<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/2022111012110/636cd9da9c7e80680e092ec6jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="1000" height="1500"/><figcaption>Photo: BIKRAM RAI</figcaption></figure>As Nepal prepares for the 12th National Population and Household Census, there is much happening behind the scenes before thousands of enumerators fan out across the country  knocking door-to-door.Scheduled for 8-22 June, this is the <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/nepalis-to-stand-up-and-be-counted-next-year/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">first census under a federal system</a> and the most inclusive and ambitious since the first count was done in 1911.Since the census happens once every 10 years, those involved are usually new and need extensive training. The <a href="https://cbs.gov.np" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Central Bureau of Statistics</a> (CBS) has devised three levels of training at the central, provincial and local levels.Three program sessions were completed as part of the central-level training in early March, during which 200 officials were brought up to speed to operate as provincial and district officers. They will be deployed in 87 census offices across Nepal. At present, CBS officials are on the last leg of a week-long, provincial-level training session for instructors countrywide.The instructors will in turn train the enumerators and census supervisors, passing on skills on how to approach, interact with, and interview people and fill out the questionnaire.To improve the process of data collection, CBS has also changed the method of collating information this time around. Instead of just assigning government school teachers for data collection as was the practice in the past, an open call for applications for enumerators and census supervisors was made.“We had been having discussions for a long time about the need to mobilise educated young Nepalis around the country to help with data collection,” says Tirtha Raj Chaulagain, information officer at the CBS. “More than 120,000 people have responded to our request to apply, and there is bound to be a lot more applicants because there is still time until the application deadline.”The CBS now faces the task of vetting applicants and selecting 39,000 enumerators and 8,000 census supervisors. Those who have completed high school are eligible to apply for ‘enumerator’ while those with a bachelor’s degree can apply to become ‘census supervisors’. The age limit caps off at 40 for male applicants and 45 for female applicants.The data collection itself is set to be more comprehensive and detailed, with the use of three separate questionnaires.<a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/?p=38073&amp;preview_nonce=5c5e53a600&amp;preview=true" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">How will Nepal develop in the next decade?,</a> Sonia Awale“Nepal will have the longest census questionnaire out of any other country in the world that conducts a census,” says Chaulagain. “Census questionnaires elsewhere in the world generally have 20 questions on average. Ours will have 55.”The first pilot survey of House and Household Listing will be completed in May, which will collect household and livestock data. For gender identity, the option for ‘Other’ was introduced for the first time in the last census in 2011. Officials say they are preparing to note that survey provides space for individual conversations and safe space for gender minorities.The second phase will begin after the responses of the first one has been analysed. This will allow time for the CBS  to conduct an entirely different survey depending on the data that they receive.The main questionnaire will have 55 questions related to family resources, property ownership and income. Other details related to language, religion, ethnic identity, educational background and disability will also be part of this section. The main questionnaire will have 8 questions related to head count of family members living and working overseas.Two new parameters have been added to the main questionnaire, one being ancestral language, and another a question about whether children under 5 years of age in any given household have birth certificates or not.The third part of the census will be the Community Questionnaire, the first of its kind used in a national census. Information from every ward in the country, ranging from the demographic structure of each community to its access to government services, development infrastructure, national resources, and disaster preparedness will go into this.Among all the firsts happening this time, another one of them is the documentation of the existing infrastructure. Count of buildings, along with information indicating their use and purpose is a part of the questionnaire. There are questions that will help differentiate between villages and cities, eventually contributing to mapping the degree of urbanisation of each ward.The census will also make a more prominent use of technology in the data collection process this time around. Enumerators deployed within Kathmandu Valley will use electronic tablets to collect data, while paper-based questionnaires will be used in the rest of the country. Nepal’s diplomatic missions around the world will participate in an e-census by responding online.Scholars and population experts note that this year’s census is going to be the most inclusive and accurate census in Nepal’s history.<a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/lies-damned-lies-and-statistics/">Lies, damned lies, and statistics</a>, Ramesh Kumar“Not only are the questionnaires themselves more inclusive of Nepal’s diverse communities, but the operational modality itself has changed. The members of civil society and other concerned organisations will be able to directly participate in the data collection process,” says Yogendra B Gurung, PhD, who teaches at the Tribhuvan University.CBS has also adopted the motto, ‘My Census, My Participation’, to reflect the level of interaction this census is expected to engage the citizens in.“Potential enumerators and supervisors will be selected based on which communities they belong to and what languages they speak because that makes a big difference in their ability to interact with a diverse range of people across different communities,” explains Tirtha Raj Chaulagain.<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/2022111012110/636cd9dd9c7e80680e092ec7jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="201" height="151">The census results are expected to reflect the country’s changing socio-political and demographic landscape more accurately. The study is expected tol provide more accurate data on the increasing urban-rural divide.“All levels of our government and our civil society have felt the need and are waiting for new data, as old data and statistics are outdated and of little use under the federal system,” says Gurung. “With the data collection parameters becoming so comprehensive, there can be no doubt about the quality of the results, provided that the data is managed in an efficient manner.”<a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/nepals-population-to-cross-30-million/">Nepal’s population to cross 30 million</a>, Nepali Times_________________<h2>A century of census</h2><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/2022111012110/636cd9de9c7e80680e092ec8jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="669" height="461">Although official accounts document the first Nepal census in 1911, there have been claims and accounts of Jang Bahadur Rana conducting a headcount after returning from the UK in 1850.In fact, Volume 1 of the 2014 <a href="https://nepal.unfpa.org/sites/default/files/pub-pdf/PopulationMonograph2014Volume1.