India, Sept. 8 -- The protests in Nepal against a ban on most popular social media apps are stunning in their scale, but the rage fueling them was far from sudden.

It reflected more recently in trends and hashtags referencing "Nepo Kids" - children of politicians photographed enjoying luxurious lifestyles - to expose alleged nepotism and corruption.

That rage matched with ingenuity meant that despite a ban on platforms like Facebook, WhatsApp and Snapchat, protesters gathered in the thousands in capital Kathmandu and elsewhere on Monday, using alternatives like TikTok or technical workarounds like VPN to spread their message.

And what began as a hashtag over nepotism, turned into a full-scale "Protest by Gen-Z" when the government went...