It was around 3 am on Wednesday morning. A group of our friends and relatives, having bathed at home according to religious rituals, dressed in fine clothes, left for Mansarovar through the holy shrine of Gosaikund in the pitch dark.
There was deep faith in the heart, enthusiasm on the face and enthusiasm towards the destination in the steps. There was no omens that morning. Everyone's footsteps were moving at a light and calm pace.
Even till reaching the banks of Betravati after crossing Dhunge Bazaar via Trishuli Bazar, the rhythm of the river was normal as always. The water was certainly a little murky as it was the dry season, but it was moving slowly, gurgling in its own rhythm, crashing against the rocks.
Little did anyone know, the same bank of the river that always sounds peaceful will become a terrible tunnel of death for hundreds of lives within a few moments.
According to eyewitnesses and local residents, the scene of cataclysm was staged in the river within a short span of half an hour. The water level suddenly rose above nine meters.
From the top of Langtang Mountain, an immeasurable mountain of snow, water, frozen soil, huge rocks and mud fell down. Along with a terrible sound that shook the ground, the road, concrete bridge, house, market, everything that came in front of the road, paved bridge, swallowed them all in a moment.
The people who were walking down the road just a few minutes ago making travel plans were nowhere to be seen. Some fell to the banks of the flowing river, some were buried forever under the deep mud of the banks and piles of gegran, and the exact details of who went where have not yet been found.
The scene after the flood is even more heart-wrenching. In the destroyed slums, young children between the ages of seven and twelve are standing in front of the broken doors and moving towards the road.
They are saying in an unintelligible voice, 'Father is coming, mother is coming.'
However, there is no longer a walking path left, nor a bridge to cross the river, nor a whole yard to walk on. All around is Ledo's empire. The phone network is zero when trying to understand if your people are safe.
All means of communication are severed. The hope of returning relatives is fading, but as the evening falls, the children's eyes are becoming more and more sleepless and wide.
This tear is no longer only for one family or village, it has become a common tragedy of thousands of families. And with this tragic scene, a big question has been raised before the country. Why does such a disaster happen again? Whose fault is it? Is it just a play of nature or the result of our human carelessness and extreme failure of the state?
Helplessness cloaked in the unimaginable and unprecedented
There is a chronic disease in our disaster management and governance. After every disaster, it is dismissed as unprecedented and unimaginable. When there was a torrential rain in 2024, we said, 'This is the biggest rain since 1970, it has never happened before.'
When Himtal erupted in 2025, the state apparatus again repeated the same words, 'This is an unprecedented event.'
When the same word is repeated year after year, it is satirizing not the extraordinary activity of nature, but our poor unlearned habits. We don't learn from any disaster, we just pretend to be shocked after it happens.
Our adage, 'Looking for a bridge only after the flood comes' is equally applicable in today's modern age. By the time the mechanism of information and communication wakes up, the river will have washed away the settlements, people and foundations of life.
Have we ever seriously thought about it? Due to climate change, such heavy rains and sudden disasters are increasing globally, so where is our scientific study, risk assessment and preparedness? How long will the state continue to escape from its responsibility by always wearing the veil of the unprecedented?
The most frightening aspect of this catastrophe is the lack of early warning. According to statistics, the first warning message was sent just 38 minutes after the avalanche hit the Langtang region at an altitude of 5,600 meters.
38 minutes is enough time for a flash flood on the steep terrain of the Himalayas to wipe out dozens of settlements below. The early warning sensors on the banks of the river to measure the water level were washed away by the flood before they could transmit the information.
When the water level started to rise across the border towards Tibet or the tremors of the avalanche started, the signal should have come to Nepal. But the news came to us only when the water crossed the border and started causing havoc in Nepalese villages.
Were there GPS sensors attached to satellites in the high mountain areas of snow valleys and potential avalanche areas? Did the mechanisms that measure the rapid increase in temperature give no early warning? These questions are still unanswered.
After the disaster, the communication situation became another embarrassment. 83 towers of Nepal Telecom and 27 towers of Ncell were damaged at once in Rasuwa, Nuwakot and Dhading districts.
At the time when the flood-affected people should have called their relatives and said 'I am in danger, save me' or 'I have reached a safe place, don't worry', the mobile screens went to sleep showing 'no service'. The security personnel and the local administration involved in the rescue were forced to work in the dark due to lack of communication.
Only when the telecom towers fell in 'seeing a snake and looking for a stick' style did discussions of alternatives begin. Why are backup systems such as satellite phones or alternative microwaves not prepared in advance in the Himalayan and hilly districts that are at high risk of disaster? In this age of technology, it would be nothing but unforgivable negligence to stop the rescue because of the destruction of the communication system.
We taught fear, we did not teach to live
Even our education system has limited the disaster to only book letters. In school textbooks, long lessons are taught about floods, landslides, mountains, rivers and earthquakes.
However, all of them are used only to get marks by writing in the exam. If a glacier bursts from above or a river is blocked and there is a sudden flood, which safe height will you run to? When the warning siren sounds, what should people in the house do immediately to be safe? These vital things are never taught in our classrooms.
Every year when Earthquake Safety Day comes around, children are told to 'hide under the table', but it is ignored that the real danger of our hilly and mountainous geography is floods, landslides and landslides.
A beautiful map of Nepal is hung on the walls of the school, but that map cannot show that 'this part of our village is at high risk.
The National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority (NDRRMA) occasionally conducts intelligence drills (drills) in a limited number of schools.
However, it is neither regular, nor nationwide and mandatory. Unless every school has compulsory on-site disaster rescue and safe evacuation drills at least twice a year, our children will be forced to watch the road in terror when disaster strikes.
