A republic still ruled by ritual

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Prof. Timila Yami Thapa

To honor Dharma Ratna’s legacy is to recognize that secularism is not a finished project. It is an ongoing struggle — to free the mind as much as the state, to let every citizen believe, or not believe, without fear or hierarchy. “Secularism was never a betrayal of tradition,” he might remind us.
“It was the promise of equality our traditions never fulfilled.”

The Legacy of Dharma Ratna Yami and Secularism

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Prof. Timila Yami Thapa

The true frontier of secularism is not simply removing religion from the state, but redistributing who gets to define the sacred and the just. Whether in the temple or in the algorithm, the underlying moral demand is the same: no power structure, old or new, should be allowed to legitimize inequality.

Lived experience of senior citizens

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Prof. Timila Yami Thapa

In the context of the old Nepal, to see the rulers as ordinary people was the crime. And in the context of the new Nepal, to continue insisting on the fundamental ordinariness and equality of all people, and thus the illegitimacy of any inherited hierarchy, remains the unfinished work of the revolution.

Human-centered approach

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Prof. Timila Yami Thapa

By aggressively and strategically tackling these three fronts—Infrastructure, Affordability, and Literacy—Nepal can ensure that the deployment of AI truly serves as an engine for unmaking inherited hierarchy and building a genuinely equitable, modern state.