The post World War II <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/review/west-is-west">decade of the 1950s</a> saw the dismantling of colonial systems, establishment of a new world order with the United States replacing Britain. <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/peacemongers-at-india-pakistan-border">India and Pakistan</a> had just gained independence and were still traumatised by partition.&nbsp; In China, Mao Zedong came to power after 20 years of revolution, and promptly annexed Tibet. The <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/a-new-cold-war-in-the-himalaya">Cold War</a> between the US and the Sino-Soviet alliance led to proxy wars in Korea and Vietnam. In Nepal itself, <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/inside-story-of-nepal-s-rana-dynasty">the Ranas</a> were replaced by <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/history-on-canvas">the Shahs</a> in 1951, and ten years later <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/last-days-with-bp-koirala">BP Koirala</a> became the first democratically elected prime minister — soon deposed in a coup by King Mahendra. Nepal opened up to the world and tried to keep a delicate balance between global and regional powers. The book, Nepal in the Long 1950s, explores politics, economics and the socio-culture milieu in the decade following the end of the Rana rule. Edited by researchers Pratyoush Onta, Lokranjan Parajuli and anthropologist Mark Liechty, the book is a collection of 10 essays, the first six of which place <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/the-geopolitics-of-nepal-s-politics">Nepal in the larger geopolitical context</a>, while the last four explore the role of foreign specialists and institutions in reshaping Nepal. Prawash Gautam examines how the last years of <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/Nepali-Times-Buzz/the-rana-reign-a-recap-of-history,3751">Rana rule</a> were marked by looser controls, enabling the emergence of the public sphere. One tea shop near Dharara became a space for socialisation, discourse, as well as political organisation.&nbsp; However, while this teashop was unique in that it allowed customers from ‘lower’ caste communities, Gautam says <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/nepal-s-caste-struggle">caste-based discrimination</a> and limited access to women still prevented public spaces from <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/everybody-counts-in-nepal">being inclusive</a>. Bandana Gyawali writes about how the Nepali notion of unnati (progress), was replaced by the concept bikas (development), a ‘more democratic’ term championed by the American aid programs that associated development with material gain which at the time meant little to Nepalis.&nbsp; Peter Gill’s chapter discusses efforts to legislate and implement socio-economic reform, including birta abolition, tenancy rights, and land distribution. However, he writes, these reforms were ultimately a populist tool used by new leaders for political gain. Sharad Ghimire delves into the state’s disaster response in the aftermath of<a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/60-years-after-1954-devastating-flood-same-failings-of-government-today-post-quake,2433"> the deadly 1954 floods</a>. Political incompetence and attempts to politicise the crisis led to the failure of relief led by Prime Minister M P Koirala, ultimately deepening rifts between himself and leaders of the ruling coalition — giving King Mahendra the chance to assert himself.&nbsp; Meanwhile, the US answered Nepal’s call for help in <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/disastrous-management-in-nepal">disaster management</a> to curb possible Communist influence in Nepal, much to India’s annoyance. Pratyoush Onta examines how <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/kingdom-lost-republic-gained">post-Rana politics</a> encouraged Nepalis to realise their intellectual freedom and pursue knowledge creation and distribution. The formation of the short-lived Nepal Sanskritik Foundation, set up by political leaders, scholars, and intellectuals like Bal Chandra Sharma and Isvar Baral who had witnessed and participated in India’s anti-colonial movements, facilitated social research and knowledge enterprise. Two chapters discuss the development of <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/editorial/lessons-not-learnt-homework-not-done">Nepal’s education sector</a>. Lokranjan Parajuli looks into how domestic and foreign actors impacted the founding of Tribhuvan University, documenting the role of queen consorts Janti Rajya Laxmi Devi Shah and Queen Ishwari Rajya Laxmi Devi Shah, even as Mahendra remained wary lest it produce intellectuals who would undermine his authority. Read also: <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/america-nepal-and-the-royal-coup">America, Nepal and the Royal Coup</a>, Tom Robertson India and the US were vying to help TU, writes Parajuli, but China and USSR arrived to also support higher education sector with less strings attached. This led to US and India joining forces, and the US eventually let India take the lead. Susan Heydon’s research into <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/is-free-health-care-possible-in-nepal">Nepal’s healthcare</a> sector reveals that development in biomedicine was in large part due to assistance from Christian missionaries, despite Nepalis’ wariness towards them, visiting foreign <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/grass-is-greener-overseas-for-nepals-doctors">healthcare experts</a>, as well as <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/e75-million-eu-aid-to-nepal-for-covid-19-ckmyfbkq">international aid</a>.&nbsp; As <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/how-usaid-cut-affects-nepal">USAID fund cuts impact Nepal</a>, Jeremy Rappleye’s chapter on the US development assistance and Nepal’s modern education system is relevant read. He recalls how American educator Hugh Wood’s aid-centered blueprint for educational development in the 1950s was incongruous with what Nepali officials wanted. Wood’s model laid the groundwork for <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/teaching-nepali-teachers-to-teach-better?fbclid=IwY2xjawIfg2JleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHRlYZ7S9dci12M2TMdHcirodLAD3e5OHzlfKW0z07B4plWF8Ofxo88JPfQ_aem_Ka7WIxuhTW0ghPf2qD-Yzg">Nepal’s modern education</a>, writes Rappleye, although it was not entirely appropriate. Former USEF Nepal director Thomas Robertson takes on the US ‘Four Point Program’ aimed at making Nepal reliant on American support. With the region in the grip of the Cold War, the US sought to expand its sphere of influence in Asia, in particular to stop India from going the way of China. Nepal therefore became strategically important to America’s aspirations for the region, writes Robertson. This meant Washington poured aid and into Nepal, including anti-malaria programs and land reform initiatives — in stark contrast to <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/the-great-game-2nd-half">Donald Trump’s current pullout of USAID, MCC and other programs</a>. Mark Liechty ends the book with his exploration of the life and times of Boris Lisanevich and his Hotel Royal which ushered Nepal into the age of <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/missing-out-on-nepal-s-tourism-potential">tourism</a>. But Boris was not particularly well versed in the art of hospitality, and while Nepalis in this burgeoning sector realised the opportunities and went about realising those potentials Lisanevich continued to dwell in his anachronistic <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/nepal-britain-mark-centenary-of-1923-treaty">colonial fantasy</a> of Nepal, not doing himself any favours.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250220080248_ac072d9d13e541b5d8616f34edb4aae86a8859c6fe44682932408722fa9bff37.jpg" data-media-id="editor_23" data-image-id="20250220080248_ac072d9d13e541b5d8616f34edb4aae86a8859c6fe44682932408722fa9bff37" data-rendition-name="original" width="1136" height="702" loading="lazy" alt="Nepal in the long 1950s"> </figure>

Shristi Karki

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Nepal in the world, the world in Nepal

In December, the Nepal government announced it would not allow a Beijing-appointed Tibetan spiritual leader, the Panchen Lama, to attend a Buddhist conference in Kathmandu. Immigration at the airport was put on high alert to ensure he did not try to sneak in.&nbsp; Coming soon after Prime Minister K P Oli’s visit to China, that decision underscored Nepal’s precarious tight-rope act in addressing religio-political sensitivities in its relations with China. The Panchen Lama episode can be seen as a test for Nepal’s handling of the succession of the Dalai Lama, who turns 90 in July. “When the time comes to find a successor to the Dalai Lama, Nepal will face a larger policy dilemma,” predicts Sudheer Sharma, author of two recent books on Nepal-China relations. “The government is still unclear what it will do if the successor is chosen from the Tibetan community in Nepal, or from China or India.” <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/dalai-lama-gets-block-of-glacial-ice">The Dalai Lama</a> is the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism and a symbol of Tibetan identity; he is revered as the manifestation of Avalokitesvara, the Bodhisattva of Compassion. He was born in 1935 in northeastern Tibet and was formally recognised as the Dalai Lama in 1940.&nbsp; He has been living in exile in Dharamsala for the past 65 years after fleeing Lhasa following the Chinese takeover. He has been allowed to make a low-profile visit to Lumbini only once in 1987, and never after that due to objections from China.&nbsp; Nepal does not have a national strategy to handle the presence of <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/nepal-s-sherpas-mourn-tengboche-abbott">religious leaders</a>. If there are policies, they are ad-hoc or undeclared, depending on the government of the day in Kathmandu. The Nepal government, under Chinese pressure, even prevents public celebrations marking the Dalai Lama’s birthday on 6 July. “The Dalai Lama’s attempts to visit Nepal again have been stopped &nbsp;since Nepal thinks he is not only a religious leader, but a political figure as well,” says Sharma. “There is no discussion in Nepal’s political circles regarding the succession of the Dalai Lama. The topic is regarded as a non-issue.”&nbsp; Over the years, the Dalai Lama has made various statements regarding his succession. At times, he has suggested that he will write a will to select a successor from within the Tibetan community. On other occasions, he has hinted that the next Dalai Lama could be chosen from a “free country”, and could even be a woman.&nbsp; The Panchen Lama succession in 1995 could provide a hint about how the post-Dalai Lama era will play out. The Panchen Lama is the second most important spiritual leader in Tibetan Buddhism, and heads the <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=18580">Tashilhunpo Monastery in Xigatse</a>, the epicentre of the 7 January earthquake, located 250km away from Lhasa.&nbsp; The Panchen Lama traditionally has the role of finding the next Dalai Lama, but the previous Panchen Lama (Lobsang Trinley Lhundrup Choekyi Gyaltsen) has been missing since 1995, after the Chinese installed their own candidate (Gyaltsen Norbu). The present Panchen Lama’s visits are carefully planned, and he has made only one foreign visit so far, to Thailand. “Nepal did not permit Panchen Lama’s visit as he is Chinese Communist Party-appointed, thus making him a political figure,” says Amish Mulmi, author of the book All Roads Lead North.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250124090148_3bb3d803c04c34657d0ac9759ca904073f75734a446506f8a57e50178b381c00.jpg" data-media-id="editor_3" data-image-id="20250124090148_3bb3d803c04c34657d0ac9759ca904073f75734a446506f8a57e50178b381c00" data-rendition-name="original" width="1087" height="697" loading="lazy" alt="Dalai Lama NT"> </figure>  What China was trying to do through the Panchen Lama’s visit for the Nanhai Conference in Kathmandu last month was to project its soft power, and perhaps prepare the ground for the Dalai Lama succession. But the ban raised the question of what Nepal will do if there is a visit by Hindutva figures from India at events in Nepal.&nbsp; Religious leaders and figures from various faiths regularly visit Nepal for devotional events, meetings and conferences. Their trips are often significant for promoting dialogue and cultural exchange, and cannot be banned under the Constitution. “We did the Nanhai Conference, and in future religious leaders will definitely visit Nepal. The question arises whether or not to allow them to engage in political activities or not,” says Mulmi. “Religion has always been political. So Nepal must not take easy decisions and must think it through.” Although Nepal and Tibet fought wars in the past two centuries, they share deep-rooted and ancient cultural, religious and trade ties. After the Chinese annexation of Tibet 70 years ago, Kathmandu gradually started dealing directly with Beijing.&nbsp; Today, Nepal is the only country with a consulate in Lhasa, a city from where the only direct international flight is to Kathmandu. Over the years, these ties have evolved, with shifts in trade dynamics and people-to-people interactions reflecting broader regional and global changes. Despite this, the historical bond between Nepal and Tibet remains a significant aspect of present-day bilateral relations with China, and this is why the selection of the next Dalai Lama has resonance here. “It is clear that China has been trying to adopt Tibetan Buddhism as a soft power. It is trying to co-opt Tibetan Buddhism on the lines of China’s ambitions and narratives,” explains Mulmi.&nbsp; The Dalai Lama’s <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=14733">considerable following</a> in Nepal, India, Europe and the United States is an irritant for Beijing. Recent Sino-American tensions have therefore given the spiritual ownership of Tibetan Buddhism a geopolitical dimension, and in this the Dalai Lama succession will become an important factor.&nbsp; Relations between Washington and Beijing during the second Trump term will have a bearing on this. As a buffer state between India and China, Nepal has historically tried to maintain equidistance between the two powers.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2025012308014_95372c819980513e21490c3abe2aa8e712af6c89c5829e04d5f57880ad4f2a23.jpg" data-media-id="editor_5" data-image-id="2025012308014_95372c819980513e21490c3abe2aa8e712af6c89c5829e04d5f57880ad4f2a23" data-rendition-name="original" width="2500" height="1000" loading="lazy" alt="What (or who) after the Dalai Lama NT"> <figcaption>THEIR HOLINESSES: The Dalai Lama, who will be 90 in July (left), and China-installed Panchen Lama (above). Traditionally, it is the Panchen Lama who has a role in finding a new Dalai Lama. Photos: TENZIN CHOEJOR (left) / CHINAN NEWS SERVICE (right)</figcaption> </figure>  But China has rarely stuck its neck out for Nepal. Despite repeated requests for military help during its war with the British East India Company in 1814-16, the emperor in Beijing refused.&nbsp; Explains Sudheer Sharma: “China did not want to get involved with the British. They thought of their own national interests then, and they are thinking of their own national interests now with India.” During the Khampa Uprising in the 1960s, Kathmandu was also squeezed between American support for the guerrillas and China’s objections to Nepal being used as a base. But with the Nixon-Mao rapprochement in 1972, the Americans stopped helping the Khampas. Nepal then yielded to pressure from Mao Zedong to mount a military campaign to drive them out.&nbsp; Nepal was left to manage and host Tibetan refugees, and balance that with China’s security concerns. Explains Amish Mulmi: “Nepal has pretty much done everything China has asked to do, including deporting Tibetans. China doesn’t need to be insecure, but Nepal needs to maintain a careful balance.” Today, despite Donald Trump’s chest-thumping and <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/editorial/trump-s-second-coming">threats of a tariff war against Beijing</a>, he and Chinese President Xi Jinping are on the same page regarding democracy and freedoms. Which may mean Washington could once more leave the Tibetans in a lurch, and this could have a direct bearing on the Dalai Lama succession sequence. The United States' shifting foreign policy has often been criticised for leaving allies and partners to fend for themselves. Trump may revive his pressure on Japan, Korea and Taiwan to pay for the US defence umbrella.&nbsp; Nepal’s stance on the Tibetan community relies on marking boundaries and offering protection. During Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to Nepal, China proposed that Nepal sign an extradition treaty which Nepal politely refused. “Nepal has tactfully not let the Chinese side extend a longer hand on the Tibetan issue,” says Sharma. “Possibly, we are learning our lessons from history.” The question of who will choose the successor to the Dalai Lama will be decided by geopolitics, and China’s increased stature as a global economic power.&nbsp; Beijing could insist on sticking to tradition to let its candidate for the Panchen Lama make the final decision. This would allow it to move the seat of the Dalai Lama from Dharamshala back to Lhasa. The present Dalai Lama could also appoint his own candidate, but that person will not be allowed into Tibet by China. In that case, we may have a situation where there are two Dalai Lamas.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250127030140_c9048725407641601bc68568db19e48197154cd6396f39d67ab113d94c26e675.jpg" data-media-id="editor_7" data-image-id="20250127030140_c9048725407641601bc68568db19e48197154cd6396f39d67ab113d94c26e675" data-rendition-name="original" width="1910" height="757" loading="lazy" alt="Voice for the Voiceless Dalai Lama"> <figcaption>Dalai Lama's latest book Voice for the Voiceless details his dealings with China over the last seven decades. </figcaption> </figure>

