Dust Settles

 

Dust Settles

- BottleButea

Sept 10, 2025 

The smoke still choked Kathmandu, yet there was a calm. Whether it was a calm to stay or the calm before the storm will be known in the days to come. But for now, there was relative peace in Kathmandu. Dusk has started to settle, and the facts of yesterday are becoming clear.

If someone asked me, “Good news first or bad news?” I would pick the bad news first, because I believe the good news helps soften the impact of the bad news I hear first. As such, I will begin with the bad events that took place today.

Due to yesterday’s chaos, almost 13,000 criminals escaped confinement. Some of them were armed, with guns stolen from yesterday's protest. Additionally, the death toll had now risen to 30, and thousands were reported injured from the protest. The unorganized mass remained organized; even when the army asked for representatives from the group,there seemed to be no clear leaders. 

The absence of a clear representative and organization has led to confusion and anxiety. Fake news spreading on social media, along with propagandas has  acted as a catalyst to further increase anxiety among the people. I am reminded of the Indonesian supporter I mentioned yesterday, and his caution about propaganda becomes more apparent by the day.

  

People’s speculation about third party also seems to be growing. There is fear among youths that their protest will be hijacked by other groups, or that they were all pawns in a wider game. 

In accordance with most of the Gen-Z “representatives”, the army is preparing to create an interim government. When asked who should lead it, there was no clear unity among the groups. In “Hami Nepali” the most prominent organizer of the protest, most of the discussion is being done through discord, a social media app. The positive aspect of that, we will get to in a while. For now, through a vote among a list of candidates, Sushila Karki was nominated through a poll in Discord to be the interim Prime minister. The result of the poll looked like this:

There are various reasons why I am anxious about this. 

First, I have never heard of Sushila Karki before. Perhaps heard is not the right word. She had not been placed in a prominent position in my mind. So it came as a shock to me when she won over popular candidates like Sagar Dhakal and Mahabir Pun. I was also confused why Random Nepali, a Youtuber, had been added to the list and had managed to secure a shocking 26% of the votes. In absolute honesty, I would have been absolutely shocked  and disappointed if such a historic position had been given to him, because I do not believe he has much credibility for such a role. However, I should mention that he later put out a video explaining that he was not vying for the role of interim prime minister and there had been a misunderstanding.

Second is something I have already mentioned—propaganda. There was a spree of conspiracy surrounding her. I became scared when I saw multiple posts claiming she had been planted by the Indian government. There were posts showing that Indian Youtube channels had predicted her as the interim PM way before names for the role were discussed. Additionally, her decision to take an interview with an Indian channel was definitely not a smart move,  which was sure to arouse even more suspicion. Along with this, there was also some propaganda spreading about Hami Nepali’s organizers being inclined toward Indian authorities. However, those claims looked very baseless to me and scared me far less than the conspiracy surrounding Sushila karki.

Third was the extensive use of Discord. It bugged me: couldn’t Discord be hacked and the polls manipulated? Additionally the discussions, potentially of high importance later, were conducted in voice channels and were sadly not very constructive.They often sounded childish and stupid at times. I did not invest myself in the meetings for a long time because there was constant use of slurs, and as I said, things did not look to be going anywhere.

However, seeing a good mass of people agreeing on Sushila Karki, I believed that rejecting her would do more harm than good. As such, I went to Reddit to encourage acceptance of an interim government under her, although I was not completely satisfied.

Similarly the stability brought about by the army was like the hanging sword of Damocles. It brought about relative stability but if the army got too comfortable and the confusion instilled, a military government could have been formed which I believe could lead to disastrous consequences in the future. 

But all was not lost. Finally, let's get the good news. 

Although the sword of Damocles was hanging, it was true that we were indeed finally seeing some stability and civil order. Additionally, the damage had been less than what had been predicted yesterday. While millions of dollars’ worth of buildings and documents had indeed been lost, most important documents had been kept elsewhere and were safe. Criminals and looters had started to be caught. Although there was a huge gap between the number of escapees and those caught, I am sure, most of us started to feel relieved that the number of criminals on the street was decreasing.

Similarly, there were reports of youths going out to clean the street that had been polluted yesterday. I thought that this was indeed a good way to start the new day after yesterday’s arson. Nepal was getting a lot of international attention.

The attention for the protest in international media was certain, but Nepal was also getting attention for using discord for determining its leaders. Its  youths taking charge for change was appreciated in social media by ordinary people worldwide. The use of Discord, if marketed properly, could certainly be beneficial for Nepal and was certainly very unique and monumental in the world.

 

Similarly, Sushila Karki being the interim Prime Minister could be a huge milestone. Although I had mentioned only negative aspects before, her track record seems commendable. She was the ex-Chief Justice and, according to some, was a strict critic of corruption. Although her husband, Durga Prasad Subedi,was a former youth leader of the Nepali congress who had gained notoriety for his role in a plane hijacking, people claim that she was especially tough on corruption of Nepali congress and other parties. She also supported independent candidates, which the youths especially liked. Furthermore, the significance of the interim PM being female, and Nepal’s first PM, would be historic in Nepal and world wide. 

To add, around 10 p.m., I heard that Balendra Shah, the current mayor of Kathmandu and without a doubt one of the most, if not the most prominent face of the protest had put out a status showing his support for Karki. Balendra, popularly called Balen, did not directly involve himself in the protest. But he is the most popular leader as of now, and many people paint him as the messiah. Whether this is an accurate representation or whether he too will fail, only time will tell. But there is no doubt he has significant sway among the Nepali public, and if social media is to be believed, he is certain to win the election if he runs. I would even go as far as to say that some people would be willing to sacrifice democracy to see Nepal under his rule (On this note, I would like to add that I am very happy to see that most of the youths are in the favor of democracy claiming that “democracy is the only alternative for democracy”). So his support for Sushila Karki should definitely create harmony among the divided youth and help move forward to other crucial steps. 

I should also mention an event took place near my home that left me both humoured and satisfied. A group of thugs had taken advantage of yesterday's unrest and stolen a bike from the police station. Today, the same thugs rode the stolen bike to drink chya, however the owner of  chya pasal  turned out to be the actual owner of the bike. The thugs got a slight beating and were handed over to the army. The fun turn of events left me laughing and satisfied with the delivery of justice.

I wonder what the coming days will hold.