<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221109191116/636beeb34b0ad905ca02ef60jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="1500" height="1112"/><figcaption>Charge d' Affaires L. Douglas welcomes BP Koirala to the US Embassy inaguration in 1959.</figcaption></figure>On 15 December 1960 (पुस १) exactly 60 years ago, King Mahendra ordered the jailing of Prime Minister BP Koirala and other political figures, many of whom the Nepali people had put in power 18 months earlier in Nepal's first-ever election.Ending a decade of democratic experimentation, Mahendra decided to rule the country directly. After his death in 1972 his son Birendra took power. Many of today's top political leaders cut their political teeth in years of underground opposition to the monarchy.The U S government at the time noted that Mahendra's coup was accomplished ‘with great secrecy and superb organisation’. After 1960, the US slowly shifted its approach in Nepal, embracing the monarchy and moving away from democratic reform.<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221109191116/636beeb64b0ad905ca02ef61jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="719">Ten years earlier, the globalisation of the Cold War had forced the US to pay more attention to South Asia. After China turned Communist in 1949 and war broke out on the Korean peninsula in 1950, Asian nations, particularly those near China, became hot spots for Cold War competition between the Soviet Union and China on one hand, and the US led capitalist democracies on the other.During the 1950s, believing economic progress and expanded political freedoms would inoculate Nepal against communist influence, the U S offered aid programs and supported democratic reforms. As part of this vision, Washington promoted health and agriculture programs but also, in part to counter populist Communist Chinese programs, pushed for economic leveling programs such as land reform.In the late 1950s, the US grew increasingly concerned as China and the Soviet Union expanded activities in Nepal. A November 1960 National Security document warned that Nepal had become ‘a particularly vulnerable target’.But the US believed that Nepal's 1959 election had strengthened the country. Nepal, the National Security document noted, ‘currently enjoys greater internal stability than heretofore, following the introduction of popularly-based parliamentary government’.The US also thought highly of B P Koirala. A 1960 memo explained, ‘Koirala is intelligent, forceful, respected by his party, and popular with his people.’ He was ‘basically pro-Western and anti-Communist’ and didn't underestimate the communist threat, showing ‘grave concern’ about it.<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221109191116/636beeb84b0ad905ca02ef62jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="465" height="578">The US had a less positive view of Mahendra. He was seen as anti-communist and as a ‘stabilising and unifying force’ but seemed less forceful, and less consequential. An internal memo discounted him as ‘a conscientious man of simple tastes and austere habits … rather naive politically and not particularly forceful as a ruler … awkward socially, and indecisive’. It noted he had advanced some reforms but that ‘he is firmly convinced that a strong monarchy is necessary to insure stability’.The last lines of an April 1960 US memo raised the possibility of a royal takeover in Nepal, saying the king was not ‘irrevocably committed’ to representative government. But it discounted the possibility: ‘Such a drastic step is not anticipated.’A week after the coup, on 20 December, 1960, CIA Director Allen Dulles told the National Security Council that the King's ‘strange coup’ owed to two reasons: Koirala was ‘too progressive’ and had too ‘close relations’ with India. He warned of a more ‘archaic form of government’.US Ambassador Henry Stebbins met with Mahendra on 21 December, 1960 and cabled Washington to say that the King professed a strong belief in democracy, which he claimed he himself had brought to Nepal. He said he dismissed the Koirala government and imprisoned its leaders because they were guilty of corruption and of aiding and abetting Communism. In a letter to US President Dwight Eisenhower a couple days later, he also blamed poor administration.Stebbins did not buy it. He wrote: ‘Mahendra is guided less by the issues of corruption and Communism than by a growing fear that his own personal position and prestige were dwindling and that if he did not act soon, it might be too late." Stebbins thought the coup might yield ‘disastrous’ results.President Eisenhower addressed the Nepal coup at a 11 January 1961 meeting, just 10 days before handing over the office to John F Kennedy. He was reminded of ‘intensive Bloc efforts to detach Nepal from India's sphere of influence’. The choice was to support the Nepali Congress or create some kind of accommodation between the NC and the king. The US chose accommodation, pointing to ‘the inevitable chaos which would be exploited by the Communists … and the Nepali Congress’ presumed inability to establish a viable government’.But this didn't mean giving the king full legitimacy. As a later document put it, for a short time after the coup, the US maintained ‘correct relations’ with Mahendra but didn't openly back him ‘for fear of alienating the exiled NCP (Nepali Congress Party)’.Things began to shift a year later, by early 1962, even before the dramatic events of later that year on the Sino-Indian border. ‘State is considering a new emphasis in our Nepal policy,’ reported a February memo. Department officials ‘now believe the King will probably stay in power despite the recent sharp increase in NCP-sponsored dissident activity’. They showed new concern the King would turn to the Communist bloc. ‘State feels now may be the time to move closer to him, lest he look increasingly to the Bloc for support.’Democratic values seemed less a concern than power politics. ‘Our chief problem is to keep Nepal from becoming too dependent on Bloc aid, especially from Red China, and to preserve her strong economic ties with India. In the past, we’ve tuned our policy to New Delhi’s.’At first, though, coming round to support the King did not mean the abandoning US efforts at democratic reform within Nepal. Instead, the US hoped Mahendra could be the source of reform. Mahendra, it said, ‘is probably making almost as much progress with economic and social reform as the NCP did’. He appeared to embrace land reform as well.<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221109191116/636beeb94b0ad905ca02ef63jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="500" height="379">Everything changed in the fall of 1962 when China and India came to blows over disputed Himalayan territory. Catching the Indians flat footed, Chinese incursions spurred a reversal of India's hardline stance toward Mahendra. India abandoned support of Koirala and the Nepali Congress dissidents, and moved to win back Mahendra's favour. The U S lost leverage in Nepal, and land reform lost momentum.Mahendra continued to back भुमी सुधार land reform, but only outwardly. By March 1963, an American Ford Foundation official had noticed a new ‘spirit of complacency’ in Kathmandu on the issue. He wrote: ‘The desire to move ahead with the measures of unquestioned importance for the welfare of Nepal, so evident in September is hard to find now.’A sea change in Nepal politics had occurred. Observers began to see the 1950s as a restoration, not a revolution. The monarchy had returned to full power, not the people. The US, once a strong voice for democracy in Nepal, now supported the king and gave up on programs such as land reform.America's Reform Push in 1950s NepalVisiting