Nepal schoolchildren donate snack money to Bhotekoshi flood victims

Kathmandu,UPDATED: Sep 3, 2026 14:16 IST

Schoolchildren across Nepal are contributing part of their snack money and pocket money to help victims of the devastating Bhotekoshi floods in Rasuwa, even as domestic and international assistance continues to pour in. Moved by television images of homes being swept away, families being separated and schools being damaged, many children far from the disaster zone have found their own way to respond by giving whatever little they can.

From Achham and Kapilvastu to Rautahat and Kathmandu, students have donated sums ranging from NPR 5 to NPR 500, with some skipping snacks for a day. Their contributions have been deposited into the Prime Minister's Relief Fund and the Prime Minister's Natural Disaster Relief Fund as the country deals with widespread destruction caused by the floods.

At Shodasha Secondary School in Mangalsen Municipality-5 of Achham, the idea came from ninth-grade student Yunik KC, The Kathmandu Post reported. On Monday, members of the student-led child club, which represents around 1,500 students, met to discuss the farewell of a retired head teacher. During the meeting, Yunik suggested that they do something for children affected by the floods, and they decided to collect donations for children who had lost their homes, relatives or access to education.

"I felt that even if we did not have much money, we could still do something," Yunik was quoted as saying. Yunik said students went to all classrooms asking for voluntary contributions, and the donations ranged from NPR 5 to NPR 500. "For some of us, it meant using the money we would normally spend on snacks so that it could help students affected by the flood," Grade 10 student Laxmi Shahi said.

Students who had themselves lost loved ones also contributed. "Seven friends who have lost their parents also contributed. We wanted to help students like us," Shahi said.

The child club collected NPR 8,785 on the first day and NPR 5,470 on the second, taking the total to NPR 14,255. Teacher Dhan Kumar KC said the money was deposited into the Prime Minister's Relief Fund through Rastriya Banijya Bank on Wednesday. "A contribution is not big or small," KC said, adding that the students themselves took the initiative. "I have only been facilitating them," he added.

At Pragatisheel Basic School in Mangalsen-1, students repeated the gesture by donating money meant for one day's snacks. Teacher Himmat Bahadur Rawal said they collected NPR 585, which was deposited into a relief fund.

In Kapilvastu, nine-year-old Somya Upadhyay, a Grade 5 student at Rastriya Janahit Secondary School in Dharmanpaniya, asked her parents for NPR 20 more than usual for snacks on Wednesday and donated the NPR 50 she received that day. Seven-year-old Radhika Kohar, a Grade 3 student at the same school, donated NPR 30. Both girls skipped their snacks and put the money into a donation box.

Their classmates then contributed between NPR 5 and NPR 100 after the morning assembly, raising NPR 10,050, which was later deposited into the Prime Minister's Natural Disaster Relief Fund. Headmaster Raj Kumar Kohar said more than 200 of the school's 350 students contributed. "The students made the collection box themselves and went from classroom to classroom asking their friends to contribute," he was quoted as saying.

In Rautahat district, 26 students of Prempur Gonahi Secondary School in Dewahi Gonahi Municipality-7 pooled NPR 5 and NPR 10 portions of their snack money and deposited NPR 470 into the Prime Minister's Relief Fund. Head teacher Mukesh Yadav said the students' gesture showed that distance could not prevent people from sharing another community's pain. "Geography may keep people apart, but suffering is shared," Yadav said.

In Kathmandu, students at Manmaiju Secondary School also joined the effort. Led by students of Grades 11 and 12, children from Grades 6 to 12 cut their snack expenses and collected NPR 37,110, which was deposited into the Prime Minister's Relief Fund.

The donations have come as the Bhotekoshi disaster has caused widespread damage across Rasuwa and downstream districts. Several schools in Rasuwa, Nuwakot and Dhading were damaged, with classrooms filled with mud, sand and silt. The flash floods were triggered by an ice-rock avalanche near the Nepal-Tibet border on August 26 and devastated towns and villages in northern and central Nepal. The death toll from the devastation rose to over 1,250 on Thursday as more bodies were recovered, while more than 4,800 people were still missing.

As of Wednesday afternoon, NPR 7.77 billion had been deposited into the Prime Minister's Relief Fund, while around USD 6 million had been deposited into the government's dollar account, the report said. Across the country, children have added their own small contributions to that wider relief effort by giving up part of their daily spending to help other children who have lost homes, families and classrooms.

With PTI Inputs

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