“The Himalayas are dying — and three Nepali poets at Delhi’s Indraprastha Cultural Festival are sounding the alarm while there is still time to listen.

Moderator Yusuf Shabir opens by threading ancient sacred traditions — the mountain man who breaks a twig to ask the goddess’s permission before entering the forest, the Pandavas’ final pilgrimage, Annapurna as Shiva’s wife whose glaciers feed all civilisation — against the hard reality of unplanned roads cutting into alpine valleys like dragons, Everest smothered in tourist garbage, and villages racing to pour concrete over their own sacred landscapes. He reads from his book Annapurna Poems, the poem “”Mules”” capturing those who carry modernity’s weight up glaciers until their legs give out. Senior poet Hari Adhikari then recalls growing up believing the mountains themselves held up the sky, before reciting “”Remote,”” “”Concrete Jungle,”” and the devastating “”Modikola”” — a poem about a sacred Himalayan river strangled like a noose by an encroaching road.

The panel debates Nepal’s defining paradox: Bhutan preserved its ecology under tighter governance, but Nepal’s democratic opening in the 1990s triggered uncontrolled construction and Maoist-era exploitation of the mountains. Speakers call for indigenous infrastructure over Chinese dependence, and express cautious hope in a younger generation that sees India and Nepal as one civilisational family. The session closes with the poets claiming their role — “”unacknowledged legislators,”” powerless in politics but irreplaceable as keepers of the sacred.”

About the Speakers:

Shailendra Sakar is a leading Nepali poet and short story writer who has published over a dozen books spanning poetry, fiction, and memoir. He is an active participant in shaping cultural resistance, leading influential movements. His memoir Bhojpure Hulakika Santan offers a reflective and deeply personal account of memory, struggle, and literary evolution.

Yuyutsu Sharma, “the world-renowned Himalayan poet”, is a Punjab-born Indian poet, one of the few poets in the world who make their living from poetry. He has received fellowships and grants from numerous prestigious institutions including Rockefeller Foundation & Ireland Literature Exchange. The author of eleven poetry collections, his newest, In God’s Messy Workplace: New Poems, will appear in 2026.

Hari Adhikari is a leading writer, editor and mentor in contemporary Nepali literature. He has published several influential poetry collections, including Sansadma Ek Din , Hari Adhakarika Kavita and Garmentki Gayatri (The Gayatri of the Garment). Adhikari has also written short fiction that captures the subtleties of ordinary lives and the complexities of social change in Nepal.