It was September 28, the birthday of five-year-old Sagun. The day turned out to be the most tragic in his life. His mother Sabita Sapkota was killed when a landslide triggered by incessant rains, struck a house at ward 1 of Panauti Municipality in Kavrepalanchok district.

Sagun and his mother had arrived at his maternal uncle’s home at Ashramedanda in ward 1 of Panauti on September 2. After two days of heavy rain, on the morning of September 28, fear of a looming landslide sent villagers scrambling out of their homes. At around 7 am, Sagun and his grandmother stepped out and headed towards a nearby house where Sagun’s mother Sabita and his aunt Rashmita were still asleep. But, before they could reach the house, a massive landslide buried it. In a desperate attempt to save her daughters, the grandmother rushed to the landslide but sustained serious injuries while her daughters were buried to death.

Sagun was the witness of this heart wrenching incident. The boy is still traumatised by the disaster that happened in front of his eyes. Sagun used to call his mother ‘Sabi aunty’. He shows the incident site to whoever visits the bereaved family to express their condolences and says, “the landslide buried Sabi aunty here.”

Sagun’s relatives repeatedly attempt to take him elsewhere, but he refuses to leave the site. He looks at the incident site and says, “My Sabi aunty is under the debris.”

Not only did Sagun lose his mother on his fifth birthday, but her death has also dashed any hope of ever knowing his father, whose identity still remains a mystery.

Sabita had gone to Kathmandu in search of a job. She met a man and they were in a relationship, but when she became pregnant, he vanished. Then she returned to her maternal home at Ashramedanda and gave birth to Sagun in 2019. Two years ago, determined to secure a future for her son, Sabita again went back to the national capital.

Sabita had been working as a house maid in New Baneshwar, Kathmandu. She had only returned to her maternal home for a short break while her landlords had gone abroad for a few weeks.

Sagun’s grandfather Kanchha Sapkota, ekes out a living as a daily wage worker. He had three daughters and a son, but the landslide killed his two daughters—Sabita and Rashmita. His wife was badly injured in the disaster, and his son is currently working in Saudi Arabia.

Kanchha’s home had already suffered damage in the 2015 earthquake. A social organisation had rebuilt it, but the recent landslide wiped it out.

“Now I have neither the house nor the children. My wife is injured and cannot walk properly. There is no one to take care of my grandson and my wife,” lamented Kanchha, who is performing the 13-day death ritual of his daughters in his brother’s house. The neighbours are providing care to his injured wife and grandson.

Kanchha is worried about his grandson’s future. Since his father is not known, Sagun does not have a birth registration certificate. “The boy does not have identification papers (legal documents). His mother is dead and we don’t know who his father is. He will be in trouble in future without documents,” said Kanchha.

Gita Banjara, deputy mayor of Panauti Municipality, has assured that the municipality would coordinate with the district administration office to resolve the issue with Sagun’s birth registration.

Kavre, a hill district of Bagmati Province, is the hardest hit by the floods and landslides that hit various parts of the country in the last week of September. A total of 78 people were killed in Kavre alone while the rain-induced disasters ruined various infrastructures including houses, roads, the drinking water projects, utility poles. According to preliminary data of the Agriculture Development Office, the floods and landslides destroyed agricultural crops worth around Rs420 million in Kavre.