By Devendra Gautam Nepal’s extended neighborhood is in turmoil, once again. By the way, when was the entire region peaceful the last time? Well, I have no idea. Recent anti-government protests in Bangladesh have sent the strife-torn country’s Prime Minister, Sheikh Hasina, fleeing on an eleventh-hour flight to the next-door neighbor without even getting the opportunity to deliver an impromptu address to the nation, leaving the reins of power to the national army. Meanwhile, a caretaker government is taking shape in the country in the wake of the death of hundreds and injuries to thousands in a brutal crackdown against the protests that began with students hitting the streets against generous job quotas for the relatives of the veterans of the 1971 independence struggle. There are fears that the turmoil in the South Asian country with a population of around 17 crore people may lead to a humanitarian crisis marked by the displacement of a large section of the population. If the past is any guide, such a crisis can have a huge impact on our ill-guarded, ill-governed and instability-plagued country, where things are far from honky-dory. So grim is the situation that the government of Nepal, a country of around 2.9 crore people, has sent a large section of the national population abroad for employment opportunities, given the lack of jobs and a conducive environment for employment-generating industries at home. In the wake of rising violence against minorities in the country, an influx of a large section of humanity to Nepal through a porous border with India will have a detrimental impact on Nepal and the Nepalis. Historically, Nepal has not shied away from providing for displaced populations from the extended neighborhood. This ill-prepared country has been providing for a significant number of displaced people from Myanmar, which sneaked into Nepal through a border that is open on our side, and provided every possible support to around one lakh Nepali-speaking Bhutanese citizens, displaced at the whims of a draconian regime in Thimphu and later pushed into Nepal from India using the latter’s border security apparatuses, among other displaced populations, not to mention a steady influx of humanity looking for jobs. But as things stand at present, the country is in no position to deal with another humanitarian crisis. Still, in an apparent anathematic move, the government has decided to reopen the Kakarvitta border point in the east to allow cross-border movement of third-country nationals between Nepal and India, which shares a 4000-plus-km-long border with the strife-torn Bangladesh. What spurred this decision to reopen a border point, shut for five years since the 2019 Covid-19 pandemic, even as the country keeps ‘closely watching the recent political developments’ in another South Asian country, is anyone’s guess. At the same time, India’s  Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri concluded his visit to Kathmandu, in the first high-level visit from India since the formation of the UML-Nepali Congress coalition government. During his stay in Kathmandu, Misri met the most powerful people in Nepal—President Ramchandra Paudel, Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli, Foreign Minister Arzu Rana Deuba, ministers, party leaders and his counterpart Sewa Lamsal. Who else enjoys such unfettered access to the highest echelons of power in Nepal? Can our foreign secretary even dream of meeting in New Delhi the President, the Prime Minister, the External Affairs Minister and the National Security Adviser, and putting forth Nepal’s concerns? It’s said that a host of issues, including the developments in Bangladesh, figured in Misri’s engagements with the who’s who of Nepal. Will Nepal be under increased pressure to make room for displaced populations as the crisis worsens before a marked improvement in the situation in the restive South Asian country? Will it face fresh pressure to water down citizenship provisions further to welcome another wave of demographic aggression? As the officialdom of both sides won’t speak on such a sensitive issue, all that we can do is try to make the best guess. In summary, keeping a sorry state of affairs in the country in mind, the government should step up security along the borders with India to avert another humanitarian crisis in the country at a time of multiple crises not only in Bangladesh but in the extended neighborhood, including in Bangladesh’s another next-door neighbor Burma (modern-day Myanmar) where the military junta is fighting rebels. It should also think long and hard about the severe consequences of regional connectivity projects like road and rail networks to Nepal, in terms of national security in particular. The sooner the government wakes up to the unfolding crisis, the better, amid mounting woes for a political leadership that has done precious little for the betterment of the country and the people despite getting a golden opportunity to rule like tyrants for decades on end.