Kathmandu in 1953, US Ambassador to India and Nepal Chester Bowles confronted a tricky issue: As an outsider working in a starkly hierarchical society, how much should you work with the existing power structure and how much to push for change?Nepal's land ownership patterns, some of the most unequal in Asia, spurred Bowles to ponder this question. He had come to Nepal to meet with Nepal's King Tribhuvan to discuss land reform. How hard should the U S push?Many foreigners in Nepal do not see the country's harsh hierarchies. Or they see parts, such as class and gender divisions, but miss more unfamiliar caste and ethnic divisions. I still remember my disappointment visiting Dang a few years ago after the end of the Maoist war, and learning that, of the many foreign volunteers working in the district, all of whom lived with local families, not one lived with a Tharu or Dalit family.But Bowles had an unusual background, and the early 1950s were a special moment. He had emerged from a progressive tradition, connected to the Great Depression of the 1930s, that had emphasised structural poverty and social reform. And because of family relations, he possessed a much deeper understanding of America's history of racial discrimination than many white Americans. In the 1950s, he pioneered opportunities <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/african-americans-in-cold-war-nepal/">for African Americans as diplomats</a>, including in Nepal.In February 1953 Bowles <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/land-reform-in-cold-war-Nepal,4192">travelled from New Delhi to Kathmandu</a> to meet with Nepali government officials, including King Tribhuvan, to discuss new American development programs for Nepal. In the previous year the US had started mineral surveys, agriculture, and health programs. But most of all Bowles wanted to discuss land reform.<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221109191116/636beebb4b0ad905ca02ef64jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="640" height="357"><figcaption>Chester Bowles Papers (MS 628). Manuscripts and Archives, Yale University Library</figcaption></figure>Few Asian countries had starker disparities in land ownership than Nepal. A UN report as far back as 1952 highlighted that fully one-fourth of Nepal's cultivable land was tax-free birta and that the jamindar landlord class held most of the other land. ‘The illiterate peasants,’ the report said, ‘are always exploited by Zamindars and used for state labour.’ Rents ate as much as 50% of each crop.Unequal land distribution seemed to hold Nepal back economically and politically. But it was a tricky issue. How much should Bowles push? Would he alienate powerful Nepalis he hoped to win over to the US side?The early 1950s saw new worlds emerge. In the previous five years, three huge earthquakes had shaken South Asia's political landscape: Indian independence from Great Britain (1947), the Chinese communist party's takeover of China (1949), and war in Korea (1950).<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221109191116/636beebc4b0ad905ca02ef65jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="422"><figcaption>The cover of Bowles’ book, Ambassador’s Report, 1954</figcaption></figure>Both Nepal and the US stood at the crossroads. In Nepal, after the Rana regime that had ruled for a century collapsed in 1950, a new coalition government promised democracy and development.The U S had emerged from World War II Asia's most dominant power. The British departed. War between North and South Korea had intensified Cold War competition between the Soviet Union and its communist allies and the United States and its democratic capitalist allies all over Asia, particularly those, like Nepal, near China's borders. ‘The invasion of Tibet by Chinese Communists,’ Bowles wrote in 1952, ‘has catapulted Nepal into the front line of the cold war.”To bolster Nepal, the U S relied upon India’s security umbrella, but also economic development programs. The US gave taxpayer dollars for health and agriculture programs in Nepal for altruistic reasons, but also for geopolitical gain. But would these programs succeed without more equal access to the single most essential resource in Nepal's rural society: land?On one hand, pushing for land reform could be seen as a kind of internal interference, an overreach that smacked of imperialism. Even if in the name of greater equality, what gave the US the authority to judge right and wrong and to decide the path for change? And didn't the US have its own huge problems of inequality?On the other hand, the US was giving hard-earned resources for programs desperately needed in Nepal. Bowles wanted those programs to be effective. It might be convenient to partner with the castes, classes, and genders that ran Nepal, but wouldn't that just reinforce them? Today, especially in the wake of Acemoglu and Robinson's influential 2012 book Why Nations Fail, ideas of ‘inclusive institutions’ and ‘inclusive development’ have become conventional wisdom among development professionals. Wasn't Bowles simply pursuing an early variant of this?In a candid letter from early 1953, Bowles reflected on exactly this dilemma: how much should an outside country like the US press for internal reforms in Nepal. Bowles noted that the year before he had proposed that US foreign aid be denied to any country not making sincere progress at land reform and other internal reforms. He also noted that many diplomats and policymakers strongly disagreed, seeing his proposal as inappropriate internal meddling.In the end, he decided that donor countries must insist upon certain ‘basic reforms’ within recipient countries or else ‘our aid is wasted’. Pressure for reforms should not be dismissed as interference, as he saw it, because development aid would fail without those reforms. To not push for serious reforms would be not just nonsensical but also counterproductive; it would mean ‘wasted’ aid.<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221109191116/636beebd4b0ad905ca02ef66jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="693" height="847">In the early 1950s, several factors made it easier for Bowles to make these arguments in Nepal. Prominent Nepali Congress leaders like B P Koirala also called for land reform. And it seemed that such efforts would help counter the appeal of Chinese and Soviets calls for resource redistribution. So Bowles wasn't really going far out on a limb.In his 1953 meeting with Tribuvan and his advisers, including some of Nepal's wealthiest men, Bowles pushed hard for land reform. Many American programs in the 1950s, including its flagship program in Chitwan, featured strong land reform programs. In the end, they often failed to deliver much social levelling, but not for lack of trying.American programs in Nepal in the 1950s reflected the reformer hopes of Bowles. <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/Nepali-Times-Buzz/how-chitwan-was-opened,4159">Paul Rose</a>, the top US official actually based in Nepal from 1952 to 1958, described U S programs in Nepal as a ‘prescription for revolution’.On 15 December 1960,  Tribhuvan's son Mahendra seized absolute power. For a couple years, the US government continued to push for land reform in Nepal but the push for such reform would not last long. In the early 1960s, people and politics would align in a very different pattern than in the early 1950s.<a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/african-americans-in-cold-war-nepal/">Tom Robertson</a>, PhD, is author of  Notes from the Archive: U.S. Ambassador Chester Bowles’s 1953 Letter to King Tribhuvan, about Land Reform and U S Development Programs in Nepal, Studies in Nepali History and Society, December 2020.

