Rejected at border, former Bhutanese political prisoners return after 18 years in jail

Chatur Man Tamang and Hasta Bahadur Rai began a journey back toward Bhutan on Tuesday evening, only to be rejected at the Nepal border after spending more than 18 years as political prisoners.

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I remember a little.

Tamang and Rai were among the Nepali-speaking Bhutanese expelled from Bhutan in the early 1990s. They had hoped to return to refugee camps in eastern Nepal where they spent their childhood. Instead, they found themselves stranded at the Nepal-India border without identification and with no country willing to accept them.

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Indian vehicles dropped us near the Mechi River.

After their expulsion from Bhutan in 1992, their families initially lived near the Mai Khola before relocating to refugee camps in Jhapa and Morang districts. Tamang and Rai grew up together in these camps, attending school until they became involved in advocacy for repatriation to Bhutan. Around 2008, they attempted to return to Bhutan, were arrested, and subsequently imprisoned for 18 years and three months.

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We simply got in.

During their imprisonment, family visits ceased after 2016, and they learned their relatives had resettled in Australia and the United States. Carrying photographs of their families, Rai had hoped to return to the Beldangi refugee camp. However, they were released from prison on Monday and instructed by Bhutanese police to board a vehicle to the Indian border town of Jaigaon. There, Bhutanese security personnel warned them never to return to Bhutan.

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They told us never to come back to Bhutan. They said that if we returned, even by mistake, we would be se