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Population Monograph of Nepal</a> published by the National Planning Commission and the Central Bureau of Statistics mentions  head-counts, counting households, stone taps, paatis, and temples at various points in history before and during the prime ministership of Bhimsen Thapa from 1806 to 1837.The first official census of Nepal, however, was conducted in 1911 following an Istihaar announcement published in 1910 by Chandra Sumsher Rana’s government.“Nepal’s administration was very much influenced by British colonial power, and so the census was conducted as much as an attempt to follow in their footsteps as it was to identify Nepal’s able-bodied, working population in order to find out the number of youths who could be conscripted into the British Indian Army amid a looming political crisis in Europe,” says researcher Sanjay Sharma.The results of the 1911 census put Nepal’s population at a little over 5.64 million, with most Nepalis living in the mid-mountains. That number would decrease by almost 65,000 people to 5.57 million in the 1920 census, with the decrease attributed to a significant loss of Nepali lives in World War I, the 1917 influenza epidemic, as well as out-migration. The 1930 census showed a further decrease to 5.53 million, but this could also be due to counting inaccuracies.In his 2014 book, One Hundred Years of Census-Taking, statistician Tunga Shiromani Bastola writes, ‘The absence of a large number of young males from the country and the death of a large number of them during the war might have lowered the fertility and growth of population in the Hill region.’Indeed, Nepal’s mid-mountains had lost much of its population after the war, with some ethnic communities like the Gurung, Magar, Rai and Limbu which were preferred by the British as Nepal’s ‘martial races’ suffering more significant losses than others.“Data about ethnicity was not included in earlier censuses, so it isn’t quite possible to say exactly which ethnic communities were most affected. But colonial British policy was to hire the Gurung and Magar people from the western hills and the Rai and Limbu people from eastern Nepal, so these communities might have been affected disproportionately to other Nepalis,” explains Sharma. “Moreover, some battalions were also comprised of Chhetris, so it can be assumed that these five ethnic communities were the most affected by the war.”The 1920 census thus also included data of injured and disabled Nepalis in an attempt to quantify the impact of the First World War. Since the war in Europe had ended by then, however, the 1920 census was also aimed at preparing an inventory of slaves by sex in Nepal, called Kamara-Kamari, a system that was abolished in 1925.The population would further decrease by 41,000 according to the results of the 1930 census, with a sharp decline in the population of Kathmandu valley. The reason for the decrease has been attributed to undercounting at a time when young Nepalis feared the census was being conducted for the purpose of conscription as tensions rose between Nepal and Tibet, and war looked imminent. The population would bounce back by the next census in 1941, showing an increase for the first time since Nepal began conducting censuses.After the 1950 revolution that led to the fall of the Rana autocracy, and much of the work related to the census was abandoned in the wake of Nepal’s newly democratic political climate. The census, therefore, began after a gap of more than 10 years in 1952, ending in 1954.<a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/nepal-in-the-2020s/">Nepal in the 2020s</a>, Sewa BhattaraiThis count also marked the first modern census in Nepal’s history, what Bastola has characterises in his book, as ‘an endeavour to collect internationally comparable data’.Around 17,000 enumerators were deployed across Nepal to collect demographic data. Language and religion were also added to the questionnaire for the first time in 1952.Ten years later, the 1961 census was the first one conducted by Nepal’s Central Bureau of Statistics which was established in 1959. The results took four-and-a-half years to be published, and established the tradition of a decennial census in Nepal.Nepal was now in the Panchayat era, and the 1971 census marked a huge technological leap with the advent of an electronic data processing system with early computers. Meanwhile, the 1981 census introduced a ‘Post-enumeration quality check survey’ (PES) in an attempt to check the accuracy of the data.Journalist Mohan Mainali worked as an assistant census supervisor in Taplejung during the 1981 census, having just completed his SLC exams at age 17. During three weeks in March 1981, he and an assistant travelled across two village Panchayats in Taplejung to conduct the Household Schedule. The Assistant Supervisor would conduct the household schedule while enumerators would conduct the individual schedule.“The questionnaires we had to carry were long and heavy,” Mainali recalled. “It would sometimes take more than an hour to travel just from one household to another, since there were no roads connecting villages back then. There also was the possibility of rain, so we also had to protect the questionnaires.”Mainali describes the cultural climate at the time that posed challenges in conducting an accurate household count. “The men would be away from most households, and we would need to interview the women. Since the head of the households were men, we would ask the women for their husbands’ names, but they would be reluctant to utter the name of their spouses, such was the tradition in rural Nepal,” he says. “This and other factors prevented us from getting accurate counts.”Mainali also remembers how personal motivations affected data collection. “An enumerator would earn 20 paisa for data collected on each individual and often, they would over-count and exaggerate data to earn more money,” Mainali told Nepali Times. “There were significant discrepancies between the population data collected in the household schedule and the individual schedule, which resulted in us having to redo the individual questionnaires.”The 1991 census, the last census of the 20th century, identified 60 castes and ethnic groups for the first time and employed school teachers as enumerators for the first time, as well. The <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=8345#.X6oMhi8RoWo" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">2001 census</a> was conducted amidst a period of political turmoil in the aftermath of the Royal Palace massacre and the middle of an armed insurgency. It used a combined data collection method of complete and sample enumeration and adopted multimedia platforms for result dissemination.‘The <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/blogs/thebrief/2011/09/27/nepals-population-26-6-million/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">2011 census</a> … included census publicity in local languages, maximum involvement of female interviewers, and the involvement of enumerators from different caste and ethnic groups,’ writes Bastola in his book.By this time, Nepal’s population had surpassed the 26 million mark, a 370% increase in a century. A century after the first census, therefore, Nepal’s 2011 census served as numeric and demographic documentation of Nepal’s historic political and socio-cultural changes.Read also:<a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/?p=38051&amp;preview_nonce=38f8426e6c&amp;preview=true" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Nepal in 2030,</a> Sanghamitra Subba<a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/?p=38023&amp;preview_nonce=024823c344&amp;preview=true" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Towards 2030</a>, Nepali Times