original

674x448

610x380

500x500

400x266

400x240

400x203

301x200

1250x600

1084x550

America, Nepal and the Royal Coup

<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221109181144/636be7ae9c7e80680e087817jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="1500" height="1112"/><figcaption>Charge d' Affaires L. Douglas welcomes BP Koirala to the US Embassy inaguration in 1959.</figcaption></figure>On 15 December 1960 (पुस १) exactly 60 years ago, King Mahendra ordered the jailing of Prime Minister BP Koirala and other political figures, many of whom the Nepali people had put in power 18 months earlier in Nepal's first-ever election.Ending a decade of democratic experimentation, Mahendra decided to rule the country directly. After his death in 1972 his son Birendra took power. Many of today's top political leaders cut their political teeth in years of underground opposition to the monarchy.The U S government at the time noted that Mahendra's coup was accomplished ‘with great secrecy and superb organisation’. After 1960, the US slowly shifted its approach in Nepal, embracing the monarchy and moving away from democratic reform.<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221109181144/636be7b19c7e80680e087818jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="719">Ten years earlier, the globalisation of the Cold War had forced the US to pay more attention to South Asia. After China turned Communist in 1949 and war broke out on the Korean peninsula in 1950, Asian nations, particularly those near China, became hot spots for Cold War competition between the Soviet Union and China on one hand, and the US led capitalist democracies on the other.During the 1950s, believing economic progress and expanded political freedoms would inoculate Nepal against communist influence, the U S offered aid programs and supported democratic reforms. As part of this vision, Washington promoted health and agriculture programs but also, in part to counter populist Communist Chinese programs, pushed for economic leveling programs such as land reform.In the late 1950s, the US grew increasingly concerned as China and the Soviet Union expanded activities in Nepal. A November 1960 National Security document warned that Nepal had become ‘a particularly vulnerable target’.But the US believed that Nepal's 1959 election had strengthened the country. Nepal, the National Security document noted, ‘currently enjoys greater internal stability than heretofore, following the introduction of popularly-based parliamentary government’.The US also thought highly of B P Koirala. A 1960 memo explained, ‘Koirala is intelligent, forceful, respected by his party, and popular with his people.’ He was ‘basically pro-Western and anti-Communist’ and didn't underestimate the communist threat, showing ‘grave concern’ about it.<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221109181144/636be7b39c7e80680e087819jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="465" height="578">The US had a less positive view of Mahendra. He was seen as anti-communist and as a ‘stabilising and unifying force’ but seemed less forceful, and less consequential. An internal memo discounted him as ‘a conscientious man of simple tastes and austere habits … rather naive politically and not particularly forceful as a ruler … awkward socially, and indecisive’. It noted he had advanced some reforms but that ‘he is firmly convinced that a strong monarchy is necessary to insure stability’.The last lines of an April 1960 US memo raised the possibility of a royal takeover in Nepal, saying the king was not ‘irrevocably committed’ to representative government. But it discounted the possibility: ‘Such a drastic step is not anticipated.’A week after the coup, on 20 December, 1960, CIA Director Allen Dulles told the National Security Council that the King's ‘strange coup’ owed to two reasons: Koirala was ‘too progressive’ and had too ‘close relations’ with India. He warned of a more ‘archaic form of government’.US Ambassador Henry Stebbins met with Mahendra on 21 December, 1960 and cabled Washington to say that the King professed a strong belief in democracy, which he claimed he himself had brought to Nepal. He said he dismissed the Koirala government and imprisoned its leaders because they were guilty of corruption and of aiding and abetting Communism. In a letter to US President Dwight Eisenhower a couple days later, he also blamed poor administration.Stebbins did not buy it. He wrote: ‘Mahendra is guided less by the issues of corruption and Communism than by a growing fear that his own personal position and prestige were dwindling and that if he did not act soon, it might be too late." Stebbins thought the coup might yield ‘disastrous’ results.President Eisenhower addressed the Nepal coup at a 11 January 1961 meeting, just 10 days before handing over the office to John F Kennedy. He was reminded of ‘intensive Bloc efforts to detach Nepal from India's sphere of influence’. The choice was to support the Nepali Congress or create some kind of accommodation between the NC and the king. The US chose accommodation, pointing to ‘the inevitable chaos which would be exploited by the Communists … and the Nepali Congress’ presumed inability to establish a viable government’.But this didn't mean giving the king full legitimacy. As a later document put it, for a short time after the coup, the US maintained ‘correct relations’ with Mahendra but didn't openly back him ‘for fear of alienating the exiled NCP (Nepali Congress Party)’.Things began to shift a year later, by early 1962, even before the dramatic events of later that year on the Sino-Indian border. ‘State is considering a new emphasis in our Nepal policy,’ reported a February memo. Department officials ‘now believe the King will probably stay in power despite the recent sharp increase in NCP-sponsored dissident activity’. They showed new concern the King would turn to the Communist bloc. ‘State feels now may be the time to move closer to him, lest he look increasingly to the Bloc for support.’Democratic values seemed less a concern than power politics. ‘Our chief problem is to keep Nepal from becoming too dependent on Bloc aid, especially from Red China, and to preserve her strong economic ties with India. In the past, we’ve tuned our policy to New Delhi’s.’At first, though, coming round to support the King did not mean the abandoning US efforts at democratic reform within Nepal. Instead, the US hoped Mahendra could be the source of reform. Mahendra, it said, ‘is probably making almost as much progress with economic and social reform as the NCP did’. He appeared to embrace land reform as well.