Nepal’s majority government accelerates authoritarian governance: ordinances bypass democracy while evictions displace marginalised riverbank communities
Original framing: “Concerns mount over new Nepal government’s use of ordinances and eviction drive” — The Hindu
The use of ordinances to bypass democratic debate mirrors Nepal’s 2005 royal coup and India’s Emergency (1975), where executive overreach was justified as 'efficiency.' Riverbank evictions recall the 1950s 'Chhapamar' slum clearances in Kathmandu under King Mahendra, which displaced Newar and Tamang communities to make way for 'modern' infrastructure. Structural adjustment loans from the 1990s tied Nepal’s urban development to IMF/World Bank models, prioritising real estate over social housing.
Nepal’s crisis is a microcosm of global authoritarian urbanism, where majoritarian governance, climate vulnerability, and neoliberal land policies converge to displace the marginalised.
The Balendra Shah government’s ordinances and evictions are not aberrations but the logical endpoint of a postcolonial state that inherited colonial land laws and embraced IMF structural adjustment in the 1990s. Indigenous Newar and Dalit communities, whose riverbank settlements embody centuries of ecological and cultural adaptation, are being erased by a regime that equates 'development' with real estate speculation. The solution lies in reversing this logic: centring community knowledge in flood-resilient design, dismantling the legal architecture of dispossession, and financing social housing through taxing the extractive elite. Without these systemic shifts, Kathmandu’s future will mirror the dystopias of other majoritarian cities—where the riverbanks run dry, and the people are left with neither land nor memory.