September 12, 2025 06:14 PM IST First published on: Sep 12, 2025 at 06:14 PM ISTThe Gen Z protests in Nepal have brought about a significant shift in the country’s politics, with the erstwhile protagonists of the nation’s transition to democracy from a monarchy now being viewed as its antagonists. The protests, which began in response to an oblique ban on social media in the country, snowballed into a full-fledged attack against the ruling figures of Nepal’s political class, including past prime ministers, irrespective of their party affiliations.“Nepo kids”, the children of the political class, had often drawn the ire of Nepalese citizens on social media. However, these discussions came to a jarring halt when K P Sharma Oli, who resigned as prime minister this week, banned access to 26 social media and instant messaging platforms, including Facebook, X, Instagram, and WhatsApp, citing their non-compliance with local laws on data localisation and non-cooperation on taking down offensive social media posts.AdvertisementThis snowball effect is not new and certainly not unique to the Gen Z protests in Nepal. However, these protests stand out for being sparked by the call for a right to access social media and, by association, the right to freedom of speech in Nepal. This brings to mind the first such protests where social media was expressly mentioned as a catalyst for change. On January 25, 2011, a small group of citizens in Cairo came together to form a human chain at the Corniche along the river Nile to protest the custodial death of an individual named Khaled Said after being tortured by the police in Egypt who picked him up from a cyber cafe for allegedly posting videos suggesting police involvement in drug dealing.As seen in Nepal in 2025, the protests in Egypt in 2011 prompted a massive crackdown by the police, and inadvertently snowballed the anger directed at them into a wider disenchantment with the government led by the then Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, a former military officer who had been in power for 30 years until 2011.The geography of protestAnother similarity between the protests in Nepal and Egypt is their origin in a peaceful gathering at a popular city square. If the Tahrir Square became synonymous with the Arab Spring agitation in Cairo, the protests for the right to access social media began at the Mandala intersection in Kathmandu.AdvertisementThe two instances also share similarities in how a peaceful protest on a specific issue evolved into a more assertive demonstration after it mixed with existing undercurrents of dissatisfaction.As reported by this newspaper, the country’s overreliance on the services sector — from mountaineering to tourism and IT — as well as remittances from abroad, indicating the shrinking domestic employment opportunities, were existing issues that simmered onto the surface during the Gen Z protests. The social media ban jarringly cut off Nepalese expatriates from their relatives back home, exacerbating people’s anger.Social media’s evolution in protestUnlike the North African countries that witnessed a political churn during the Arab Spring — from Egypt to Tunisia and Syria — Nepal is led by a democratically elected government. Another important note is the evolution of social media in the culture of protests. While the Arab Spring was also dubbed a “Facebook Revolution”, owing to its origins in a social media page calling for protests on the platform, the Nepal protests involved agitation for the right to access social media itself.The Facebook page called “We are all Khaled Said” in Egypt was started by Wael Ghonim, a Google marketing executive based in the UAE, who later returned home to participate in the protests. Ghonim was arrested by the police and tortured for fomenting protests, as narrated in his memoir Revolution 2.0.This was another factor that led to the Arab Spring being touted as a social media revolution, which empowered people to speak truth to power.However, the Gen Z revolution in Nepal can be dubbed as a social media revolution in the truest sense. The Oli government’s ban on social media platforms was interpreted as an attempt to muzzle dissent, underlining the importance of these platforms as a medium of expression and discussion, outside the physical public sphere.While K P Oli’s abrupt resignation may be seen as a win for the public, it still leaves open questions about the right to access social media, the discontent around “Nepo Kids”, corruption and succession. The protests in Nepal mirror another realisation from the Arab Spring in Egypt — irrespective of the medium of dissent, when citizens organise to assert their rights and question the legitimacy of those in power, the price of change inevitably is paid in blood.ishaan.mital@expressindia.com