<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221109181144/636be7b59c7e80680e08781ajpeg.jpg" alt="" width="500" height="379">Everything changed in the fall of 1962 when China and India came to blows over disputed Himalayan territory. Catching the Indians flat footed, Chinese incursions spurred a reversal of India's hardline stance toward Mahendra. India abandoned support of Koirala and the Nepali Congress dissidents, and moved to win back Mahendra's favour. The U S lost leverage in Nepal, and land reform lost momentum.Mahendra continued to back भुमी सुधार land reform, but only outwardly. By March 1963, an American Ford Foundation official had noticed a new ‘spirit of complacency’ in Kathmandu on the issue. He wrote: ‘The desire to move ahead with the measures of unquestioned importance for the welfare of Nepal, so evident in September is hard to find now.’A sea change in Nepal politics had occurred. Observers began to see the 1950s as a restoration, not a revolution. The monarchy had returned to full power, not the people. The US, once a strong voice for democracy in Nepal, now supported the king and gave up on programs such as land reform.America's Reform Push in 1950s NepalVisiting Kathmandu in 1953, US Ambassador to India and Nepal Chester Bowles confronted a tricky issue: As an outsider working in a starkly hierarchical society, how much should you work with the existing power structure and how much to push for change?Nepal's land ownership patterns, some of the most unequal in Asia, spurred Bowles to ponder this question. He had come to Nepal to meet with Nepal's King Tribhuvan to discuss land reform. How hard should the U S push?Many foreigners in Nepal do not see the country's harsh hierarchies. Or they see parts, such as class and gender divisions, but miss more unfamiliar caste and ethnic divisions. I still remember my disappointment visiting Dang a few years ago after the end of the Maoist war, and learning that, of the many foreign volunteers working in the district, all of whom lived with local families, not one lived with a Tharu or Dalit family.But Bowles had an unusual background, and the early 1950s were a special moment. He had emerged from a progressive tradition, connected to the Great Depression of the 1930s, that had emphasised structural poverty and social reform. And because of family relations, he possessed a much deeper understanding of America's history of racial discrimination than many white Americans. In the 1950s, he pioneered opportunities <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/african-americans-in-cold-war-nepal/">for African Americans as diplomats</a>, including in Nepal.In February 1953 Bowles <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/land-reform-in-cold-war-Nepal,4192">travelled from New Delhi to Kathmandu</a> to meet with Nepali government officials, including King Tribhuvan, to discuss new American development programs for Nepal. In the previous year the US had started mineral surveys, agriculture, and health programs. But most of all Bowles wanted to discuss land reform.<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221109181144/636be7b79c7e80680e08781bjpeg.jpg" alt="" width="640" height="357"><figcaption> </figcaption></figure>Few Asian countries had starker disparities in land ownership than Nepal. A UN report as far back as 1952 highlighted that fully one-fourth of Nepal's cultivable land was tax-free birta and that the jamindar landlord class held most of the other land. ‘The illiterate peasants,’ the report said, ‘are always exploited by Zamindars and used for state labour.’ Rents ate as much as 50% of each crop.Unequal land distribution seemed to hold Nepal back economically and politically. But it was a tricky issue. How much should Bowles push? Would he alienate powerful Nepalis he hoped to win over to the US side?The early 1950s saw new worlds emerge. In the previous five years, three huge earthquakes had shaken South Asia's political landscape: Indian independence from Great Britain (1947), the Chinese communist party's takeover of China (1949), and war in Korea (1950).<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221109181144/636be7b89c7e80680e08781cjpeg.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="422"><figcaption> </figcaption></figure>Both Nepal and the US stood at the crossroads. In Nepal, after the Rana regime that had ruled for a century collapsed in 1950, a new coalition government promised democracy and development.The U S had emerged from World War II Asia's most dominant power. The British departed. War between North and South Korea had intensified Cold War competition between the Soviet Union and its communist allies and the United States and its democratic capitalist allies all over Asia, particularly those, like Nepal, near China's borders. ‘The invasion of Tibet by Chinese Communists,’ Bowles wrote in 1952, ‘has catapulted Nepal into the front line of the cold war.”To bolster Nepal, the U S relied upon India’s security umbrella, but also economic development programs. The US gave taxpayer dollars for health and agriculture programs in Nepal for altruistic reasons, but also for geopolitical gain. But would these programs succeed without more equal access to the single most essential resource in Nepal's rural society: land?On one hand, pushing for land reform could be seen as a kind of internal interference, an overreach that smacked of imperialism. Even if in the name of greater equality, what gave the US the authority to judge right and wrong and to decide the path for change? And didn't the US have its own huge problems of inequality?On the other hand, the US was giving hard-earned resources for programs desperately needed in Nepal. Bowles wanted those programs to be effective. It might be convenient to partner with the castes, classes, and genders that ran Nepal, but wouldn't that just reinforce them? Today, especially in the wake of Acemoglu and Robinson's influential 2012 book Why Nations Fail, ideas of ‘inclusive institutions’ and ‘inclusive development’ have become conventional wisdom among development professionals. Wasn't Bowles simply pursuing an early variant of this?In a candid letter from early 1953, Bowles reflected on exactly this dilemma: how much should an outside country like the US press for internal reforms in Nepal. Bowles noted that the year before he had proposed that US foreign aid be denied to any country not making sincere progress at land reform and other internal reforms. He also noted that many diplomats and policymakers strongly disagreed, seeing his proposal as inappropriate internal meddling.In the end, he decided that donor countries must insist upon certain ‘basic reforms’ within recipient countries or else ‘our aid is wasted’. Pressure for reforms should not be dismissed as interference, as he saw it, because development aid would fail without those reforms. To not push for serious reforms would be not just nonsensical but also counterproductive; it would mean ‘wasted’ aid.<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221109181144/636be7b99c7e80680e08781djpeg.jpg" alt="" width="693" height="847">In the early 1950s, several factors made it easier for Bowles to make these arguments in Nepal. Prominent Nepali Congress leaders like B P Koirala also called for land reform. And it seemed that such efforts would help counter the appeal of Chinese and Soviets calls for resource redistribution. So Bowles wasn't really going far out on a limb.In his 1953 meeting with Tribuvan and his advisers, including some of Nepal's wealthiest men, Bowles pushed hard for land reform. Many American programs in the 1950s, including its flagship program in Chitwan, featured strong land reform programs. In the end, they often failed to deliver much social levelling, but not for lack of trying.American programs in Nepal in the 1950s reflected the reformer hopes of Bowles. <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/Nepali-Times-Buzz/how-chitwan-was-opened,4159">Paul Rose</a>, the top US official actually based in Nepal from 1952 to 1958, described U S programs in Nepal as a ‘prescription for revolution’.On 15 December 1960,  Tribhuvan's son Mahendra seized absolute power. For a couple years, the US government continued to push for land reform in Nepal but the push for such reform would not last long. In the early 1960s, people and politics would align in a very different pattern than in the early 1950s.<a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/african-americans-in-cold-war-nepal/">Tom Robertson</a>, PhD, is author of  Notes from the Archive: U.S. Ambassador Chester Bowles’s 1953 Letter to King Tribhuvan, about Land Reform and U S Development Programs in Nepal, Studies in Nepali History and Society, December 2020.

