Kathmandu’s Khulamanch encroachment symbolises an attack on people’s freedom of speech

After a referendum was announced in 1980 , BP Koirala stood atop Khulamanch, an open ground in central Kathmandu, stating how the country needed a multiparty system and criticising the partyless Panchayat system that was in place during the time.

Koirala, who returned from exile in India in 1977 with the policy of national reconciliation, said that the Panchayat government could no longer take decisions of national importance, hence the system should continue no longer.