What (or who) after the Dalai Lama?

The shock wave of the return of Donald Trump to the White House, as well as the Republican control of the Senate and possibly the House, will impact not just America but people across the world.
In South Asia, it will mainly change the way Washington views and deals with China and India, and in more unpredictable ways. The impact on Nepal will be governed by how US relations with the country’s two giant neighbours develop in the next five years.
“Compared to Harris who has been focused more on multilateralism and maintaining allies, Trump is more confrontational and unilateral,” says National Assembly member and former Foreign Minister Bimala Rai Paudyel. “There is fear that Trump’s policies will push the world to become even more polarised than it is now.”
India and China will both be able to fill the gap left by Trump America’s retreat from global and regional leadership. They will be able to take advantage of Trump diluting relations with or abandoning traditional allies in Europe and Asia.
Although India is in the western camp, New Delhi has wanted to call its own shots. It is using its growing economic clout to thumb its nose at the EU and the US. For example, India has got away with importing oil from Russia despite western sanctions.
Says Akhilesh Upadhyay, Senior Fellow at the Strategic Affairs Center, IIDS: “From a traditional security perspective, Nepal is bang in the middle of China and India. China and America have a great power rivalry, and it is unclear which way Indian axis will go.”
India can also benefit if Trump follows through on threats on more tariffs on Chinese imports. Even though the Biden-Harris administration has been punishing China with tariffs and other barriers, Trump has in the past been more belligerent on Beijing.
“On the one hand, India is close to US in Quad, on the other hand, it takes part in BRICS where it works with Russia and China, and the Shanghai Cooperation. It remains to be seen how the US relationship plays out with our two big neighbours,” adds Upadhyay.
Since the enemy of an enemy is a friend, Washington has regarded India as its bulwark against increased Chinese economic and military clout. But New Delhi has not always gone along with US strategic interests, and does not really like the Americans being too involved with India’s smaller neighbours.
On the downside, A Trump administration could curb the influx of Indian IT workers in US, and the easy access Nepali students have to those jobs in the US could also be scaled back.
Some experts say which party is in the White House will not affect policy South Asia, and Nepal even less. But a Trump win could mean less development assistance to Nepal, particularly in reproductive health, human rights, and social safety.
Nischal Pandey at the Centre for South Asian Studies in Kathmandu says that the few state-level visits between the US and Nepal — from King Mahendra’s address to the joint session of US Congress during President Eisenhower tenure in 1960 to Ganesh Man Singh being received at the White House by President Bush Sr after 1990, to US Secretary of State Colin Powell’s visit in 2002 during George HW Bush’s term — have all been during Republican administrations.
He adds, “Historically, Republican presidents and administrations have been &nbsp;interested in Nepal than Democratic ones.”
More directly, Nepalis aspiring to migrate to the United States could find it more difficult. There are currently about 300 Nepalis waiting in Mexico for human traffickers to smuggle them into the United States, and that border is going to be tightened even more.
Earlier this year, Sao Paolo airport in Brazil had 150 Nepalis stranded after arriving to take the Darien Gap backdoor to the US. Another 200 headed out to Brazil were stuck at Addis Ababa airport, forcing Ethiopia to ban visas to Nepalis.&nbsp;
Trump has threatened a 20% tariff on Mexican imports if it does not stop migrants. He plans to deport 11 million undocumented people, he may not be able to carry it through but the threat is there for Nepalis in the US without papers.
Trump’s strong rhetoric on China could be bargaining brinkmanship, and it will be interesting to see how he balances this with Sino-Russian alignment. Biden did not roll back bans on Huawei and restrictions on TikTok, and US security concerns about China’s rise is a bipartisan issue, just as Gaza is. Harris would not have done things differently in those sectors.&nbsp;
Says MP Bimala Rai Paudyal: “Trump’s win could cause economic tensions with China, which will affect trade here as well, this is something we will need to prepare for.”
America’s moral authority to lecture countires like Nepal on transitional justice, human rights, democracy, and press freedom will be diminished during the second Trump term.&nbsp;
Reproductive rights, support for family planning projects in Nepal through the UN system may also fall like it did during his earlier presidency. Foreign aid through USAID could also be cut.
But perhaps the more indirect impact on Nepal of the Trump presidency will be his rollback on America’s commitment to curb climate change which will accelerate melting of the Himalayan icecap with major impact on water supply downstream in Asia.&nbsp;
“America’s climate commitments and goals will be impacted by Trump who doesn’t believe in climate change,” says Paudyal. “The current work on loss and damage, and carbon trading depends significantly on US funding, and the world looks to the US to be proactive.”
If Trump can bring the Ukraine war to a close by cosying up to Putin, a peace deal may improve fuel and food situation globally. There are thousands of Nepalis in the Russian Army, at least 50 have died, and they could finally come home.&nbsp;
Concludes Upadhyay: “As for Nepal, the Trump administration should see Nepal as a soverign nation on its own right rather than through the prism of great power rivalry either between US and China.”

Trumpet Call

The current wave of anti-Chinese sentiment in the United States has been building for years. It started in the early 2000s, when US policymakers first raised national-security concerns about Huawei.&nbsp;
China’s national technology champion, the market leader in developing new 5G telecommunications equipment, was accused of deploying digital backdoors that could enable Chinese espionage and cyber-attacks. US-led sanctions in 2019 stopped Huawei dead in its tracks.
But Huawei was just the start. The US has since spiraled into a full-blown outbreak of Sinophobia – a strong word that I don’t use lightly. Phobia is the extreme or irrational fear or dread aroused by a particular object or circumstance.
Indeed, China threats now seem to be popping up everywhere. The US government has imposed export controls to cut off China’s access to advanced semiconductors – part of its concerted effort to stymie the country’s <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/artificial-intelligence-vs-human-stupidity">artificial-intelligence</a> ambitions.&nbsp;
The Department of Justice has just indicted a state-sponsored Chinese hacking group for allegedly taking aim at critical American infrastructure. Much has also been made of the purported risks of Chinese EVs, construction and dock-loading cranes and now TikTok.&nbsp;
Nor are the fears confined to technology. Several years ago, I wrote about America’s trade-deficit disorder, whereby the US government misdiagnosed a multilateral problem – a trade deficit with more than 100 countries – as a bilateral problem and punished China with tariffs.&nbsp;
Others have warned that Washington’s exaggerated claims of the Chinese military threat have, at times, bordered on hysteria as tensions mount in the South China Sea and the Taiwan Strait.
Of course, all this is only half the story. China is equally guilty of its own strain of Ameriphobia – demonising the US for its accusations of Chinese economic espionage, unfair trading practices, and human-rights violations.&nbsp;
Both phobias are related to the profusion of false narratives that I address in my most recent book, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Accidental-Conflict-America-China-Narratives/dp/0300259646">Accidental Conflict</a>. Notwithstanding this tit-for-tat blame game, my point now is different:&nbsp;
There is good reason to worry about an increasingly virulent strain of this phobia spinning out of control in the US. Not since the red-baiting in the 1950s, has America so vilified a foreign power.&nbsp;
Back then, a two-pronged congressional approach, led by US Senator Joseph McCarthy of Wisconsin and the House Un-American Activities <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/review/the-destroyer-of-worlds">spearheaded an assault on alleged Communist sympathisers</a> under the guise of protecting Americans from Soviet espionage and influence.
Today, another politician from Wisconsin, Representative Mike Gallagher, has led the charge as chair of the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party which, in an eerie parallel to the McCarthy era, has leveled a series of unsubstantiated charges against China. While Gallagher will retire from Congress in April, his legacy will live on, not just as co-sponsor of a bill that could lead to an outright <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/rattled-by-criticism-nepal-bans-tiktok">ban of TikTok</a>, but also as the leader of a congressional effort that has cast a long shadow over those who support almost any form of engagement with China.
The litany of US allegations is a manifestation of unproven fears wrapped in the impenetrable cloak of national security. Yet there is no “smoking gun” in any of these cases. Instead, it is all about circumstantial evidence of an increasingly aggressive China. At work is an unmistakable bipartisan politicisation of deductive reasoning.
For example, US Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo, a leading Democrat, <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/china-cars-national-security-threat-investigation/" target="_blank">asks us</a> to “imagine” what could happen if Chinese EVs were weaponised on American highways.&nbsp;
FBI Director Christopher Wray, a Donald Trump appointee and member of the conservative Federalist Society, warns that Chinese malware could disable critical US infrastructure “if or when China decides the time has come to strike” (emphasis added).&nbsp;
And a former US counterintelligence officer has compared sensors in Chinese-made cranes to a Trojan horse. There are many what ifs and mythical parallels, but no hard evidence on intent or verifiable action.
What is it about China that has generated this virulent US reaction? In Accidental Conflict, I stressed that the US has long been intolerant of competing ideologies and alternative systems of governance. The claim of &nbsp;American exceptionalism seemingly compels us to impose our views and values on others. That was true in the Cold War, and it is true again today.
Read also: <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/staying-neutral-in-a-us-china-confrontation">Staying neutral in a US-China confrontation</a>, Project Syndicate
I also argued that excessive fear of China conveniently masks many of America’s own self-inflicted problems. Bilateral trade deficits may well reflect the unfair trading practices of individual countries – China today, Japan 35 years ago – but broad multilateral trade deficits stem more from chronic US budget deficits that lead to a deficiency of domestic savings.&nbsp;
Similarly, the technology threat is not only an outgrowth of the alleged Chinese theft of US intellectual property, it also represents, as I stressed in Accidental Conflict, America’s underinvestment in research and development and shortfalls in STEM-based higher education. Rather than taking a long, hard look in the mirror, it is politically expedient for US politicians to blame China.
As Sinophobia feeds on itself, fear starts to take on the aura of fact, and the dangers of accidental conflict with China intensify. By acting on these anxieties, America risks inciting the very outcome it wants to deter. Fears over Chinese aggression &nbsp;in Taiwan are a case in point.
The US can and must do better. Rather than excusing the excesses of Sinophobia as justifiable reactions to the China threat, US leaders need to avoid the low road and think more in terms of being the adult in the room. Global leadership requires nothing less.
In his first inaugural address in 1933, US President Franklin Roosevelt underscored the ultimate risk of this dangerous pathology with the memorable line, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”&nbsp;
Amid today’s Sinophobic frenzy, that message is well worth remembering. © <a href="http://www.project-syndicate.org/" target="_blank">Project Syndicate</a>&nbsp;
Stephen S Roach is a faculty member at Yale University and the author of the forthcoming Accidental Conflict: America, China, and the Clash of False Narratives (Yale University Press, November 2022).&nbsp;

