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By Rabi Raj Thapa

As a retired veteran police personnel, it is heart-wrenching to see so many Nepali youths die in one day’s incident. When I was in the Nepal Police, I had dealt directly with the referendum of 1980 and the First People’s Revolt of 1990. But the incident in Tinkune on March 28 has raised a serious question by the international security forces about the Nepal Police and the Armed Police Force on the excessive use of force. 

It is indisputable that the first and foremost duty of the police is the safety and protection of life and property. This is achieved by the police in different ways. The first is the prevention of crime and the maintenance of law and order. It is also important to instil a feeling of care and protection, which is why police organizations form groups like Community Police and slogans like “Police, My Friend”.
But how does a police strike a balance between police help and support, law enforcement and use of force? This is more of a vocational and professional education than a random application. That is what the police organizations of federal Nepal seem to be failing.

There may be many factors for police failure. The first and foremost is the doctrine of minimum required use of force. This is also called the proportional use of force. This type of balanced police behavior comes only through good-quality professional training with emphasis on compassion and a feeling of community service above police coercive power.

Law enforcement personnel can learn a lot of lessons from the international media today. For example, there are daily occurrences of people’s protests all over the world. There are political protests in America, European countries and even Israel, where we don’t hear any fatalities in policing except the perpetrator also carries firearms and weapons. But in Nepal, almost all the time, protesters don’t carry firearms and sharp weapons, with some exceptions. Then why do riot police carry so many guns and bullet rounds in the hands of ill-trained, low rank police personnel who may be less professional, more emotional and immature to control fire proportionally!

This is the main dilemma that the police organizations of South Asia, Africa and Latin America.

Normally, excessive and unnecessary force, unwarranted shootings, and murder by law enforcement are labeled as police brutality. Nepal Police was seen as the most compassionate and human in South Asia for a long time. Recently, it has been losing that image and credibility. Now the time has come to study and analyze the causes and think of their remedial approaches.

There can be multiple steps that may help to reduce the risk of police violence and brutality affecting civilians in future. Maybe police of all ranks need better training and orientation for better standards for the use of force.

Recent police use of force at Tinkune, Kathmandu, on March 28 and September 8, 2025, has been condemned by the public and community as a whole. In all these incidents, police personnel in the field do not realize that they are being used by the government in power, who just use them against their threats and opponents like a sacrificial pawn, without the knowledge of the police who are using force against a common civilian without any fault.

Therefore, the Oli-led majority coalition government has been using police as a tool to serve their political interests, has cost unimaginable human, material and infrastructural costs. In all these incidents, the main authority and order must have come from the executive Prime Minister. Then the blame and responsibility go to the Home Minister and Home Secretary, who pass orders and instructions to the police through the Chief District Officer.

As Gen-Z are the prime victim of this case, it is of utmost importance and priority for the present to form an investigation and probe commission as soon as possible. Any delay in this case will be interpreted as government apathy to address the urge and aspiration of the GEN-Z and also affect the law and order situation in the national elections in future.

Finally, I extend my fond tribute to those Gen-Z martyrs for sacrificing their lives for the nation.