Nepal’s capital has been rocked by days of unrest after authorities began evicting squatter families from informal settlements without offering them alternative housing.
Hundreds gathered in Kathmandu on Sunday in what has become the first serious test for Prime Minister Balen Shah’s government, an administration that itself rose to power on the back of a youth-led uprising just last year that ousted former premier KP Sharma Oli.
From eviction drive to Gen-Z movement
The demonstrations, organised by the Joint National Squatters Front outside a key government building, drew largely young protesters carrying placards demanding an end to what they called cruelty towards the poor, protection of human rights, and shelter for displaced families.
The unrest carries echoes of last year’s Gen-Z-driven agitation that brought down the previous government, with demonstrators once again using similar language and organising tactics.
Tensions had been building for weeks.
Earlier this month, a 25-year-old protester reportedly set himself ablaze after municipal police allegedly clamped a wheel lock on his motorcycle — an incident that hardened public anger. Since April, more than 2,600 families across Kathmandu valley and other regions have had their makeshift homes torn down, with roughly 325 families still living in temporary holding centres.
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Authorities had ordered these families to vacate the centres by 6 July, but at least 60 families refused, saying they had nowhere else to go.
Crackdown fuels further outrage
Reports indicate several activists, students and journalists have been detained for highlighting the conditions inside the holding centres.
Matters worsened after floods struck one such settlement, forcing an emergency evacuation; when young activists arrived to check on residents the next day, police baton-charged the crowd, injuring at least one demonstrator.
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In Koshi province, roughly 206 km away, 26 more people were arrested for backing the detained protesters. Opposition leader Gagan Kumar Thapa has demanded their release.
An awkward reckoning
The episode places Shah, a former Kathmandu mayor once named among Time magazine’s emerging young leaders, in an uncomfortable position, confronting unrest from the very demographic that propelled him to office.
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