants">public services</a> and administration, including interest, pensions, salaries, social security, and subsidies. Meanwhile, <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/till-debt-do-us-part">capital expenditure</a> involves investing in long-term assets such as development programs, equipment, and <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/climate-smarter-himalayan-infrastructure">infrastructure projects </a>to expand the productive capacity of the <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/now-the-economy-stupid">economy</a>. As it stands, Nepal’s recurrent expenditure is staggering compared to capital spending. <a href="https://scispace.com/papers/relationship-between-capital-and-recurrent-expenditure-with-hpoenzfmk4" target="_blank">Studies</a> show that the money spent on recurrent expenditure tends to have a stronger and more immediate effect on the GDP.&nbsp; In the fiscal year 2022/2023, Rs1.18 trillion was allocated for recurrent spending, while Rs380 billion was earmarked for capital expenditure. However, actual spending fell short of allocations in both expenditures, with recurrent expenditure falling short by an annual average of 14.7% and capital expenditure by a much larger average of 35.30% over the last nine years. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; This consistent underspending in capital expenditure is particularly alarming, and has direct impacts on the macroeconomy. It also plays a crucial role in creating economic momentum through the proper business <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/why-invest-in-nepal">investment </a>climate and business confidence.&nbsp; When capital expenditure falls short, aggregate demand contracts result in fewer<a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/few-jobs-created-by-nepal-employment-drive"> employment opportunities</a>, reduced household consumption, and delayed infrastructure projects that discourage business investment.&nbsp; Meanwhile, the dominance of recurrent expenditure driven by rising administrative and social security expenditures continues to crowd out funds for capital investment, perpetuating a cycle where budget numbers grow, but transformative development fails to take shape. &nbsp; The core challenge in Nepal's budget execution can be explained by the <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/social-sciences/principal-agent-theory" target="_blank">principal-agent</a> problem theory - an economic theory that explains the misalignment of conflicting incentives between two parties. In the context of Nepal, the Ministry of Finance is the principal authority that allocates the budgets and resources, while the line ministries are the agents assigned to propose and execute the budget.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250528030544_3b3b12a4065ae34b9703e848ff91f40ff570ce4b771e44d4338c4b134054f42e.png" data-media-id="editor_12" data-image-id="20250528030544_3b3b12a4065ae34b9703e848ff91f40ff570ce4b771e44d4338c4b134054f42e" data-rendition-name="original" width="512" height="377" loading="lazy" alt="Budget NT"> </figure>  However, a disconnect in incentives between the Finance Ministry and line ministries often leads to budget misallocations, which in turn cause inefficiencies and poor budget outcomes. &nbsp; One of the key dimensions of the problem is asymmetric information. The Line ministries possess detailed information of their needs and priorities in projects that are unavailable and unverifiable to the MOF. This information gap further incentivises ministries to propose higher budgets than actually needed.&nbsp; This is common behavior and expected in budget negotiations, as ministries compete for limited funds and seek to maximise their budget. Consequently, funds may be disproportionately allocated to ministries that lobby more effectively or exaggerate needs rather than those that would deliver the greatest public benefit. &nbsp;&nbsp; Read also: <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/nepal-in-the-red">Nepal in the red</a>, Ramesh Kumar This budgetary misallocation distorts not only priority projects &nbsp;but also induces &nbsp;inefficiencies in implementation. Where funds flow into inefficient use as a result, the government cannot deliver effective services or complete development projects within scheduled deadlines. This results in delayed spending, wastage of resources, and underperformance, which undermine economic growth and confidence in government. &nbsp; Closing the persistent gap between allocated total budgets and total expenditures and between the allocated and actual recurrent and capital expenditures requires the Finance Ministry to strengthen its <a href="https://ieg.worldbankgroup.org/what-monitoring-and-evaluation" target="_blank">monitoring and evaluation</a> to appropriately administer resources after the budget announcement.&nbsp; For this, the Finance Ministry must ensure effective monitoring of how line ministries spend their allocated funds throughout the fiscal year, so that it can hold the other ministries accountable and identify bottlenecks or time delays in budget implementation. This can be achieved through periodic reporting of progress, linking budget release with performance, and using combined financial management information systems. In addition, linking future budget allocations to ministries’ past performance in budget utilisation would create stronger incentives for responsible and efficient spending. When ministries know that their ability to secure funds in the next fiscal year depends on how well they manage and execute their current budget, they are more likely to submit realistic proposals and prioritise timely implementation. Doing so would help to synchronize the incentives of the Finance Ministry and line ministries in order for Nepal to effectively execute the budget and direct resources toward projects aligned with our national priorities, ultimately minimising the country’s budget deficit. Siddhartha Rayamajhi holds a BA in Economics from Kathmandu University.

