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Although International Relations (IR) is taught at Tribhuvan University as a social science discipline, one’s attempt to identify the ingredients of ‘social’ and ‘science’ in the prescribed syllabus of IR may become a futile struggle. Scanning the syllabus, one may notice a perceptible dearth of topics, concepts, approaches, and methods for enquiring, understanding, and interpreting the role of wider social interactions in a country’s foreign policy choices.

The syllabus was introduced in 2013 and revised after receiving ‘expert opinions’ in 2017. Still, misreading and misrepresenting IR only as the study of state power further repudiates the role that social units have in the production, accumulation, and reproduction of power. While IR fundamentally claims to study the relations between the state and non-state actors, the Nepali IR has principally failed to identify and inculcate the larger social aspects of such relations that help measure power as social production.

Firstly, teaching IR in Nepal is robbed of any academic inquiry into the existing social phenomenon that presents politics as a social activity. Secondly, its minuscule reliance on political science for any scientific observation is not sufficient to produce a good political scientist. Thirdly, its overemphasis on national power and national security divulges divergence between everyday social realities and political rhetoric. As such, IR is more of an elite sense, not a social science.

More elite, less social

The syllabus of IR is crammed with global, regional, and national issues. But those issues are scarcely studied and investigated in the context of social realities. Professors in the IR program may make a quick escape by divulging the lack of required human resources to teach the subject. Here, physical walls built by departments inside the university also share the blame. After all, the physical walls confine your epistemic behavior to the constructed sense of belonging to one academic discipline. It utterly prevents the discipline from becoming suitably interdisciplinary. Just lettering your syllabus as interdisciplinary doesn’t fulfill the objective unless an IR wala is made enthusiastic to sit in the classrooms of political science, sociology, anthropology, history, and economics prior to his/her foreign policy analysis of any diplomatic episodes. Sad but true, there are no practices of visiting philosophically associated departments and spending time in each other’s libraries and classrooms. In such a context, how and from where a young program like IR will acquire and develop the components of ‘social’ and ‘science’?

A prevalent irony in Tribhuvan University’s social sciences is the rationale behind classifying the academic subjects as social sciences. Generally, social science is understood as the study of society, social institutions, and social behavior. But those elements are missing in the syllabus and teaching of IR in the university.

University’s social sciences—which are largely expected to study social realities—have today poignantly failed to grasp the nature and characteristics of existing Nepali society. Despite the mediocre history of social sciences in Nepal, just a cliche(mentioned as an example below) may instantly attest that social sciences in the university remain ignorant of everyday social experiences. For instance, academic departments and programs at Tribhuvan University, including the IR program, are never tired of describing Nepal as a “poor and underdeveloped/ developing country”. But the exorbitant semester fees imposed on the students of “the poor and underdeveloped/ developing country” stands contrary to their claim. It’s an apt example revealing the indifference of university authorities to existing social realities shaped by class, wealth, income, and social inequalities. When the university doesn’t pay heed to the students of “the poor and underdeveloped/ developing country” opposing the exorbitant semester fees, it becomes obvious that the university is apathetic to social realities. In such an environment, programs like International Relations may attract more money to the university.

An IR wala never gets bored of reiterating foreign policy as the extension of domestic policies. But the social actors and factors associated with those domestic policies are seldom discussed in the classroom. It may be because of two reasons: Firstly, faculties find it easier to weave the accessible media narratives on the everyday changes taking place in global and regional politics. Secondly, IR students remain submissive to the details drawn from the elitist phenomenon of decision-making in world affairs. Actually, they find the world being presented to them in the classroom adventurous. As such, they rhapsodize world political affairs, where the amount of ‘social’ is swiftly relegated to the study of power and influence.

While the IR program at TU is all set to make a decade-long institutional history, students and young faculties in the IR are incessantly lured by the mere mentions and fleeting references of the globally renowned diplomats. Being ignorant of the significance of intellectual biography and intellectual history, their taste and flavor are either reduced to general likes/dislikes or driven by popular narratives. In the Nepali context, two historical characters are seemingly glorified in the IR classroom—PN Shah and Mahendra Shah—for their reported contributions to Nepal’s national security and diplomatic responsibilities. Interestingly, the social realities in their days never become the units of the syllabus, the matter of classroom discussion, and the topic or argument of dissertation writing/ supervision.

Although the key actors shaping Nepal’s foreign policy and diplomacy in different periods of time are taught and studied, neither the IR faculties nor the students have the access and understanding to identify the backroom boys and decipher their roles in foreign policy decision-making. Take the case of MCC as an example, the classroom discussions of international relations in the university were widely dependent on the news and views from the mainstream media. The IR faculties may be well paid for what they teach but their dependence on media analyses and internet surfing corrode the analytical and observatory capacities, which a university faculty should cultivate unremittingly. Consequently, their routine emphasis on the secondary data positioned around the matters of national power, national security, and national interest fails to comprehend the social realities shaping both the historical and contemporary episodes with regard to what is nation and national.