Shristi Karki

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Everybody counts in Nepal

&nbsp;
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…To hell with poetry, with memories, &nbsp;
with my mother’s food- maybe not my mother’s biryani-&nbsp;
To hell the memory of turning nineteen&nbsp;
in quarantine. To hell with waiting. To hell
with this poem. To hell with how long.
(<a href="https://soundcloud.com/user-115260978/359-cooking-by-mukahang-limbu">Mukahang Limbu</a>)
Your friend sends you half a poem by <a href="https://poems.poetrysociety.org.uk/poets/mukahang-limbu/" target="_blank">Mukahang Limbu</a>, with a note at the bottom: Found this gem online and thought to share with you. You go back and read it a couple more times, the way you do with poetry that reaches into you to touch certain chords and you instantly know you’ve found a place to go to.&nbsp;
But home can also be just a memory and you find out why as you read When I first came from Nepal by Limbu:
Missing the feeling of home&nbsp;
I smell the iron rust
of the Municipal Gardens.
The sour tang of home still sits&nbsp;
on the tip of my tongue&nbsp;
like the zest of sweet citrus fizzing.
There are nights when you turn to poetry for reprieve. The world closes in upon you sometimes and sometimes pushes you away, leaving you on the fringes, staring at the inner circle, where you feel you do not belong.
You discuss the imposter syndrome with your friend. What can one really do to become authentic in a world that constantly tests? Often, there is only so much to do. Perhaps it is to be and to live as you are and bare yourself to the core, even between strangers.
<a href="https://www.voicedairy.com/spoken-word">Deepa Bohora</a> beams at the sight of you, asks you your name and smiles as though you are not a stranger but an old friend. She instantly engages with you in conversation about her childhood, about her struggle with Lupus.
“It is poetry that salvaged me. And Yukta Didi, who showed me that I could also write poetry,” she says of Yukta Bajracharya, poet and writer.
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As you navigate a busy street in Patan together, Bohora tells you about her father’s work in India and about a fan that was her friend when she was a child. And there is that poem she narrates, about this fan. The fan.
The fan is her friend. But in her poem, she becomes a friend to the fan. The fan goes on to tell us the story of the little girl with Lupus, strung in her own metaphor of healing. The device, which has been sitting in her house for years, gathering dust, warped with spider web, becomes a symbol of her own yearning to recover.
When the fan is repaired and once again starts spinning off cool air, Bohora writes a second installment about its restoration. And as the fan rises from its ashes to become a device of use again, what we really see is Bohora’s recovery.&nbsp;
“I write poetry because I like to tell stories. There are so many stories in me and in the people around me. That’s why I write poetry,” says Bohora. But poetry comes to her like a song, like the humming of the fan on a hot summer’s day in Surkhet, so she becomes the little girl again, who runs around her village telling everyone the fan has been fixed.
That healing she finds in poetry is shared experience for many. “They say we are all poets at least once in our lives. And that is when the heart breaks,” says Saras Chari. He says he started writing poetry as a form of expression away from a childhood scarred by bullies.
“First it was that, and then at some point, I realised that I had some talent, but as I grew older, I realised it was my only talent. And so I write to see where I fit in this society and to talk about issues that are misinterpreted,” says Chari.
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When a <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/peaceful-physically-distanced-protests/" target="_blank">series of anti-government protests</a> were staged in Kathmandu in 2020, Chari noticed how at each one of those events, the public was pitted against the government security personnel. “They’re not our foes. They’re one of us. Their families are one of us. But when they’re out there, defending the line, they become the ones who stand against us. And in that, they’re oppressed by the government, while being tasked at oppressing us,” says Chari.
And so his poem, Pyadha, traverses the minds of traffic police, police and soldiers:
Those toes locked inside boots bleed, too,
They get sucked on by leeches and
They yearn for the feel of the grass…
(translated from Pyadha)
&nbsp;“Look at how many ways poetry has been used in history,” Chari says. “Poetry was taught to us by pundits to propagate religions. Poetry was used to teach, but also to control. It has also been the medium for expressing love, just as much as it has been used to stir rebellion. Poetry is powerful,” says Chari.
Anand Vijay Gurung, who sits in the audience as Chari performs his verse on stage says that poetry serves its own purpose. “Or wait, why must it even serve a purpose? That’s a difficult question to answer. If a piece of poetry inspired you to feel more intensely, it has served its purpose,” says Gurung, who likes to think of poetry as a word game. And so in his poem, We Are All Migrants, he writes:
…to navigate their way in a world and find
The elusive perfect nest
etched in their mental maps.
“Poetry is pretty much everyone’s game,” says Chari. Like Deepa Bohora, he too found a community in <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/Nepali-Times-Buzz/Review-from-the-page-to-the-stage,593" target="_blank">the Word Warriors</a>, a spoken word poetry group. And while Gurung calls writing a lonely task, Slam poets like Bohora and Chari have formed their own circles where poets come together to write and perform.
Chari and his friends Prakash Zimba, Rupesh Bhattarai and Shuvangi Khadka perform together under the name, <a href="https://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Finstagram.com%2Fkavindrapur%3Figshid%3D16dc04x37mx12%26fbclid%3DIwAR0ODA8yTZBhHrFb4mDQXWyuTGANf04wl47UtkeeXhUMfXYrbaqfhdMyG2A&amp;h=AT2gylLtbTPg2QgDfSfe3jOP_z3o2IwdJ-yQvnn-hAhN4_ue4tA2asN8zbjw06-pJ9a8kCnD1cSi8qxEOy3QoDxQJJ1s4uPHlW8nn8UO2pq9D-n4CrO61UUIryNapDw0LA1iB8Q0pxA" target="_blank">Kavindrapur</a>, in memory of the &nbsp;forgotten poets that frequented a sattal rest house next to Kastamandap, during the reign of Pratap Malla.
The king was the patron of the poets. And there in a rest house in the heart of old Kathmandu, the streets would reverberate with verses as poets wove a mesh with their words. It is this memory that has been created into a legacy by the young poets, even as they struggle with other challenges of being poet.
“Poet, but paid” is painted in white on the black tee shirt Chari wears. “We get invited to events, often to perform or to judge, but no one cares to pay for our time or expression. Poetry is not respected,” Chari expresses his frustration.
And his sentiment is seconded by Gurung: “Nepali society respects writers and poets but there is no support system to serve that vocation. There is no reward monetarily and often, poets pay for their own books to be published.”
Gurung’s anthology of poetry, Dandelion Snow was published in 2020, and most of the people who bought his books have been friends. Poetry books are published with the expectancy of a prolonged shelf-life, he says.
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And yet that does not deter the courage of Bohora, who hopes someday to pull together a book of her poems. “That’s the dream, I’ve been carrying. Someday, I’d like to do a book of my own,” she says. “My words have done what my father’s sweat hasn’t.”
When the likes of Rupi Kaur and Nayyira Waheed stormed Instagram’s little boxes with their anecdotes, poetry appeared to have found a new platform for revival. While it has also given birth to debates about what really is poetry, then, if it can be dashed off in incomplete sentences and expressions.
“At least it’s helped other poets see, that it is possible to sell,” says Gurung.
In Kathmandu, a surge in performance poetry was seen in the last decade with Word Warriors performing at different events, raising pertinent personal and political questions, while also creating space for young writers to form their own groups.
But poetry has also been used to challenge. In the recent anti-government protests, the crowd cheered as Sapna Sanjeevani recited: Ab hum Sita Nai Banbo, refusing to the submission that Sita had to adhere to. And it is a sentiment that resonates with many women writers of the decade.
My country cries over&nbsp;
burnt flags,
borders,
the birth lore of gods,
not the bodies of desecrated dead girls;
My country says I am a Goddess.&nbsp;
Neha Rayamajhi's a poem published in <a href="https://lalitmag.com/my-country-loves-me/">LaLit magazine</a> is steeped in sadness and anger. There is sarcasm. There is mostly protest in her words:
My country asks me&nbsp;
for my father’s name.
Men who are dead,
or have become ghosts
they own me more than the women who birth me:
My country asks me to love this motherland.
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“Writing poetry is creating something beautiful out of sometimes messy and ugly emotions. It also means clamining and reclaiming power from those experiences,” says Rayamajhi.
Her words are representative of the <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/editorial/everyday-as-if-it-is-womens-day/" target="_blank">new generation of Nepali women</a>, who dare to question traditions passed down to them and laws that threaten to bind them. The refrain carries the irony of the idea of motherland while being force to disrespect mothers, who are allowed to birth children but never allowed to be citizens.
But to not be citizens is not limited to being <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/nepal-waits-for-an-unequal-citizenship-law/" target="_blank">unable to pass down your identity to your children</a>. It can sometimes be tangled in memories of who we were and who we have become.
Away in Oxford, Mukahang Limbu’s life unfolds to his audience on his Instagram stories as he cooks meals with fellow students and lives the life that has the semblance of a typical university life. But this award winning poet recreates the idea of home in his posts through foods as much as he does in unfinished, dangling sentences.
Away from home, we often discover ourselves more closely. Home, then becomes an idea. Home can be the taste of a vegan ice-cream made from cashew milk in Manhattan, sometimes. But home can also be fried-rice eaten on repeat when you live far away from home.&nbsp;
Home can also be friends who do not ask you questions, just as home can be a tandoori sandwich eaten during a conversation with strangers you have just begun to trust.
And so these lines by <a href="https://nationalpoetryday.co.uk/poem/when-i-first-came-from-nepal/">Limbu resonate</a> with so many of us:
I know now 
In this place, where I did not know, the things I did not know embrace me in ways 
I didn’t know.

