Nepal, Sept. 26 -- When studying social studies at school, I remember learning about King Prithvi Narayan Shah, Bhimsen Thapa, the great unification of Nepal, the Sugauli treaty, the Kot massacre and the many palace conspiracies that followed. It always felt as if they were just names and events to memorise for tests, rather than topics to analyse and understand. They came with little to no context or depth; all the information was presented as isolated facts, not as a history that shaped the Nepal we live in today.

Later, in grades 11 and 12, the subject of history had almost disappeared from our curriculum, unless one chose the humanities stream (it rarely provided the required historical perspectives and depth). There is no option to ...