EXCLUSIVE | Nepali Journo on Gen Z Protests Post Social Media Ban: 'Day After Oli Laughed It Off... - video Dailymotion

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Nepal is witnessing a massive youth-led uprising as Gen Z protesters flood the streets of Kathmandu against the government's ban on major social media platforms and widespread corruption. The peaceful protest escalated into violent clashes near the Parliament, resulting in many deaths and many injuries. Ajay Thakur, CEO of Avenues TV in Nepal, shares an on-ground update about the spiraling crisis, youth frustrations over unemployment, and the government's response. Watch.   #NepalProtests #GenZUprising #SocialMediaBan #NepalNews #YouthProtest #Corruption #World   🔊 LIKE ➡ SHARE ➡ SUBSCRIBE  For More Updates:  English: https://newsable.asianetnews.com/  Hindi: https://hindi.asianetnews.com/  Malayalam: https://www.asianetnews.com/  Kannada: https://kannada.asianetnews.com/  Tamil: https://tamil.asianetnews.com/  Telugu: https://telugu.asianetnews.com/  Bengali: https://bangla.asianetnews.com/  Like us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AsianetNewsa...  Follow us on Twitter:  https://twitter.com/AsianetNewsEN  Follow us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ann.newsable/  ➡ If you like our video, give us a thumbs up and subscribe to our channel to get the daily dosage of news, entertainment, sports and more.

Transcript

00:00Hi, I have with me Ajit Hakur. He is the CEO of Nepal's news media outlet, which is

00:21Evernews TV. Thank you so much, Ajit Hakur, for speaking with AsiaNet News. You know,

00:25the visuals that are coming out of Nepal, they are quite disturbing. What is the current

00:29situation? How bad it is? You know, as far as Nepal is concerned, it's slowly spiraling out of control,

00:38the way it has been panning out since the morning. It started at about nine o'clock in the morning,

00:46the protest, and now we are at five o'clock local time. So it's almost now eight hours and

00:53it first was restricted to a certain section of Nepal. It's called Mahitigat Mandala, where these

01:02people were supposed to congregate and to protest against both the closure of the social media

01:10networks as well as of the like, you know, corruption. So this social media network

01:19and stuff like that, as well as corruption, they were actually going hand in hand. And

01:25till that point of time, it was just looking like a absolute and even till now, it looks like an absolute

01:31Gen Z kind of protest where these are all youth, you know, well educated, even less educated, all kinds

01:42of people they joined. And they started this whole thing. And they were peacefully, they were proceeding

01:50towards the Parliament House. And it's called the sunset over here. So they were going over there and then

01:58things spirally quickly spiraled out of control. And they just gate crashed the Parliament. There were

02:08scenes of, you know, the students getting into Parliament annex and, you know, some of them

02:16when roughed up the cops, but at the same time, the cops struck back. The most important or the

02:22disturbing thing which has come up as of now, the disturbing news which is coming in is that over

02:2780 people have been injured. 17 people have been confirmed dead. And the figure is expected to rise.

02:36And this thing has actually even spiraled beyond in the sense that what has happened is, it's also now

02:45across the rest of the country. So like, you know, places like Berat Nagar, which is in the east,

02:51to Bilganj, which is in the centre, and even fires. So we are getting, you know, reports from all over

02:58the place. Students are breaking into this spontaneous protest, and they are clashing with

03:02authorities. Journalists are also part of this protest. What are they actually saying? You know,

03:08this bill was not passed in Parliament, but the government cited the Supreme Court's directive,

03:13which also kind of asked these social media companies to go ahead and register with the Nepali

03:17authorities. So what exactly are the journalists and the youth of the country are saying?