How Nepal can budget wisely

A growing number of <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/searching-for-a-homeland-away-from-home">adult adoptees of Nepali origin have started returning to the land of their birth</a>, and seeking not only emotional reconnection but formal recognition through the Non-resident Nepali (NRN) card or citizenship.&nbsp; But these returnees are too often met not with welcome, but with suspicion, obstruction, and at times, open hostility.&nbsp; After becoming the first adoptee to obtain an NRN card, I recently returned to Nepal to successfully claim <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/nepal-s-citizenship-amendment-bill-explained">NRN-citizenship</a>. That success does not signify a welcoming state structure towards adoptees. On the contrary, it was an odyssey through psychological, legal and <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/making-overseas-migration-better">transnational hurdles</a>. In fact, my case is among the more straightforward ones: my birth parents are alive, and my adoption paperwork is complete and legally valid. Yet even in this privileged scenario, officials created several hurdles and used intimidation instead of supporting my <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/now-what">return to Nepal</a>, which would be expected from a public service agency. I was able to counter this with legal knowledge and persistence.&nbsp; But for most adoptees it is not so easy. A systemic overhaul is urgently needed. Thousands of children were involuntarily removed from their country of birth under fabricated or incomplete documentation. Then there is the negligence of <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=15215">adoption </a>agencies and government institutions, which often failed to preserve adoption records. Nepal’s citizenship laws are built on assumptions that do not hold for internationally adopted citizens -- they presume patrilineal continuity, uninterrupted documentation, and lifelong presence within the country. But <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/nepal-s-baby-export">intercountry adoption</a> especially interrupts all of these.&nbsp; It severs legal ties with birth parents, replaces surnames, and shifts <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=19930">jurisdiction abroad</a>. What remains is often a fragile or incomplete paper trail, if at all. Yet adoptees are still expected to prove family ties that the law itself dissolved, claim a birthplace without official records, and seek recognition while being treated as foreigners. At first glance, it may seem as though we as adult adoptees are asking to be written into a legal framework that was never meant for us. But this perception ignores both <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/12-full-opinion/nepal-s-history-foretold">Nepal’s historical promises</a> and the core of its own <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/nepals-unequal-citizenship-law">citizenship policy</a>. The country follows jus sanguinis — the right of blood — as its guiding principle, meaning that descent from a Nepali parent should be sufficient to establish eligibility. In theory, this includes adoptees who can prove their birth and parentage. But the practical process demands documentation that many adoptees simply do not possess due to systemic negligence during the adoption era such as a citizenship certificate of a parent or grandparent, an original Nepali birth certificate, verified family links, or a local ward recommendation. The structural failure of the government to rectify those mistakes and grant birthright citizenship is in violation of the human rights of its five thousand adoptees. In my own file, for example, my birth father and adoptive parents signed a clause agreeing not to erase my religion or name and to facilitate my return to Nepal. These were not symbolic gestures — they were official commitments enshrined in Nepali legal documents. They demonstrate an intention by the Nepali state to protect the child’s identity and <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/nepal-assam-connection-revived">connection to the country</a>, not to erase it.&nbsp; The state must therefore do its part to honor the clauses it required others to sign. Failing to do so does not just betray individual adoptees—it undermines <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/constitutional-guardianship-in-nepal">Nepal’s credibility in its own legal system</a> and its obligations under <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/latest/stop-stalling-transitional-justice-global-human-rights-bodies">international human rights</a> and children’s rights frameworks.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250522230540_980907d76717d6d91e3f40ac73cdbddd83fe2887f385994541aa19ea4f434992.png" data-media-id="editor_12" data-image-id="20250522230540_980907d76717d6d91e3f40ac73cdbddd83fe2887f385994541aa19ea4f434992" data-rendition-name="original" width="1015" height="922" loading="lazy" alt="Born in Nepal, treated as a foreigner NT"> <figcaption>Adoption agreement between Kul Prasad Adhikari and the family Sacré-Bonnarens with official government stamps detailing Clause 3 about facilitating the return of the adoptee to his/her own country. </figcaption> </figure>  Yet, what adult adoptees now face is the opposite. The hostility we encounter at orphanages, local wards, and District Administration Offices (DAO) stands in sharp contrast to the protective spirit of the original documents. More troubling still is the contradiction between Nepal’s 2010 suspension of intercountry adoption — initiated after international concern over <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/from-the-nepali-press/children-and-crime">child trafficking</a>, falsified documentation, and lack of regulatory oversight — and its ongoing refusal to facilitate the legal return of adoptees.&nbsp; Reports by UNICEF and Hague Conference observers documented cases of children being declared<a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=4734"> orphans </a>while biological families were still alive, prompting countries like the US, France, and Italy to halt adoptions from Nepal.&nbsp; In 2007 and again in 2010, Nepal pledged reform, but while the pipeline of adoptions was shut down, no system was created for those sent abroad to come back home. The very individuals whose lives were shaped by <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/higher-corruption-in-high-places">the corrupt system </a>Nepal sought to abolish are now being left in limbo. Here are four moments from my NRN citizenship application that highlight the scale of the problem: "You’re not Nepali!"&nbsp; -Kaski DAO official holding my birth certificate At the Kaski DAO office, I was told to my face, while the officer held my Nepali birth certificate in his hands, that I was not Nepali. My Belgian citizenship documents also stated my place of birth as Kaski, and my adoption papers clarified my connection to my birth and adoptive parents. Yet the verdict was final. It was only after we requested to speak to the Deputy Officer and argued based on Nepal’s own adoption documents that we were permitted to begin the procedure. Ironically, the Legal Handbook for Non-Resident Nepalis explicitly lists birth in Nepal as one of the primary forms of proof for establishing NRN eligibility, yet even this was dismissed at the local level. "You don’t speak Nepali, you’re not Nepali!"&nbsp; -Kaski DAO official Several officers opposed the Deputy's decision. They began obstructing the process, questioning my motive, and ridiculing my language ability. One insisted that I respond without my lawyer, as if speaking Nepali, even imperfectly, could serve as legal proof of citizenship.&nbsp; Another official absurdly accused me of speaking with a Hindi accent. I was told, over and over again, that I was not Nepali. Yet language proficiency is not a criterion for citizenship by descent, making these remarks not only discriminatory but legally unfounded. I know my rights and persevered, but many adoptees would be deterred by such hostile behaviour. "You faked your birth certificate!"&nbsp; -Kaski DAO official The accusation of forgery came from a more senior officer. Like most adoptees, I only had English translations of my adoption records, and the originals were not preserved by the ward office. The ward office of my birth parents facilitated the renewal of the certificate based on the English translation. The Embassy of Nepal in Belgium had accepted this same document for my NRN card. Yet at the Kaski DAO office, it became grounds for suspicion. Here lies the deeper issue for adoptees: due to incomplete or untranslated records, ward offices often need to reconstruct or reissue birth certificates to align with the format required for legal procedures in Nepal. If Nepal failed to preserve its records, why punish the adoptee? "You should be grateful you’re even considered for citizenship!"&nbsp; -Kaski DAO official Despite having fulfilled every legal requirement, my file was repeatedly placed at the bottom of the pile. When we questioned the delay, we were told to be grateful that I was even being considered. But citizenship is not a gesture of goodwill. It is a legal right. Adoptees, like all Nepalis born <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/born-in-nepal">in Nepal</a>, are entitled to that right, regardless of where they grew up. The ability of lower-level staff to delay or obstruct files at their discretion reveals a deeper structural problem: <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/comment/nepal-must-reboot-human-rights-rule-of-law">access to rights in Nepal</a> too often depends not on the law, but on the personal attitudes of those tasked with upholding it. While the hostility was jarring, there were also moments of empathy. The Deputy Officer and Chief Officer acted with integrity, supported my case, and even apologised for the unnecessary delays. But this does not erase the need for structural change. Adoptees returning to claim citizenship are not asking for special treatment. They are invoking rights already granted to them under international law, including<a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=16505"> the Convention on the Rights of the Child </a>and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. These frameworks guarantee the right to identity, family, and nationality. Nepal has an obligation to honour them. Countries like<a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/delayed-dreams-for-korea-bound-nepalis"> South Korea </a>have embraced returnee adoptees as part of their diaspora. Nepal must do the same. Public education campaigns and training for administrative staff are urgent. DAO officers must be equipped to understand who adoptees are, what records they can bring, and how their return is not a threat, but a form of <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/justice-delayed-justice-denied-byrx8a1c">justice</a>. The roughly 5,000 Nepali children adopted abroad were once exported as orphans. Now, many are returning as adults — educated, legally prepared, and determined. They are not visitors. They are citizens.&nbsp; And they will not wait. They will claim their rights, case by case, until the system is forced to evolve. Hari Prasad Adhikari Sacré, PhD, is a postdoctoral researcher at Ghent University in Belgium, specialising in education, multilingualism, identity and intercountry adoption.