Mere sense, no science

Social science studies society on various fronts. In today’s academic milieu, while political science, sociology, anthropology, and history themselves have botched to report, investigate, and analyze society and social institutions treading on the existing philosophical, historical, and theoretical standpoints, it may not be fitting to expect a new program like IR—which theoretically and philosophically doesn’t have anything of its own—concentrate its teaching and study on the inevitability of social elements shaping foreign policy decisions?

Already, as a discipline, IR is preoccupied with the interests and relations between the states. Saddest of all, in developing countries, those interests and relations are also not taught as per global academic practices, commenced and continued by the best IR schools around the world.  As a result, faculties and students in countries like ours may make sense of the events and phenomena but can rarely practice it as a social science.

After all, the strands of society are largely elapsed in their approaches and analyses. In all the dissertations produced by the students of the IR department since 2016, the social component is relentlessly missing. A cursory look over the analysis and inferences drawn in their dissertations may indicate the presence of scientific research methods but a thorough probe into the dissertation may reveal the story of duplication and oversimplification. Dissertations produced on Nepal-China relations are an apt example. How justifiable is it to pen a dissertation on Nepal-China relations without knowing basic Mandarin or the basic attributes of Chinese society? Is it convincing and per the popular research ethics to pull the information already available in Google or archives and reproduce it as your own analysis? The most bewildering aspect of teaching IR at the university is the acceptability of the dissertations without any scientific knowledge of the proposed issues. Not even a handful of dissertations are based on field visits, participant observations, ethnography, and interviews. Against such a backdrop, on the basis of what remaining yardsticks can IR be considered a social science in the Nepali context? Methodologically, it has compromised science over sense. In terms of perspectives, it has dismissed social interests and social relations over the promotion of elite interests and power relations, which are often misunderstood as national interest in IR classrooms.

'Khambandi'

Injecting a few components of ‘social’ and ‘science’ into the disciplinary hat of International Relations won’t make its approach social, however. Instead, the understanding of ‘social’ may vary from one IR walla to the other, at least, until power remains at the core of its disciplinary existence. The element of ‘science’ that the syllabus is supposed to carry—not in a prescriptive sense, but more in a reflective sense—has already been compromised to the 'Khambandi' culture. When acquaintances come to know that your department has received funds from the University Grants Commission (UGC) or elsewhere, you will see ‘experts’ in droves being welcomed with 'Khambandi'—paid in an envelope for their ‘expertise’. Despite the reckless duplication in the contents of the syllabus being revised, plagiarism in the units, and above all, more guff-gaaf and less expertise in the process of syllabus-making, they don’t hesitate to receive the 'Khambandi'. On what moral and professional grounds is that justifiable? When experts and practitioners are lured more by 'Khambandi', faculties are dependent on Google and popular narratives, and students are reliant only on the faculties’ slides, one can imagine the future of Nepali IR under the semester system in the oldest university of Nepal.

The number of trekkers visiting the Annapurna Conservation Area has bounced back and reached the pre-covid levels.

A total of 172,108 trekkers visited the area in the fiscal year 2022/23, according to Rabin Kadariya, the information officer of the Annapurna Conservation Area Project (ACAP). This figure comes close to the pre-covod record of 183,357 trekkers in 2018/19. This is the highest footfall the area has seen so far

After the outbreak, however, trekker numbers dropped to 104,165 trekkers in 2019/20 and a meager 4,916 in 2020/21 during the peak of the pandemic. However, there was a positive resurgence, with numbers picking up to 75,824 in 2021/22. In the fiscal year 2022/23, ACAP generated Rs 299.43m (including VAT) from permit fees.

As only the ACAP and Pokhara International Airport records the number of tourists visiting Pokhara, the exact number of foreign tourists visiting Gandaki Province is not precisely known. The provincial tourism ministry had initiated the registration of foreign tourists two years before the covid pandemic, but it has been discontinued now.

With the commencement of construction on Pokhara International Airport, tourism entrepreneurs have made substantial investments in various tourism infrastructures such as hotels, restaurants, and several adventure activities. The hotel industry alone received investments of over Rs 100bn in the past five years, according to Laxman Subedi, president of Pashchimanchal Hotel Song Pokhara, the industry lobby representing hotels operating in Pokhara and its surrounding areas.

Charges leveled against me (vis-a-vis the 100-kg gold smuggling case) are totally false and fabricated. What’s the motive? I see things from two perspectives. First, whenever some big scandal happens, our police and political system face pressure to identify the main culprit immediately. Buckling under pressure, they fabricate a character.

Second, all this is meant to divert public attention and protect the main culprit. There’s another baffling thing in this case. It is cheaper and more profitable to purchase brake shoes produced in India in the same country. No trader can make profit by importing brake shoes from Hong Kong via air. Our customs officials don’t even know a basic thing?

The government has formed a panel to probe the case. It should identify the main culprit through a proper and impartial investigation; it should expose the nexus involved. Linking a businessperson in this case is a character assassination attempt. 

In July 2018, Nepal gifted two pairs of endangered greater one-horned baby rhinos to China as part of rhino diplomacy. The first pair was Bhadra (male) and Rupasi (female), who boarded a chartered flight to the Chinese city Guangzhou as symbolic ambassadors of Sino-Nepal friendship.

