Between Giants: Nepal’s Fragile Political Balance

May 2024 — I had just come down from the Annapurna Base Camp trek when the conversation in a teahouse drifted from trail conditions to politics. It’s impossible to spend long in Nepal without sensing it: a country pulled in two directions, balancing between the gravitational forces of India to the south and China to the north.

A Landlocked Nation, A Hard Road to Growth

Nepal’s terrain is stunning, but it doesn’t make development easy. The same terraced mountainsides that yield green rice paddies also mean roads snake endlessly, and large-scale transport becomes labor-intensive. In the mountains, I passed porters carrying not only backpacks but bundles of corrugated roofing, heavy wooden beams, even steel plates larger than the porter himself — each one hauled on foot to villages unreachable by vehicle. Infrastructure here is not simply built; it is carried.

Being landlocked amplifies these challenges. Nepal’s trade routes depend almost entirely on its neighbors — a dependence that has made it vulnerable to political winds far beyond its borders, and a reality any cross-border development project must account for in its planning and risk management.

Caught Between Two Powers

For decades, India has been Nepal’s largest trading partner and primary transit route, handling about two-thirds of Nepal’s trade. China, meanwhile, has been building influence through infrastructure projects under the Belt and Road Initiative, such as the new Pokhara International Airport — where I landed after a short domestic flight from Kathmandu on Buddha Air, hoping the airline’s name might offer a little extra protection from bad weather and potential flight risk.

Even that airport is a case study in geopolitics: India has so far declined to allow it use of its airspace for international flights, limiting its viability. Development projects here are not decided on economics alone — they are shaped by political leverage and bilateral negotiations.

In 2015, an undeclared blockade — widely seen as linked to Indian displeasure with Nepal’s new constitution — choked the country’s fuel and medicine supply for months. The crisis led Nepal to sign a petroleum deal with China, a bold step to diversify its dependency. Yet this shift also pulled Nepal further into the delicate game of balancing both neighbors’ interests.

The Human Side of Geopolitics

Geopolitical sway filters down into everyday life. Take the situation of Tibetan refugees in Nepal. While historically more tolerated, their presence has become increasingly restricted under Chinese pressure — from limits on public gatherings to the denial of official refugee status for those arriving after 1990. In Kathmandu, I passed through neighborhoods with Tibetan prayer flags strung high, but behind them is a community navigating shrinking space for cultural expression.

Politics, Natural Resources, and Clean Energy Potential

Politics also shapes how Nepal uses its natural resources. The country’s vast hydropower potential — rivers cascading from Himalayan glaciers — is a coveted asset for both India and China. Harnessing this clean energy could be transformative for Nepal’s economy and its contribution to regional climate goals. But bringing such projects to life requires more than engineering: it means navigating multi-jurisdictional regulatory frameworks, managing stakeholder engagement across borders, and structuring agreements that protect both national interests and community rights.

For example, the West Seti hydropower project has shifted hands between Chinese and Indian developers over the years, stalled not only by financing and feasibility issues but also by the geopolitics of control over energy exports. Such cases underline that the path to sustainable infrastructure is as much about governance, legal clarity, and operational coordination as it is about technology.

A Fragile Equilibrium

Hiking the trails, I often thought about how much of Nepal’s fate is determined beyond its borders. The porters who carry bricks up the slopes, the farmers who till narrow terraces, the shopkeepers selling imported packaged snacks — all live within a web of decisions made in faraway capitals.

It is easy to trace maps of influence and measure the push and pull of powerful neighbors, but harder to account for the quiet resilience of the people whose lives are shaped by those forces. Every negotiation over trade, airspace, or dam rights trickles down into the price of rice in a market stall, the cost of sending a child to school, or the choice to stay in a village or seek work abroad. These are not just abstract policy outcomes — they are the daily realities that shape hopes, opportunities, and survival.

Nepal’s position between two global powers brings opportunity and investment, but also risk and constraint. For the country to truly chart its own course, it must navigate not only its mountain paths but also the invisible, shifting trails of diplomacy — much like any organization seeking to deliver equitable, sustainable energy solutions in the world’s most complex terrains.