Born in Nepal, treated as a foreigner

How adoptees face hostility and human rights violations in Nepal’s citizenship system

A growing number of adult adoptees of Nepali origin have started returning to the land of their birth, and seeking not only emotional reconnection but formal recognition through the Non-resident Nepali (NRN) card or citizenship. 

But these returnees are too often met not with welcome, but with suspicion, obstruction, and at times, open hostility. 

After becoming the first adoptee to obtain an NRN card, I recently returned to Nepal to successfully claim NRN-citizenship. That success does not signify a welcoming state structure towards adoptees. On the contrary, it was an odyssey through psychological, legal and transnational hurdles.

In fact, my case is among the more straightforward ones: my birth parents are alive, and my adoption paperwork is complete and legally valid. Yet even in this privileged scenario, officials created several hurdles and used intimidation instead of supporting my return to Nepal, which would be expected from a public service agency. I was able to counter this with legal knowledge and persistence. 

But for most adoptees it is not so easy. A systemic overhaul is urgently needed. Thousands of children were involuntarily removed from their country of birth under fabricated or incomplete documentation. Then there is the negligence of adoption agencies and government institutions, which often failed to preserve adoption records.

Nepal’s citizenship laws are built on assumptions that do not hold for internationally adopted citizens -- they presume patrilineal continuity, uninterrupted documentation, and lifelong presence within the country. But intercountry adoption especially interrupts all of these. 

It severs legal ties with birth parents, replaces surnames, and shifts jurisdiction abroad. What remains is often a fragile or incomplete paper trail, if at all. Yet adoptees are still expected to prove family ties that the law itself dissolved, claim a birthplace without official records, and seek recognition while being treated as foreigners.

At first glance, it may seem as though we as adult adoptees are asking to be written into a legal framework that was never meant for us. But this perception ignores both Nepal’s historical promises and the core of its own citizenship policy. The country follows jus sanguinis — the right of blood — as its guiding principle, meaning that descent from a Nepali parent should be sufficient to establish eligibility. In theory, this includes adoptees who can prove their birth and parentage.

But the practical process demands documentation that many adoptees simply do not possess due to systemic negligence during the adoption era such as a citizenship certificate of a parent or grandparent, an original Nepali birth certificate, verified family links, or a local ward recommendation.

The structural failure of the government to rectify those mistakes and grant birthright citizenship is in violation of the human rights of its five thousand adoptees.

In my own file, for example, my birth father and adoptive parents signed a clause agreeing not to erase my religion or name and to facilitate my return to Nepal. These were not symbolic gestures — they were official commitments enshrined in Nepali legal documents. They demonstrate an intention by the Nepali state to protect the child’s identity and connection to the country, not to erase it. 

The state must therefore do its part to honor the clauses it required others to sign. Failing to do so does not just betray individual adoptees—it undermines Nepal’s credibility in its own legal system and its obligations under international human rights and children’s rights frameworks. 

Adoption agreement between Kul Prasad Adhikari and the family Sacré-Bonnarens with official government stamps detailing Clause 3 about facilitating the return of the adoptee to his/her own country.

Yet, what adult adoptees now face is the opposite. The hostility we encounter at orphanages, local wards, and District Administration Offices (DAO) stands in sharp contrast to the protective spirit of the original documents. More troubling still is the contradiction between Nepal’s 2010 suspension of intercountry adoption — initiated after international concern over child trafficking, falsified documentation, and lack of regulatory oversight — and its ongoing refusal to facilitate the legal return of adoptees. 

Reports by UNICEF and Hague Conference observers documented cases of children being declared orphans while biological families were still alive, prompting countries like the US, France, and Italy to halt adoptions from Nepal. 

In 2007 and again in 2010, Nepal pledged reform, but while the pipeline of adoptions was shut down, no system was created for those sent abroad to come back home. The very individuals whose lives were shaped by the corrupt system Nepal sought to abolish are now being left in limbo.

Here are four moments from my NRN citizenship application that highlight the scale of the problem:

"You’re not Nepali!" 

-Kaski DAO official holding my birth certificate

At the Kaski DAO office, I was told to my face, while the officer held my Nepali birth certificate in his hands, that I was not Nepali. My Belgian citizenship documents also stated my place of birth as Kaski, and my adoption papers clarified my connection to my birth and adoptive parents. Yet the verdict was final. It was only after we requested to speak to the Deputy Officer and argued based on Nepal’s own adoption documents that we were permitted to begin the procedure. Ironically, the Legal Handbook for Non-Resident Nepalis explicitly lists birth in Nepal as one of the primary forms of proof for establishing NRN eligibility, yet even this was dismissed at the local level.

"You don’t speak Nepali, you’re not Nepali!" 

-Kaski DAO official

Several officers opposed the Deputy's decision. They began obstructing the process, questioning my motive, and ridiculing my language ability. One insisted that I respond without my lawyer, as if speaking Nepali, even imperfectly, could serve as legal proof of citizenship. 

Another official absurdly accused me of speaking with a Hindi accent. I was told, over and over again, that I was not Nepali. Yet language proficiency is not a criterion for citizenship by descent, making these remarks not only discriminatory but legally unfounded. I know my rights and persevered, but many adoptees would be deterred by such hostile behaviour.

"You faked your birth certificate!" 

-Kaski DAO official

The accusation of forgery came from a more senior officer. Like most adoptees, I only had English translations of my adoption records, and the originals were not preserved by the ward office. The ward office of my birth parents facilitated the renewal of the certificate based on the English translation. The Embassy of Nepal in Belgium had accepted this same document for my NRN card. Yet at the Kaski DAO office, it became grounds for suspicion. Here lies the deeper issue for adoptees: due to incomplete or untranslated records, ward offices often need to reconstruct or reissue birth certificates to align with the format required for legal procedures in Nepal. If Nepal failed to preserve its records, why punish the adoptee?

"You should be grateful you’re even considered for citizenship!" 

-Kaski DAO official

Despite having fulfilled every legal requirement, my file was repeatedly placed at the bottom of the pile. When we questioned the delay, we were told to be grateful that I was even being considered. But citizenship is not a gesture of goodwill. It is a legal right. Adoptees, like all Nepalis born in Nepal, are entitled to that right, regardless of where they grew up. The ability of lower-level staff to delay or obstruct files at their discretion reveals a deeper structural problem: access to rights in Nepal too often depends not on the law, but on the personal attitudes of those tasked with upholding it.

While the hostility was jarring, there were also moments of empathy. The Deputy Officer and Chief Officer acted with integrity, supported my case, and even apologised for the unnecessary delays. But this does not erase the need for structural change.

Adoptees returning to claim citizenship are not asking for special treatment. They are invoking rights already granted to them under international law, including the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. These frameworks guarantee the right to identity, family, and nationality. Nepal has an obligation to honour them.

Countries like South Korea have embraced returnee adoptees as part of their diaspora. Nepal must do the same. Public education campaigns and training for administrative staff are urgent. DAO officers must be equipped to understand who adoptees are, what records they can bring, and how their return is not a threat, but a form of justice.

The roughly 5,000 Nepali children adopted abroad were once exported as orphans. Now, many are returning as adults — educated, legally prepared, and determined. They are not visitors. They are citizens. 

And they will not wait. They will claim their rights, case by case, until the system is forced to evolve.

Hari Prasad Adhikari Sacré, PhD, is a postdoctoral researcher at Ghent University in Belgium, specialising in education, multilingualism, identity and intercountry adoption.