Sahina Shrestha

Pratibha Tuladhar

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Young Nepali poets in search of poetic license

During the 2022 election, populist candidates campaigned with algorithms and were elected mayors. In 2026, they are campaigning with AI-generated memes and videos. Four years ago, the idea that the most potent weapon in the next election in Nepal would be artificially generated clips of politicians beating each other up would have been science fiction. Yet, here we are: at a fever pitch of AI-based political content. Some are generated by the IT cells of political parties, while most are just produced and posted by young tech-savvy supporters of the new candidates. Most of them ridicule older leaders, and the predominant target is former prime minister K P Oli who was forced to resign after the September protests. On 20 January the TikTok account ‘iamfunnyman88’ posted a slapstick video in which former Kathmandu Mayor Balendra Shah is seen accosting ex-prime minister K P Oli with a giant bell (pictured), swinging it in Kung Fu Hustle style in what looks like Patan Darbar Square. Oli is sent splattered on the ground. K P Oli has become a symbol of the legacy parties and their aged leaders, and everything that is wrong with them. Balendra Shah represents the new protest candidate. The two are contesting from Jhapa-5, and it is turning out to be a prime ministerial race for 5 March. In another video, the RSP vs UML clash played out as a high-stakes war from the Mahabharat. Oli is a young warrior with a chiselled jaw and wearing a heavy golden armour ready to lead his followers to battle (pictured). A stylised Nepal flag flutters above him to the accompaniment of filmy dialogue.&nbsp; The videos are everywhere on TikTok, YouTube and Facebook. Many of the posts are hitting over 200,000 likes and 5 million views. Such content seems to be engaging more voters than speeches and door-to-door campaigning at the hustings. The videos are fake, but the numbers, and the attention they command, are very real.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2026013014010_ed52fe3248b54eb4f9f391ee718e874a86c1b98297dde203800ad7b114bdacda.jpg" data-media-id="editor_0" data-image-id="2026013014010_ed52fe3248b54eb4f9f391ee718e874a86c1b98297dde203800ad7b114bdacda" data-rendition-name="original" width="2000" height="1000" loading="lazy" alt="Nepal election memes"> </figure>  At first, it looked like the RSP’s digital media presence was a joke aimed at getting easy-to-access publicity via the far-reaching arms of the algorithm. But it is looking like a carefully designed strategy promoting Balen Shah as the RSP’s star player in this election.&nbsp; In 2022, it was just for the mayor of Kathmandu. This time, Balen Shah is already being promoted in these videos as a winner who has defeated the legacy politicians.&nbsp; In previous elections in Nepal, political parties used to spend lavishly on the ‘masu bhat’ strategy — feeding heavy plates of mutton curry and rice to constituents in return for votes. Ideology was swapped for immediate caloric gratification often accompanied by free-flowing alcohol.&nbsp; But surely, the new voter is too sophisticated for this. Politicians insist they have rebooted their operating systems to serve this enlightened demographic. We are talking, after all, about the generation that brought down a government over 36 hours in September.&nbsp; The assumption is that young voters today are too aware and far too proud to trade democratic agency for something as crude as a plate of steaming mutton curry and rice.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2026013014014_983476ba334f895b64cd8ea34bd0ad79c1632c428feb119c84477d8e929eb057.jpg" data-media-id="editor_1" data-image-id="2026013014014_983476ba334f895b64cd8ea34bd0ad79c1632c428feb119c84477d8e929eb057" data-rendition-name="original" width="2000" height="1000" loading="lazy" alt="Nepal elections meme"> </figure>  But the question is: are voters today any different? Aren’t these social media memes digital versions of the masu bhat that delivers a dopamine rush to voters? Watching the videos is entertainment that delivers a state of bliss, a protest against what is old but no enlightenment about how to get to the new. &nbsp; The I-cannot-go-a-single-minute-without-checking-my-phone demographic has leaned firmly towards politicians whose main focus is to be a social media star first, and an accountable politician second. More than 70% of Nepalis have smartphones now and most are hooked on data plans. The public has acquired a taste for a different kind of masu bhat - the digital kind. Instead of being made to slurp up the free spicy, fatty goat curry with deep guttural satisfaction, voters are being made to swallow easy-to-digest online clips to make serious voting decisions.&nbsp; After all, it is more fun than paying attention to a candidate’s policy proposals and actually thinking critically about the candidates.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2026013014014_eb3a9e0c50f4a47706a6695e78ae41556c3d9754c15d564d42fb0de3f4199999.jpg" data-media-id="editor_2" data-image-id="2026013014014_eb3a9e0c50f4a47706a6695e78ae41556c3d9754c15d564d42fb0de3f4199999" data-rendition-name="original" width="2000" height="1000" loading="lazy" alt="Nepal elections meme"> </figure>  TURNING POINT An important moment for the evolution of this digital masu bhat is the 2020 pandemic. It was just six years ago that the entire population was cut off from physical interaction. The phone screen became the sole mediator of social existence.&nbsp; Technology changes what we see as important, and this prolonged immersion fundamentally alters our perception of reality, training us to accept the flattened, binary logic of the algorithm as a substitute for the complex, multisensory texture of political reality. What is on the phone has started to dictate the questions we ask and the answers we accept. If it is not on the phone, it is starting to look irrelevant. The memes manufacture consent. Gerontocratic politicians habituated to legacy media have not fathomed the implications of this new virtual world. Everyone has been swayed by a good story since the beginning of time. Now, the phone has allowed millions of Nepalis to tell, retell, consume, and remix stories that would traditionally have huge barriers to entry. Consider the vegetable vendor killing time between customers, Gen-Z youth with no memory of the Maoist conflict, or the grandad who cannot distinguish an AI video from real footage.&nbsp; When they finally step into the voting booth, what is guiding their hand? Is it a careful calculus of policy proposals, demonstrated competence, and leadership integrity? Or is it the cumulative impact of those AI-generated dopamine hits they have been fed on a loop? This digital fog of war cuts both ways. In a twist of supreme irony, actual footage of candidates behaving badly is now routinely dismissed as ‘AI-generated’ by their PR teams. This was a convenient get-out-of-jail-free card that Balen’s camp used when a video of him shoving cadres went viral.&nbsp; Meanwhile, completely fabricated tear-jerkers of old leaders like Prachanda weeping are consumed by the public as gospel truth. We have arrived at a point where the inconvenient real is dismissed as a glitch, and the emotional fake is embraced as history.&nbsp; In Society of the Spectacle, Guy Debord argued that images eventually replace real life. Today’s voters in Nepal and elsewhere are not even consuming the actual meat-and-bones of mutton curry; they are swallowing the 15 second digital imitations of it.&nbsp; Welcome to the age of digital मासु भात.

