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The unveiling of the National Commitment Paper by the new government is a welcome step. In a context where public discourse has been dominated by the negativity and failures of the past regime, this reform agenda signals a much-needed attempt to restore trust in governance, strengthen accountability, and set a new direction for Nepal's development.
Yet, amid these ambitious pledges, one glaring omission undermines the credibility of the document: the denial of women's basic economic right to their labour.
Women's economic contributions remain invisible in the government's framework. Despite sustaining over 80% of the population through unpaid care, subsistence agriculture, and informal labour, their work is not recognised as "economic." This denial reflects a historic pattern where women's labour has been systematically excluded from the definition of "productive work".
The government's 100-Point Governance Reform Agenda speaks of agricultural modernisation, green growth, and energy export strategies. Yet nowhere does it acknowledge that women are the backbone of Nepal's agriculture. Women are also central to climate resilience, managing water, forests, and community adaptation. Their role is critical to green growth, but it is erased from the economic framework, leaving them excluded from resources, benefits, and decision-making.
Equally troubling is the silence on unpaid care labour. Too often, "care infrastructure" is narrowly understood as facilities for children, the elderly, or the sick. But care extends far beyond these domains. It includes the daily, invisible household and domestic chores – cooking, cleaning, fetching water, fuel collection – that sustain families and communities. Women disproportionately shoulder this burden, subsidising both the state and the market.
The government rightly acknowledges the historic exclusion, injustice, and humiliation of deprived groups, but it remains silent on the equally historic denial of women's economic rights and gender justice. Unlike caste, which is one axis of discrimination, gender cuts across all groups and sectors of the economy. Women have been historically excluded not only from governance structures but also from the recognition of their labour as economic, despite their critical role in sustaining households, agriculture, and community resilience. Justice cannot be selective: acknowledging one form of exclusion while ignoring gender-based exclusion undermines the very foundation of inclusive governance.
If Nepal's reforms are to be truly transformative, gender justice must be embedded alongside caste and class justice. That means recognising unpaid care work as part of the national economy, integrating gender-disaggregated indicators into every reform pledge, ensuring women's land rights and access to credit, and embedding women's agricultural and climate contributions into green growth strategies. Without women's voices, labour, and leadership, the promise of reform will remain incomplete.
A version of this article appears in the print on April 22, 2026, of The Himalayan Times.