51 people, including Indian, died in recent anti-government protest in Nepal: Police

Kathmandu: At least 51 people, including an Indian national, have died in the recent 'Gen Z' protest that erupted across Nepal against corruption and a ban on social media sites, police said on Friday. Senior Superintendent of Police Ramesh Thapa, who is co-spokesperson for Nepal police, said the casualties include one Indian national, three policemen and other Nepali citizens, The Kathmandu Post newspaper reported. At least 36 bodies are at Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital, Maharajgunj, where post-mortems began on Friday, it said. Police said 17 bodies were recovered from different parts of the country on Thursday and Friday.

At least 19, mostly students, were killed when police opened fire at the Parliament building in Kathmandu when the protests under the banner of Gen Z launched their agitation on Monday. Prime Minister K P Sharma Oli quit on Tuesday shortly after hundreds of agitators entered his office demanding his resignation over the deaths during Monday’s protest. The ban on social media was lifted Monday night. The violence continued even after Oli's resignation, with protesters setting fire to the Parliament, the President's Office, the PM's residence, government buildings, political parties' offices and homes of senior leaders. Meanwhile, many of the bodies were cremated at Aryaghat of Pashupatinath Temple near the bank of Bagmatai river on Friday afternoon. Nearly 1,700 people sustained injuries during the protests. Of them, around 1,000 have returned home after recovery, police said. Nepal's police force is gradually resuming operations in the Kathmandu Valley, with police stations and posts that were vandalised or set ablaze slowly coming back into operation, officials said.