Nepal’s AI-generated election

In December we headlined an analysis in this paper that the election was going to be a fight between <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/old-vs-new-in-2026-eyyt3itl">Old and New</a>. With just a month to go for polls, it is now looking more like New vs New.
The symbolic Balendra Shah vs K P Oli struggle has now been replaced by a face-off between Shah and Gagan Thapa, the new leader of the Nepali Congress (NC).
The Tarai with its vast vote bank has become the battleground for this fight with Shah contesting against Oli in Jhapa and Thapa standing in Sarlahi. And social media is the arena for this epic clash of personality cults.
Which means that instead of finding solutions to problems like health, education, jobs, inflation and social welfare, it is all about optics and stunts. AI-generated and algorithm-driven memes are influencing people’s choices.
“This is not democracy but a very morphed form of political consumerism where political men are selling their brand, and people are lapping that up,” says political scientist Sucheta Pyakuryal.&nbsp;
“Democracy is a way of life, it is not one size fits all, it doesn’t bully opposing voices, it is civilised, personable, tolerant.”
To be sure, Shah and Lamichhane claim to represent GenZ aspirations for cleaner and more efficient government, much like they did in 2022. But elections are expensive, and that is the root of corruption. Shah driving around Nepal in a flashy Defender SUV loaned by a noodle tycoon is proof to some that despite all the rhetoric of ‘new’ it is the same old crony-driven politics.
Author Mohan Mainali says party cadre used to mobilise voluntarily during campaigns, but Nepal’s elections have long stopped being about issues and ideology,
“But political parties lost their morality, and when their actions opposed their avowed principles, the spirit of elections was lost too,” Mainali says. “Cadre and crowds have to be rented, making elections more expensive, and it looks much worse this time around.”
Parties both old and new have moved so far away from what they promise in their manifestos, that it makes little sense to have them. All this means that this election is not so much about what the new candidates can do, but a protest vote against the tried, tested and failed legacy parties.
And that decision is made on the basis of ‘who’ rather than ‘what’. Who wins in Jhapa 5, for example, will determine the future course of Nepal. The winner there will eliminate one prime ministerial candidate, and then set up the possibility of a contest with Gagan Thapa.&nbsp;
“The real question is, can the RSP and NC, which have already declared their prime ministerial candidates muster majorities in Parliament?” Mainali muses. “In all likelihood no. The proportional representation vote is very important so people are tempted to vote based on who will be the next prime minister. But that is not how our system is supposed to work.”&nbsp;
Madhes Province has over 3.6 million voters, and more than half of Nepal’s population is in the Tarai. That can make or break the election for candidates. In the past parties have canvassed in the polls only to ignore the region once in power. And that goes for many Madhesi leaders themselves.
It was only after the 2015 federal republican Constitution that Madhes saw some representation, but it has been mostly sidelined in the GenZ protests.
In his analysis for the Annapurna Post this week, Birganj-based political commentator Chandrakishore writes that the Madhes should not just be a vote bank, but a political conscience for the nation.
‘Federalism has not favoured the Madhes, but it is the duty of the state. The parties that made the Constitution should tell us why federalism was weakened. The RSP should answer why it ignored the provincial structure in the past. The Madhes only wanted identity, representation, rights, and good governance,’ he wrote.
Indeed, it is ironic that the RSP that has been ambiguous on federalism, is now actively campaigning in the capital of federalism with Balendra Shah now capitalising on his plains ancestry — something he has not emphasised in the past.&nbsp;
“On one hand you say you want to remove provinces because there are too many positions which have become extremely costly for the state but you are also assuring your aides that there are plenty of positions to be doled out in the current federal structure,” says Sucheta Pyakuryal.
She adds: “You could forgo the ideology which we have done in Nepali politics for a long time now, you don’t even have to be a diehard socialist or liberal to enter the political arena but when even the lowest benchmarks such as basic decency and honesty are not met, how can you represent the people? We want representatives who look like us, sound like us, think like us, not brand names and saviours.”&nbsp;

