Category Kathmandu, Mustang & Nepal

The Chameleon’s Gambit: Survival Over Substance in Nepal’s Politics

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A chameleon changes color to adapt to the physical environment around it—more often than not to save itself, not because it loves the environment.

Following the September 2025 fall of the government, Nepali Congress leader Gagan Thapa successfully leveraged the 'reformer' label to seize leadership from Sher Bahadur Deuba. But while the face has changed, the soul of the party remains the same: a bastion of Khas-Arya privilege. Despite the rhetoric of a 'New Nepal,' the upcoming 2026 elections reveal a familiar reality, with over 52% of the party’s tickets handed to Khas-Arya males, leaving marginalized groups like Dalits with a near-invisible 0.6% representation.

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The Anatomy of a Hollow Society: An Audit of Nepal’s Missing Moral Core

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Returning to Nepal in 2013 after spending most of the preceding twenty-five years abroad, I made a few devastating discoveries about Nepali society. One was how hollow and deeply flawed it was. Struggling to recover from major personal issues, I needed to understand the details of this "hollowness" for my own sanity. Starting in late 2020, I began documenting evidence of this decay on X/Twitter. In this post, I share an analysis of those 130 documented instances to demonstrate exactly how and why Nepali society is currently lost in a state of hollow confusion.

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An Enduring Legacy: Structural Discrimination and Systemic Casteism in Nepal’s Executive Branch

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Since the formation of the modern Nepalese state via the expansion of the Gorkha kingdom approximately 250 years ago, the country has been internally colonized by hill-origin, so-called high-caste Hindu men through the poor, minimal, and selective education of the population. Consequently, all four pillars of democracy have remained monopolized by this demographic, even throughout the nation's thirty-year democratic experimentation. This data-driven analysis details their continued hegemony over the Executive branch. Until the population attains a significantly higher level of education, these entrenched power structures are unlikely to yield.

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The Big Fix: How Big Political Parties in Nepal Rig Elections

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If the data is to be believed, Nepalis register for and show up to the polls in amazingly high numbers for a country where voting is restricted to a single day, must be done in person in one's constituency, and often relies on the recognition of symbols over names. While some see this as a sign of deep-rooted trust in the democratic process, that trust is tragically misplaced. The truth is simpler and far more cynical: Elections in Nepal are rigged. They are a 'Big Fix'—manufactured by national political parties to preserve the dominance of the old Khas-Arya establishment.

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The 2026 Mirage: Why Nepal’s Upcoming Elections Won’t Break the 250-Year Cycle

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Throughout Nepal’s 250-year history, the nation has endured a persistent internal colonization by the Khas-Arya—specifically, Khas-Arya men. This hierarchy remained immutable even after the hereditary monarchy was toppled in 1990; the Khas-Arya elite simply metamorphosed from royal subjects into democratic hegemonists. The upcoming March 2026 elections fail to signal a departure from this legacy. By orchestrating a selectively educated populace, the ruling caste has ensured that the mechanisms of their power remain both unchallenged and, for many, invisible.

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A Legacy of Structural Discrimination And Systemic Casteism: The Nepal Army

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The entire history of Nepal is characterized by structural discrimination and systemic casteism, initiated by Prithvi Narayan Shah, the founder of the country. Evidence of these structures—from the highest levels of federal government to the smallest local offices—abounds, if you care to look. The Nepal Army, the institution responsible for the nation’s safety and security, is just one example. A disproportionately high percentage of those who head the institution are hill so-called 'high-caste' Hindu men.

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An Enduring Legacy: Structural Discrimination and Systemic Casteism in Nepal’s Executive Branch
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The Chameleon’s Gambit: Survival Over Substance in Nepal’s Politics
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