A settlement in the face of death without knowing the risk
Experts in disaster management have been saying for years, clear legal risk mapping should be done on which river banks and valleys should be declared as high risk areas, where settlements should be banned and hydropower projects should be banned. But what is happening in practice?
In the blind pursuit of development and economic profit, hotels, resorts, concrete houses and crusher industries have been erected by encroaching on the natural flow area (right of way) of the river.
Since it is easier and cheaper to build roads and infrastructure along the river, the long-term environmental risks are completely avoided. This is not development, it is sowing the seeds of destruction.
But it also has another bitter reality. Cultivable and habitable land is very limited in the mountainous terrain of Nepal. If risky settlements are to be moved, where will those poor communities be resettled? Who will guarantee their livelihood and how will they be compensated? Neither the government has clear answers to these complex questions, nor any plans.
The government sees the problem but remains silent. And the result...!
Year after year, houses collapse in the same place, people are buried in the same place, and the state thinks its duty is done by distributing some tripal and noodles in the name of relief.
The danger across the border was not known in time
Rivers and mountains know no political boundaries or maps. The source of Bhotekoshi and Trishuli rivers flowing from Tibet is across the border. However, our warning system stops at the border fence.
It has been seven years since Nepal and China signed an agreement to exchange information on cross-border hydro-meteorological disasters and floods. However, for seven years, the agreement remained locked up in the red tape of the government drawer.
Which points of the agreement were implemented? Why was the joint technical team mechanism not operational for information exchange? What level of information should have come from China on time and why it did not come? The state's foreign affairs and water resources machinery is silent on these serious questions.
In today's era, technology is available to view instant images and real-time data from satellites. But we are still stuck in paper diplomacy and formalities.
The statement expressed by the chairman of Gosaikund Rural Municipality in this regard is commendable. "Before the people could forget the pain of the previous year and the destroyed structures could not be rebuilt, another terrible flood came again." The bridge washed away by the previous flood was still built, but the geographical condition of the valley was still weak and dilapidated. What this shows is that it is not enough to simply rebuild some physical structure after a disaster; Continuous scientific monitoring, vigilance and sustainable strategy are essential to prevent recurrence of disasters.
This destruction was not caused by a small weakness of any one body. Curriculum void, immaturity of communication system, policy deviation, risky urbanization and lack of coordination between government agencies. All these are different links in the same chain.
When one link of the chain is weak, the entire chain will snap under the load. Today exactly that happened on the banks of Bhotekoshi and Trishuli.
This event has also pushed the limits of the tools we have. Sensors placed only to measure earthquake vibrations could not signal avalanches, because the two waves have different frequencies.
Some of the river level measuring stations were designed to record only the normal and gradual rise of the water. When there was a terrible flood with Ledo, the tools themselves became the first victims.
Former head of National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority. As Anil Pokharel said, "The early warning system will not be created if the cable is placed in some places, it should be transformed into an integrated system for overall preparedness, communication and immediate access to a safe place."
Although the constitution has established a three-level federal structure, the distribution of rights and responsibilities between the federal, provincial and local levels in disaster management has not yet been clarified. When some provisions of the Local Government Act and the Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Act conflict with each other, confusion is created during field work.
Besides, the biggest neglected link is ourselves, the local community. The concept of community-based disaster risk management states that the local community is the first responder when disaster strikes. In the first hour of the disaster, the army or the police cannot reach, there the neighbor has to save the neighbor's life.
But, irony! We have not provided the community with any preparedness training, nor the necessary first aid equipment. Local governments allocate budget for disasters, but that budget can be used to buy dozers to dig roads or to distribute rice after disasters. There is never a cost to upskilling the community.
The way forward: A pre-disaster resolution
Standing on the hill of Betravati, one irrefutable truth is evident. We cannot change the laws of nature, nor can we completely stop the natural upheaval caused by climate change.
However, with serious preparedness, proper use of modern technology and responsible policies, human losses can be reduced to zero. For that, it is imperative to take concrete steps, not speeches and condolence statements.
1. Cross-border real-time early warning system: The seven-year agreement with China should be immediately implemented to install satellite-based automatic GPS sensors, cameras and water level measuring devices in watersheds in Tibet and high Himalayan lakes towards Nepal. Its data should be linked directly to the National Emergency Operations Center and local residents' mobile phones.
2. Reliable communication options: Satellite phone, VHF radio and microwave communication systems should be deployed as permanent backups at strategic points in vulnerable Himalayan and hilly districts instead of relying on mobile towers alone.
3. Curriculum and Compulsory Disaster Practice: Disaster management should be made a compulsory practical subject from the basic level of school education. At least twice a year in every school, students and teachers should be given a field drill (milk drill) to safely escape from floods, landslides and fires.
4. Risk Mapping and Safe Resettlement: There should be a strict legal ban on the development of concrete structures and settlements in river basins, old landslides and geologically vulnerable areas. The state should implement a long-term resettlement scheme with decent compensation to relocate vulnerable poor and marginalized communities to safer places.
5. Community Empowerment and Decentralization: Disaster management should be taken out of the Singha Darbar and district administration rooms and brought to the ward and tol levels. Local youth, clubs and mothers' groups should be empowered with modern training and equipment in first aid, rope use and search-and-rescue.
Until we bridge these policy, technological and human gaps, our destiny will not change. If our old lazy habit of looking for an umbrella only after it rains continues, we will again be forced to witness the pitiful scene of a seven-year-old child standing on the broken roof of a house waiting for his parents who will never return.
Nature has warned us time and time again. History will never forgive us if we don't wake up now.
(Writer Dway Sundar Pant is the headmaster of Amar Jyoti Secondary School located in Nagarjuna-10 and Vinod Duwadi is the English subject teacher of the same school.)
Published: 22 Bhadra 2083 20:59 Monday