Born in Nepal, treated as a foreigner

<a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/human-face-of-a-himalayan-climate-crisis" target="_blank">Janmu Sherpa</a> was a grandmother with a dozen goats and a tea house in Donggang in the Rolwaling Valley. Her stopover served trekkers en route to Tso Rolpa Glacial Lake and the trail over Tashi Laptsa Pass to Khumbu. In 2018, I spent months in the Rolwaling Valley studying how <a href="https://www.ted.com/talks/rastraraj_bhandari_what_climate_activists_are_doing_wrong" target="_blank">mountain communities perceive</a> climate change. Unlike my climate-anxious self, Janmu was calm, even hopeful, despite having lived through floods, landslides, and the 2015 earthquakes. “No one knows when Tso Rolpa will burst, so we cannot stop our daily chores. Let fate decide,” Janmu Sherpa had said. Last year, fate did decide. On 22 June 2024, the Dorji Phungmo Glacial Lake burst. The resulting flood swept through the Rolwaling River, washing away homes and hotels in Donggang. Janmu <a href="https://thehimalayantimes.com/nepal/climbers-valley-devastated-by-floods-immediate-relief-sought" target="_blank">was among</a> the missing, and later declared dead.&nbsp; I learned of her disappearance during a recent cycling trip through Panauti along the <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/multimedia/a-flood-of-tears-on-the-rosi" target="_blank">Rosi Khola</a>, which was devastated by deadly flash floods on 28 September 2024.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2025051918054_14898953b7a5808b51440f7a6fa35a7d66146bbb1d62bf88729a83a558ca8ebf.jpg" data-media-id="editor_4" data-image-id="2025051918054_14898953b7a5808b51440f7a6fa35a7d66146bbb1d62bf88729a83a558ca8ebf" data-rendition-name="original" width="1500" height="1000" loading="lazy" alt="A pre-monsoon déjà vu"> <figcaption>Tso Rolpa glacial lake at 4,580m has grown seven times in size in the past 60 years due to global warming. </figcaption> </figure>  Tipper trucks rumbled through the dusty road, carrying stones and gravel from unregulated quarries and sand mining along the Rosi. This was destruction disguised as development, and the crusher industries had <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/the-revenge-of-the-rivers" target="_blank">magnified the impact of record rainfall</a>. On the other side of the mountain, along the Lele and Karmanasa Khola, families are still reeling from last year’s floods. Here, too, a quarrying frenzy exacerbated the <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/nepal-valley-suffers-quadruple-disaster">destructive power of the floods</a>. There are thousands of untold stories like Janmu, and the estimated 200 who perished in the September floods. Most have been forgotten, their deaths blamed on fate. I write this from afar, as Kathmandu hosts the Sagarmatha Sambaad this week to draw global attention to the impact of the climate crisis on the Himalaya. The summit took place as pre-monsoon rains lashed the Rosi and Lele Valleys. Even before the start of the rainy season, more debris flows from the mining operations destroyed repaired roads and neighbourhoods rebuilt after floods last year. The rivers that flooded Kathmandu in September 2024 are still vulnerable. Aside from a few sandbanks built by local hands, nothing has changed. No national reckoning. No systemic response. Instead, everything is blamed on climate change.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2025051918054_57fa57586b1e370e715daf837aa4cae3e73b0f029bb0ccef8be768e85656cc5f.jpg" data-media-id="editor_7" data-image-id="2025051918054_57fa57586b1e370e715daf837aa4cae3e73b0f029bb0ccef8be768e85656cc5f" data-rendition-name="original" width="1499" height="1000" loading="lazy" alt="A pre-monsoon déjà vu NT"> <figcaption>Janmu Sherpa's village of Donggang is directly downstream from Tso Rolpa Glacial Lake.</figcaption> </figure>  <a href="http://as%20kathmandu%20hosts%20the%20sagarmatha%20sambaad/" target="_blank">Janmu Sherpa’s story</a> haunts me not just because of her loss, but because she shaped my journey as a climate activist. She taught me that climate action is not just about carbon or conferences, it is about livelihoods, listening, and the impossible trade-offs faced by communities where survival is more urgent than sustainability. As monsoon clouds gather again, there is a sense of dread not just about floods, but for the apathy that follows. We are trapped in a cycle of climate inaction fueled by corruption, state neglect, and a development model that treats rivers as resources to be drained, not lifelines to be protected. It is no longer a question of if the floods will come, but when, and how devastating they will be. And yet, <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/politicians-and-cronies-blamed-for-kavre-floods" target="_blank">those in power remain unmoved</a> even when disaster strikes their own backyard. We are still chasing climate finance and hosting international summits, while local insurance markets stagnate and communities fend for themselves. To be sure, global advocacy matters. The Himalayan climate crisis must be on the international agenda. Melting glaciers here affect billions downstream. But adaptation cannot begin and end in air-conditioned conference halls. It must bring real preparedness to villages, valleys, and riverbanks of Nepal.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2025051918058_3ec77114d434385351ad1637fd5ab42dc6a76b94b0e90f1c6e683c71535f6e6a.jpg" data-media-id="editor_10" data-image-id="2025051918058_3ec77114d434385351ad1637fd5ab42dc6a76b94b0e90f1c6e683c71535f6e6a" data-rendition-name="original" width="1701" height="1000" loading="lazy" alt="A pre-monsoon déjà vu"> <figcaption>The Sagarmatha Sambaad climate conference in Kathmandu this week. Photo: PRADEEP RAJ ONTA / RSSseasonmedia2007</figcaption> </figure>  I visited the communities ravaged by floods in September and as I wrote in <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/flood-of-despair" target="_blank">Nepali Times</a> then, top-down responses are always too little, too late and too ineffective. The only real solution is bottom-up, community-led adaptation. Those who lived through the floods know what needs to be done, and those privileged and in power need to enable them. Community-led adaptation is not just a buzzword. It is our only viable path forward. It means empowering local people with the tools, knowledge, and resources to protect themselves. It means investing in early warning systems that reach the last mile and actually work, restoring ecosystems that buffer floods, and supporting indigenous knowledge that has long helped communities live in harmony with nature. It means letting go of our belief that somehow our degrees in climate change and attendance in global climate conferences enable us to tell communities how they should be responding to climate change. It means shifting power and funding to the grassroots, where resilience is not theoretical — it is lived, practiced, and urgently needed. As the rains return, I am reminded of Janmu Sherpa’s voice of quiet wisdom. Her innate resilience did not save her life. Let us not wait for the next flood to act. Let us protect what we still have. Rastra Raj Bhandari is co-founder and fellow at the Himalayan Water Project, where he leads the research on climate finance opportunities for the Himalaya.

Comment

A pre-monsoon déjà vu

The recent removal of Kulman Ghising a few months before his tenure heading the National Electricity Authority (NEA) ended made headlines. Hitendra Dev Shakya, whose previous tenure ended amid similar behind-the-scenes politics that <a href="https://en.setopati.com/political/157021">never saw a final court verdict</a>, was put back in charge.&nbsp;
For many, Ghising was the architect of the end of 18-hour-a-day power cuts till a decade ago. His abrupt removal sparked outrage across the public sphere, and the political spectrum.
Leadership at the NEA has never been just about performance, it has long been entangled in political proximity, not merit. The agency is more than a power utility, it is more about control of budgets, contracts, and narratives.
As long as the lights stay on, many Nepalis will willingly overlook the messy compromises that greases the system. Appointments, removals, court cases, and backroom political bargain are the norm. Sometimes like with Ghising, a figure emerges as a public hero, sometimes, they do not.
A decade after routine load-shedding ended, political leaders still scramble to claim credit, over what should fundamentally be just the day-to-day work. The sector is mired in controversies, from metering disputes to ad hoc political committees, tariff issues, to negotiating cross border power trade.&nbsp;
Even basic statistics like electrification rates are held hostage to executive narratives with no clear standards and compliance on what counts as real access. Nepal's power sector seems to be running without a referee.
There are three agencies involved: the <a href="https://moewri.gov.np/">Ministry of Energy</a>, the NEA, and the little-known <a href="https://erc.gov.np/">Electricity Regulatory Commission (ERC),</a> each with a distinct mandate, at least on paper.
In a well-regulated market, issues like metering disputes and executive appointments would barely register outside the industry. In Nepal, such decisions often spill into political crises and can shake the fate of governments. Yet, the ERC is rarely seen or heard, even when these issues strike at the heart of its regulatory mandate.
Blurred roles have left Nepal’s power sector in a state of chronic overlap. The ministry often interferes with operations, drawn by the quiet influence that comes with the turf: contracts, budgets, and visibility.&nbsp;
NEA straddles the line between implementer and influencer, while the regulator still seems hesitant to assert its space.
Created in 2019 after years of industry bargaining, the regulator’s job is to establish rules, resolve disputes, and bring predictability and fairness back to the system. And this critical role remains a blind spot in Nepal’s energy debate and power struggles.
Disputes that should fall under regulatory inquiry and consultation, from the Time-of-Day (ToD) meter disputes and industrial payment defaults, to the NEA’s role in cross border power trade negotiations have instead become political flashpoints.
Despite the politics, if a regulator cannot assert itself in matters squarely within its mandate like pricing, contracts, disputes, compliance, what exactly is it regulating?&nbsp;
We did not create this new regulator just to be another spectator. But that, for now, is all it seems determined to be.
The regulatory mess runs deeper into the way Nepal prices its electricity. By many measures, Nepal’s electricity sector has made real progress. The country now exports surplus power to India while still relying on imports during peak demand. In 2023/24, Nepal became a net electricity exporter for the first time, selling as much power as &nbsp;two and half months of domestic demand.&nbsp;
Every hydropower <a href="https://nea.org.np/admin/assets/uploads/PPA_Rates.pdf">project under 100 megawatts is paid the same flat rate</a>: Rs8.40 per kilowatt-hour in the dry season, Rs4.80 in the wet season. Hard or easy, near or remote, the price stays flat.&nbsp;
Whether a project is built right along the accessible roads of Trisuli corridor or in the remote gorges of the Karnali that demand new roads and transmission lines to &nbsp;generation sites, it is the same price.
The Chamelia Hydropower Project cost <a href="https://www.adb.org/sites/default/files/project-documents/41025-012-nep-tacr.pdf">NPR 56 crore per megawatt to build</a>. Chilime came in at about Rs140 million. In a functioning system, a regulator would benchmark these costs, scrutinise financial models, and adjust tariffs to reflect real-world differences. &nbsp;&nbsp;
To give the ERC some benefit of doubt: it is a young institution<s>.</s> But institutions do not mature by aging; they need to step up and take positions, enforce rules, intervene, and speak up when it’s easier to stay silent, whether the pressure comes from a utility boss or a political heavyweight, celebrity or not.&nbsp;
Nepal’s energy industry cannot afford a regulator that hides every time the stakes get high. That responsibility weighs even heavier today. Ram Prasad Dhital, the current Chair of the ERC, was not an outsider parachuted into the role. He served as one of the Commission’s founding cohort and has seen it through its formative years.&nbsp;
His second term cannot be for keeping the seat warm. But will the ERC act, or will it continue to choose the safer path of silence? As the ERC evolves, the challenge is not just about leadership. It must resist the prevailing tendency to solely rely on short-term contracts and familiar recycled bureaucratic networks.&nbsp;
Building a credible regulatory institution requires stability and technical depth, a professional core of energy experts, economists, engineers, financial analysts, and legal specialists who can audit costs, arbitrate disputes, and navigate the rapidly evolving regulatory terrains.&nbsp;
Tariffs must reflect real costs and real geographies. Export pricing must adapt to dynamic domestic and regional markets. Disputes must be settled through credible regulatory mechanisms rather than through endless political committees.
The real question now is not just what the ERC was created to do, but whether it has the will, the knowledge, and the courage to do it. &nbsp;And the longer it forgets that and drifts further to become another spectator, the deeper the price the industry will pay.
Bibek Raj Kandel works at the intersection of energy, climate, and political economy.&nbsp;