New vs New in Nepal

The dawn air in Muktikot is dewy as the sun sets over the horizon in the mountains of western Nepal. A sad farewell song drifts across the village from a mud plastered house.&nbsp; Rani BK sings a half melody, half lament: “I feel like my own hands are being cut off as you leave.” She is bidding farewell to her youngest brother, 37-year-old Ranne, his wife Akashe. They are going to Bangalore in India to find work. Neighbours gather quietly in the gathering light, some wiping their eyes, others joining in song. “Please, don’t cry,” Ranne says softly. “These tears will haunt us on the journey.” Migration is not new to Muktikot, but the tears are. For decades, nearly every household here has sent its men to India every winter to work. They return in spring to plant their crops.&nbsp; What is new is that women like Akashe BK are now also going, and for longer periods. The couple is leaving their two of their children behind, and will be away for at least five years.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20260203130224_f8d2d5980da1f3c1e22944003969d64cffd10f280c523ab207f983ef42b4cb9b.jpg" data-media-id="editor_0" data-image-id="20260203130224_f8d2d5980da1f3c1e22944003969d64cffd10f280c523ab207f983ef42b4cb9b" data-rendition-name="original" width="1600" height="1067" loading="lazy" alt="women migrating"> <figcaption>Daughter and son left behind with Rani BK after departure.</figcaption> </figure>  Ranne has been a daily wage labourer since he was 17, moving across Nepal and different parts of northern India. This journey is different — it will be to southern India.&nbsp; He had borrowed Rs50,000 from a local lender to cover the travel cost, hoping to recoup it from his earnings as a security guard. Aakashe plans to work as a household helper.&nbsp; “We would not go if we have a choice,” Aakase says quietly, her eyes fixed on “We are forced to leave our children. We cannot afford to educate them, there is little to eat here, no water, no work, no electricity.” Their daughter Sitala, 12, and son Dipson, 10, put auspicious red tika on their parents’ foreheads. Aakase sobs as she asks relatives to look after their children and their house.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20260203130224_a6316df8ff8a7f95d963396f2a01a7549dca3dcc1ac0364763eecd9f29b7bed7.jpg" data-media-id="editor_1" data-image-id="20260203130224_a6316df8ff8a7f95d963396f2a01a7549dca3dcc1ac0364763eecd9f29b7bed7" data-rendition-name="original" width="1600" height="1067" loading="lazy" alt="women migrating"> <figcaption>Departure of Ranne BK.</figcaption> </figure>  “We may return by the time you finish school,” Ranne tells Sitala, who is in Grade 6. Sitala stands forlorn by herself, not saying anything. Across Muktikot, women who once stayed back to raise children and manage households now join their husbands in India to support families in these remote mountains of western Nepal.&nbsp; Unnati BK, 30, and her husband Barune BK decided to migrate to India after their home was damaged by landslides in 2021 and the family was nearly killed. The arid farms did not produce enough food as rains failed. “Nothing grows here,” says Unnati, who is also leaving for Bangalore with her husband, along with Ranne and Akashe.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20260203130228_50db0f2d1827584bc9aa6d19d7d79b385ea1211192ccfc1f1147b245c941912e.jpg" data-media-id="editor_2" data-image-id="20260203130228_50db0f2d1827584bc9aa6d19d7d79b385ea1211192ccfc1f1147b245c941912e" data-rendition-name="original" width="1600" height="1067" loading="lazy" alt="women migrating"> <figcaption>Unnati BK</figcaption> </figure>  After 54 families lost their homes in landslides four years ago, the district administration has set aside Rs500,000 for families including Unnati and Barune. But although nearly complete, they have received only Rs175,000 each. Unnati had realised and told her husband that if they stayed in the village, their sorrows would multiply. So they planned to leave, hoping that a little extra hardship in India would allow them to pay for the education of their three children, who are 11, eight, and six years old. “We chose Bangalore because relatives told us it is easy to find jobs there for both men and women,” Barune says. They plan to leave their children with Unnati’s parents for now, and later send them 250km away to Kailali to attend school.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20260203130228_3ee37136e936fe7dba7d1320452c83a17f08805663a7cbb4b6efa986c79147ed.jpg" data-media-id="editor_3" data-image-id="20260203130228_3ee37136e936fe7dba7d1320452c83a17f08805663a7cbb4b6efa986c79147ed" data-rendition-name="original" width="1600" height="1067" loading="lazy" alt="women migrating"> <figcaption>Landslide four years ago caused 54 families to lose their homes.</figcaption> </figure>  More than 75 couples from 350 households in Muktikot have left for cities like Mumbai and Bangalore in the past three years alone, leaving behind their children either with their in-laws or in the Tarai cities where they go to school. Ajay Kumar BK, chair of the rural municipality of Muktikot says, “There is a clear intention to leave the village altogether.” &nbsp; Diksha BK, 25, has three sons aged six, three, and one. Her husband Dhirjan works in Surkhet. She and her husband have given up on Muktikot, saying they see no future there. DISASTER-PRONE Muktikot is populated mostly by Dalit families, and used to be named Dumkot after a derogatory term used by higher caste people for Dalits. During the Maoist conflict, many Dalit boys joined the guerrillas and the rebels renamed it Muktikot, meaning ‘freedom’.&nbsp; The village clings to a steep mountain flank wrinkled with rain-fed farm terraces. Many of the men who have left for India have never come back, and now even the women are leaving. The 2020 Disaster Preparedness and Response Plan of Bajura identifies Muktikot as a disaster-prone area, making its rain-fed agriculture vulnerable to droughts. The denuded slopes above are at risk of landslides.