US afflicted with full-blown Sinophobia

Nowhere is Nepal’s delicate balancing act between its giant neighbours India and China as evident as it is in this tourism capital.&nbsp; The <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/pokhara-s-china-connection">Chinese have cultivated a special relationship with Pokhara</a> ever since they built the 200km Prithvi Highway connecting it to Kathmandu in 1974, right up to the inauguration of Pokhara International Airport last year. India has not been far behind: it financed the 181km Siddhartha Highway connecting Pokhara to Bhairawa in 1971, and a dam that raised the level of Phewa Lake. There are strategic reasons for India and China to eye Pokhara. Most <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/recruitment-of-nepalis-into-indian-army-paused">Gorkha soldiers in the Indian Army are sourced from these mountains</a>, and there is an Indian military pension centre here.&nbsp; For China, it is important to keep an eye on refugee centres here with thousands who fled Tibet after the Chinese annexation. Both India and China have an interest in who governs Nepal, and have followed (often meddled) with political developments in Kathmandu. A Nepali Congress-Maoist coalition that was seen by many to be India-leaning was <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/catapulting-to-singha-darbar">suddenly replaced on Monday with a Communist-led coalition</a> more amicable to China.&nbsp; However, it is Pokhara that is on the main geostrategic fault line between India and China, where the rivalry is openly played out. Pokhara’s mayor Dhana Raj Acharya is from the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Socialist and has earned the moniker ‘Chinese mayor’ for pushing direct flights to Pokhara from Chinese cities, and activities like the Dragon Boat Festival on Phewa Lake, the China International Crosscountry Championship, and a full-scale celebration of Chinese New Year last month.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20240309010324_1a033dbd507869e172cfe184d622391defeaf39a1af0a4a4e1c6b60bd5d1a675.jpg" data-media-id="editor_3" data-image-id="20240309010324_1a033dbd507869e172cfe184d622391defeaf39a1af0a4a4e1c6b60bd5d1a675" data-rendition-name="original" width="3500" height="2333" loading="lazy" alt="Pokhara epicentre of Sino-Indian rivalry in Nepal"> <figcaption>Pokhara Mayor Dhana Raj Acharya with Chinese Ambassador Chen Song. Photo: DHANA RAJ ACHARYA/FACEBOOK</figcaption> </figure>  The Indians have been looking at this flurry of Chinese activity with some concern, and have organised their own events.&nbsp; The first international flight at Pokhara's new airport was a Sichuan Airlines jet from Chengdu in June flying in the Dragon Boat Festival crew. India has been dragging its feet on allowing direct flights between Pokhara and Indian cities because the airport was built by the Chinese. Read also: <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/pokhara-s-desperation-and-hope">Pokhara's desperation and hope</a>, Kanak Mani Dixit To make its point, the Indian Embassy organised a Yoga Day function on the same day as the inaugural Chinese flight. It was not a coincidence that both the Chinese and Indian ambassadors to Nepal were in Pokhara on the same day.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20240309010324_d07a2bdaa9fdff8dd3d9e585673b83f642e3bbf03dfc45d5b7bbec0d6cfbd55d.jpg" data-media-id="editor_5" data-image-id="20240309010324_d07a2bdaa9fdff8dd3d9e585673b83f642e3bbf03dfc45d5b7bbec0d6cfbd55d" data-rendition-name="original" width="1840" height="1292" loading="lazy" alt="Pokhara epicentre of Sino-Indian rivalry in Nepal"> <figcaption>A Sichuan Airlines Airbus 319 was the first international flight to the new Chinese-built Pokhara airport in June last year. Photo: XINHUA. It landed on the same day that the Indian Embassy organised Yoga Day at the nearby Pokhara Stadium (below).</figcaption> </figure>   <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20240309010328_ac491e7363d9a7ee6ff46ff926bcb29b0cc08aba0687d9c6d3d4bb5afa09318e.jpg" data-media-id="editor_6" data-image-id="20240309010328_ac491e7363d9a7ee6ff46ff926bcb29b0cc08aba0687d9c6d3d4bb5afa09318e" data-rendition-name="original" width="2250" height="1501" loading="lazy" alt="Pokhara epicentre of Sino-Indian rivalry in Nepal"> <figcaption>Photo: DHANA RAJ ACHARYA/FACEBOOK</figcaption> </figure>  &nbsp;On another recent visit to Pokhara, Indian Ambassador Naveen Srivastava made a pointed reference to the fact that Pokhara was connected to the Indian border (by the Indian built road in 1971) before it was linked to Kathmandu (by the Chinese-built road in 1974). He added that although Indian visitors liked to drive to Pokhara, they were facing difficulties because of the poor state of the Prithvi Highway.&nbsp; “I don’t know who is repairing that highway,” Ambassador Srivastava continued, referring obliquely to Chinese contractors, “but India has set a record in highway construction. Next time, also remember Indian companies.” Srivastava made no mention of India’s reluctance to allow flights to Pokhara, adding that most Indian visitors came by road anyway. Chinese Ambassador Chen Song also appeared concerned about the slow progress on the expansion of the Prithvi Highway, and drove along a part of it during a recent visit, posting drone footage of the upgrading work on social media. Read also: <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/begnas-going-the-way-of-phewa">Begnas going the way of Phewa</a>, Durga Rana Magar While in Pokhara, Ambassador Song also publicly criticised the Indian policy of not importing electricity from Nepali hydropower plants built by the Chinese. And to drive that point home, two Chinese Air Force Y-20 transport aircraft landed at Pokhara airport in November with 50 tonnes of relief for Jajarkot earthquake survivors.&nbsp; New Delhi insisted that the India-Nepal Bilateral Consultative Group on Security Issues be held in Pokhara in October.&nbsp; “The great game between India and China is being played out in Nepal, and Pokhara is where it is most visible,” explains geopolitics expert Indra Adhikari.&nbsp; She adds, “India is concerned about an increase in Chinese activity around Pokhara, and competition between Nepal’s neighbours is heating up.”&nbsp; India’s main sensitivity appears to be over the fact that Kaski and neighbouring districts of central Nepal are major recruitment centres for the Gorkha regiments of the Indian Army. The Gorkha Pension Camp was opened as far back as 1955 in Pokhara, and in 1987 it established a school for the children of Gorkha soldiers in its military.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2024031106034_a5c5037ae3a76c0443eca037a02d822494de1f60649e6f42466936fb3e632ddd.jpg" data-media-id="editor_8" data-image-id="2024031106034_a5c5037ae3a76c0443eca037a02d822494de1f60649e6f42466936fb3e632ddd" data-rendition-name="original" width="900" height="551" loading="lazy" alt="Pokhara geopolitics"> <figcaption>Indian Ambassador Navin Srivastav with mayor Acharya.</figcaption> </figure>  Similarly, China’s touchiness concerns the presence of British Gurkha veterans and their families living in Hong Kong, and Tibetans in four refugee camps in and around Pokhara.&nbsp; Pokhara was also the staging post for American and Indian military support for Khampa guerrillas who were fighting the Chinese Army in Tibet till they were disarmed or driven out in 1976. Explains analyst Ananda Raj Mulmi: “Beijing does not want Pokhara to once more become a base for anti-Chinese activities.” After opening the China-Nepal border at Korala in Mustang, the Chinese are keen to make Pokhara a trading hub in central Nepal.&nbsp; “The Chinese had a long term time horizon to link the Prithvi Highway to Korala, and wanted to extend the road from Pokhara to Jomsom but King Mahendra did not approve, so they just built it up to Baglung,” adds Mulmi.&nbsp; Pokhara’s sister city relations with eight Chinese cities is a source of soft power, and means there are frequent cultural exchanges. Pokhara is a household word in China because of the popular television serial Deng Feng Lai which was filmed on location here, and the main characters took a paragliding flight. <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/chinese-tourist-influx-to-nepal-in-2020-nqr538k3">Chinese visitors used to be the mainstay of Pokhara’s tourism till Covid</a>.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2024031106034_ff7c3ce0f0e3b2e83849bcdf35942892b9fb7e4f110ce6032920fd3e4ccd8094.jpg" data-media-id="editor_10" data-image-id="2024031106034_ff7c3ce0f0e3b2e83849bcdf35942892b9fb7e4f110ce6032920fd3e4ccd8094" data-rendition-name="original" width="976" height="665" loading="lazy" alt="Pokhara geopolitics"> </figure>  More than a year after the inauguration of Pokhara Airport, there are no regular international flights. India may be preventing flights to its cities, but it is Nepal’s failure that it has not been able to attract airlines to connect Pokhara to Chinese destinations.&nbsp; “This is because we went ahead and built an expensive airport without factoring in geopolitical sensitivities,” says foreign policy expert Krishna KC. “We have to convince the Indians that it is also in their interest to allow flights.”&nbsp; Chinese Ambassador Song announced at Pokhara Airport’s inauguration that it was a BRI project even though it predated the concept, and this ticked India off even more. Nepal’s unclear flip-flopping over the issue aggravated both sides, diplomatic sources say.&nbsp; Even so, most people here blame India for being petty-minded about not allowing new air routes making Pokhara operations feasible, as well as permitting connections to Indian cities.&nbsp; Professor of geostrategic studies Bhim Nath Baral says it is natural for both powerful countries to be concerned that Pokhara will be used against its national interest.&nbsp; “But it is up to Nepal to deploy diplomatic skills to understand and reassure both sides,” he adds. “That can only come with a mature and self-confident foreign policy.”