Right before their flight, I had followed all the preparatory activities and rhinos’ road journey in a truck from Chitwan National Park to Kathmandu. After exactly five years, this June, when I traveled to Guangzhou, I couldn’t stop myself from saying hello to the exquisite and rare pair living in a special zone of Chimelong Safari Park.

As Harisharan Pudasaini, Consul General at Nepali Consulate Office in Guangzhou, said, the baby rhinos have not just found a new home in Guangzhou, but also have helped strengthen the friendship between the two countries. “Nepali rhinos are in good hands, growing in a safe and healthy environment. Every time I visit the park, I feel like they are happy and smiling for being able to see us; their Nepali connections. It’s a special feeling.” Are they really happy? How is their new home in China? I tried to find answers through Zhang Xueli, general manager of Chimelong Safari Park.

Excerpts from the interview:

What is the current status of baby rhinos brought from Nepal?

On 12 July 2018, the young Bhadra and Rupasi boarded a chartered flight from Nepal's capital Kathmandu to Guangzhou to start their new life in Chimelong, China. Bhadra and Rupasi are in good condition and have grown up healthy. Bhadra, the male Greater One-horned Rhino, has grown from 670 kg to 1,830 kg, with a total weight gain of 1,160 kg, while the female Rupasi, has grown from 865 kg to 1,474 kg, with a total weight gain of 609 kg.  

Have they adapted to the new environment? How is their nature, food habits and daily activities?

Yes, they are now adapted to their living environment in Chimelong. They are docile and enjoy basking in the sun on the ground. They are large and cute animals. In order to ensure that Nepal’s national treasure is better adapted to the Chinese environment, Chimelong Group has specially set up a special farm for Asian rhinos, planting a large number of high-quality elephant grass for Greater One-horned Rhinos to eat a large amount of food, while adding other grass, leaves, some amount of vegetables and fruits, concentrate and other foods to make it nutritiously balanced. RUPASI especially likes carrots. At the same time, in order to solve the imbalance of dietary fat, soluble and insoluble carbohydrates, minerals and vitamins, Chimelong has developed a special diet for them, adding salt bricks during the feeding process. We believe that the inorganic salts in salt bricks can promote the bone growth of Greater One-horned Rhinos. In addition, Chimelong deliberately expanded the logistics conservation area, which consists of the hay area and the soil area, so that they can express their daily behaviors freely- roll mud bath and grind.

Do you plan to continue keeping them in a special protected area or relocate in the public section of the park?

At present, the two rhinos from Nepal are nearing adulthood. Because the species is so valuable, breeding and enlarging the population is a priority compared to the park display. Chimelong is currently concentrating its efforts to carry out scientific research and strive for early reproduction. Meanwhile, Chimelong has put the exhibition on the agenda and will show them to the public at the right time.

Any specific future plans regarding the increase in their population?

Chimelong has built a herbivorous research center, and continues to carry out scientific research on rhino protection and breeding, constantly breaking through the artificial conservation technology of rhinos, and successfully achieving the breeding of black and white rhinos. At present, Chimelong animal conservation and scientific research team is working on the conservation technology of Greater One-horned Rhino, cooperating with the European Association of Zoos and Aquariums (EAZA) and  participating in EAZA breeding program, and striving to achieve successfully breeding at an early date. In addition, we hope that the Nepali authorities will re-approve the export of Greater One-horned Rhino to Chimelong and establish a sustainable artificial population in Chimelong. In the future, Greater One-horned Rhinos individuals born in Chimelong will be returned to Nepal, making contributions to Nepal’s wild population protection and public education, as well as the world's rhino conservation.

Since they are in a special protected area, do the Chinese public have any impression about these Nepali rhinos?

More than 100 years ago, the Greater One-horned Rhino was distributed in the wild in China. There are records of rhinos on oracle bone inscriptions dating back more than 3,000 years, referring to the Greater One-horned Rhino. Even now, the Greater One-horned Rhino has a high profile among the Chinese public and is an important flagship species that China needs to restore its wild population in the future. Bhadra and Rupasi carry the deep friendship and trust of the Nepalese people to the Chinese people. As the symbol and messenger of China-Nepal friendship, they have been carefully cared for and managed by the Chimelong conservation team. They are growing healthily and vigorously in their new home in Guangzhou.

What is the significance of these rhinos in China? How will the Sino-China friendship be promoted through this precious gift? 

The Greater One-horned Rhino carries the memory of the Chinese people for thousands years, and has a high status in the minds of the Chinese people. Greater One-horned Rhino is extinct in the wild in China. We hope that with the gradual recovery of wild habitats in China, we can reintroduce Greater One-horned Rhinos to the wild in China in the near future through our efforts. Nepal is known in China for its famous snow-capped mountains, and the Chinese public doesn't know much about Nepal’s Greater One-horned Rhinos. Through the publicity of the Greater One-horned Rhinos of Nepal, people can learn about the diversified wildlife and natural environment of Nepal, more and more people will be attracted to travel to Nepal, friendly exchanges between the people of China and Nepal will be promoted, and the friendship between two countries will be enhanced. May the friendship between people of China and Nepal last forever.