Nepal’s Power Struggles

At the start of May, Bunu Dhungana brought some things in the belly home to Nepal. When she had curated the first iteration of the show in 2023, in Delhi, she had hoped she would be able to bring it home, and she did. The exhibition opened to the public in Kathmandu at Nepal Art Council on 2 May and closes on 16 May. The exhibition brings together works by Asmita Badi, Irina Giri, Shradha Devkota, Tripty Tamang Pakhrin, Shristi Shrestha, Ujjwala Maharjan, and the curator, Bunu Dhungana herself. And there’s an installation of yours truly. In the step up to the show, Bunu organised calls for the artists. Tripty joined at odd hours from her newfound home in Syracuse. As did Shradha from her home in London. Ujjwala joined, from her many different trips to India and other places in Nepal.&nbsp; The rest of us joined from wherever we were in Nepal during call hours, probing the unknown, most of us unsure what we wanted to present to the public. The only thing we had clarity on was the theme Bunu had suggested: mother-daughter relationship. And we were to exchange letters with our mothers. Some of us wrote letters to our mothers from the comfort of our homes, some from Pokhara, or whichever town we were in at the time of writing-- sending it by snail mail, which thankfully, hasn’t gone obsolete yet! Our mothers responded to us from their comfort nooks, each one, taking it up seriously like little girls responding to school assignments. Standing before the wall that has the mothers’ letters at the exhibition, one is easily struck by the basicness of the stationery used by the mothers to write to their daughters. They use pages torn out from a notebook, loose examination sheets or even an abandoned diary. So simple and so straightforward. And in that, powerful. Like the truth of the uterus that is all mothers. In the letters, their emotions take center-stage, as maternal emotions do, coming from a place of wanting the best for their daughters-- to protect them, and to keep them happy and healthy. Daughters’ desires are not too different from that of the mothers. But they come in more complex forms and through different mediums. They write an entire journal on these feelings, write pages and pages, enough to fill a room, weave poems and songs from the rhythm that connects the phantom umbilical cord to the mother. Daughters compose images-- some of oil and smoke, some of suffocation, of stillness, of water and ice and of open spaces and of moments of strife, like something heavy being dragged up a stairway by a lone woman.&nbsp; “While not all the works were made exclusively for the show, I did create new pieces - paper made from a letter I wrote to my mothers, and a series of linoleum cut prints. These processes made me reflect more deeply on the role of repetitive, physical labor in my practice and how it relates to the everyday labor of my mothers,” says Tripty, who documents work dedicated to her two mothers. And there are bright hues in gouache, where mothers and daughters are arrested in moments of fun and chit-chat or even just being at the table watching Tiktok. There’s abandoned sound in a dark, spotlit corner, which takes the listener through a journey of contemplation and upheavals. And there are stories from the kitchen, the base for most mothers in the world. For many of us, it is sometimes impossible to separate the fragrance of spices from our mothers or to tell the spices apart from the scent of our mothers.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250514140528_1dd1b5f95e6230f49afb3b084b88542b3fbcc6a454548a3eee60ee85724f7215.jpg" data-media-id="editor_0" data-image-id="20250514140528_1dd1b5f95e6230f49afb3b084b88542b3fbcc6a454548a3eee60ee85724f7215" data-rendition-name="original" width="2048" height="1365" loading="lazy" alt="some things in the belly"> </figure>  some things in the belly is an intimate exhibition, and as the show got underway, visitors were seen returning as if to collect something they had left behind. Many kept coming back to read and to write. And that was precisely what Bunu had wanted to create-- a safe space. Visitors sat down, read, wrote letters to their mothers, listened, watched, laughed and wept. Ujjwala says: “The [letter-posting] wall, how it’s growing and how people are reading and writing, that’s the most interesting thing for me. You don’t know how people connect and what hits who. But I’ve seen people tearing up at the letter-writing section. You forget that it does reach the people it needs to reach.” Bunu’s aim when she was taking on the challenge of curating the exhibition was to also create a circle of sisterhood, by bringing together women to work together on a theme. And in the process, she has also managed to help the artists involved create and learn from one another and to be deeply touched by the familiarity of sentiments. “Each piece is so different and that is the beauty of this exhibition that has come together. Tripty’s and Shradha’s work, the experimentation was very inspiring for me and the process itself...what has come out is powerful,” explains Ujjwala.&nbsp; She adds: “They are visual artists but the poetry in it is so beautiful. Shristi’s work, I fell in love with. The care of it. Ashmita’s work, too. To textual people, the importance of a desk and sitting down, the tactileness of books that inspire us. What would mom write? What would their lives be like...the imagination is dreaming along with our moms-- the amalgamation of dreams.” In one of her journal notes to her mother, Ujjwala mentions she can’t remember how long it has been since she gazed carefully into her mother’s face. One pauses to read that sentence again. How long since we did that? At the heart of the stories in the exhibition is also intergenerational trauma and mother-daughter conflict-- how mothers and daughters tug in different directions, even when they’re chasing the same love.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250514140528_d150acebaa02da545dd3c92db7c1202aef73e60d600537106ec0db40dc84cbfc.jpg" data-media-id="editor_1" data-image-id="20250514140528_d150acebaa02da545dd3c92db7c1202aef73e60d600537106ec0db40dc84cbfc" data-rendition-name="original" width="2048" height="1365" loading="lazy" alt="some things in the belly"> </figure>  When Hishila Yami and her daughter Manushi visited the exhibition with little Yugeen in tow, we caught up on this topic briefly. Manushi said: “We hold so much in our hearts and who do we tell it all to? So we end up dumping it on our mothers. Because who else is there for us as mothers are? “We have such complex relationships of love with our mothers,” Bunu said.&nbsp; All loves have their own equations. The love daughters feel for their mothers is raw and tender and full of familiarity. Everything daughters want for their mother is the same they would want for their daughter, so in that, we serve an endless knot.&nbsp; Then there’s the question of language. What language really serves as a bridge in the gap that exists in mother-daughter relationships? How do we make up in language for the absence of words that can ever convey the sentiments? And so the process of creating some things in the belly has been something like reforging mother-daughter relationships in the crucible. “Each one of us has shaped our practices, and stepped more fully into ourselves. Watching that unfold has been such a privilege,” says Shradha. “I hope, as a collective, this exhibition has offered something real for people to hold onto, reflect upon, or carry with them.” Read also: <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/suburban-tales/our-mothers-silences">Our mothers' silences</a>, Pratibha Tuladhar some things in the belly Till 16 May Nepal Art Council, Baber Mahal