Tom Robertson

<a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/waiting-for-bipin-joshi" target="_blank">Nepali student Bipin Joshi</a>, who was taken captive by Hamas on 7 October 2023, was not on the list of those freed following the end of the bombardment and fighting in Gaza.&nbsp; On Monday morning, the Israeli military notified Bipin's family and Nepal’s ambassador to Israel Dhan Prasad Pandit, that there is no evidence of him still being alive. However, Nepal's Foreign Ministry is yet to be notified by Israel's government of Bipin's status. The news came three days after a US-brokered ceasefire between Israel and Hamas came into effect, and hostage and prisoner exchanges by the two sides started Monday morning.&nbsp; Almost 2,000 Palestinians held in Israeli prisions are expected to be released by Israel in exchange for the hostages during the next phase of the peace deal between the two parties, and the bodies of deceased hostages remaining in Gaza are also expected to be returned.&nbsp; Bipin Joshi was among a group of Nepalis who had arrived in Israel in 2023 just weeks before 7 October 2023 as part of a ‘learn and earn’ program to work and earn in kibbutz farms there.&nbsp; Along with other students Joshi had been working on a farm in Kibbutz Alumim in southern Israel near Gaza. <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/war-in-israel-earthquake-and-grief-in-nepal">Ten Nepali students were killed </a>while taking cover in shelters near their farms in two separate attacks by Hamas fighters.&nbsp; Joshi’s colleagues, fellow Nepalis who survived the attack, recall gunmen lobbing two grenades into the bunker that they had taken cover in. Bipin hurled one of the grenades out, they say, but the other one exploded, killing and injuring Nepalis inside. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shortly after, Bipin was captured by Hamas along with a Thai national and led away into Gaza. CCTV footage showed Bipin alive and at a hospital in Gaza on the day of the attack itself after he was taken hostage.&nbsp; Thirty-one Thai citizens, who like Nepalis worked in farms in Israel, were taken hostage during the Hamas attack, the highest number of foreign captives in October 2023.&nbsp; <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/deft-diplomacy-freed-thai-hostages">Deft Thai diplomatic engagement</a> with officials from Iran, Egypt, and Qatar brought about the release of 23 of its nationals in 2023. Five more Thai nationals were released earlier this year.&nbsp; In August, Joshi’s family visited Israel at the invitation of the government and urged the international community to push for his return. Bipin’s mother Padma and sister Pushpa have been at the United Nations to lobby for his release.&nbsp; His family last week also released a video clip of Bipin briefly speaking on camera, reportedly obtained by Israel and said to be filmed in November 2023, around a month after he was taken captive. Joshi looks healthy in that video.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20251013091028_d551c7f88204c52217152fb5db655bb5a5f8bf2cff1e6a055326ebf64453ff9f.png" data-media-id="editor_3" data-image-id="20251013091028_d551c7f88204c52217152fb5db655bb5a5f8bf2cff1e6a055326ebf64453ff9f" data-rendition-name="original" width="2848" height="1528" loading="lazy" alt="Bipin Joshi NT"> </figure>  More than 67,000 Palestinians have been killed during the last two years of the genocide in Gaza. About 1,200 people were killed during the Hamas attack on 7 October 2023, while more than 251, including Bipin Joshi, were taken as captives.&nbsp; This is the third ceasefire implemented in Gaza since 7 October 2023 after previous ones in November 2023 and January 2025. This 20-point deal facilitated by intermediaries US, Qatar, Turkey, and Egypt included terms for Hamas to give up its arms, and for a devastated Gaza to be governed by a Palestinian body of independent technocrats, while Israeli troops will withdraw in stages from Gaza.&nbsp; Hamas has agreed to relinquish control of Gaza, but has rejected the demand for disarmament, saying the group will demobilise but is prepared to resume fighting if Israel breaches the ceasefire.&nbsp; Following the ceasefire, Palestinians in Gaza have begun long journeys back to homes reduced to rubble by Israel’s two-year assault on the strip. The flow of humanitarian aid in the city has also increased following the peace deal.&nbsp; Israel's closure of humanitarian corridors in the past months had blocked the entry of food and medicine into Gaza, causing widespread famine. The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) has said that the restriction of aid into the beseiged city has left as many as <a href="https://www.unrwa.org/newsroom/news-releases/gaza-unrwa%E2%80%99s-lancet-study-reveals-alarming-surge-child-malnutrition">54,600 children acutely malnourished</a>.&nbsp; Meanwhile, US president Donald Trump landed in Israel on Monday as hostages were being released, and world leaders are expected to head to Egypt for an international summit to discuss the next steps in Gaza, Israel, and West Asia.&nbsp;

