KATHMANDU: After the Gen-Z revolt, conspiracy theories have become so popular in Nepal that we now have everyone—from political leaders, public intellectuals, professors, geopolitical experts, podcasters, and social commentators to common people gathered in teashops—sharing their own version of the conspiracy behind what unfolded between 8th and 13th September 2025.

It was such a massive political quake that its aftershocks have not yet settled. In addition to toppling the country’s federal government, the Gen-Z protest succeeded in dispelling the false preconceptions that political leaders, their expert advisors, political analysts, public intellectuals, and senior citizens held about Nepal’s younger generation.

Gen Z were assumed to be submissive, docile, politically inert, socially ignorant, consumer-focused, enmeshed in their small spheres of influence, at ease with middle-class comforts, and eagerly looking for a way out in a foreign country. In particular, our political elites had cultivated a false perception that the young generation—already divided along religious, ethnic, caste, ideological, and regional lines—was not competent enough to organize around a common purpose and bring about political change that could endanger their own political and social existence.

However, when Gen Z’s protests shattered these clumsy assumptions with revolutionary zeal, instead of critically reflecting on their own flaws and failures, our politicians and their party members began hurling conspiracy theories to protect their self-image and delegitimize the Gen-Z protests as a chaotic youth movement staged by foreign powers.

They are still busy searching for one picture after another—even AI-generated memes are trusted, as is any piece of news from any source—just to discredit the Gen-Z protests as a genuine revolt against Nepal’s corrupt political system.

Moreover, in an information market open to conspiracy theories, we are now left with an entire ecosystem of podcasters, YouTubers, political analysts, politicians, and journalists, all scrambling to concoct their own versions of conspiracy—preferably dark, deep, and spiced up. Esoteric? Astrological? Mysterious? Even better.

And if anyone out there has something truly sinister and unknown, they beg: tell us. Furthermore, among intellectual opinion-makers in Nepal, there has been a consistent tendency to generate conspiracy theories that attribute political challenges in Nepal to external foreign power structures and portray the Nepalese people as helpless victims. After all, they can’t directly blame their own audience for the political instability in Nepal.

Even the general public in Nepal is now applying conspiracy theories to cover up their lack of civic sense, national consciousness, collective responsibility, and ethical failings during the protest. After all, the world saw Nepali people looting local businesses, neighbors setting fire to other neighbors’ homes because they were more wealthy, students destroying their own colleges, and people making reels and TikToks while smoke oozed from government buildings—citizens illogical enough to expect future governments to drastically transform Nepal’s economic condition after having caused so much damage to existing businesses and industries. Hence, surely it must be a conspiracy. After all, without some evil foreign influence, dark energy, or Lucifer rising, how on earth could people from the land of Lord Buddha, Pashupatinath, and Sita Mata carry out such horrible and heinous deeds?

Conspiracy Theories as a Political Excuse

Even before the Gen-Z protest, Nepal was facing a deep leadership crisis, marked by narcissism, incompetence, corruption, and a dangerous lack of political vision, with two large parties running a government while protecting leaders involved in corruption scandals.

We also had underqualified leaders attempting to cosplay as global figures like Xi Jinping, Narendra Modi, or Donald Trump, without possessing an ounce of their stature, ideological clarity, nationalist ethos, moral convictions, or even the basic statesmanship required to govern a 21st-century democracy.

Moreover, this leadership crisis was utterly exposed when the government decided to ban social media platforms. For millions of Nepali youth, social media is not just a source of entertainment; it’s a lifeline. It is where they communicate, express, create, organize, earn, and dream.

Cutting this lifeline was like pulling the plug on the ventilator for a generation already struggling to find its socio-political space and voice. Hence, the backlash was inevitable, and a competent leadership would have known that such raw impulses can be hijacked by anti-government, fringe, radical, opportunistic, and anti-social elements.

Besides, no foreign power or international agency—from Beijing, New Delhi, Moscow, London, or Washington—ever encouraged the government led by KP Sharma Oli to continue its assault on digital freedom.

It was a homegrown failure that evolved from authoritarian impulse, apathy, the arrogance of power, and the indifferent reasoning of political leaders. However, instead of acknowledging their political and governance failures, rampant corruption, abuse of authority, and power-driven arrogance, Nepal’s political leaders have begun using conspiracy narratives as easy escape routes—blaming foreign powers and international organizations for this political crisis.

Rather ironically, even different factions within Gen-Z groups have started to come up with their own versions of conspiracy theories to cover up issues like ideological differences, vested interests, intergroup conflicts, exclusion during the formation of the interim government, and the hijacking of their protest by various interest groups.

After all, no government can easily drive substantial socio-political reform and economic growth in a nation plagued by moral decay, social fragility, ethnic divisions, fragmented national unity, perpetual political turmoil, ideological clashes, a law-and-order crisis, and weak investor confidence.

The Lack of Critical Culture in Nepal

The popularity of conspiracy theories after the Gen-Z protest indicates a lack of critical culture in higher education, media, politics, society, and public discourse—one that encourages questioning, critique, debate, investigative depth, evidence-based inquiry, creativity, problem-solving, and analytical thinking among Nepali citizens.

Without a critical culture, society becomes either too passive or overly reactive, where skepticism is mistaken for intelligence, unverified claims spread rapidly through social media, and people are unable to navigate misinformation, recognize emotional manipulation, analyze hidden agendas, or question the information itself.

Furthermore, it is crucial to realize that activism for political change only becomes transformative when it is combined with critical awareness—one that examines the root causes of Nepal’s socio-economic and political problems.

Moreover, as citizens of Nepal, we must acknowledge that those in or aspiring to positions of political power will use conspiracy theories to further their hidden agendas, defend illegal behavior, conceal their governance shortcomings, hide dubious institutional and geopolitical ties, and suppress the unsettling reality of ethical decay among their supporters and potential voters.

However, the betrayal of democratic values will always be the real conspiracy against the people of the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal—and it starts internally, not externally.