Pratibha Tuladhar

Suburban Tales

Dear Maa,

The two sides of Punjab in India and Pakistan may be 2,000km away, but the war between two <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/editorial/south-asia-2040-qxr16oup">South Asian neighbours </a>sent aftershocks here to the <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/borderlines/nepal-india-trans-boundary-bonds">India-Nepal border</a>.&nbsp; Among the 26 tourists killed by terrorists in Pahalgam on 22 April was a Nepali from Butwal on a holiday with his family, and Nepali nationals enlisted in the Indian Army could be see action in case of <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/peacemongers-at-india-pakistan-border">conflict between India and Pakistan</a>.&nbsp; The open border between India and Nepal is usually relaxed with people going back and forth without much checking, but after hostilities broke out last week, controls by India’s Border Security Force of documents and inspections of vehicles has been stepped up. About 15km east of Birganj is the frontier village of Ghodasahan. On the Nepal side, the settlement is under the Bisrampur Rural Municipality in Bara District and on the other side it is in East Champaran of India’s Bihar state. There are <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/20-years-ago-this-week/secularism-debate">Hindus and Muslims </a>on both sides of the national boundary that slices through the village. The increased security on both sides of the border is starting to affect the daily life of villagers who had been used to going back and forth without any hindrance. Read also: <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/editorial/nukes-in-the-neighbourhood">Nukes in the neighbourhood</a>  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250511160520_7202b268e053118ed783c740918389ace533bf47576c0bda787eecb6f71af5b9.png" data-media-id="editor_5" data-image-id="20250511160520_7202b268e053118ed783c740918389ace533bf47576c0bda787eecb6f71af5b9" data-rendition-name="original" width="2230" height="1534" loading="lazy" alt="No man's land"> </figure>  “We know who the locals are, but if there are people who we don’t know and they look different, we interrogate them,” one Nepali security official said, adding that local people also inform the police if they see any strangers. Right along the 1,700km <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/people-to-people-at-india-nepal-border">Nepal-India border</a>, there are many townships like Ghodasahan which have the same name on both sides of the border. In some places, the border divides <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/comment/home-is-where-the-heart-is">homes and households</a>, in others one side of the road is in Nepal and the other side is in India.&nbsp; In most of these villages, the local people have come to accept the presence of <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/job-insecurity-in-security-forces?%2F">security forces </a>on both sides. Some farms are divided by the border, and villagers are used to border guards inspecting harvests being brought across. The India-Nepal border is also a hotbed of <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/from-the-nepali-press/smuggled-chimps-wait-it-out-in-kathmandu?%2F">smuggling</a>, so police inspections are normal, but the heightened tension between India and Pakistan have made such checks stricter. Also in Bara district is the village of Gulariya which also stretches on both sides of the border. Seventy-year-old Satan Bhagat’s house is on the other side of no-man’s land in India but his livestock shed is in Nepal.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250511160520_4b4057c9f03b82e4f634fc071929b2847897b13982e2dc08eaaa48c6feb9f906.jpg" data-media-id="editor_10" data-image-id="20250511160520_4b4057c9f03b82e4f634fc071929b2847897b13982e2dc08eaaa48c6feb9f906" data-rendition-name="original" width="1600" height="1204" loading="lazy" alt="No man's land NT"> <figcaption>Satan Bhagat</figcaption> </figure>  With new requirements for citizenship on both sides, and stricter enforcement of those with dual citizenship, families are having to decide whether they are Nepali or Indian. “We don’t want war, we want peace,” said one villager, apprehensive of the spillover effect of the India-Pakistan conflict. “In the 1971 war we followed what was happening on the radio, but now we know minute-by-minute what is happening <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/comment/surveying-nepal-s-digital-landscape">on our mobiles.</a>”&nbsp; The open Nepal-India border is a model for other parts of the world, where frontier controls are getting tighter and populist anti-migration parties are winning elections. The rhyming slogan in Hindi here has been ‘बोर्डर बनेंगे अमन के निशान, दोनों &nbsp;मित्र नेपाल - हिंदुस्तान’ (Nepal-India Border: A Symbol of Peace).  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250511160520_7607dcca541c23093c11c3b3a5e1380d27401d458d2ce28a24c18a6b609df1fd.jpg" data-media-id="editor_12" data-image-id="20250511160520_7607dcca541c23093c11c3b3a5e1380d27401d458d2ce28a24c18a6b609df1fd" data-rendition-name="original" width="1600" height="1204" loading="lazy" alt="No man's land NT"> <figcaption>The village of Gulariya in Bara district also stretches on both sides of the Nepal-India border.</figcaption> </figure>  But slogans only go far when policies about these<a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=7594"> borderlands </a>are made in faraway national capitals in New Delhi and Kathmandu. <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/editorial/messaging-is-the-message">The media </a>also has a role in making border controls only about security and crime, and not about how much it helps local people on both sides. The reason there are calls for stricter border control is due to <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/the-geopolitics-of-nepal-s-politics">geopolitics</a>, and this concern has been enhanced by <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/indo-pak-tension-hits-saarc-climate-action">the India-Pakistan conflict</a>. But this is not just about safeguarding India’s security interests, but also about Nepal being vigilant and taking advantage of its open border.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250511160524_d31874e0dad74299d3849a37690e050690604a03f0320b79f1816ea3bb039679.jpg" data-media-id="editor_17" data-image-id="20250511160524_d31874e0dad74299d3849a37690e050690604a03f0320b79f1816ea3bb039679" data-rendition-name="original" width="1600" height="1204" loading="lazy" alt="No man's land NT"> <figcaption>Naser Ahmed</figcaption> </figure>  <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/comment/the-world-9-11-made">Terrorism </a>cannot be defined as ‘moderate’ or ‘radical’. Terror has no morals. It cannot be justified by arguments for or against. Terrorism has no respect for innocent human life — whether it is structural violence of the state, or militant counter-violence. Pahalgam was proof that terrorism is not an accident. It does not happen in a vacuum. When geopolitical rivalry is involved, it complicates matters further as a tit-for-tat in which <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/review/remembering-not-to-forget-the-peoples-war">innocent civilians are cruelly caught in the crossfire</a>.&nbsp; As Naser Ahmed on the Nepal side of the border village of Ghodasahan says: “The open border may not be open forever, we have to work to <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/justice-delayed-justice-denied-byrx8a1c">safeguard peace </a>on both sides of no-man’s land.”

Chandra Kishore

Borderlines

No-man’s land

Fenerbahçe Beko won the Turkish Airlines EuroLeague finals in Abu Dhabi, held 23-25 May, defeating Monaco 81-70 in the final. Olympiacos, who defeated Panathinaikos 97-93, finished the series in third place. The Most Valuable Player (MVP) of the final match, Nigel Hayes-Davis from Fenerbahçe Beko, received a prize of 1,000,000 Miles&amp;Smiles from Turkish Airlines’ Chief Commercial Officer Ahmet Olmuştur. The carrier has been the title sponsor of the Turkish Airlines EuroLeague, a top tier tournament, since 2010.