Nepali hostage in Gaza not alive: Israel

Already trying to balance youth demands with legal provisions in the Constitution, Prime Minister Sushila Karki’s interim government faced yet another challenge over Dasain: a receding monsoon dumped unseasonal rain unleashing floods and landslides that killed at least 60, mostly in eastern Nepal.&nbsp; The government was rated positively for its early warning and the ‘visibility’ of its disaster response, with many comparing it to the inaction of the NC-UML coalition during last year’s floods.&nbsp; Government agencies and police proactively closed off hazardous sections of highways as Kathmandu was marooned from the rest of the country in the peak holiday season. Stranded passengers were taken care of, with police, army and local governments in Ilam coordinating rescue and relief efforts. Many of the problems were structural and inherited from decades of neglect and corruption in highway contracts. Shoddy bridges and encroachment of settlements along river banks have increased risk from more frequent extreme weather caused by climate breakdown. With Dasain over Tihar around the corner and the worst of the disaster behind, the Karki administration is trying to balance the separate demands of GenZ movers and shakers who installed her in office with constitutional provisions. It has not helped that the badly-mauled political parties are spoiling for a fight, and the three top leaders show little signs of stepping down. “Nepal’s movement did not happen in a democratic vacuum, so this government walks a very fine line in political legitimacy," says Bidushi Dhungel of the National Democratic Institute in Nepal. "In this fragile space, whatever the work done — or not done— by the interim government within its limited mandate, it may open up avenues for further dissent from old and new actors. They are &nbsp;caught between a rock and a hard place.” Civil society activists issued a statement on Wednesday calling on the main political parties to heed the writing on the wall and reform themselves. Signed by professor Krishna Khanal and former ambassador Keshab Mathema, the statement said: 'The main leaders of the main parties should say sorry, and voluntarily resign ... they must respect public sentiments and work to reform and transform their parties to be more accountable to the public, or risk being irrelevant.'&nbsp; Complicating matters further are the sometimes contradictory demands of various GenZ factions on punishing those responsible for the carnage and rampage of 8-9 September, Constitution and elections. Karki faces calls to immediately detain former PM KP Oli and Home Minister Ramesh Lekhak for their involvement in the massacre outside Parliament. Under pressure from GenZ delegates, Home Minister Om Aryal fired off a letter to the police to arrest Oli and Lekhak. But later at a confrontational midnight meeting at the prime minister’s residence in Baluwatar, all four security chiefs advised Karki that arresting the UML and NC ex-ministers could unleash violent confrontation on the streets. The interim government is in a bind. It has formed a committee headed by Gauri Bahadur Karki to investigate the killings last month as well as the arson and vandalism that followed. The question is: should it wait for the committee to submit its report before punishing perpetrators, or let police arrest those who can easily be identified in social media posts setting fire to Singha Darbar, the Supreme Court and other sites.&nbsp; GenZ’s Sudan Gurung faction has gone beyond its original demand to submit an 8-point ultimatum that includes the sacking of the Chief Justice and officials of the anti-corruption bureau.&nbsp; The Prime Minister is caught in the crossfire between managing the expectations of a movement that appointed her, and working within the framework of her interim government’s mandate and Constitution. But it is not just the government that faces challenges. The lack of clear consensus among youth factions and their outspoken collectives is surfacing.&nbsp; &nbsp;“This has been a leaderless and decentralised movement, and the traditional variables typically seen in a political revolt seem missing here," notes political scientist Sucheta Pyakuryal. “There is no organised structure, nor any ideological pull factor, therefore a big question is how much bargaining power does a movement like this have, and how sustainable will it be.” GenZ leaders seem to be in two main camps. Demands like the one for a directly elected prime minister, and the constitutional processes that can make for such an outcome, have emerged as a major point dividing the movement.&nbsp; Nepalis both within and outside the youth movement are watching Hami Nepal’s Sudan Gurung closely — especially after his recent interview with Al-Jazeera during which he expressed his interest to run for Prime Minister and seemed to not accept a win by political parties in the March elections.