Pokhara epicentre of Sino-Indian rivalry

China’s sharp economic slowdown has raised alarm bells around the world. But it has also thrown into relief the rise of another demographic powerhouse next door.&nbsp; The Indian economy grew at an impressive <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/india/indias-economic-growth-set-accelerate-its-fastest-year-2023-08-31/">7.8% annual rate</a> in the second quarter of 2023, and the country recently reached an important milestone by becoming the first to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/23/science/chandrayaan-3-india-moon-landing.html">land a spacecraft</a> on the Moon’s potentially water-rich south pole. India’s ascent, unlike China’s, has not been accompanied by an increasingly assertive foreign policy. As India’s geopolitical, economic, and cultural clout grows, so does its global footprint. China’s ‘<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/29/opinion/china-economy-decline.html">decline</a>’, as some have begun to call the conclusion of the country’s four-decade-long economic boom, opens new opportunities for the Indian economy and other developing and emerging countries. Earlier this year, India reached another milestone when its population officially <a href="https://www.un.org/development/desa/dpad/publication/un-desa-policy-brief-no-153-india-overtakes-china-as-the-worlds-most-populous-country/">surpassed that of China</a>, which had been the world’s most populous country for <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/19/world/asia/india-china-population.html">more than 300 years</a>. While China’s shrinking, <a href="https://www.scmp.com/economy/economic-indicators/article/3207047/china-population-2022-marks-first-population-decline-60-years">rapidly aging</a> population is likely to impede economic growth and may curtail its geopolitical ambitions, India – one of the world’s <a href="https://indbiz.gov.in/one-of-the-youngest-populations-in-the-world-indias-most-valuable-asset/">youngest</a> countries, with a <a href="https://www.worldometers.info/world-population/india-population/#:~:text=The%20population%20density%20in%20India,1%2C202%20people%20per%20mi2).&amp;text=The%20median%20age%20in%20India%20is%2028.4%20years.">median age of 28.2</a> – is poised to reap a huge demographic dividend. But the driving force behind India’s emergence as a major global power is its rapid economic growth. While India’s GDP is still smaller than China’s, the country is currently the world’s <a href="https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/WEO/Issues/2023/07/10/world-economic-outlook-update-july-2023">fastest-growing</a> major economy and is projected to account for <a href="https://t.co/SMFH21oTa0">12.9% of global growth</a> over the next five years, surpassing the United States’ 11.3% share.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20231029081036_781e265ec0c9f72b3c2596697419554293b721f2c4e8c93b963d66e35f4aa3c1.jpg" data-media-id="editor_10" data-image-id="20231029081036_781e265ec0c9f72b3c2596697419554293b721f2c4e8c93b963d66e35f4aa3c1" data-rendition-name="original" width="696" height="477" loading="lazy" alt="India China graph NT"> </figure>  In addition to fueling a consumption boom, India’s youthful population is also driving innovation, as evidenced by the country’s world-class information economy and its recent moon landing, which the country managed to achieve despite a national space budget equivalent to <a href="https://www.wsj.com/world/asia/india-races-russia-to-be-first-to-land-on-moons-south-pole-ad5d9d05">roughly 6%</a> of what the US spends on space missions. Having already surpassed the United Kingdom, its former colonial ruler, India’s GDP is poised to <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2022/12/01/india-to-leapfrog-to-third-largest-economy-by-2030.html">overtake</a> that of Japan and Germany to become the world’s third-largest economy by 2030, behind the US and China. Given its increasingly unstable neighborhood, it should come as no surprise that India has the world’s <a href="https://www.sipri.org/media/press-release/2022/world-military-expenditure-passes-2-trillion-first-time">third-largest</a> defense budget. The deepening <a href="https://asia.nikkei.com/Opinion/Pakistan-China-and-terrorism">strategic alliance</a> between China and Pakistan underscores India’s precarious position as the only country bordering two nuclear-armed <a href="https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/pakistan-becoming-chinese-client-state-by-brahma-chellaney-2016-05?">revisionist states</a> with expansionist ambitions. Moreover, for the past three years, India has been locked in a tense <a href="https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/china-cannot-win-india-himalayan-border-dispute-by-brahma-chellaney-2023-04">military standoff</a> with China along its Himalayan border. Bilateral relations, marked by <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/12/12/india-china-arunachal-border/">intermittent clashes</a> in the disputed Tibet-Ladakh border region, are at their lowest point in decades. By confronting China despite the risk of a full-scale war, India has challenged Chinese power in a way no other country has done in this century. But despite leaning toward forging closer ties with the West, India remains hesitant to enter into formal military alliances with Western countries. Western powers are partly to blame. US President <a href="https://www.project-syndicate.org/columnist/joseph-biden-jr">Joe Biden</a>’s reluctance to comment on the Sino-Indian military standoff, let alone openly support India, has sent a clear signal that India is responsible for its own defense. Given that the country’s future growth hinges on its ability to defend itself against external threats, India will likely step up its efforts to modernize its conventional armed forces and enhance its nuclear deterrence. The escalating geopolitical rivalry between China and India could also impede efforts to unite the Global South and transform the BRICS group into a credible alternative to the G20 and G7. The BRICS countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) recently agreed to expand the group by adding <a href="https://www.thepresidency.gov.za/content/xv-brics-summit-johannesburg-ii-declaration-24-august-2023">six new members</a>: Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Ethiopia, Argentina, and Iran. Given the 11 members’ divergent interests, BRICS+ will likely find it even harder to reach consensus on any major issue.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20231029081040_43ee34df0da045fc9466deb8642e67e778412c7494d5aa1275da28fc08e002e9.jpg" data-media-id="editor_20" data-image-id="20231029081040_43ee34df0da045fc9466deb8642e67e778412c7494d5aa1275da28fc08e002e9" data-rendition-name="original" width="599" height="402" loading="lazy" alt="India China NT 2"> </figure>  Meanwhile, China’s economic slump could prompt President Xi Jinping to double down on his expansionist agenda. Biden recently <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/11/us/politics/biden-china-criticism-economy.html">characterized</a> the stagnating Chinese economy as a “ticking time bomb,” warning that, “When bad folks have problems, they do bad things.” China’s controversial <a href="https://twitter.com/globaltimesnews/status/1696104724691570945">new national map</a>, which depicts vast areas of India, Malaysia, the Philippines, Vietnam, Taiwan, and Bhutan (and even a bit of Russia) as Chinese territory, underscores the threat posed by China’s increasingly aggressive behavior. In addition to these external threats, India’s future will be shaped by its response to domestic economic challenges. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has made <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/12/world/asia/in-india-government-tracks-its-own.html">great strides</a> in modernizing the notoriously outdated Indian bureaucracy and promoting e-government to reduce red tape and attract foreign direct investment. His government has invested heavily in upgrading and expanding the country’s infrastructure, implemented regulatory reforms, and sought to boost domestic manufacturing through Modi’s <a href="https://mea.gov.in/Images/attach/Make_in_India_Initiative.pdf">“Make in India” initiative</a>. But to transform itself into a global manufacturing hub, India must invest in human capital, particularly in <a href="https://www.imf.org/en/News/Articles/2015/09/28/04/53/sp012202">education and training</a>. Moreover, India’s size and diversity also pose enormous challenges. India may be the first developing economy that, from the beginning, has pursued modernization and prosperity through a democratic system. But as one of the world’s most culturally diverse countries, its seemingly never-ending election cycle has often fueled division and polarization. But, despite its <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/divided-families-and-tense-silences-us-style-polarization-arrives-in-india/2019/05/18/734bfdc6-5bb3-11e9-98d4-844088d135f2_story.html">US-style polarized politics</a>, India’s democratic framework has served as a pillar of stability. By fostering open expression and dialogue, the Indian political system has empowered grassroots communities and individuals, enabling members of historically marginalized classes and castes to rise to the highest levels of policymaking. Whether India can maintain its current upward trajectory will depend on its ability to maintain political stability, rapid economic growth, domestic and external security, and a forward-looking foreign policy. Success would enhance India’s <a href="https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/india-us-china-balance-of-power-without-formal-alliance-by-joseph-s-nye-2023-06">global standing</a> and help advance <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/can-india-emerge-as-a-rival-to-china-manufacturing-population-it-investment-trade-youth-regulatory-reform-11673895652?mod=opinion_featst_pos2">US interests</a> in the Indo-Pacific, the world’s new geopolitical fulcrum and home to its fastest-growing economies.&nbsp; © Project Syndicate Brahma Chellaney is Professor of Strategic Studies at the Center for Policy Research, New Delhi and Fellow at the Robert Bosch Academy in Berlin. His book <a href="https://press.georgetown.edu/Book/Water">Water: Asia’s New Battleground</a> (Georgetown University Press, 2011) for which he won the 2012 <a href="https://asiasociety.org/media/press-releases/brahma-chellaney%E2%80%99s-water-asia%E2%80%99s-new-battleground-wins-2012-asia-society-bernard">Asia Society Bernard Schwartz Book Award</a>.

India’s quiet rise

Following the <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/nepals-maoist-leader-visits-china">visit of Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal to China</a> earlier this month, there was talk that export of buffalo meat to China was on the agenda. If so, not enough homework was done before Nepal raised the possibility.&nbsp;
Some traders in Kathmandu claim there is a growing demand for buffalo meat in China, and there have been reports of slaughterhouses in the eastern Tarai where buffalo meat is processed specifically for the purpose of smuggling it to China through various routes.
Chinese media do report the seizure of undocumented buffalo meat inbound to China from Vietnam, there is no evidence that the contraband is originally from Nepal.
Finding out if there is indeed a growing demand for water buffalo meat in China is not easy. The annual Chinese customs import data categorise buffalo meat (not visceral organs like liver, intestine, tongue, etc.) together with other cattle raised for meat under the category 'meat of bovine animal'.
Furthermore, an average Chinese person does not distinguish between buff and beef as separate products. For the average Chinese, beef/牛肉 (shuǐ niú ròu) is interchangeable with buffalo meat. Shuǐ/水 means water in Mandarin.
With the growth of China's economy and rising living standards, the demand for bovine meat is indeed shooting up. Due to the limited arable land and the local bovine population, ever larger quantities of beef/buff need to be imported every year.
China was already importing $2.52 billion worth of beef in 2016, and this grew to $17.76 billion in 2022. The top five source countries were Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, New Zealand and Australia.&nbsp;
The export of beef from Nepal is prohibited, but water buffalo meat export to China could be economically viable. But a great deal more homework needs to be done on the legal or technical infrastructure aspects.
The General Administration of Customs of China (GACC) has strict rules for imports of 18 food items, including meat products. These not only relate to how the meats are produced or manufactured, but also ensure that the food safety management system of the exporter country is equivalent to Chinese standards.
Which means that even a state-of-the-art Nepali slaughterhouse following safety and hygiene practices in frozen meat production has little to no chance of exporting to China unless the GACC has certified it.&nbsp;
Furthermore, there are exhaustive GACC standards in the evaluation and confirmation process, which include confirming legal provisions, animal and plant diseases, competence of food safety supervisory, overall safety and hygiene control in food production, processing, transportation and storage, competence in export food safety, food protection, traceability and recall system, emergency response preparedness, technical support capabilities, so on and so forth.
Read also: <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/are-you-sick-of-chicken">Are you sick of chicken?</a>, Sonia Awale
While there are provisions in Nepal for food safety and animal and plant epidemics, there is a wide implementation gap for safety and hygiene control in food production, transportation and supplies. For example, the Slaughterhouse and Meat Examination Act 1999 makes the licensing of slaughterhouses and examination of the meat mandatory, but looking at meat shops even in Kathmandu, it is clear how lax enforcement is.
The most recent epidemic of the lumpy-skin disease in cattle and the shortage of vaccines is indicative of Nepal's lack of preparedness in responding to the animal and plant epidemics, and the country needs to do a lot more to qualify as an exporter country for food products including bovine meats.
However, assuming that Nepal is planning to export water buffalo meat to China, it must quickly request an evaluation by the GACC -- even if such an exercise will likely result in the Nepalese food security management system not meeting the standards.
Read also: <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/nepal-sets-ambitious-target-for-food-sufficiency">Nepal sets ambitious target for food self-sufficiency</a>, Ramesh Kumar
Doing so would have practical benefits in having recommendations from the GACC as rectification instructions would also indicate the gaps, addressing which could strengthen technical cooperation between Nepal and China, at least in animal husbandry, and have benefits for Nepal’s own domestic meat industry.
Once Nepal moves toward standards-based food production, transportation, storage and security, it could then apply to be registered as an exporter in the GACC registration system.
Should Nepal pass the GACC evaluation and confirmation assessment, it can expect Chinese investors to be willing to set up meat and other food production and processing facilities here. According to a 2021 FAO estimate, Nepal has 2.32 million hectares of land underutilised which could potentially be developed as pasture.
Increased investment in food production and processing industries in turn can have trickle-down benefits to farming populations, especially in the hinterland where youth are migrating away from the land due to the lack of opportunities.
What is needed is <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/editorial/polluted-politics">political will</a>, integrity and a determination to follow through. Things will eventually fall in place once we realise the gap and work to fill them. Or we can continue on being the country with the most bilateral MOUs with no practical significance except junkets for bureaucrats and politicians.
Nirab Gyawali is a Nepali lawyer working to be the first Mandarin-speaking transaction lawyer in Kathmandu.

Not easy for Nepal to sell buffalo meat to China

Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal’s visit to China comes as the season here in Beijing begins to shift from the summer to autumn.&nbsp;
As the Prime Minister alights from his aircraft at the Beijing Capital International Airport being greeted by still balmy conditions, he may very well wonder why his flight could not have touched down at the other (newer) colossal international airport in Beijing, Daxing International, designed by the award winning British architectural firm Zaha Hadid Architects.
That facility is not just a piece of art but is the world’s largest single-building airport occupying more than 7.5 million sq feet of ground space. Although by land-area, Daxing International is still significantly smaller than King Fahd International or even Denver International or Washington Dulles, the way in which the airport evokes, in combination, a sense of power, networks and a futuristic vision is inescapable.&nbsp;
Read also: <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/fixing-the-broken-parts-in-nepal-china-ties">Fixing the broken parts in Nepal-China ties</a>, Kanak Mani Dixit
This is not surprising at all because the People’s Republic of China is probably at this juncture of history the example par excellence of a Eurasian power vigorously straddling the super continent in almost every sense of the word: political, economic, cultural and certainly in respect to hard infrastructure systems.&nbsp;
It is also no surprise that it is exactly due to this position China currently occupies as a preeminent Eurasian power that it is bumping up with such great and increasing friction against not just the United States but <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/latest/political-geography-of-india-nepal-china-ties">other leading powers in the system such as India</a> and so on.&nbsp;
The state of progressively intense upheavals that is consequently being generated within the international system is something that smaller powers such as Nepal will find almost impossible to circumvent let alone easily maneuver around.&nbsp;
Read also: <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/nepal-now-has-to-balance-not-just-india-and-china-but-also-the-west">Nepal now has to balance not just India nad China, but also the West</a>, Bhairaja Panday
It is within this broad lay of the land that Dahal's September sojourn to China must be viewed and analysed. Sino-Nepal relations do not exist in a vacuum, they are part of larger (and ever shifting) structural, geopolitical forces at play that can potentially pull Nepal against gravitational force into spaces not easily comprehensible, much less simple to navigate.&nbsp;
This comes back to the question as to what is the natural direction of Nepal’s foreign policy, where does the gravity of Nepal’s foreign policy lie, because it is against this question too that better inferences and assessments of the prime minister’s China visit can be brought to bear.&nbsp;
At any given point in history, the state of Sino-Nepal relations will be dictated as well by the overall <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/40-years-after-the-sino-us-thaw">nature and tenor of Sino-US</a>, Sino-Indian as well as Sino-Russian relations and different combinations of those bilateral relationships.&nbsp;
Nepal’s relationship with India and then the United States exerts a profound impact on its foreign policy towards China, and this is exponentially the case in contemporary times as larger and larger diaspora communities in those countries become more entrenched and organised, giving rise to push and pull factors that reverberate back into the corridors of power in Kathmandu.&nbsp;
It must not be forgotten as well that the Maoist party Prime Minister Dahal's visit to China takes place at a time in Nepal's history when its governmental and administrative apparatus is perhaps the most fragile and fungible they have ever been, and therefore prone to being malleable in general or definitely within certain distinct pockets.&nbsp;
Read also: <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/editorial/geopolitical-tectonics">Geopolitical tectonics</a>, Editorial
There are certain strong domestic lobbies in favour of China within Nepal’s political ecosystem, but it is hard to establish the extent to which these have the ability to triumph in forging real diplomatic success in <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/sino-nepal-ties-in-the-post-afghan-era">Sino-Nepal relations</a>.&nbsp;
Surely in terms of big-ticket items in the bilateral relationship such as expansion of BRI and an elevated position for China in harvesting the green energy market in Nepal, it appears that Nepal’s position is currently circumscribed to a large extent by structural factors and that Kathmandu would need to approach cooperation with China with greater creativity encompassing an international approach.&nbsp;
For example, harnessing <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/geopolitics-of-nepal-s-rivers">Nepal’s substantial hydropower potential</a> is a key objective of policy makers in the country but due to the divergent and fragmented geopolitical environment Nepal faces externally, it becomes challenging for any one of the great powers alone to plan and actually execute large scale infrastructure projects without inciting adverse pushback.&nbsp;
So would it be feasible for Kathmandu to think along the lines of gradually proposing and nurturing international consortia (by including within a single basket China, India and the United States, for instance) to address the <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/balance-of-power">development of hydropower in Nepal</a> or other large scale infrastructure initiatives?&nbsp;
It is unlikely that such an approach can be made to happen, but it is certainly worth the effort by the prime minister to explore during his high-level engagements with leaders in China. Sticking to a strictly bilateral approach on this visit to China will be a safe bet for the Prime Minister Dahal and will not ruffle any feathers.
But if one can think out of the box as a means to inject more momentum from Nepal towards much needed regional economic growth, then why not at least try?
Bhaskar Koirala is an independent analyst with Peking University. Views here are the author's own.