Turkish Basketball

Thousands of Nepali students dreaming of an American education have been forced to look elsewhere as the Trump administration’s visa restrictions make their future uncertain.
The US was long considered a top destination for higher studies, making Nepal the 10th biggest country of origin for international students in America.&nbsp;
However, that number has seen a significant decline with the total for Nepali students now at 16,482. Some 8,000 Nepali students obtained no-objection certificates to study in the US from the Ministry of Education in the past year.&nbsp;
India, Australia, Canada, South Korea, United Kingdom and Japan are the other popular destinations for Nepali students. There are no clear numbers for Nepalis going to India, but a slight decline was noted this year after the deaths of two female students.
The US State Department has issued a circular to its embassies not to issue new visas to applicants until further notice. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio in the directive stated that the department planned to expand the screening of applicants' social media.&nbsp;
While new applicants are barred including those applying for visitor visas, students with scheduled interviews are allowed to proceed.
“Many of our students are affected by the new restrictions, but those who had applied for student visas earlier have got interview dates,” one Kathmandu-based college counsellor told us.
Meanwhile, even foreign students with spotless records already in the US have not been spared, as visa scrutiny intensifies under the new policy. In a move that underscores the growing sense of insecurity, many US colleges advised international students to carry their passports and documents at all times, even when traveling locally.
“Me and my friends did not go home this summer because we were not sure we would be allowed back, so we just went to Niagara Falls,” said a Nepali undergrad in Ohio, who like many interviewed for this report did not want her name used for fear of repercussion.
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Nepali students have adopted a cautious stance, with many choosing not to return home during summer vacation due to fear of visa revocations as well as travel bans. Meanwhile, over 7,000 Nepalis with Temporary Protected Status (TPS) will have to come back to Nepal by 5 August or face deportation. Thirty-seven were flown back to Kathmandu on Omni Air last week.
“The US is one of the most sought-after destinations for higher education, and the ban will definitely impact bright students,” says Narottam Aryal of the King’s College in Kathmandu.
Indeed, Nepali undergraduates admitted into Ivy League colleges for the 2025 academic year have been asked to look for alternatives. The entire Fulbright Foreign Scholarships Board resigned on Wednesday citing interference from the Trump administration on the selection of this year’s cohort. Some Nepali students already on Fulbright scholarships have noted disruptions, delays and even cancellation of stipends.&nbsp;
The student visa restrictions were initially just for foreign students admitted to Harvard University, but it was later extended to all Chinese students and now to all students. Universities like Columbia which actively recruit foreign students, face sharp enrolment declines, threatening their financial stability and diversity.
An Indian female PhD candidate at Columbia University had her visa revoked by the US State Department, and said she was targeted on the basis of her social media posts on Israeli military attacks in Gaza. Social media vetting of political activism has raised concerns about privacy and freedom of expression in a country where such rights were a given.
Many students have been informed via email that their visas have been revoked for getting speeding or parking tickets, but even others with no criminal record have been affected. The fear of deportation looms large amongst international students, including those from Nepal.&nbsp;
For most Nepalis who migrate to the US for education, the journey is a high-stakes investment. They come largely from middle-class families, often rely on a patchwork of scholarships, work-study programs, loans, or even the sale of family assets to afford fees.
Most Nepali students pursue STEM subjects which offer extended Optional Practical Training (OPT) periods that help fund their education. But with the US backsliding on education and humanitarian matters, countries like the UK and Canada are becoming more attractive despite their own recent stricter controls on student visas.&nbsp;
The UK universities saw a 63% rise in Nepali students’ admissions in 2024. Japan is another popular destination with 64,816 Nepali students enrolled as of 2024.
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Already, China, Hong Kong and Malaysia are poised to benefit from the increased scrutiny of US student visas. Several Hong Kong universities are offering unconditional admission to affected students, while Malaysian institutions are targeting previously US-bound Asian students. China and India have 330,000 and 280,000 students respectively in America, but the numbers for China have seen a sharp drop in the past year.
Elsewhere, branch campuses of American institutions such as NYU in Abu Dhabi, Georgetown in Dubai and Northwestern in Doha are getting more admission applications, and universities in the Gulf region are expanding infrastructure to accommodate those who would otherwise have gone to the US.&nbsp;
Even educational institutions in Nepal are hopeful that the US visa restrictions can be an opportunity to at least keep Nepali undergrads in Nepal, and also attract foreign students from the region.&nbsp;
“Many students might choose to complete their undergraduate degree here in Nepal and then move abroad for their Master’s degree later,” says Aryal of King’s College. “There was a need for quality higher education in Nepal anyway in terms of innovation and opportunities, so this could be the time to reduce our dependence on other countries.”
Nepal’s strategic position between India and China makes it sensitive to US policy shifts. India, a key ally, is also under US scrutiny for potential student travel restrictions. Chinese universities are already offering more scholarships to Nepali talent to capitalise on the US retreat.
American universities have challenged student visa restrictions in the courts. A federal court in Boston revoked the blanket ban on Harvard, and the State Department has ordered the resumption of processing student and exchange visitor visas.&nbsp;
Some are still hoping that President Trump will backtrack on the student visa restrictions, just like he has done with many of his more drastic executive orders.
Even so, the visa see-saw and longer-term uncertainties about living in the United States and its education system means students across the world are making alternative plans.
Says Aryal: “Policies of foreign countries change according to their needs, so excessive dependence was never a good idea. We should work to create different opportunities and choices of higher education within Nepal, so students are retained.” &nbsp;

