Nepal’s Rulers Paid for Seeking a Monopoly Over ‘Illegitimate’ Violence

The K.P. Oli Government’s Fall Began with Its Own Misuse of Force

By Vishal Arora

September 17, 2025

Coffins of youths killed during the protests being prepared for last rites in Kathmandu on Sept. 16. Photo by Vishal Arora

A government does not survive by force alone, but by the public’s acceptance that it has the right to use force in the first place. Nepal’s government seemed unaware of this basic principle. The little trust that remained, already hanging by a thread, gave way completely on September 8, when police used brutal violence against young protesters. By the time ambulances began arriving with school and college students bleeding from bullet wounds to their heads and chests, the state’s claim to legitimacy was in free fall.

Doctors at the National Trauma Centre were prepared for baton injuries. What they got instead were bodies riddled with live ammunition, as reported by The Kathmandu Post. Teenagers shot in the torso. Uniformed students barely alive, some regaining consciousness in the middle of CPR. What made this more horrifying was not just the scale of injuries, which was over 1,700 across two days, 72 dead, but the fact that these were not terrorists or insurgents.

They were students, marching peacefully in what became known as the Gen Z protest. The movement had grown out of long-standing public frustration and helplessness over corruption and authoritarian rule, along with the growing momentum of the “Nepo Kid” campaign, which exposed how the political elite shielded their children from the hardships faced by ordinary Nepalis. The protest called for accountability and free expression, sparked most immediately by a fresh ban on 26 social media platforms. The school uniform became its most visible symbol. Music, satire and digital mobilisation gave it momentum. What started as a creative and peaceful show of dissent ended in bloodshed.

Nepal’s old political guard, now overthrown and in hiding, must ask themselves why they ever believed they could hold on to power through violence without legitimacy. Just over a year ago, they would have read about the fall of Sheikh Hasina’s government in Bangladesh. But they failed to read the warning.

Political theory, which is rarely examined in media coverage that remains focused on party politics and political personalities, offers a clearer understanding of what gives a state its authority. The state is granted a monopoly over violence because it is expected to follow the law, act with restraint and remain accountable. That monopoly loses legitimacy the moment accountability collapses and dissent is treated as something to silence rather than hear.

This idea is well established in political theory. Max Weber, the German sociologist, defined the state as the institution that holds a monopoly over the legitimate use of physical force within a given territory. The word “legitimate” is central to this definition. It means the state’s use of force is accepted by the public because it is bound by law, exercised with restraint and subject to accountability. But for many in the political class, the focus tends to fall only on the use of force itself, rather than on what makes it lawful or justified. Legitimacy is never permanent. It must be renewed through consent, competent governance and respect for rights. A state that fires on its own people to silence dissent is no longer exercising a monopoly over legitimate force. It is committing violence without public consent.

Nepal’s political elite made that crossing in broad daylight. Young Nepalis, facing joblessness, poor education and a government that seemed both deaf and decadent, used humour, memes and satire to speak truth to power. The state answered with censorship and illegitimate violence. International human rights standards and Nepal’s own Constitution provide protection for children and students. But police opened fire anyway. Not into the air. Into their bodies.

The doctors’ testimony tells the story. “There were rubber and live bullets lodged in their head, chest, abdomen and other body parts. We could not extract all of the bullets,” The Kathmandu Post quoted a doctor as saying.

The next day, when the protests exploded, political leaders fled. Prime Minister Oli resigned without a fight. His ministers vanished. The state had tried to prove its strength with force. Instead, it proved its fragility.

Theories of civil resistance have shown that most protest movements begin non-violently. It is usually after the state responds with force, such as police brutality or mass arrests, that protesters begin to adopt more confrontational tactics out of a sense of helplessness.

Governments ban speech not out of strength, but out of weakness. Nepal’s rulers lost power because they lost the argument and then turned to violence. That decision cost them more than their positions. It stripped them of any standing in the moral imagination of the country, and that loss will follow them for years, if not decades.

In trying to block digital criticism and suppress public anger, the state exercised its monopoly over violence in a way that resembled vengeance rather than law enforcement. The force it used was not just disproportionate, it exposed the state’s own failure. By targeting unarmed students, it discredited itself and became the villain in a story it could no longer control.

The phrase “illegitimate violence” is often reserved for mobs and rioters. But in Nepal, it applied most precisely to the state. A government that shoots its own students, censors dissent and responds to protest with bloodshed forfeits its claim to authority.

The idea that the state exists only with the consent of its people is older than any constitution. Once that is forgotten, the state no longer governs with legitimacy. It rules by power alone, with an end in sight.

The Gen Z protest on September 9, after the youngsters were killed, was about the boundary between governance and tyranny. Since that boundary was crossed, the people responded with the one thing any government should fear most: they withdrew consent.

History shows that governments can survive incompetence, corruption and even scandal. What they cannot survive is the moment people stop believing that their power is lawful. Nepal reached that moment on Sept. 8. Everything that followed was consequence.

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