Nepal's Maoist leader visits China

In 1960, during his second official visit to Nepal, Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai sat on a boat on Pokhara’s Phewa Lake with Prime Minister B P Koirala for one and a half hours and was spellbound by the reflection of Mt Machapuchre on the water.&nbsp; King Mahendra’s chief adviser Gunja Man Singh and Chinese ambassador Yuan Zhongxian had signed the agreement to establish diplomatic relations between Nepal and China on 1 August 1955, only a year after Zhou became Premier.&nbsp; In the nearly 70 years since, China has financed and supported infrastructure projects across Nepal — but especially those with links to Pokhara, like the Prithvi Highway that first linked Kathmandu to Pokhara by road. Anand Raj Mulmi, former president of the Federation of Nepal Chamber of Commerce and Industries (FNCCI), notes that China initially wanted Pokhara to be its focal point in Nepal.&nbsp; “The Prithvi Highway was built to project China’s soft power, and advance its geopolitical interest to link Nepal to China through Korola in Mustang,” Multi explains.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2023091313094_0e0bd60f12dc8ce1ea07bb38116ae1d8da359d06808774e980ae840766d435f6.jpg" data-media-id="editor_0" data-image-id="2023091313094_0e0bd60f12dc8ce1ea07bb38116ae1d8da359d06808774e980ae840766d435f6" data-rendition-name="original" width="4608" height="3072" loading="lazy" alt="Pokhara China connection"> </figure>  Indeed, China worked on road, irrigation, highway and hydropower projects in Pokhara. After the Prithvi Highway, it financed the construction of the Pokhara-Baglung road in 1988. The strategy was connectivity, long before the Belt and Road Initiative was even thought of. By 1980, China was also helping Pokhara’s irrigation sector, providing financial and technical assistance for a hydropower and irrigation project on the Seti River. All this&nbsp; Chinese activity made India suspicious, and Mulmi says things did not turn out like Beijing wanted.&nbsp; Even so, China’s love affair with Pokhara did not wane. The popular Chinese tv serial Deng Feng Lai (Up in the Wind) was filmed on location in Pokhara in which the two protagonists took <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=19255#.XgmF09Iza70" target="_blank">a paragliding flight</a>. Since then, many young Chinese have started booking holidays in Pokhara.&nbsp; This dovetailed well with Rs 22 billion Chinese ExIm Bank loan for Pokhara International Airport which was inaugurated on 1 January 2023. The international flight to land there was a Sichuan Airlines Airbus 319 from Chengdu last month.&nbsp; The chartered flight on 23 June brought 130 Chinese passengers to Pokhara for the first Nepal-China Dragon Boat Race Festival organised by the Nepal Tourism Board, Pokhara Metropolitan City.&nbsp; “Events like the Dragon Boat Race Festival will bolster Pokhara’s economy, and enhance the socio-cultural relations between our two countries and its people,” said Chinese Ambassador Chen Song during the opening ceremony of the event.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2023091313094_3e8d98945946e3368b5b5a360f9dad23253f680eee3d5e63049a47dd1d8a2861.jpg" data-media-id="editor_2" data-image-id="2023091313094_3e8d98945946e3368b5b5a360f9dad23253f680eee3d5e63049a47dd1d8a2861" data-rendition-name="original" width="1800" height="896" loading="lazy" alt="Pokhara China connection"> <figcaption>A Chinese team participating in Nepal-China Dragon Boat race earlier this year.</figcaption> </figure>  Although the pandemic killed tourism prospects in Pokhara, Chinese tourists are flocking back. Lakeside restaurants in Pokhara once more have Mandarin menus and the city is still hoping that Chinese airlines will start direct flights to the new airport. Pom Narayan Shrestha, chairman of the Pokhara Tourism Council, says that Pokhara’s local as well as Gandaki Province government should push promotional activities.&nbsp; Pokhara first established sister-city relations with the city of Linzhi in the Tibet Autonomous Region in 2008. Since then, similar sister-city links have been established between Nepali cities and Kunming, Guangzhou, Yibin, Chiuchow, Haikou, Nanning and Yanji to promote bilateral cooperation in various sectors, including business.&nbsp; However, entrepreneurs in the region say that there have been no benefits to their business from such agreements.&nbsp; Experts also note that Pokhara has not been able to take advantage of the agreements, and the bilateral relationship has been limited to mayors and deputy mayors of Pokhara and the Chinese cities attending events in each other’s countries.&nbsp; “Pokhara’s sister-city agreements with various Chinese cities will only be relevant if Pokhara is promoted as a tourist destination there, and entrepreneurs from Pokhara can participate in and benefit from trade fairs in those cities,” says Mulmi. “Similarly, people from China also need to be invited to events in Pokhara, that is how all of the cities involved will benefit economically. Events like the Dragon Boat festival, and other Chinese cultural affairs represent a new beginning.”&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20230913130920_a2059268ee3f3ff7fbb916cb47806e0710fbfb02e25595771c49a5f1ac26640b.jpg" data-media-id="editor_3" data-image-id="20230913130920_a2059268ee3f3ff7fbb916cb47806e0710fbfb02e25595771c49a5f1ac26640b" data-rendition-name="original" width="1080" height="720" loading="lazy" alt="Pokhara China connection"> <figcaption>Pokhara Mayor Dhanraj Acharya with Chinese Ambassador to Nepal Chan Song.</figcaption> </figure>  Kiran Prasad Koirala of Pokhara Metropolitan City, admits that the town has not been very aggressive in promoting &nbsp;sister-city relationships, but adds that Chinese cities have supported Pokhara, having provided financial, ambulance, and other aid during the pandemic. &nbsp; Bishwa Shankar Palikhe, president of the Nepal-China Friendship Association, has been actively involved in expanding exchanges between Pokhara and its sister cities in Kunming, Guangzhou and Linzhi. However, he admits a lot more needs to be done.&nbsp; Palikhe adds: “We must study the development and experiences of our sister cities and incorporate them into Pokhara’s development plans. Additionally, the entire world at present is trying to draw tourists from China, we must take advantage of our proximity.”&nbsp;

