World Newah Organization Honors Heidelberg Team for Exhibition on Buṅgadyaḥ: The Rain-Making God
On October 4, 2025, the World Newah Organization (Baltimore, USA) honored the Forschungsgruppe Nepal at Heidelberg University for curating the exhibition “Buṅgadyaḥ: The Rain-Making God” at the CATS Library. The award was presented by Kumar Napit, President and European Coordinator of the Organization’s German Chapter in Hamburg, and Bishnu Malla, a senior cultural artist from Nepal, in recognition of the team’s contribution to promoting Newar culture through the exhibition. The exhibition was curated by Manik Bajracharya, Christiane Brosius, Simon Cubelic, Rajan Khatiwoda, Monalisa Maharjan, and Marion Wettstein. It presents four thematic dimensions—places, people, text, and performance—of the Buṅgadyaḥ (Rāto Matsyendranātha) procession, one of the Kathmandu Valley’s most significant ritual celebrations. The exhibition was inaugurated during the 28th European Conference on South Asian Studies (ECSAS) at the Library of the Centre for Asian and Transcultural Studies (CATS) and will remain open until November 25, 2025.