America no longer prime destination for Nepali students

That winter day in January 1664 marked an exceptional event in the reign of King Pratap Malla of Kathmandu. It was 15 Paush 784 of the Nepal Sambat and for the first time, a historical event was being immortalised on canvas for generations to come.&nbsp; The occasion was the grand Tuladaan ceremony of the King’s youngest son Chakrabartendra Malla from his wife Anantapriya, an Indian princess from Cooch Behar in present-day Assam.&nbsp; During the ritual, the prince was weighed against gold, silver, pearls, and other precious stones, which were then offered to Goddess Taleju Bhavani, the guardian deity of the Malla dynasty.&nbsp; The 170 x120cm painting captures the time of King Pratap Malla in all its splendour and is more than a personal tribute to his son: it is a significant visual historical document. It was evidently completed five years later in 1669, and could be considered a photographic record, with retrospective recreation of the event by the unknown artist. A Tuladaan ceremony is performed to purify one’s karma, quell impending bad luck, or as an act of charity and devotion. Chakrabartendra Malla was not well, and the ritual was performed in hopes of restoring his health. King Pratap Malla had arranged for each of his sons to take turns ruling Kathmandu so they got administrative experience. But Chakrabartendra died just two days after assuming power in 1670 (790 NS). This painting is considered the earliest known example in which the composition is dominated by an architectural landscape: the Taleju Temple. Given the stylistic features such as side-profile facial depictions and the rendering of human forms, it is believed that the Nepali artist was trained by a Rajput master.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250615040624_ddad3bc27a327e3f9926c8473287e4f14b53081296c295049009f327a4d97051.jpg" data-media-id="editor_0" data-image-id="20250615040624_ddad3bc27a327e3f9926c8473287e4f14b53081296c295049009f327a4d97051" data-rendition-name="original" width="3248" height="4395" loading="lazy" alt="Tuladaan NT"> </figure>  During that era, there were regular exchanges of artists between Northern India and Kathmandu Valley. The painting is also a melding of Nepali, Tibetan, Mughal, and Rajput art styles of the time. Pratap Malla could have been inspired by a painting of Mughal Emperor Jahangir’s Tuladaan ceremony for his son Khurram in 1607. The Mallas and Mughals shared cordial relations, which is reflected in the cultural influences seen in the art and attire of the period.&nbsp; The clothing of the Malla ruling class, in particular, features colourful tunics, turbans, and jewelry that display strong Rajput and Mughal stylistic elements. The musicians in the upper tier are also dressed in Indian-style clothing, while the ensemble on the lower steps wear local attire, notably without turbans. Their hairstyles also differ, with the lower group wearing their hair tied in a bun at the front. This national treasure is currently in storage at the Collège de France in Paris, and has never been publicly displayed. Nepal’s art scholars like Gautam Vajracharya, Pratap Aditya Pal and Anne Vergati have written about this iconic paubha in the past, but the only detailed study is from the perspective of music history by researcher Richard Widdess who had access to high resolution copies of the original.&nbsp; Widdess from the Department of Music at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London describes the paubha as the most significant and richly detailed documentation of music in Nepali art. He identifies distinct musical ensembles on the terraces of the temple, and remarkably most of them are actively used today. One of them reflects the Mughal naqqārakhāna model — a loud outdoor ensemble typically composed of kettledrums, trumpets, and cymbals, traditionally performed from the gateway of the emperor’s palace to announce his entrances and exits. The depiction of such an ensemble in the tulādāna painting is likely the earliest known representation of a complete naqqārakhāna in Nepal — considered the forerunner of the panche baja, the traditional Nepali ensemble. On the stepped pyramid base of the temple are two groups of musicians playing local instruments: dhimey, bhushya, and dha. They are unmistakably Newar musicians, wearing short skirts and short-sleeved tops, with bare heads and legs—clearly distinguished as local performers.&nbsp; Higher still on the temple pyramid are musicians of apparently higher status, positioned close to the king, and his courtiers, possibly professional court musicians from India, well-versed in rāga and tāla. A dāphā group is also clearly depicted, identifiable by their characteristic instruments.&nbsp; Dāphā bhajan is likely the oldest surviving tradition of Newar devotional singing, and this paubha is the oldest visual record of it. Pratap Malla himself is believed to have composed songs that continue to be performed by dāphā groups throughout Kathmandu till today.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2025061211064_d67636730cdc0ec778c02494817aca0b99654f2950d0fae4b95499a61faf7ef3.jpg" data-media-id="editor_1" data-image-id="2025061211064_d67636730cdc0ec778c02494817aca0b99654f2950d0fae4b95499a61faf7ef3" data-rendition-name="original" width="596" height="768" loading="lazy" alt="Priceless paubha in Paris NT"> </figure>  The artist’s thorough attention to musical detail may be attributed to King Pratap Malla’s own deep interest in music. His inscriptions on this painting and elsewhere proclaim his mastery of all branches of knowledge, including music. He is also known as the author of dance dramas and poems, penning his name as Kavindra (king of poets). Some noteworthy elements of new art techniques stand out: for example, the roof of the temple is filled with realistically rendered white doves, pigeons, and crows. This is a rare feature in paubha, where animals and birds are stylised, mythological forms. This remarkably talented unknown artist has managed to also render an orthographic projection: the front and side view of Nepal’s first architectural paubha. The Taleju Temple, with its staggering multi-tiered structure and numerous steps and platforms, is masterfully translated into layers within the painting. This represents a significant artistic achievement of the time, especially considering that dimensional perspectives had not started in deity-based paubha.&nbsp; The artist has also made a meticulous effort to capture architectural details such as the toran (ornamental arch) and temple struts with impressive precision. There are flickering lamps along the steps and some people carrying what appear to be oil pots.&nbsp; It is a full moon night and the dark sky is adorned with all the gods and goddesses, who are depicted as blessing the ceremony while seated on stylised thangka clouds. There is a lot happening in this painting, with people engaged in various activities. The artist has also rendered a forest backdrop behind the temple, complete with deer, trees, and flowers. Could there have once been a royal garden behind the Taleju Temple?&nbsp; More details and clarity can only be achieved if we are able to view the original or a high-resolution scanned version of the artwork. Many countries proudly display art depicting historical events in their national museums with great reverence. France, for example, has The Coronation of Emperor Napoleon and Empress Joséphine by Jacques-Louis David (1808–1822), along with numerous paintings of the Napoleonic Wars. Many were commissioned by Napoleon himself for future generations to remember.&nbsp; For Nepal, the equivalent is the Tuladaan paubha which is a visual record capturing a historic moment involving one of Kathmandu’s greatest kings, on the very day the event took place. Sadly, we await the day when this masterpiece is displayed, shared in high resolution for detailed study, or more rightfully — repatriated to its homeland, where it truly belongs. &nbsp; Shaguni Singh Sakya is the Director of the Museum of Nepali Arts (MoNA) at Kathmandu Guest House in Thamel. <h2>Gods homeward bound</h2> The Nepal Heritage Recovery Campaign and Nepal’s Department of Archaeology are convening the first international conference on the Recovery of Cultural Heritage from 16-18 June in Patan. The conference will address urgent issues of theft, illicit trafficking, the campaign to repatriate looted cultural artifacts, and explore how the return of sacred antiquities contributes to justice, healing, and reconciliation for communities and nations affected by cultural loss. American art crime professor Erin L Thompson and Saubhagya Pradhananga of the Department of Archaeology will deliver the keynote. Meanwhile, author and Nepali Times publisher Kunda Dixit will lead a conversation on Illicit Trafficking: Public Opinion and Role of Media with Erin Thompson, Amr Al Azm, associate professor of Middle East History and Anthropology at Shawnee State University in Ohio, as well as Bradley J Gordon, a lawyer based in Phnom Penh. There will be sessions looking at repatriation perspectives from Cambodia, India, Vietnam, China and Poland, international frameworks for repatriation, emerging digital technologies in the repatriation of cultural heritage, cultural property agreements, museums as well as trends in the art market, and heritage diplomacy and the role of media.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2025061211068_59cfccfa8f5d73bfe8b4c5811a7f53abc09ea04e8cb7c638933d62e5283efdf6.jpg" data-media-id="editor_2" data-image-id="2025061211068_59cfccfa8f5d73bfe8b4c5811a7f53abc09ea04e8cb7c638933d62e5283efdf6" data-rendition-name="original" width="1080" height="1350" loading="lazy" alt="Heritage recovery NT"> </figure>  <h2> </h2> Some of the other highlights include James K. Reap, a professor in the Master of Historic Preservation Program at the University of Georgia who has a session on the US response to illicit trafficking. Art historian Lea Saint-Raymond is taking on “Gods at Auction: The Market for Himalayan Artefacts”, while lecturer of criminology at the University of Glasgow Emiline Smith is delving into transformative approaches to heritage ownership and repatriation. Helena Arose of Antiquities Coalition and Melina Antoniadis of NOSTOS Strategies that specialise on the return home of cultural heritage as well as Hao Liu of International Cultural Heritage Law at the School of Law at Shandong University are some of the others attending. The Nepal Heritage Recovery Campaign was set up in 2020 to develop a coordinated movement to reclaim Nepal’s stolen gods and goddesses, with an aim to ensure that recovered items are returned to their original shrines, niches or sanctums. Ahead of the conference opening organisers have arranged for a film screening of Loot &amp; Return: 4 Documentaries at YalaMaya Kendra in Patan Dhoka between 14-15 June. Following the conference is a multimedia exhibition titled Absent Gods: Nepal’s Lost Heritage from 31 July to 4 August at Patan Museum.