03:21See, first of all, like, you know, I think back in India, if you would have seen, you know,

03:27people coming from Nepal, and even across the globe, the people coming from Nepal are actually

03:32connected to each other, mostly through the social media platforms and instant messengers. And

03:39so what happened is essentially, you know, in a country which is struggling to, you know, get its

03:45infrastructure into place, what is happening is, okay, you have the communication, you know,

03:51platforms, you have got mobile phones and stuff like that. But the broadband networks, the social media,

03:57they become the mainstay for connecting between different countries and between different people.

04:02So now what happens is, you know, for the journalists also, this is, you know, one of the source of,

04:06you know, sourcing information, because quite a few of the media houses have got, you know,

04:14alignments. So there's a general kind of a discontent, you know, even in the people over here,

04:22they look more at social media for the correct picture of things. So that's what happens is,

04:28like, and of course, the youth of this country, they are interacting more over here through this

04:33social media platform, not to forget the fact that these social media platforms, you know,

04:38they are also a great source of income for a lot of these youths, because, you know,

04:45influencers and, you know, opinion makers and, you know, videos and stuff like that. So it's a huge

04:51population, which also depends upon that. And most importantly, in our democracy, like, you know,

04:56this is one of the best places for them to give in to their feelings. Now, that was something which was

05:00not happening. And like, you know, with these kinds of closure, I mean, looking for the past,

05:05now, a little more than 72 hours, this country has been battling slow networks and stuff like that,

05:12even, you know, the roaming calls from other countries, which was on the first day, it was okay,

05:21but it's also started, like, you know, going down, it's become erratic. We can, you know, censor,

05:28you know, handle the government and all this. So what is happening is, and to, you know, sort of

05:34add insult to injury, last evening, the Prime Minister, like, you know, in, you know, the Prime

05:41Minister just got a thundering majority to, you know, extend his stay as the leader of the ruling UML

05:50Party, and which they amended the constitution essentially to make him the party supreme for a

05:58third term, as well as they also removed the cap for the upper age limit, which was 70 years or so.

06:04So what has happened is, in that, in, you know, I think in one of the primary sessions,

06:10he actually laughed at the Gen Z protests, because this was happening, this shutdown was happening,

06:16parallel to the, you know, parallel to the UML's, you know, convention, which elected him. So,

06:24of course, there are different schools of thought, but the Prime Minister also, like, you know,

06:30laughing it off, that also added a bit of insult to injury. So, so that's what, how things like,

06:37you know, just went out of control over here. Right. And I'm also trying to get a sense of the

06:42situation on ground. Is it only the anger because of the ban on social media? Because we have been

06:47hearing reports about protests against unemployment and against corruption in the government? See,

06:53ban on the social media was the flashpoint. That was the last thing that the government should have

06:58done. See, what happens is over here, like, you know, opinion is pretty fragmented and pretty polarized.

07:07So, you know, you have got medias, you know, alignments and stuff like that. But most importantly,

07:13what has happened is this was, you know, in terms of press freedom index, Nepal is much,

07:19much higher than practically all the South Asian countries. So, I mean, it's actually in the top

07:2560s. So what happened was like, you know, people cherish that freedom a lot. And these are mind you,

07:30youth, Nepal is a young country, over 65 to 70% of the population is young. So what happened was,

07:37this was the only thing that they could do to rent out their feelings against unemployment. Every

07:42year, almost three to 5% of the people from here have to migrate overseas to get a decent leaving.

07:50There is, you know, the GDP is not exactly much to talk about. Most of the economy is being run through,

07:57you know, through remittances. So what happens is there was a, there's been a growing discontent

08:04amongst youth. Although all the political parties, you know, draw their strength from these people

08:11also, from the youth also, but this time, it was like a more enough is enough. And, you know,

08:16the platform that, you know, they used to use to give vent to their feelings, that was actually going off

08:22the radar. So that's how this whole thing, you know, spiraled out of control. And I don't see it,

08:28like, you know, these people are in a forgiving mood on this side. Just last question from my side

08:34would be, what are we hearing from the government side? Because as you quoted, 17 people have died so

08:40far. What is the government saying so far? What can we expect in the future to tackle this situation?