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20251009201044_fcba7e92bb9a8812fd0ad4e9770d6f4d4189972de5229f91e9a832a26e388901.jpg" data-media-id="editor_0" data-image-id="20251009201044_fcba7e92bb9a8812fd0ad4e9770d6f4d4189972de5229f91e9a832a26e388901" data-rendition-name="original" width="2916" height="1000" loading="lazy" alt="One month on NT"> <figcaption>GROUND ZERO: The destroyed centre of Nepal's government with Singha Darbar (in green scaffolding), the Attorney General's Office, Supreme Court, and in the distance, Parliament building. Also seen are the nearly finished new Parliament Complex and the new Supreme Court buildings. Drone shot taken on Thursday morning. Photo: SUMAN NEPALI</figcaption> </figure>  Gurung’s participation in the NDRRMA’s disaster management meeting and manner of his interaction with officials at the event was met with both bouquets and brickbats. Interestingly, some of the criticism was youth activists themselves. &nbsp;“There's a lot of self-involvement and self-importance that seems to be guiding a fragmented young leadership, as opposed to constructively engaging in how to concretise reforms,” says Dhungel. “There seems to be very little stocktaking of what's happened in the past, and what's happened in other countries to try identify where lapses could be before they occur."&nbsp; In the absence of unified positions and level-headed leadership, the youth who spearheaded post-protest negotiations, as well as the GenZ movement in general, risk losing public goodwill already dented by the destruction of state property on 9 September. This also leaves an opening for political parties which are on the defensive and licking their wounds to capitalise on youth discord.&nbsp; Says Pyakuryal: “Post revolution, the political landscape becomes extremely unpredictable and therefore there is a risk of co-optation from several Machiavellian political actors including political parties, monarchists, as well as other forces, and that is concerning.” The immediate and visible transformation that Nepal’s youth expect will not manifest right away, and while there is a need for long-term political planning, the caretaker government must also undertake measures that have a palpable impact on the daily life of citizens. &nbsp;&nbsp; “While youth frustrations must be addressed urgently, statecraft isn’t just about fulfilling short-term goals,”says Pyakuryal. &nbsp; Many, including the youth themselves, now see the need for GenZ to have a more united stance and to move beyond making demands that the interim government cannot fulfil and start mobilising for elections — even by forming its own party.&nbsp; A strong showing in elections can enable them to enact the changes they want to strengthen Nepal’s democracy, and make future governments more accountable.&nbsp; This week, the Election Commission announced 16 November as the deadline to register new parties for the 5 March polls.&nbsp; Youth representatives have said that they want to be active participants in the political process, particularly in national-level politics. The Constitution defines ‘youth’ as being between the ages of 16-40. In the 2022 elections, the Election Commission stated that over 41% of locally-elected representatives were from ages 21-40 years.&nbsp; If young Nepalis are to contest the election outside the banner of mainstream parties, this leaves electoral aspirants little more than a month to decide whether to form a loose coalition with existing parties, a separate political party, or to contest elections independently. “This is first of a kind movement, where political language is digital, not ideological, where organising is done through online platforms and where there is no one leader spearheading the movement,”says Pyakuryal. “I don’t know if ‘anti-corruption’ or ‘political reform’ have a strong enough ideological pull to band people together in the long run.” Indeed, the RSP was formed only four months before the 2022 elections and cashed in on anti-incumbent and anti-corruption sentiments of voters — mainly driven by social media. But controversy and strife within their party means it has largely lost its public trust.&nbsp; Nepal’s September Uprising and its aftermath have shown that a majority of young people are entirely disillusioned with establishment parties and politicians, even using ‘ex-political parties’ as a phrase of reference. Any new young political figures that emerge from this movement and this election will have to work with mainstream parties in a multiparty democracy.&nbsp; &nbsp;“The reality of politics is that change is not possible without engaging with existing political institutions and actors,” says Dhungel. “To say that they do not want to engage, negotiate, or identify allies or proactively seek out input from at least the reform-minded individuals within each of those outfits is political naivety, and may lead to a lack of institutionalised reform.” However, Dhungel notes that the youth leadership would have more agency if they are clear not just on what they want to change, but about whether they are interested in active politics or civic engagement. “The window of opportunity that is fast closing is to really negotiate hard and push for internal reforms within political parties and across the electoral system,” she adds. Pyakurel also adds: “GenZ are smart and politically mature, I hope they see these loopholes. I am optimistic about the direction they take.”