&nbsp; The 2021 International Migration in Nepal report counted 13,482 people migrating to India from Bajura alone that year. There are an estimated 3.5 million Nepalis living and working in Nepal — mostly from the western mountains.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20260203130228_df4f333c7a5bc0b0a7fd75ae6c2e9f02444a097fc5b13c24dc61a276ea6ac3ff.jpg" data-media-id="editor_4" data-image-id="20260203130228_df4f333c7a5bc0b0a7fd75ae6c2e9f02444a097fc5b13c24dc61a276ea6ac3ff" data-rendition-name="original" width="1600" height="1067" loading="lazy" alt="women migrating"> <figcaption>Houses being built under resettlement plan.</figcaption> </figure>  National Environment and Equity Development Society (NEEDS) Nepal found that 70% of households in Sudhurpaschim Province have had at least one member migrating to India at some point in their lives. “Female migration used to be low, but there is now an observable trend of women migrating for work from Sudhurpaschim,” says Prakash Madai of NEEDS Nepal. However, anthropologist Jeevan R Sharma says female migration is not new, what is different is the scale and duration of women migrants. Increasing demand for part-time household help in India makes it a pull-factor for Nepali women from the rural west to enter the informal workforce. “Women used to go only when opportunities arose, working for half a year to maximum two years, and frequently going back and forth,” says Sharma. “The potential rise is likely due to the need for greater income driven by rising cash-based expenses for health, education, food, and purchase of consumer goods.” COST OF LEAVING “Previously people struggled for basic needs, and we did not have the money or the roads to travel to Kathmandu, which is why most people went to India for manual work,” says Kartik Kami, 60, of the rural municipality. “Migration trends have changed because both men and women can make money washing, cooking, and cleaning in cities. Soon, there will be no one to conduct weddings or funerals, only children will remain.” While women from other parts of Nepal began participating in foreign employment three decades ago, women from traditional Sudurpaschim families are only now venturing into the Indian labour market. “This surge is filling a labour vacuum in India created when its domestic migrants shifted their focus to Gulf countries,” explains historian Yadab Devkota. Yet, research paints a social cost. A 2020 study found that children of migrant parents suffer loneliness and neglect due to the absence of parental care and love. Children fall back in studies, and girl children are burdened with excessive workload managing the household and siblings.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20260203130232_e1e02cd082e7cbb77243103b2197fd1dfca75531bb9d6f518763afccb9ed452c.jpg" data-media-id="editor_5" data-image-id="20260203130232_e1e02cd082e7cbb77243103b2197fd1dfca75531bb9d6f518763afccb9ed452c" data-rendition-name="original" width="1600" height="1067" loading="lazy" alt="women migrating"> <figcaption>Sitala BK, daughter of Ranne and Aakashe.</figcaption> </figure>  The emotional toll is manifested in anxiety, stress, depression, and in some cases, suicide, especially for those whose mothers have migrated.&nbsp; “The significant shift towards couple migration is driven by families making difficult and high-cost decisions in the hopes of breaking the cycle of poverty,” says Arjun Kharel at the Centre for the Study of Labour and Mobility (CESLAM ). “Migration remains primarily a strategy for subsistence rather than development, it is a calculated family decision made in the absence of local opportunities.” Migration to India remains largely invisible to the Nepal government. The country’s foreign employment framework does not extend to migrants going to India. And because they travel through the open border, they are not regulated by formal systems.&nbsp; There is no accurate count of how many Nepalis are working in India, or of Indians in Nepal. According to the Indian Population and Housing Census, there are 600,000 Nepalis working in India, but this is a gross underestimation.&nbsp; A study by Aapti Institute describes Nepali migrants in India as ‘liminal’ neither fully protected as citizens nor recognised as foreigners there, exposing them to exploitation and risk.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20260203130232_14a613729f6ebb1db0bec63032cc78abe3087341680b2f88bc0ab4456621b012.jpg" data-media-id="editor_6" data-image-id="20260203130232_14a613729f6ebb1db0bec63032cc78abe3087341680b2f88bc0ab4456621b012" data-rendition-name="original" width="1600" height="1067" loading="lazy" alt="women migrating"> <figcaption>Ranne and Aakashe's last night at home.</figcaption> </figure>  “Nepali migrants in India are not covered by compensation if they fall sick and or if die, unlike migrants to other overseas destinations who can receive compensation of up to Rs700,000,” notes labour migration expert Saru Joshi. The recent draft National Labour Migration Policy 2025 of the Ministry of Labour, Employment, and Social Security offers a flicker of hope for migrants to India with provisions for welfare, social security, and mental health support for families left behind. The draft also mandates better data collection of the movement of people.&nbsp; It is unlikely that these initiatives will make any difference to the people who remain in Muktikot. Many like Ranne and Akashe are likely to go to India for work. “If I had only two or three children, I would take my wife to India too,” says Jaya BK, 46. But he has seven children, including newborn twins, whom he has stayed behind to help his wife look after this time, rather than leaving for Uttarakhand in winter like he usually does.&nbsp; With the support of Internews' Earth Journalism Network.

