Trees could save Kathmandu. But can Kathmandu save its trees?

Tirtha Bahadur Shrestha remembers growing up in a Kathmandu that looked nothing like it does today. That Kathmandu was all green fields, with just a smattering of mud houses—the remnants of which one can still see on the fringes of the Valley. The roads were dotted with jacarandas and massive peepal trees, whose branches spread out against the blue sky, providing pedestrians with dappled shade.

But as Shrestha grew up, Kathmandu expanded. Changes were slow at first, up until the 1960s. But by the 1980s, as Nepal opened up to the world, rapid ribbon development began to escalate. Roads were built everywhere and houses alongside them. People started swarming into the Capital, and before anyone knew it, the face of Kathmandu had changed.

“The Kathmandu I knew has completely vanished today,” says Shrestha, now 84, a conservationist and a retired botany professor at Tribhuvan University. More here by Marissa Taylor.

With Oli out of the country, Dahal sees opportunity to make moves

With ruling party Co-chair KP Sharma Oli out of the country for medical treatment, Co-chair Pushpa Kamal Dahal has begun internal machinations, according to party insiders. Although things appeared to have calmed down between the two chairmen, Oli’s absence has given rise to a new internal powerplay, several party leaders told the Post.

For the first time since the party’s unification 15 months ago, Dahal chaired the party’s secretariat meeting on Monday, where he took a number of important decisions, including the induction of four individuals—Devendra Parajuli, Kalpana Dhamala, Padam Rai and Kiran Rai—believed to have close relations with him into the party’s central committee. They had deserted Netra Bikram Chand’s Communist Party of Nepal and Baburam Bhattarai’s Naya Shakti Party to join the ruling Nepal Communist Party (NCP). Read more by Tika R Pradhan.

Police rough up a Madhesi man yet again. This time, it’s on video

At a time when the Nepal Police is promoting its ‘Police, my friend’ campaign, a video of several police personnel manhandling a Madhesi man has prompted outrage on social platforms, as Nepalis criticise the heavy-handedness of the police while dealing with the public, especially Madhesis and Tharus in the southern plains.

According to Ghanashyam Mishra, a journalist who filmed the video, the police roughed up Sushil Karna, a social campaigner, after summoning him to the Janaki police station at the Janaki Temple in Janakpur. Karna had previously confronted police personnel for beating a coconut vendor while clearing the temple premises. Police had then asked him to present himself at the police station, said Mishra.

“Karna then called some of his friends, including me and Rastriya Janata Party spokesperson Krishna Singh, fearing the police might do something wrong,” Mishra told the Post in a phone interview on Friday. More on the story here by Samuel Chhetri.