Thanks for your prompt feedback, I will share this information and I hope it contributes something to to your situation. I'm Irish and have always had a lot of respect for the Gorkha people because their historical situation is easy to identify with. I definitely encourage you to write up a short article of your own on this since you have first-hand experience, perhaps for submission tomorrow or friday (around this same time of day or a little earlier for best exposure).
This seems like a textbook case of a problem that should be easily soluble by technical means but which is blocked by other factors. It's strange and unfortunate that Firechat doesn't work on desktop (allowing easy spread by USB keys), and also (AFAIK) that it's not practical to pper up to install it.
I have no idea about how to build a data-on-voice app (which would have the same bootstrapping problems as firechat), but if you have a printer and want to do some organizing you could establish phone trees with some friends, and then get people to travel by bus to your neighborhood, install firechat, and begin (slowly) lighting up the dark zone, maybe?
http://www.intermountainpro.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/P...
Please do submit an article on this. I think it's an important example of a collective action problem of the sort that people int he west have partly forgotten how to deal with.