One month on

Scenic Phortse in the lap of Mt Everest is called ‘the village of mountaineers’ because just about every household has someone who has summited the world’s highest mountain multiple times. However, while the international mountaineers they assist to make it to the top go on to fame and glory, their Sherpa guides from Phortse <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/without-sherpas-there-is-no-mountaineering" target="_blank">barely get a mention</a>. It is a risky occupation for Nepal’s high altitude guides, and every other family in this village has lost a member in Himalayan expeditions. Sherpa guides are <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/on-mt-everest-s-70th-records-and-fatalities" target="_blank">disproportionately more at risk </a>on Mt Everest because they have to traverse the Khumbu Icefall many times during an expedition. One third of the over 300 climbers who have died climbing Mt Everest are Nepali high altitude guides and porters. In 2014, <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/everest-dangerous-place-to-work,1316" target="_blank">16 guides were killed</a> when an avalanche fell on them while going up the treacherous Icefall carrying expedition gear. Then in 2015, the <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/Nepali-Times-Buzz/big-drops-in-Everest-bookings-affect-livelihoods-of-Nepali-high-altitude-guides,2048" target="_blank">earthquake triggered a massive avalanche</a> that killed 22 climbers at Base Camp. Many of the fatalities in both years were Sherpa guides from Phortse. Despite the danger, Phortse honours and celebrates its climbers like heroes. One such is the late &nbsp;Nima Tshiring Sherpa, who was a porter and guide in the 1953 John Hunt expedition in which Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay became the first to set foot on the world’s highest summit.&nbsp; Nima Tshiring and his eldest son Pasang Gyalzen both reached 8,000m carrying expedition gear for the Hunt expedition in 1953. Nima Tshiring had eight sons and a daughter and although he never submitted himself, most of them have climbed Mt Everest at least once. In fact, his children and grandchildren have been to the top of Mt Everest a total of 81 times — a record for any family in Nepal.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20251011171048_a55e45bee2b5bbf38e4ee5bcea101edcc3041f40e331b8fee44e473457f42553.png" data-media-id="editor_4" data-image-id="20251011171048_a55e45bee2b5bbf38e4ee5bcea101edcc3041f40e331b8fee44e473457f42553" data-rendition-name="original" width="2144" height="1436" loading="lazy" alt="Sherpa climbers"> <figcaption>Nima Tshiring Sherpa with wife and children in Phortse. An unanmed Everest climber on right.</figcaption> </figure>  “We were born in Phortse which is in the lap of Everest, our identity is Chomolungma,” says one of his sons, Panuru, using the Sherpa name for the mountain. “In fact, I feel our entire family was born to climb Everest.”&nbsp; Phortse has a population of 350 people living in 95 households. Besides Nima Tshiring’s clan, more than 75 of the inhabitants have climbed Everest, many of them multiple times.&nbsp; Another one of Nima Tshiring’s sons, Ngawang climbed Everest 11 times, his brother Mingma Dorje has summited 14 times, and another brother Ngati not only got to the top seven times, but was the first climber to reach the peak from the Chinese side and descend down the Nepal part of Mt Everest. Ngati was killed in an avalanche on Annapurna while climbing with an American expedition in 1993.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20251011171044_60693527b31aba22fe6f6c233cf367a3683b88be8dc2a53bfb5c2c02b2db1e5b.png" data-media-id="editor_5" data-image-id="20251011171044_60693527b31aba22fe6f6c233cf367a3683b88be8dc2a53bfb5c2c02b2db1e5b" data-rendition-name="original" width="2242" height="1660" loading="lazy" alt="Sherpa climbers"> <figcaption>Mingma Dorje has climbed Everest 14 times.</figcaption> </figure>  Panuru himself has reached the summit of Everest 16 times, and set up the<a href="https://www.khumbuclimbingcenter.com/" target="_blank"> Khumbu Climbing Centre</a> in 2003 to train others in climbing techniques. Following in his footsteps was another brother Mingma Tshiring, who has been up 15 times and <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/sherpaland-co-usa" target="_blank">now lives in Colorado</a>.&nbsp; Nima Tshiring’s only daughter Mingma Yanjin has also climbed Cho Oyu, Ama Dablam and other &nbsp;Himalayan mountains. Her husband Lhakpa Chiri Sherpa has climbed Everest 11 times. Counting him, the total summits for the family would be 92. This number also does not include other Himalayan eight-thousanders besides Mt Everest that the family from Phortse has summited. Nima Tsiring’s youngest son is Danuru who has climbed Everest 16 times, and has been on top of North American peaks from his base in Colorado. He is giving Everest yet another try.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20251011171048_cd3e2961567ca507fc4110c97e01d85ee1c7e35f787276564ff59a4a76151fe2.png" data-media-id="editor_8" data-image-id="20251011171048_cd3e2961567ca507fc4110c97e01d85ee1c7e35f787276564ff59a4a76151fe2" data-rendition-name="original" width="1308" height="980" loading="lazy" alt="Sherpa climbers"> <figcaption>Nima Tshiring Sherpa and his son Danuru.</figcaption> </figure>  Even his grandchildren are following Nima Tshiring’s footsteps up Everest. Panuru’s son Lhakpa has climbed Everest from both sides and wants to break previous Everest records.&nbsp; “It is a dangerous occupation, but the rewards in terms of fame and money are substantial,” says Danuru. “One season’s income is enough for a Phortse climber to support his family for a year. And we have Chomolungma to be thankful for.”  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20251011171048_d1f16e3925890663cadf3e20d955a531f21c479708f662df371fad3fdb87cf7a.png" data-media-id="editor_9" data-image-id="20251011171048_d1f16e3925890663cadf3e20d955a531f21c479708f662df371fad3fdb87cf7a" data-rendition-name="original" width="760" height="1040" loading="lazy" alt="Sherpa climbers"> <figcaption>Mingma Chhiring Sherpa who has climbed the Everest 16 times with a client.</figcaption> </figure>

cia

America, Nepal and the Royal Coup

America, Nepal and the Royal Coup

Nepali hostage in Gaza not alive: Israel

One month on

Nepal’s most prolific mountaineering clan

National interest vs community needs