Mass migration from Muktikot

The car’s trunk was crammed with boxes and suitcases, almost to the roof, and I was just waiting for the inevitable heart-wrenching screech or thud from underneath as I feathered on the accelerator, trying to cross through the infamous Daunne uphill section of the East-West Highway in an MPV.&nbsp; But to my surprise, the ground clearance of 170mm did not fail. Daunne, roughly 15km long, is the landslide prone ridge between Narayanghat and Butwal section, which is perennially affected by traffic jams, thanks to ongoing (and never ending) road expansion. Traffic jams here can be tens of kilometres long. On a November 2025 trip to Bhairawa it was dry enough to wade through the dreaded Daunne where the choice on the ‘road’ is either mud or dust (or both).&nbsp; The BYD M6 MPV EV borrowed for the journey claimed a range of 440km and 580L of space at the back in an almost 4.7m long form factor.&nbsp; On board were two family members and my five-year-old dog, Kulfi (pictured) who needed frequent stretch breaks for his paws. Stopping to charge the car was most certainly not on my to-do list. Within the first 20km from Koteswor, there were already multiple DC chargers along the roadside. They were fast chargers usually between 30 to 60kWs capacities, meaning a charge to 80% would take on average less than an hour. Nepal now boasts over 1,200 charging stations, each station is often equipped with multiple charging guns. This was a stark contrast to the harsh reality of charger anxiety I faced a couple of years in our family car, the Hyundai Kona. Back then, on the way back from Pokhara there was only a single charging gun at River Side Resort in Kurintar.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2026013104014_d36a1ed529caa0b67424699407da8b42b51f4a4b63dd6dbeb662b0ab513b77a8.jpg" data-media-id="editor_0" data-image-id="2026013104014_d36a1ed529caa0b67424699407da8b42b51f4a4b63dd6dbeb662b0ab513b77a8" data-rendition-name="original" width="2652" height="984" loading="lazy" alt="Page 5 map"> </figure>  These were only fast AC chargers of speeds up to 6kWs, unlike today’s much faster DC chargers. This meant the car would take multiple hours to hit the 80% mark -- and the charger would sometimes (shockingly, and without explanation) be out of operation. No one to ask questions, and no one to answer either. While I never needed to charge my EV on the way to Pokhara from Kathmandu, my precautionary nature never allowed me to climb into the Valley via Naubise without a charge. One bad accident, some sort of natural disaster, and you knew the roads would be clogged with traffic and shut down for at least a couple of hours.&nbsp; Fast forward to the present. My mind was at ease. Even if one of the charging stations was crowded, there was conveniently another one 15 minutes away. But the BYD M6 did not require any of that anyway.&nbsp; Not only did it traverse the rough highway from Kathmandu to Mugling, and then onward over the Daunne pass with ease but because the car was heavy and low, it handled high speeds and corners like a champ.&nbsp; Foot down on the accelerator and it climbed to triple digit speeds without breaking a sweat. Put your foot relatively harder on the brakes and it would equally shed its momentum, all the while being economical. After multiple quick stretch stops for Kulfi, and a proper one hour lunch break, I had arrived at Bhairawa before nightfall, still with around 100km of range left in the car and most importantly, with all the luggage intact.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2026013104018_1cc05d858d14f0b83fcf586c7270be003f462d60cd19934218e271d59fef3496.png" data-media-id="editor_1" data-image-id="2026013104018_1cc05d858d14f0b83fcf586c7270be003f462d60cd19934218e271d59fef3496" data-rendition-name="original" width="1384" height="808" loading="lazy" alt="Bye-bye range anxiety NT"> </figure>  ROUNDTRIP A week later, my return trip to Kathmandu saw an additional passenger and even more luggage – but once again, I arrived back in Kathmandu with ease: both the M6 and Nepal’s charger infrastructure had exceeded my expectations and needs.&nbsp; This 600km drive to and from Bhairawa from the mountains around Kathmandu to the Tarai plains, with not-so-smooth hilly terrain in between, highlighted not only how far electric vehicles have evolved but also showed how far the charging infrastructure (once a major irritant during the Covid years) had come.&nbsp; EVs in Nepal are no longer niche products; they are available across budgets and segments, ranging in form factor from micro city commuters and family hatchbacks to compact SUVs, pickups, and even full-size MPVs.&nbsp; One noticeable improvement on the highways is that the charging infrastructure has grown from a scattered and company-installed. NEA units along major routes have now converted into full-fledged, round-the-clock networks that allow flexibility and convenience to those of us who like to enjoy our times on the road.&nbsp; What once felt like a gamble, now feels like momentum — and the road ahead for electric mobility in Nepal looks smoother. &nbsp;&nbsp; Arnav Upadhyay reviews automobiles and promotes road safety under the handle Casually Annoyed Driver on Youtube, Tiktok and IG and this monthly column Drive Line in Nepali Times.

nepali-times-weekend-longreads

Everybody counts in Nepal

Young Nepali poets in search of poetic license

Nepal’s AI-generated election

New vs New in Nepal

Mass migration from Muktikot

Bye-bye range anxiety