New Delhi: Nepal is grappling with its worst outbreak of Hindu-Muslim communal violence in years after clashes that began during a religious procession spread across the Madhes, the country’s southern plains bordering India, leaving at least three people dead, dozens injured and prompting curfews, army deployment and appeals for calm.The violence, which began in the Dewanganj rural municipality in Sunsari district on July 26, has spread to several districts across the Madhes, a region where communities on both sides of the Nepal-India border share close linguistic, cultural and family ties.While localised communal tensions are not new, researchers and security officials say the scale and rapid spread of the latest unrest mark a significant escalation.Nearly a week after the first clashes, authorities continued to enforce curfews and prohibitory orders in several towns even as political parties, civil society organisations and religious leaders organised peace marches and interfaith meetings to prevent fresh violence. Security forces, including the Nepal Army, remain deployed across sensitive areas, while police have arrested dozens accused of participating in the riots.How a local dispute spiralled into statewide unrestThe violence began on the evening of July 26 in Dewanganj, less than 20 kilometres from the Indian border. Thousands of Hindu devotees were returning from the Koshi barrage, where they had collected holy water as part of the annual Bol Bam pilgrimage during the month of Shravan.Carrying saffron flags and accompanied by DJ music, the procession was making its way towards Kaptanganj Chowk, when members of the local Muslim community objected to the volume, and, by some accounts, to the placement of religious flags. As per some local reports, tensions in the area had already risen earlier that day after a Muslim flag was allegedly removed and replaced with a Hindu one.What began as an argument soon escalated into stone-pelting between the two groups, drawing in larger crowds. As the clashes intensified, police first attempted to disperse the crowd before opening fire. One person was killed on the spot and around two dozen others, including police personnel, were injured. Authorities imposed an indefinite curfew and deployed additional units of the Armed Police Force in an effort to restore order.The violence, however, did not end with the imposition of the curfew. Overnight, reports emerged of houses and shops being vandalised in parts of Dewanganj, while rumours and videos of the clashes spread rapidly on social media. By the following day, protests and counter-protests had begun appearing in other towns across the Madhes, transforming what had started as a local confrontation into a wider communal mobilisation.The unrest reached another flashpoint on July 30 when a 15-year-old boy was killed in police firing during protests in Siraha. His death took the toll from police action to three and triggered fresh demonstrations, with protesters vandalising shops and commercial establishments in surrounding areas.Over the four days, authorities imposed curfews and prohibitory orders in a string of towns, including Birgunj, Nepal’s principal trading gateway with India, as tensions spread westwards across the southern plains. Security was tightened in Siraha, Mahottari, Morang and other districts, with the Nepal Army eventually joining the Nepal police and Armed Police Force in patrols aimed at preventing fresh clashes. Drone surveillance was introduced in some towns.Despite the deployment of security agencies, protesters were still damaging properties and disturbing the major highways.The families of those killed initially refused to accept the bodies, demanding action against the police personnel responsible as well as government compensation. It was only after negotiations with the authorities that an agreement was reached under which the government promised to declare the deceased as martyrs, provide each bereaved family with Nepali Rs 1 million in compensation and offer government employment to one eligible family member.Although large-scale clashes had subsided by Friday, the security lockdown remained in place across several districts. Peace marches organised by local communities and religious leaders took place alongside continuing protests, illustrating both the desire to restore normalcy and the depth of mistrust that had emerged over the course of the week.Government response under scrutinyThe government’s handling of the crisis has come under criticism from opposition parties, civil society groups and political observers, who argue that the initial response was too slow to prevent the violence from spreading beyond Sunsari.Home minister Sudan Gurung travelled to Sunsari four days after the first clashes, while Prime Minister Balendra Shah’s first major public intervention came only after the violence had spread to multiple districts. Political observers questioned whether the absence of an early political outreach to community leaders had allowed tensions to escalate.Home minister Gurung (olive shirt) in Sunsari. Photo courtesy Annapurna Post.With the unrest widening, the government shifted into crisis-management mode. The Nepal Army was deployed in support of the Nepal police and Armed Police Force, while Shah convened the National Security Council on July 30 to review the deteriorating security situation. Local administrations imposed curfews and prohibitory orders across several districts as authorities sought to prevent further violence.In a televised address after the agreement with the victims’ families, Shah said protecting lives, preserving communal harmony and restoring peace was the government’s foremost responsibility, while appealing for restraint and warning that those responsible for inciting violence would face action.His remarks came amid growing calls for the government to address not only the immediate unrest but also the deeper causes behind Nepal’s rising communal tensions.While the prime minister was absent from public view, his own party chairman moved into the space. Rabi Lamichhane convened an all-party meeting on July 29, which neither Shah nor Gurung attended; met President Ram Chandra Paudel; and instructed his party’s MPs for the affected districts to return home.On Friday he met religious leaders at the party’s parliamentary office in Singha Durbar, among them Maulana Narul Husein and Maulana Mohammad Khalid; along with Ramchandra Tiwari, general secretary of the World