Pokhara’s China connection

At the annual Nepal Power Summit in Kathmandu on 18-19 April, officials called on India to allow Nepal to export power at real-time prices, not just in the day-ahead market. Also discussed was a need for more flexible guidelines on market access for Nepal’s electricity to India which currently buys power on a project-to-project basis, pointedly boycotting those built by Chinese investment or contractors. India’s interest in regulating Nepal’s rivers is not new, but with the Himalaya becoming a geopolitical and climate hotspot, its strategic interest in regulating river flow has grown.&nbsp; Climate models show that the hydrology of Himalayan rivers will change dramatically in the coming decades, with peak water in the 2030s, and low flow levels in the dry season thereafter. With 70% of the annual discharge on the Ganga flowing down from rivers in Nepal, 75% of it in the four monsoon months, storage projects in the mountains will be ever more important. Because of this, New Delhi would like pliant politicians in place in Kathmandu that will not obstruct its plans to ensure future water supply, and given current geopolitical tensions, this also means keeping the Chinese out.&nbsp; Ever since Sher Bahadur Deuba became prime minister for the fifth time in 2021, he has fast-tracked a slew of projects in which Indian companies are involved, including the West Seti reservoir project that has languished for 20 years mainly because of Indian objections to Australian and Chinese investment. Most recently, Indian National Hydroelectricity Power Corporation (NHPC) Limited is in talks to be awarded the 480MW Phukot Karnali Hydroelectric Project in Kalikot jointly with Nepal’s state-owned Vidyut Utpadan Company Limited with a share ratio of 51% to 49%. The project will likely be launched during Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal’s state visit to India in May. India’s NHPC has already been granted licenses for West Seti and Seti River-6 projects, and is also eyeing another 1,902MW megaproject on the Karnali.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2023050603050_10fc6c82b0d995c39b388d8d8628365ea5e2299a1f4d474e2c2d5b7f01d37d83.jpg" data-media-id="editor_0" data-image-id="2023050603050_10fc6c82b0d995c39b388d8d8628365ea5e2299a1f4d474e2c2d5b7f01d37d83" data-rendition-name="original" width="3776" height="2424" loading="lazy" alt="West Seti"> <figcaption>Sushil Bhatta of Investment Board Nepal and Abhay Kumar Singh of India's NHPC, after signing an agreement to develop the 760MW West Seti and 460MW Seti River 6 projects in 2022.</figcaption> </figure>  In fact, across Nepal, Indian companies are building hydropower projects which will add a combined total of 4,000MW to the grid, three of which were rushed through only in the past year. Three more Indian projects are in the pipeline.&nbsp; Why the sudden renewed Indian interest in Nepal’s rivers? And what is the hurry? The answer lies in the need to plan for the decades ahead when water is going to be an even scarcer commodity in the Indo-Gangetic plains than it is now because of climate change, increased industrial, agricultural and household consumption. Energy analysts say that although India’s interest seems to be in renewable energy from hydropower to fulfil its decarbonisation commitments, exports of power from Nepal is only projected at $800 million in the next three years, which will only be a tiny percentage of the 1,600 billion kWh that India generated in the last fiscal year.&nbsp; And although power demand is expected to rise with rising incomes, industrialisation and increasingly intense summer heat waves in the plains, India’s long-term interest is in reservoir projects to store monsoon water in Nepal’s rivers to reduce monsoon flood risk and keep rivers flowing in the dry season. And New Delhi has not tried to hide its distaste for any Chinese involvement in these projects.&nbsp; Hydropower Investment and Development Company Nepal (HIDCL) in which the government is a majority shareholder informed the Investment Board Nepal in February that it was withdrawing from the export-oriented 762MW Tamor Hydropower project.&nbsp; CEO Arjun Kumar Gautam is upfront about why: “We cannot sell electricity generated with Chinese involvement in the Indian market.” Tamor was one of the two projects agreed upon during Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to Nepal in October 2019. Soon after, Investment Board Nepal (IBN) signed up China Construction to build the project after completing a feasibility study. The HIDCL now wants to null the agreement with the Chinese contractor and bring in a new contractor more amenable to the Indians. Meanwhile, India’s state-owned <a href="https://sjvn.nic.in/">Satluj Jal Vidyut Nigam</a>, which is involved in a cascade of projects on the adjoining Arun River to generate a total of 2,000MW, is said to be aggressively lobbying top Nepali officials to also build Tamor. Besides the 900MW Arun 3, Satluj was awarded the Lower Arun by the K P Oli-led government in 2021 without competitive bidding. Then in May 2022, the Sher Bahadur Deuba-led government suddenly awarded Arun 4 to Satluj (with a 51% share) during Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Lumbini.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20230506020556_4f38ffb96de37f17c662684914f0b65ab41adaaf98183a073273e88621de480b.jpg" data-media-id="editor_2" data-image-id="20230506020556_4f38ffb96de37f17c662684914f0b65ab41adaaf98183a073273e88621de480b" data-rendition-name="original" width="1000" height="666" loading="lazy" alt="Arun 4 agreement"> <figcaption>Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and then Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba look on as Satluj Jal Vidyut Nigam's Nanda Lal Sharma and the NEA's Kulman Ghising exchange MoUs in May 2022 in Lumbini to build the 409MW Arun 4. Photo: RATNA SHRESTHA/RSS</figcaption> </figure>  But even though Satluj is said to be also interested in the 1,061MW Upper Arun, Kulman Ghising of the Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA) says it is building the project. "Upper Arun is our first priority, we are planning to start the construction of the access road," Ghising told us. Arun and Tamor are both in eastern Nepal (see map), but India is also interested in rivers in western Nepal because of the proximity of its main load centres as well as to augment the dry season flow of Nepal’s rivers that flow into the Ganga.&nbsp; There was some hue and cry last year after the Deuba-led government abruptly handed over the 750MW West Seti Dam and Seti River-6 projects to two Indian state-owned companies without competition or transparency. Experts pointed out that Nepal’s Public-Private Partnership and Investment Act 2075 states that there should be competitive bidding.&nbsp; The Seti saga is three decades long. After successive partnerships with Australian, Chinese and private Indian companies fell through, India’s state-owned NHPC finally took the lead. Since the terms of the deal are opaque, many experts question how beneficial the $1.6 billion project that involves building a high dam in the Doti district will be for Nepal.&nbsp; Indian state-owned companies appear to move faster than private Indian companies interested in river projects in Nepal. The GMR Group (Gandhi Mallikarjun Rao) obtained a permit to build the 900 MW Upper Karnali and a Project Development Agreement (PDA) was signed with the IBN in 2014 with plans to start construction in two years after securing funding. The government's latest decision to extend the deadline for the GMR by two years is being challenged in Nepal’s Supreme Court.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2023050603054_0b5cc52ed5ece09ac54bf7fd42d663e156bd8a721203fecad4470d449722bfd9.jpg" data-media-id="editor_3" data-image-id="2023050603054_0b5cc52ed5ece09ac54bf7fd42d663e156bd8a721203fecad4470d449722bfd9" data-rendition-name="original" width="1083" height="834" loading="lazy" alt="Indian investment in hydropower in Nepal"> </figure>  Geopolitical games The export-oriented 456MW Upper Tamakosi project finally started production in June 2021 after much delay. But because a part of the Upper Tamkosi was built by the Sino Hydro of China, India refused to buy power from the project during the monsoon surplus last year – even though it was built with NEA investment.&nbsp; One international lender told Nepali Times: “Obtaining an Indian nod before building any big hydropower project in Nepal has now become a must.” Indian pressure manifests itself in its refusal to buy only 364MW of electricity which was recently increased to 452MW. This is the sum total of generation capacity with no direct Chinese involvement. Nepal also cannot sell its power to China as there are no trans-Himalayan transmission lines, and exporting to Bangladesh would need an Indian approval system without giving a free and open market to Nepali electricity, while also rejecting any Chinese involvement. India’s international electricity trade procedure issued in February 2021 prohibits the import of electricity from projects invested in third countries that do not have a bilateral agreement for cooperation in the energy sector. The fact that India does not have an energy cooperation agreement with China has therefore become an excuse, not just to blacklist projects in Nepal with Chinese investment, but even Chinese contractors. India has even stopped the supply of explosives for projects like the Tanahu and Upper Trisuli-1 Schemes being built by Chinese contractors.&nbsp; "Even though there is nothing in writing, India does not want any involvement of the Chinese in any capacity in Nepal's hydropower projects, they even have details of which country is the contractor and where are the machines being used from," explains Ganesh Karki of the Independent Power Producers Association Nepal (IPPAN). India first allowed imports of electricity only from the 24 MW Trisuli and 15 MW Devighat projects, both built by the Indian in the 1960s. But after Deuba signed an agreement on energy cooperation between the two countries in 2022, NEA was allowed to 364MW.&nbsp; Even so, Nepal must renew this export provision every year, which is a bureaucratic hassle. What this essentially means is that if Indian companies do not get licenses for new plants in Nepal, they may not renew the power-selling contract either. Nepali officials have been trying to convince the Indian side that it is in their own best interest if Nepal has a surplus in the coming years. Based on projections of generation capacity, NEA has sent a proposal to New Delhi to export an additional 600MW.&nbsp; The installed capacity of hydropower projects in Nepal has reached 2,400MW and is expected to cross 3,000MW after the completion of more projects this monsoon. Projects with a combined capacity of 3,200MW are under construction and will be completed in the next three years. On the demand side, the average domestic consumption at present is about 1,600MW and is expected to increase only to 2,000MW next year.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2023050603054_1ba6d252b58558d3d1263b0f76e3abbfc1c9dd3c019f8d9d47bd8aa415651e3f.jpg" data-media-id="editor_4" data-image-id="2023050603054_1ba6d252b58558d3d1263b0f76e3abbfc1c9dd3c019f8d9d47bd8aa415651e3f" data-rendition-name="original" width="1171" height="834" loading="lazy" alt="Hydropower generation in Nepal"> </figure>  &nbsp; <div class="embed-block"><div class="flourish-embed flourish-chart" data-src="visualisation/13536204"><script src="https://public.flourish.studio/resources/embed.js"></script></div></div> &nbsp; <div class="embed-block"><div class="flourish-embed flourish-chart" data-src="visualisation/13535503"><script src="https://public.flourish.studio/resources/embed.js"></script></div></div> There are critics who say Nepal should not be exporting power to India at all since it will not make a big dent in the trade deficit, and the $85.8 million it earned last year is negligible compared to the $8.33 billion Nepal earned in remittances.&nbsp; They say the priority should be on increasing electricity consumption in cooking, transportation and industry. At present, 70% of Nepal’s energy is from biomass and only 5% is from electricity.&nbsp; Since most of the electricity in Nepal is from run-of-river schemes in which generation depends on the flow of water in rivers, Nepal will have to continue to import power from India during the peak winter months for the next three years. In the monsoon, though, generation is double of demand, but the Indian quota, inadequate transmission and low domestic demand mean much of this clean electricity is wasted.&nbsp; Dinesh Kumar Ghimire at the Energy Ministry says Nepal is looking to sign a 25-year export agreement with India. "We are preparing a draft for the agreement. If both sides are on board with it, there may be an agreement during the Prime Minister's visit to India.” Edging out China While India is awarded one hydropower project after another in Nepal, China is being edged out. Both Phukot Karnali and Tamor hydropower projects were supposed to be implemented under Beijing’s Belt Road Initiative (BRI) scheme.&nbsp; Last month, Sichuan Wangping Energy Science and Technology gave up its license to build the 235MW Humla Karnali-1 and 335MW Humla Karnali-2 in partnership with a Nepali company. The survey permit for these projects has now been granted to Ruru Hydropower, a Nepali company. The 1,200MW Budi Gandaki reservoir project has been caught in a geopolitical tangle between India and Nepal for the past six years. In May 2017, the Pushpa Kamal Dahal government handed over the project to China’s Gezhouba Group without competition. A few months later in October, the Deuba-led government reversed the decision and said Nepal would build it. Fast forward a year later and the Oli-led government gave Budi Gandaki back to Gezhouba, only for the Deuba-led coalition government in March 2022 to reverse the decision again. Exasperated, the then-Chinese ambassador Hou Yanqi said abandoned diplomatic niceties and said publicly that it was wrong for Nepal to change its decision every time a government changed. Says Ganesh Karki of IPPAN: “We have to conclude that because of India’s stance, it is difficult to get Chinese investment in Nepal’s hydropower. The top political leadership should lobby with India to remove this obstacle.” The hydro of hydropower&nbsp; Nepal’s former energy secretary Dwarika Nath Dhungel is convinced India considers water a strategic commodity, and its emphasis on electricity export hides its real intention to secure water supply in the coming decades.&nbsp; “We in Nepal, on the other hand, have no idea about this, and there is no clarity about our own water and energy policy. In fact, our policymakers are not working in the national interest at all,” he adds. Studies have shown that water scarcity in the Indo-Gangetic plains will increase as Himalayan glaciers dry up, and the groundwater level falls due to over-extraction. And in the monsoon, there is too much water, so the world’s most densely populated region is hit by destructive floods. &nbsp; Building storage dams in Nepal is a win-win-win for India, reducing flood risk, augmenting dry season flow of Nepali rivers that flow across the border, and generating electricity. Nepal will get some export income, but will not benefit much from irrigation since it only has a narrow strip of land in the Tarai, and large tracts of its fertile mountain valleys will be inundated by future reservoirs. “Nepal’s export of a few thousand megawatts will not mean much for India's huge power system with a capacity of around 400,000MW,” adds Dhungel. “What India is fixated on is our water. And that is why it does not want any third parties involved, especially not China.” Former secretary at the Ministry of Energy Anup Kumar Upadhyay on the other hand is all for more Indian investment in Nepal’s hydropower, and does not think there is any ulterior motive. He argues that the model in which Nepal is allowing Indian companies to build projects is beneficial to Nepal in the long term. At present, Indian companies that have received permission to build hydropower plants have agreed to provide about 22% of electricity to the Nepal government for free. And after 25 years, these projects will be fully owned by Nepal. Says Upadhyay: "Whatever projects we are giving to India now, India does not even have the benefit of regular water flow from them, so there is no reason to be suspicious that India has a grand design to control our rivers." Indeed, there are many in Nepal, even those critical of Indian behaviour, who say Nepal cannot choose its neighbours and it might as well keep India happy by ensuring that the river agreements are fair to Nepal as well.