08:45Because is it also simmering down or it continues to be as such? See, if you may recollect about,

08:53I think it was half a year ago, couple of months back, there was a pro-monarchist protest which

08:58happened in this country. And that also led to the, you know, the death of two people. Incidentally,

09:06one of them was one of our, you know, he was one of our cameramen who was out there, a guy called

09:11Sureshi Razak, who was out there shooting, this whole scene. So that time also, there's something

09:18that we, you know, these disturbing things we have seen happening over there and the government

09:23literally crushed the protest. Now, this time also, what is happening is, you know, the things that we

09:29are getting from unconfirmed sources are that like, you know, most of the people who are injured might

09:36have been just injured because of bullet wounds. So we actually don't know at this point of time, because

09:41till the government actually comes out with a, maybe a white paper or a clear statement on this.

09:48But one thing is definitely clear that the government was caught napping, because the way this whole

09:53thing panned out, and you know, the police, like we had been tracking the police communication and stuff

10:00like that. And what we saw firsthand was that like, the government was totally caught off guard.

10:06But more than that, what is happening is, this is also going to be, it's not going to be an easy task

10:10for the government to wriggle out. Mind you, this is the UML, the Nepali Congress government.

10:17The Prime Minister is from the UML, the Communist Party. And diametrically opposite ideology is the

10:25other ruling opposition, the ruling coalition partner, the Nepali Congress. And the Home Minister is

10:32from the Nepali Congress. So what is going to happen right now is that while, you know, this whole thing

10:37was triggered off by the UML, the ruling UML's communication minister, and this thing is, you

10:44know, going to pan out over here. So there are also simmerings within the ruling coalition, because

10:52the way this has been handled, mind you, you know, the elections are less than two years away,

10:57the parliamentary elections. So this could also be, you know, a huge sign as to what, how things are

11:05going to pan out in the future. But as of now, currently, there is an uneasy silence, the government

11:12has not yet spoken, although the government has gone into some kind of a meeting and stuff like that,

11:18some talent meeting or whatever. But the thing is, no one, none of the leading political leaders of this

11:26country in the past six years, six hours of like, you know, citizens or youth versus, you know, police,

11:36none of them have, like, you know, have spoken even a word about it. There are also talks of, you know,

11:42there are also whispers, I would say, this is always unconfirmed. We had, of course, seen it in the past

11:48of, you know, these political party aligned vigilantes, like, you know, having a shot in the dark

11:55and set situations. So we are also like, looking at such situation panning out over here. So we

12:01actually don't know at this point of time, what the government is going to say, but the government

12:06has not said anything as yet. Right. And you know, given the fact that all the major social media

12:11outlets are banned, I think journalists are resorting to other social media, which are not banned, for

12:16example, Reddit and TikTok. That's what we are hearing here in India. Yeah, TikTok will, it's the, I mean,

12:24like, you know, TikTok is pretty cute, because that's the one which they and Reddit actually

12:30ran the whole show over here. In fact, we drew all our strengths from there itself, you know,

12:37tracking things, you know, what is being planned and stuff like that. But mind you, even when they shut

12:43down everything, we saw the crowd climbing from a mere 100 to almost 20, 25,000 plus in less than

12:55three hours flat. That was TikTok for you, that was Reddit for you. So this country is, you know,

13:03very far, you know, beyond that, like, you know, what its government would have imagined that used to be.

13:07And, I mean, I would say full marks to the kids, the way they have been, like, you know, they have,

13:14you know, managed themselves with the way they have come together. But then again, the thing is,

13:22we don't know which way that things are going to pan out at this point.

13:25But, and I do need to make more of this video, and I think that's important.

13:33But, and I personally don't know which way, when I'm thinking about it, we have to do it it.

13:39But, now, with the, you know, that's really interesting.

EXCLUSIVE | Nepali Journo on Gen Z Protests Post Social Media Ban: 'Day After Oli Laughed It Off...

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