Hindu Federation; and Rajuraj Phuyal of the federation’s secretariat, urging them to use their influence to halt the protests.Shah told Madhes leaders on Friday that there was no distance between him and Lamichhane and that the all-party meeting had been convened by the party chairman by mutual agreement. At the meeting in Singha durbar, Shah faced pointed questions about why he had stayed silent for four to five days and why security personnel had fired above the waist.Security agencies had warned of rising communal tensionsLong before last week’s violence, Nepal’s security agencies had been cautioning the country’s political leadership that communal tensions in the Madhes were becoming more organised and more volatile, warning that relatively minor local disputes could quickly escalate into wider unrest.Three years ago, the Armed Police Force, Nepal’s paramilitary force tasked with border security and riot control, submitted an assessment to the government highlighting the growing vulnerability of the southern plains to communal violence.According to local media reports, the assessment warned of organised attempts to inflame religious tensions in parts of the Madhes and recommended strengthening intelligence gathering, improving coordination among security agencies and developing mechanisms to identify potential flashpoints before they turned violent.Similarly, the Nepal Army repeatedly flagged the possibility of communal violence in its internal assessments, reflecting concerns that religious tensions, once largely localised, could increasingly be exploited to trigger wider instability.Why communal tensions are becoming more frequentFor much of its modern history, Nepal has witnessed relatively few episodes of organised Hindu-Muslim violence compared to many parts of South Asia. Although disputes over religious processions, places of worship and local grievances have occasionally flared into clashes, they were generally contained and rarely acquired the scale or geographical spread seen in the past week.Researchers say that pattern has changed in recent years. A study by the Kathmandu-based Centre for Social Change documented a sharp increase in communal incidents, recording one such clash in 2022, eight in 2024, three in 2025 and 13 in the first five months of 2026 alone. While the figures do not necessarily indicate a continuous upward trend every year, they point to a marked increase in both the frequency and visibility of communal confrontations.Conflict and governance specialist Prakash Bhattarai, who has studied the trend, says the recent violence represents a significant departure from Nepal’s past. “Historically, Nepal had relatively low levels of organised religious violence compared to its South Asian neighbours, and interfaith relations have often been seen as a source of national pride,” he said. “Against this backdrop, a cluster of 37 recorded clashes in under four years, and a sharp jump in 2026, marks an important shift.”Researchers attribute the change to a combination of factors rather than a single cause. They point to growing religious polarisation in parts of the Madhes, the rapid spread of misinformation and inflammatory content on social media, and the increasing tendency for local disputes to be framed in communal terms.Unlike in the past, incidents in one district are now quickly amplified through online networks, allowing rumours and provocative videos to reach neighbouring towns within hours and increasing the risk of retaliatory mobilisation.The geography of the unrest has also shaped these concerns. The Madhes’s open border with India allows the easy movement of people, ideas and media, while communities on either side share languages, religious traditions and close family ties.Analysts say that has made the region more susceptible to political and religious currents circulating across the frontier, even as they caution against reducing the recent violence to any single external influence. Instead, they argue that local grievances, weak administrative responses and broader ideological trends have interacted to create an increasingly combustible environment.The debate over cross-border influencesThe rise in communal tensions has coincided with a broader shift in Nepal’s religious and political landscape over the past two decades. After the monarchy was abolished in 2008, Nepal ceased to be the world’s only officially Hindu kingdom and adopted secularism, a transformation that remains contested by monarchist groups and organisations campaigning for the restoration of a Hindu state.Against that backdrop, researchers and Nepali media have pointed to the growing visibility of organisations associated with the wider Sangh parivar in Nepal’s southern plains.The Kalam Weekly newsletter noted that the Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh (HSS), the international affiliate of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), has operated in Nepal since the 1990s and argued that its activities have become more visible in parts of the Madhes. It pointed to reports of slogans such as “Go back to Pakistan” and instances of Muslims allegedly being forced to chant “Jai Shri Ram” during recent clashes, describing them as rhetoric that had previously been uncommon in Nepal.A 2024 report by the Center for the Study of Organised Hate similarly said organisations such as the Vishva Hindu Parishad and Bajrang Dal had expanded their presence in Nepal’s Terai districts.Separately, the US State Department’s 2023 International Religious Freedom Report on Nepal recorded claims by civil society leaders that right-wing religious groups associated with India’s Bharatiya Janata Party were providing financial support to influential Nepali politicians advocating the restoration of a Hindu state, while noting that no evidence had been provided to substantiate those allegations.In an editorial published on Thursday, Himal Khabar claimed that its own investigations into communal violence in the Madhes-Tarai had found the direct and indirect involvement of the RSS through the HSS Nepal.The magazine alleged that individuals associated with these organisations had used social media to spread provocative messages and had mobilised crowds on the ground while calling for violence against the minority community in the name of protecting religion. It further claimed that the authorities were aware of these activities but had failed to act because of the influence of individuals linked to the organisations.