Geopolitics of Nepal’s rivers

In the black and white photograph, General Wangdu smiles broadly in front of the dusty cactus garden in Kathmandu’s Annapurna Hotel. With an ill-fitting jacket and shaggy hair he looks benign enough, but this was the last leader of the Tibetan freedom fighters who led the resistance against the Chinese from their remote mountain hideouts in <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/comings-and-goings-in-mustang">Mustang</a>. Five months later, Wangdu was dead. Snapped in March 1974, I had only recently arrived in Nepal. How did I meet this legendary fighter? Possibly with his devoted camp follower, Lynne Klapecki, and probably in the Om Restaurant near Freak Street which was the preferred <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/hippie-trail-nostalgia-in-kathmandu">hippie hang-out</a>. Om Lobsang and his brother Yeshe were <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/page/earthquake-brings-back-memories-of-camps-for-tibetan-refugees">refugees from East Tibet </a>whose cafe offered a friendly welcome and<a href="https://nepalitimes.com/multimedia/momo-loco"> the best momos</a> - they became my in-laws after I married their eldest brother Tenzin, but that was a decade later.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2025052403054_4573b34282b0f5395c007243d6bef12c7ba76bfd520419e994cdcea048d795a1.jpg" data-media-id="editor_4" data-image-id="2025052403054_4573b34282b0f5395c007243d6bef12c7ba76bfd520419e994cdcea048d795a1" data-rendition-name="original" width="1000" height="1583" loading="lazy" alt="The last days of the Khampa NT"> <figcaption>Photo: LISA CHOEGYAL</figcaption> </figure>  Wangdu’s English was enthusiastically rudimentary, but even riding around town with him on the back of an aging <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/kathmandu-s-new-motorbike-museum">motorbike</a>, he was a commanding presence. Always flanked by armed outriders, impressive scars marked his forearms and a pistol hung from the cord around his neck. A charismatic guerrilla leader, Wangdu was celebrated by his followers for his tough commitment and respected for his measured pragmatism. He seemed so young to have shouldered such a responsibility of command, leading hundreds of hardened <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/50-years-after-the%20raid-into-Tibet,1012#google_vignette">Khampa combatants </a>through what had been a particularly <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/heavy-snowfall-over-nepal-himalaya">brutal winter in Mustang</a>, the last bastion to hold out against the Chinese invasion of their Tibetan homeland.&nbsp; The freedom fighters of Tibet, known as the Chushi-Gangdruk, had emerged to resist the <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/editorial/territorialism">Chinese takeover</a> of Tibet during the 1950s. Estimated to be 80,000-strong at the time of <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/what-or-who-after-the-dalai-lama">the Dalai Lama</a>’s final escape to India in 1959, the sheer number of Chinese deployed into Tibet eventually forced the Chushi-Gangdruk to retreat to Mustang, From this high Himalayan stronghold, they continued cross-border raids on the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) throughout the 1960s.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2025052403054_8a4a935ba25ae79dc3a63bb5c14626927020e5ec098093c45ccb9a5982e009fd.jpg" data-media-id="editor_10" data-image-id="2025052403054_8a4a935ba25ae79dc3a63bb5c14626927020e5ec098093c45ccb9a5982e009fd" data-rendition-name="original" width="1114" height="676" loading="lazy" alt="The last days of the Khampa NT"> <figcaption>Guerrillas known as the Chushi-Gangdruk emerged to resist the Chinese annexation of Tibet during the 1950s. Photo courtesy: MIKEL DUNHAM</figcaption> </figure>  Their Kathmandu base was a small discreet lodge in a back lane near Rani Pokhari. Sipping sweet tea from a blue mug with a chipped lid, I sat bemused in a corner of the Mustang Hotel room whilst Wangdu and his cohorts received a battered brown suitcase from their CIA connection, a tousle-haired American in a leather jacket. Heaved onto the dingy bedspread that covered the thin mattress, it was clicked open to reveal piles of neatly stacked dollar bills.&nbsp; I cannot think why Wangdu allowed me to witness this handover but I was clearly no threat, a newly arrived world traveller with no understanding of the stakes nor any Nepali or <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/multimedia/tibetan-music-in-nepals-sacred-valley">Tibetan language</a>. Despite armed guards in the corridor,Wangdu radiated confidence and bravado, and there was a practiced familiarity to the tense transaction. This deadly dance for many years had been funded by the Americans, tolerated by <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/the-kingdom-within-a-republic">Mustang’s residents</a>, and permitted by King Mahendra and the Nepali authorities who it suited to turn a blind eye.&nbsp; But Mahendra died in 1972, and times were changing. Richard Nixon’s ping-pong diplomacy thawed the cold war and signalled a fresh entente with China. Nepal’s yet-to-be-crowned <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/if-birendra-was-alive-nepal-could-still-be-a-monarchy">King Birendra </a>was under pressure to curb the irritating incursions against the PLA launched from the Nepali territory of Mustang. Keen to appease his northern neighbour, on several occasions the King summoned Wangdu for peace talks but, despite increasingly overwhelming odds, Wangdu refused to surrender.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2025052403054_a8efd5cfb92cd997bd7cb74296a936fef46e2f7428f9cd642b03f1ac4ea11ecb.jpg" data-media-id="editor_14" data-image-id="2025052403054_a8efd5cfb92cd997bd7cb74296a936fef46e2f7428f9cd642b03f1ac4ea11ecb" data-rendition-name="original" width="1055" height="885" loading="lazy" alt="The last days of the Khampa NT"> <figcaption>General Wangdu flanked by two Tibetan resistance fighters in Mustang in the 1970s. Photo courtesy: MIKEL DUNHAM</figcaption> </figure>   <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2025052403054_75969125a745847a2ef82b6fe8b9106c0b21a116d85b8efdf5d2ee89a347bb31.jpg" data-media-id="editor_15" data-image-id="2025052403054_75969125a745847a2ef82b6fe8b9106c0b21a116d85b8efdf5d2ee89a347bb31" data-rendition-name="original" width="1044" height="792" loading="lazy" alt="The last days of the Khampa NT"> <figcaption>King Birendra with General Wangdu (right in dark glasses) taken in 1974 possibly in Mustang after one of their few attempts at negotiation. Photo courtesy: RAJRNDRA KUNWAR</figcaption> </figure>  While I naively rode pillion around Kathmandu in the spring sunshine, Wangdu was in the midst of what turned out to be his final round of negotiations with the Nepal government. Refusing to cease hostilities with the Chinese, Wangdu must have suspected the cost of his decision, making his cheerful smile in the photograph all the more poignant and brave. It was only much later that I appreciated the significance of the moment. Wangdu had been sent to replace the first resistance leader in Mustang, Baba Gen Yeshe, a much derided corrupt character who stole money meant for his troops and exploited fleeing refugees by seizing their treasures. Baba Gen Yeshe never forgave Wangdu,and sought revenge in May 1974 by betraying him and his commanders to the Nepal authorities. Renewed Chinese incursions from the north, active PLA collusion with the Nepali forces under the new King, and treachery from within the Chushi-Gangdrukranks combined to seal their fate.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2025052403054_e0987a7c90d76431b0d7d5e6115ebfe3dbda7ab939e5941e079c18d722e884c0.jpg" data-media-id="editor_16" data-image-id="2025052403054_e0987a7c90d76431b0d7d5e6115ebfe3dbda7ab939e5941e079c18d722e884c0" data-rendition-name="original" width="1400" height="769" loading="lazy" alt="The last days of the Khampa NT"> <figcaption>British television journalists George Patterson and Adrian Cowell embedded themselves with Khampa guerrillas and accompanied them from Tsum Valley on a cross border raid on a Chinese Army convoy in 1964. Photo: ESSAYS ON NEPAL / SAM COWAN</figcaption> </figure>  Mikel Dunham, renowned author of Buddha’s Warriors, writes: ‘It is possible that Wangdu was waiting for some cue from the Dalai Lama’s government-in-exile in Dharamsala, India. It is equally possible – during that last, <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/multimedia/the-human-cost-of-nepal-s-yarsa-gold-rush?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR31-Cqw8oyIwMPzf_35e4Skr0ululJvLf3_vDkzHn-AYG2h8uPw2rqqErg_aem_tGVn5coY1-jA7fze_xqhew">desolate winter </a>– that he made the decision to go out in glory rather than admit defeat. Over the last fifteen years, Wangdu had experienced Tibet’s organized resistance being squeezed and shoved around by every conceivable outside force.&nbsp; First they had been pushed out of their own country by the PLA; then they had been refused sanction while on <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/borderlines/nepal-india-trans-boundary-bonds?fbclid=IwAR0PpJ5zUEbwdug3g_U3ar6FUugngRY0S8Tl2v_7wqzrsHmXWcXsKjvL4t4">Indian soil</a>; then they were abandoned by the Americans because, apparently, Nixon wanted to make friends with Wangdu’s mortal enemies, the communists; then they had been betrayed by the vampiric Baba Gen Yeshe – a Tibetan and, even worse, a fellow Khampa; and now, finally Wangdu’s army was being evicted by the Nepalis. One thing was certain: Wangdu was a warrior. To imagine Wangdu simply giving up and settling down in the pacific squalor of a <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/elderly-left-in-bhutan-refugee-camp">refugee camp </a>was unthinkable.’  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2025052403054_8fc1ffef4ae751628b90ae781b66e11e51e4fdde2787207c9042efbee345ce49.jpg" data-media-id="editor_20" data-image-id="2025052403054_8fc1ffef4ae751628b90ae781b66e11e51e4fdde2787207c9042efbee345ce49" data-rendition-name="original" width="500" height="746" loading="lazy" alt="The last days of the Khampa NT"> <figcaption>The much derided Baba Gen Yeshe, the first Tibetan resistance leader in Mustang, who betrayed Wangdu for personal gain. Photo courtesy: MIKEL DUNHAM</figcaption> </figure>   <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2025052403054_b1d833cdb00d3ac4416b844d8730475cd88c238caaaf8da69889a584eea229a3.jpg" data-media-id="editor_21" data-image-id="2025052403054_b1d833cdb00d3ac4416b844d8730475cd88c238caaaf8da69889a584eea229a3" data-rendition-name="original" width="500" height="656" loading="lazy" alt="The last days of the Khampa NT"> <figcaption>Aditya SJB Rana of the Royal Nepal Army whose team ambushed Wangdu and his cohorts at the top of Tinker Pass in Darchula, West Nepal. Photo courtesy: GAUTAM SJB RANA</figcaption> </figure>  By August 1974 the game was up. Wangdu and six of his exhausted party were killed on their horses by <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=7270">the Royal Nepal Army</a> on the brink of escape. The officer in charge, Aditya SJB Rana, cleverly predicted their route into India after they failed to silence a police radio in Yari. A carefully laid ambush trapped them near the summit of the Tinker Pass in Darchula,at 5,000 meters the highest military operation of its time. Wangdu’s body was helicoptered to Kathmandu, and a big show made of the royal Nepal victory.&nbsp; The Tibetan armed insurgency against China had reached its end.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250524030520_3ff9c6fc85a65bc9a2c3afe9736d9f5f9413de752e790a5d9dca0981ea94f9b4.jpg" data-media-id="editor_23" data-image-id="20250524030520_3ff9c6fc85a65bc9a2c3afe9736d9f5f9413de752e790a5d9dca0981ea94f9b4" data-rendition-name="original" width="1136" height="702" loading="lazy" alt="The last days of the Khampa NT"> </figure>

The Last Days of the Khampa

The newly-formed Himalayan Art Council is set to launch Nepal’s National Art Protection Platform that seeks to preserve <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/the-history-of-heritage">Nepal’s unique cultural heritage </a>using<a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/artificial-censorship"> AI-powered tools</a>. The Council seeks to safeguard <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/nepali-art-going-places">Nepali art works</a> from neglect, theft and counterfeiting as well as preserve existing artwork and celebrate living masters by giving them a cultural space to continue the <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/sacred-survival">sacred art traditions</a>. "We are introducing a new digital platform designed to preserve, verify and elevate <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/nepals-new-generation-of-alternative-artists">Nepal’s art for generations to come,</a>” says a statement from the Council, adding that the digital platform will use AI told for authentication and blockchain to keep track of works of art. Artists can now be protected by <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/multimedia/ayo-ai?fbclid=IwAR1uwmTVq4gUB70ljfRezjzukD9ArWXPuMnUikopeQ8PoiZMjicToPSwhKE&amp;=1">AI tools</a> that detect forgeries, identify their work even when unsigned, and ensure they receive proper recognition and credit. The archives will be searchable with translated inscription and interactive guides. Says curator Meena Lama: “AI and blockchains are tools that give us the power to detect fakes and identify unsigned paintings and track every piece. With these tools we can restore trust, secure authorship and give artists the dignity they deserve.”  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250514170544_2ab58f6313c0458f75114a692b0016bd9efb3b59d5f8f07f0da72e1e37b82f53.jpg" data-media-id="editor_6" data-image-id="20250514170544_2ab58f6313c0458f75114a692b0016bd9efb3b59d5f8f07f0da72e1e37b82f53" data-rendition-name="original" width="1300" height="1000" loading="lazy" alt="Artwork at the Traditional Art Exhibition at Patan Museum."> <figcaption>Artwork at the Traditional Art Exhibition at Patan Museum.</figcaption> </figure>  The Council is also holding an exhibition of Nepali cultural masterpieces with 50 historical <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/Nepali-Times-Buzz/Buzz-the-art,671">thangka and paubha </a>by past masters and <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/review/between-the-sacred-and-everyday">contemporary works by current artists</a>. This curated collection is a living tribute to <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/when-yaks-go-so-does-culture">Himalayan culture</a> with economic depictions of deities, mandala and sacred narratives. The exhibition at <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/multimedia/a-portal-into-patan-s-past-and-present">Patan Museum</a> also provides an opportunity to meet painters and custodians of art and culture. Read also: <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/review/golden-deities">Golden deities</a>, Sewa Bhattarai ‘The exhibition is only the first step in a long journey to ensure that Nepali art is no just seen but fully understood, <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/Narratives-of-Faith-and-Memory-Remembering-the-Lost-Sculptures-of-Kathmandu-exhibition,987">protected and remembered</a>,’ the Council says. Artist Kailash K Shrestha of Artudio has spent decades promoting thankha and paubha traditions because of their beauty and devotional meaning. But he also says artists are underpaid, exploited and ignored. He adds, “AI and blockchain are not just buzzwords, they are powerful tools that can protect Nepal’s artists from fraud, verify authenticity and build a permanent record of provenance.” Traditional Art Exhibition Till 17 May Patan Museum

