Sankhuwasabha, Sept. 5 -- On a winter night in 2023, Jojo Bhote drifted off to the gushing Chhujung river, a sound that had carried him into sleep for over three decades. Around midnight, he felt the rumble of distant thuds. Jojo, whose family has tended these mountain pastures for generations, sprang from his bed, corralled his family, and stepped outside to find bulldozers tearing through stone walls that marked the community's ancestral land. When he and his neighbours approached the workers, a company supervisor pulled a sheaf of papers bearing official seals and signatures, Jojo recalls - his own name among them.

"This is not mine," he told them.

The man shrugged and continued. At dawn, Jojo and other villagers followed the tracks ...