Nepal, Sept. 14 -- Demographic studies define Generation Z as those born between 1997 and 2012, yet generational identity transcends mere birth years; it is forged by the crucible of lived experience. In Nepal's context, those born after 2002 embody the truest essence of Gen Z. We were too young to consciously experience the People's Movement of 2006 (Jana Andolan II), which dismantled monarchy and steered Nepal towards republican democracy. I was merely five years old when history was being written in the streets of Kathmandu.

What shaped our consciousness was not the lived memory of that transformative uprising, but the inherited narrative of the decade-long People's War (1996-2006) and the 19-day movement that followed. These stories ...