Digital protection for Nepal’s art

<a href="https://www.instagram.com/prabalgurung/" target="_blank">Prabal Gurung</a> left Nepal for New York in 1999 to escape years of bullying, sexism and homophobia, and to pursue his dream of becoming a fashion designer. He <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KqN0VaoAI5w" target="_blank">realised his dream</a>, but did not escape discrimination and racism in the new world. Propelled by passion for fashion, Gurung overcame everything America threw at him. He has attained <a href="https://www.vanityfair.com/style/story/prabal-gurung-recalls-his-first-met-gala-when-zoe-saldana-was-at-his-side?srsltid=AfmBOooy-H0oGgxMit864FnW_Pmw8mUnV8rYrh-co-f6OyYK6m2ip5hP" target="_blank">fame and recognition</a> for his haute couture dress designs while remaining true to his Nepali roots, and is even more resolute in <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSmNauyzACk" target="_blank">fighting prejudice</a> in all its forms. Prabal Gurung’s newly-released memoir <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Audible-Walk-Like-Girl-Memoir/dp/B0DG11HCDQ?fbclid=IwY2xjawKZfpxleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHuZcIJO2OXyXcRm1oq1iG6wzeoF7VJFrQ7GXOFI0YxuZZ4id_CNvSZSZZIna_aem_pG_mOKG73RTnYvN8JaC4fA">Walk Like a Girl</a> is a saga of harrowing abuse in boarding schools in Nepal and India, only finding himself facing a different kind of bullying in the US. He prevails over it all to be where he is today: an award-winning American fashion designer with his own label. Walk Like a Girl was launched last week in New York at a time when everything Gurung fought for — tolerance, inclusion and diversity — are in retreat in his adopted country because of a president who has espoused a culture of bullying. The book is a searing, raw exposé of how cruel and abusive people can be even at a young age in school. On the other hand, it also shows that there are generous, compassionate and open-minded souls out there. In his book, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K4le_uWX7YE">Prabal Gurung</a> calls out those who tormented and tried to hold him back (some of their names have been altered). The moral of his story is: resist, never stop believing in yourself, do not let others define you, never lose sight of your dream, and help those who have been kept out. “Walk like a girl” was a slur used by bullies back in school in Nepal and India for Gurung’s effeminate ways. He fought back then, and he is still resisting by turning those words into something to be proud of.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250519170544_4ffc9c3f565dd2cfa754d10b224816897b82bb31ebaee91b6d79d469fc96f14e.jpg" data-media-id="editor_6" data-image-id="20250519170544_4ffc9c3f565dd2cfa754d10b224816897b82bb31ebaee91b6d79d469fc96f14e" data-rendition-name="original" width="1000" height="1253" loading="lazy" alt="Prabal Gurung NT"> <figcaption>Prabal Gurung at home in Kathmandu in the 1990s.</figcaption> </figure>  “Living through it all was one thing, but writing about it is one of the hardest things I have done in my life,” admitted Gurung during the launch. “I broke down constantly during the six-year writing process.” He continues: “I did not want this to be a victim’s book. I did not want to burden my readers with my emotions. I wanted my struggle to be an inspiration for others facing what I faced. I am grateful to those who bullied me in school, they made me a stronger person ready to face the world.” Indeed, this book is a departure from his earlier one titled simply, Prabal Gurung (Abrams, 2019), which was a lush pictorial autobiography of his career in fashion. Walk Like a Girl is not a typical fashion book, it is an intimate tale of <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=16997">Gurung’s travails and triumphs</a>, and how he willed himself to succeed. Prabal pays a lavish tribute to his mother Durga Rana. We find out she is a descendant of the first wife of the eldest son of Jang Bahadur Rana who was banished to Palpa in the late 19th century. Prabal’s father served in the Singapore Police and that is where he was born before the family returned to Nepal when he was four. Gurung relates with brutal honesty about the violence his mother endured from his father. Durga raises three children as a single mother in Nepal, and Prabal credits her for his fierce determination to resist patriarchy and injustice, which in time manifests itself in his hyper-feminine and subversive dress designs. Writing the book has been a cathartic experience for Gurung, who says he is now relieved of the burdens of his past. It no longer haunts him, and he does not have to prove anything to anyone anymore. Walk Like a Girl has life lessons not just for the <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/DJmOcSgxdWz/" target="_blank">fashion industry</a>, but for every other profession. How can my job serve a greater cause? Gurung tells us his work is <a href="https://asiasociety.org/blog/asia/why-designer-prabal-gurung-doesnt-want-just-stick-fashion" target="_blank">bigger than just making clothes</a>, it is about making the world a better place because it could do with a lot of improvement.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250519170544_d75296ad8bfdc00d88935f40d23543c6fea3d4d6a10e61a99d6cfc6127f2ee5b.png" data-media-id="editor_10" data-image-id="20250519170544_d75296ad8bfdc00d88935f40d23543c6fea3d4d6a10e61a99d6cfc6127f2ee5b" data-rendition-name="original" width="1516" height="1000" loading="lazy" alt="Prabal Gurung"> </figure>  This story of chasing the American dream may sound familiar to many immigrants: knocking on doors for jobs, rejections, trying to survive from day to day on expensive rent, and dealing with subtle racism in white America. Gurung finds racism is rife, and he is often mockingly called ‘gaysian’. He writes: ‘There was a strong hypocrisy — this idea of independence felt like a marketting ruse … and for all the talk of feminism in America, these high society women were trapped by the patriarchy just like in Nepal and India.’ After a trek to the Khumbu region in 2013, Gurung is inspired to use the colours, palette and textures of Nepal for his collection exhibited on Manhattan’s 8th Avenue. A major buyer tells him bluntly: “Stick to making pretty dresses … if I need to see a collection like this, I could buy a copy of National Geographic.” The New York Times was equally dismissive: ‘The designer tries to draw connections between blistered techo-fabric used to construct it and the topography of his homeland, Nepal. But, at the moment, he has lost his map.’ One potential investor tells Gurung he cannot design for Americana because “you do not look American”. Gurung wants to use expletives, but restrains himself. After a fundraiser in New York for the Nepal earthquake in 2015, some belittled his effort, saying: “Here comes the saviour."&nbsp; Read also: <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/review/prabal-gurung-by-prabal-gurung">Prabal Gurung by Prabal Gurung</a>, Kunda Dixit The Gurkha DNA must be dominant in Prabal Gurung’s genes because he does not take such mistreatment lying down. When asked by a fashion publicist why he was designing clothes for fat people, he snaps back: “Because of people like you.” He joins the Black Lives Matter and #MeToo movements, launches the Shikshya Foundation charity in Nepal, and has powerful allies among celebrities who wear clothes he designed: Michelle Obama, Oprah Winfrey, Sara Jessica Parker, Kamala Harris, Deepika Padukone … it is a long list.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250519150556_48a5f4211991a23fa85b64bbd5377575ca7081d97309d7542035591dda5180fe.png" data-media-id="editor_12" data-image-id="20250519150556_48a5f4211991a23fa85b64bbd5377575ca7081d97309d7542035591dda5180fe" data-rendition-name="original" width="1114" height="1534" loading="lazy" alt="Being Prabal Gurung by design"> <figcaption>Nigerian novelist Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie wearing Atelier Prabal Gurung’s design for Met Gala 2025 in which the theme was ‘Superfine: Tailoring Black Style’. </figcaption> </figure>  “I don’t dress women to look beautiful, they already are,” Gurung says. “I try to bring out their innate strength and grace.” <a href="https://www.instagram.com/stories/highlights/17908766880140171/" target="_blank">Admirers</a> tell Gurung he makes it all look so easy, but he used to put up a strong facade to not show his own vulnerabilities in public. “I was closed because of my childhood experiences,” he says. “I was always on guard to defend myself because I never knew where the next punch would come from.” But in <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPVepzPA210" target="_blank">Walk Like a Girl,</a> Gurung comes to terms with his vulnerability, and bares his soul. It has not been easy, it took sustained will power and support from his mother, sister Kumudini and a circle of close friends. “I made unbelonging my power,” he says. “Nepal is where I still have my heart and soul. Nepal grounds you. It is where people go to find themselves. But I escaped.” Recently appointed vice-chair of the <a href="https://cfda.com/about-cfda" target="_blank">Council of American Fashion Designers</a>, Gurung says: “I can’t believe I am here, it feels like it is happening to someone else. Writing this book, the healing has finally begun.” <h2>‘Everything is better in color’</h2> The Met Gala was two weeks later, and my table was an example of everything I’d been fighting for all these years as my guests represented everything I believed in: dynamic, powerful, influential women who were unapologetically original and unabashedly graceful. I was grateful to Anna for inviting me to host and dress a table that reflected my ethos—and for her guidance in doing so. I was also aware of the privilege as one of the first-­ever Asian fashion designers—not just from Nepal, but from the entire continent— to get the opportunity to do so. That fact was not lost on me. I reached out beyond the expected Hollywood celebrities and well-­known socialites to curate a table of exceptional women who inspired me. I invited Deepika Padukone and Alia Bhatt for their first-­ever Met Galas, as well as Michelle Yeoh, Mindy Kaling, Camila Cabello, Ashley Park, Denée Benton, KiKi Layne, Quannah Chasinghorse, and Grace Elizabeth. Together we checked many boxes: Asian, Black, Latinx, and Indigenous, each woman undeniably chic and powerful, a dazzling array of skin tones and experiences that proved my decades‑in‑the-­making hypothesis: everything is better in color. Excerpt from Walk Like a Girl Viking © 2025 by Prabal Gurung  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250519170520_6b91d560e9f072c37d16876901058c073a51ffa05e7ad1b9461d19e1c9c28215.jpg" data-media-id="editor_16" data-image-id="20250519170520_6b91d560e9f072c37d16876901058c073a51ffa05e7ad1b9461d19e1c9c28215" data-rendition-name="original" width="1136" height="702" loading="lazy" alt="Prabal Gurung book details NT"> </figure>   <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250519170520_345240c21be400e2ce2ec629b52bd82bb53890e5bd86fe95b48340d84b5f1748.jpg" data-media-id="editor_17" data-image-id="20250519170520_345240c21be400e2ce2ec629b52bd82bb53890e5bd86fe95b48340d84b5f1748" data-rendition-name="original" width="1136" height="702" loading="lazy" alt="Prabal Gurung book details NT"> </figure>  &nbsp;

Being Prabal Gurung by design

India and Pakistan are twins separated at birth. Tensions between them have been at a hair trigger ever since independence and has erupted into full scale conflict at least four times in the past 80 years.
The 22 April terrorist attack in Kashmir that killed 25 Indian tourists and a Nepali citizen, threatens to escalate tension between the two nuclear-armed nations. India has squarely blamed Pakistan for the attacks, and Prime Minister Narendra Modi has given his military “operational freedom” to respond. Pakistan has said it has credible intelligence of an Indian military strike and its officials have promised a “full spectrum” response — a code for a <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/editorial/thinking-the-thinkable">nuclear retaliation</a>.
For Nepal, the killing of its national in the Pahalgam attack comes as another stark reminder that in conflicts from Afghanistan to Iraq, from <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/how-to-agree-an-armistice-in-ukraine">Ukraine</a> to Israel, <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/10-nepalis-from-one-town-fighting-in-ukraine">Nepalis are getting caught in the crossfire</a>. The last time full-scale fighting broke out between <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/peacemongers-at-india-pakistan-border">India and Pakistan</a> on Kargil in 1999, at least 22<a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/india-s-trial-by-fire-for-soldiers-from-nepal?%27%5C%22="> Nepalis fighting for the Indian Army</a> were killed in action.
Three of Nepal’s immediate neighbours (China, India, Pakistan) have nuclear weapons, and they do not have good relations. With China supplying weapons, <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/editorial/war-and-warming">missile technology</a> and other support to Pakistan, this triangular friction could set off a regional conflagration.&nbsp;
<a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s43016-022-00573-0" target="_blank">Research at Rutgers University</a> has calculated that even a week-long tactical nuclear exchange between India and Pakistan would throw up so much smoke and debris into the atmosphere that it would block out the sun for years, and lead to a collapse of the <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/grow-nourish-sustain-together-world-food-day">global food system</a>. This does not take into account the radioactive fallout that prevailing winds would blow up to <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/lives-on-the-line-in-the-himalaya">the Himalaya</a>, contaminating glaciers that are the sources of <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/saving-what-is-left-of-himalayan-rivers">Asia’s main rivers</a>.
The impact of <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/climate-breakdown-linked-to-thame-flood">climate breakdown </a>on High Asia was already ringing alarm bells about its <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/himalayan-icecap-melting-faster-than-thought">shrinking ice cap</a> reducing the dry season flow of water downstream. Water was going to be the next strategic commodity, geopolitical experts warned, and the next wars in Asia would be over water.
That water war is already happening. India retaliated to the Kashmir attack by suspending the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/24/world/asia/india-pakistan-indus-waters-treaty.html" target="_blank">Indus Waters Treaty</a> of 1960 mediated by the World Bank that has withstood at least three wars between India and Pakistan. The treaty gives India control over the three eastern tributaries of the Indus (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beas_River" target="_blank">Beas</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ravi_River" target="_blank">Ravi</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sutlej" target="_blank">Sutlej</a>), while Pakistan got water from the Indus and two of its western tributaries (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indus_River" target="_blank">Indus</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chenab_River" target="_blank">Chenab</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jhelum_River" target="_blank">Jhelum</a>.
Pakistan was assured of 70% of the annual flow, and India could use a reasonable amount of water for<a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=15231"> irrigation and hydropower</a>. &nbsp;Within days of its threat, India stopped water flowing down to Pakistan from the Chenab river and is reportedly preparing to do the same on the Jhelum.
The sabre-rattling has reached a crescendo. Besides threats and counter-threats there are also symbolic drills, with the Indian Air Force practicing landing on an expressway in Uttar Pradesh by its Rafale, Su-30 and Jaguar fighter jets to demonstrate ‘operational readiness’. In response Pakistan test-fired its Abdali ballistic missile that can carry a nuclear warhead and has a range of 450km.&nbsp;
The danger is that with ultra-nationalist rhetoric and the beating the war drums by both sides, India’s government and Pakistan’s military may have to ‘do something’ to appease domestic public opinion. But any tactical strike, an artillery exchange, or territorial incursion could quickly escalate out of control.
Expecting an Indian retaliation for the Pahalgam killings, Pakistan is using<a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/interfaith-collaboration-for-nuclear-disarmament"> nuclear deterrence </a>and warning of “catastrophic consequences”. The two neighbours came close to a nuclear exchange in 2019 after an attack on the Indian military in Kashmir, and prompt international intervention led by the United States cooled tensions.&nbsp;
This time, the <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/trump-shock-wave-hits-nepal">Trump administration</a> is too distracted and not as engaged. Pakistan has denied it was responsible for the terrorist attack and called on Washington to stop a possible Indian retaliation. India and Pakistan have stopped overflights by each other’s airlines, and some international carriers have even stopped flying over Pakistan fearing an air war.
Washington, Beijing, the UN and the EU have all urged restraint. Iran, which has good relations with both India and Pakistan has sent its foreign minister to urge both countries not to go into a tit-for-tat war. Iran has its own nuclear flashpoint to worry about with tensions in Israel, &nbsp;Yemen and Syria.
India and Pakistan both share similar problems of joblessness, <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/why-nepal-s-poverty-rate-is-stuck">poverty </a>and <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/climate-change-new-threat-to-nepal-s-rhinos">environmental threats</a>. Neither side needs the threat of a senseless war, and we in the neighbourhood do not need it either.&nbsp;
Kunda Dixit
This Editorial is brought to you by <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/" target="_blank">Nepali Times</a>, in collaboration with <a href="https://inpsjapan.com/en/" target="_blank">INPS Japan</a> and <a href="https://sgi-peace.org/" target="_blank">Soka Gakkai International</a>, in consultative status with UN ECOSOC.

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