Priceless paubha in Paris

While Nepal was hosting the Sagarmatha Sambaad international climate conference in Kathmandu this month, on Mt Everest it was pretty much business as usual.&nbsp; The signs of climate breakdown are all there: a river now runs through Base Camp in summer, the Khumbu Icefall is more unstable, and there are more &nbsp;frequent avalanches. When expeditions arrived in March, the mountains were bare: it had not snowed since September, but then blizzards dumped unseasonal snow in May. And despite climate worries, such is the pull of Himalayan mountaineering that the Everest Industry showed no signs of slowdown. More than 600 international climbers and their Nepali guides had made it to the summit of the world’s highest mountain. At one point there were an estimated 2,000 people in the tent city on the Khumbu Glacier. All the ropes and ladders on the Icefall came down on Thursday, marking the official end of the spring climbing season, and just in time to avoid a monsoon cyclone approaching from the Bay of Bengal. It has been an action-packed season. One factor could be that Everest fees will go up from September: each foreign climber needs to pay a $15,000 royalty, up from the present $11,000. The cost for a Nepali climber on the South Col route will also go up: from Rs75,000 to Rs150,000.&nbsp; The fee to climb Everest in autumn is $7,500 (up from $5,500), but most climbers still prefer spring. Winter permit fee (December-February) is only $3,750 per person and the mountain is now also open for monsoon (June-August) climbs, when the fee is ever lower at $2,750. The revised rule also makes it mandatory for every two climbers on an 8,000m peak to hire one Nepali mountain guide.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2025053004050_67f856fe52714e4bdcf21ae7d45c6f18c82117b9d0a5f73ed1efa04c96de1046.jpg" data-media-id="editor_0" data-image-id="2025053004050_67f856fe52714e4bdcf21ae7d45c6f18c82117b9d0a5f73ed1efa04c96de1046" data-rendition-name="original" width="931" height="732" loading="lazy" alt="The Everest Industry graph 1"> </figure>  In addition, climbers also have to pay for porters and guides, equipment, Base Camp costs, Ice Fall and fixed rope team fees, so climbing Everest does not come cheap. But such is the draw of climbing the world’s highest peak that some say the increased fees will not diminish the crowds next year. The government has tried to spread expeditions out to other seasons and other 8,000ers, but with not much success. Earlier this year, Nepal unilaterally increased the number of 8,000m peaks to 14 by adding six more sub-summits to broaden the choice for climbers. Added were: Yalung Kang (8,505m), Yalung Kang West (8,077m) &nbsp;Kangchenjunga Central (8,473m), Kangchenjunga South (8,476m), Lhotse Middle (8,410m) and Lhotse Shar (8,400m).&nbsp; The announcement could go against the accepted topographic criteria that a stand alone peak has to be at least 300m higher than an adjoining prominence, and at more than 3km isolation from it. The UIAA (Union Internationale des Associations d'Alpinisme) still recognises only 14 mountains as eight-thousanders, and only eight of those are in Nepal, or on the border with China. Nepal’s revised mountaineering regulations also increased the insurance coverage of high-altitude workers to protect porters and high altitude guides who usually take more risks on the mountains. Rescue teams and clean-up campaigners to collect trash and remove bodies of dead climbers up to Camp IV of Mt Everest do not need permits.&nbsp; The Sagarmatha Pollution Control Committee is now using drones to fly down trash in 20kg sacks. Each climber is also required to bring down at least 6kg of waste and not just their own, but this rule is erratically enforced. With five fatalities on Everest and Lhotse, Spring 2025 had a historically low death toll. Another five climbers died on Annapurna, Kangchenjunga and Makalu.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2025053004050_38681de22f0fefb6faa12b01755566d09c5064d0ff84e12ccc7b5d68ea9ba38a.jpg" data-media-id="editor_1" data-image-id="2025053004050_38681de22f0fefb6faa12b01755566d09c5064d0ff84e12ccc7b5d68ea9ba38a" data-rendition-name="original" width="665" height="740" loading="lazy" alt="The Everest industry graph 2"> </figure>  Journalist Ben Ayers who ran the Everest Live social media channel from Everest Base Camp with daily updates credited the low death rate to dramatic rescues of climbers from the ‘Death Zone’ by their Nepali guides and longline helievacs — the visuals all uploaded on YouTube.&nbsp; “Ironically, this perception of safety is bringing more and more inexperienced climbers to the mountain, and they need more rescues,” Ayers said in one of his dispatches.&nbsp; American expedition chronicler and summiteer Alan Arnette suspects there is a lot of under-reporting given that the jet stream and storms were lashing Everest even till late in the season. He told us: “I heard a lot about frostbite and rescues that were not made public. It’s become practically impossible to cover the details on Everest. All the teams report nice news, and they don’t talk about bad stuff to avoid hurting businesses.” Although trash on Nepal’s mountains makes headlines, what does not receive as much attention is the climate impact of so many expeditions. The Sagarmatha Sambaad conference sidestepped this issue, which is ironic given that the impact of climate breakdown is most evident on Himalayan peaks and their glaciers.&nbsp; <h2>Need for Speed</h2> The big stories this year have been about speed-running from their home cities to the top of Everest. Ukrainian entrepreneur Andrew Ushakov flew out of JFK on 15 May at 10:15AM Nepal time, and was on the summit 3 days, 23 hours, and 7 minutes later on 19 May at 9:22AM.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250601080640_1c5cc6fc991307861768f07037ed9d30930fb20f35dbb57dc31c9a92a9e1a885.jpg" data-media-id="editor_2" data-image-id="20250601080640_1c5cc6fc991307861768f07037ed9d30930fb20f35dbb57dc31c9a92a9e1a885" data-rendition-name="original" width="1440" height="1800" loading="lazy" alt="The Everest Industry"> <figcaption>Andrew Ushakov at the summt. Photo: ELITE EXPED</figcaption> </figure>  “I could never find the time for the traditional 40-50 days of acclimatisation,” Ushakov explained matter-of-factly. His ‘Everest Sea-to-Summit’ climb was possible because he spent 400 hours in hypoxic sleep tents over the past four years in New York. However, Ushakov did use ropes already fixed, hired four Nepali guides, helicoptered to Base Camp, and used much more oxygen than an average climber. And after the climb, Ushakov was arrested at Kathmandu airport for being in possession of $20,000 of undeclared cash and spent a night in jail and fined $60,000.&nbsp; The other speedsters were Garth Miller, Alastair Cairns, Anthony Stazicker, and Kev Godlington, all former British Army commandos. They left London and summited five days later on 21 May, and flew right back. They also used hypoxic tents to simulate the thin air high on Everest.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250601080644_90c8dd5cc07b4b43f2989b1dc0c0650ab80f10ebb06680c25a6909c519957bd8.jpg" data-media-id="editor_3" data-image-id="20250601080644_90c8dd5cc07b4b43f2989b1dc0c0650ab80f10ebb06680c25a6909c519957bd8" data-rendition-name="original" width="810" height="668" loading="lazy" alt="The Everest Industry "> <figcaption>All four members of the Furtenbach team at the summit. Photo: Sandro Gromen-Hayes</figcaption> </figure>  But more controversial was their use of xenon gas therapy in a German hospital to ramp up the production of oxygen-carrying haemoglobins in their blood. Xenon is banned by the World Anti-Doping Agency for being performance enhancing in sports. Expedition leader Lukas Furtenbach said this rule does not apply to mountaineering, as it is not a regulated sport like swimming. Nepal has no rules about xenon, but the Department of Tourism said it was launching an ‘investigation’ to decide on future policy since it is difficult to ban xenon, but allow oxygen. The controversy has also divided the mountaineering community, with some climbers saying they just want to maximise their chances of survival. Spending less time on the mountain could make climbing safer by reducing avalanche risk. It would also mean less trash on the mountains, but it would reduce the income of Nepal’s expedition industry. It is also unclear how much of the success was due to xenon therapy and whether the ex-special forces were already in good physical shape.&nbsp; The need for speed hides the fact that climbing in the Himalaya is dangerous business, and climbers cannot sprint to the top just by huffing xenon. But ultra-fast climbs could be charged more, and the revenue generated can be used to establish state-of-the-art rescue operations, and increase pay and insurance for guides. Two other speed chasers this season were Swiss-Ecuadorian Karl Egloff and American Tyler Andrews, both on Everest without oxygen. Andrews choppered to Base Camp to catch a weather window, but turned back from 8,500m due to high winds. Heavy snow and wind also forced Egloff to descend from 7,000m. Slow and steady climbers like Anja Blacha from Germany did make it to the summit without oxygen, while Kami Rita Sherpa broke his own record with his 31st Everest summit as he led a 26-strong Indian Army group. There were 468 permits issued for foreign climbers from 48 expeditions to Everest this spring. Nepal’s other eight-thousanders together had only 17 expeditions. Nepal has more than 1,000 peaks above 6,000m, and has opened only 476 of them for climbing.&nbsp;