A Nepalese teacher Mahabir Pun, with the help of volunteers from the U.S. and Europe, connects the first village in Nepal to the internet using long range wireless links built from homemade antennas. This successful attempt started the beginning of the Nepal Wireless Network, which has since connected hundreds of other villages in the Himalayas to the internet.
After earning his Master's degree in 2001, Pun returned to his native village of Nangi, in the Myagdi district of Nepal, with a dream: to provide better educational opportunities for the children in the remote Himalayan areas. He upgraded the village school to he a hub of community development projects. But his attempts were limited because there were no telephones or modern communication system of any kind in that region,
He has to walk for several hours from one village to the next, just to communicate with people.
His attempt to connect the remote areas using wireless network brought internet to rural schools, promoting digital literacy and improve education quality in overall. Pun wasn't the first to try to connect Nepal. In early 2000, there were similar attempts. But those didn't succeed because Wi-Fi was still an emerging technology back then, and Nepal itself had banned the importance of the technology because it may aid the fights between rebels in the area.
Pun was then elected Ashoka Fellow by the Ashoka Foundation, the global association of leading social entrepreneurs. The Foundation noted his contribution to overcoming the geographical isolation of many of the communities in which he works. He was later awarded by numerous awards and recognition for his ongoing and outstanding work for Nepal.