The Foundation & Yogi Ji

A small foundation, quietly at work since 2015

हिमालयन वेलनेस फाउण्डेशन — registered in Kathmandu, offering Himalayan sound healing, yoga, meditation, wellness courses and retreats into the mountains.

Yogi Ji seated in meditation in saffron dress on a woven mat, an arc of hand-hammered Himalayan singing bowls, tingsha and strikers laid out before him, two large gongs and a brass lamp behind
The organisation

What the Foundation is

Himalayan Wellness Foundation is a registered Nepali spiritual and cultural wellness organisation based at Naksal in Kathmandu. It was incorporated on 23 July 2015 with the Office of the Company Registrar, Government of Nepal, and has been affiliated with the Social Welfare Council since 2016.

Our registered objectives are plain ones: to teach and practise yoga, meditation and sound healing; to care for guests travelling in Nepal for spiritual and adventure reasons; to bring wellness programmes to institutions; and to carry Nepal's spiritual tradition to people beyond our borders who are looking for it.

We are not a large organisation and we have never tried to become one. The work is done by a few people who know each other well, and most of what we do is done for free.

How our free service works

Registration
137187/72/73Office of the Company Registrar, Government of Nepal. Incorporated 23 July 2015.
PAN
603512403
Social Welfare Council
Affiliation No. 43731Affiliated since 2016.
Tax exemption
Certificate No. 24
Where we are
Naksal, KathmanduSessions by arrangement. Please write before coming.
Formerly
Aama Memorial FoundationThe Foundation's earlier registered name.
Yogi Ji, Ashok Sharma Bhatta, seated in lotus in saffron dress on the terrace above Pashupatinath temple, Kathmandu
At Pashupatinath, in the dress he wears to practise and to teach.
The practitioner

Ashok Sharma Bhatta — Yogi Ji

अशोक शर्मा भट्ट. Director of the Foundation, teacher, and the person who will most likely be sitting with you.

Yogi Ji is devoted to the Nath tradition — to Guru Gorakhnath, to Shiva, to Pashupatinath. That devotion is not a background detail to the work; it is the work. What is offered in a session comes out of a daily practice that began long before any certificate was issued for it.

He wears his own traditional dress while giving treatment. Guests sometimes ask about it, and the answer is simple: this is how he practises, and how he was taught. It is not presented as performance for visitors.

He speaks Nepali and English. He is unhurried with people who are nervous, and he is completely straightforward about what sound and breath can and cannot do — which is, in our view, the most important qualification of all.

Plenty of people in Nepal can teach yoga. Fewer can teach yoga and also read the weather on a high pass and know when to turn a group around.

Training

Where the practice was learned

  • Certified International Yoga Teacher — 200-hour teacher training Maha Yoga Global College Australia, recognised by Yoga Alliance International and Yoga Alliance Australia (RYS 200), August 2025
  • Sound Healing Natural Soundhealing International School, Thamel, Kathmandu (IAOTH-accredited), March 2023
  • Traditional Hatha Yoga Sadhana Shree Sawar Meditation Yoga Center, Thamel, April–May 2024
  • Certified Trekking Guide Nepal Academy of Tourism & Hotel Management (NATHM), Ministry of Culture, Tourism & Civil Aviation, 94th training, 2024
  • Mountaineering Certificate — Mt. Ganchenpo, 6,378 m Department of Tourism, Government of Nepal. Summited 11 November 2022.
A record of service given

Honours received

  • National Youth Talent Award 2078 Ministry of Youth & Sports, Government of Nepal, Singha Durbar
  • Letter of Appreciation — Kathmandu Valley Police Office Ministry of Home Affairs, Ranipokhari. For yoga and meditation training given to police personnel, signed by the Deputy Inspector General and the Additional Inspector General of Police.
  • Appreciation — Panchpokhari Thangpal Rural Municipality Sindhupalchok. For being first to summit Gangchempo by the Panchpokhari route, and for the contribution to tourism there.
  • Honour — Aarughat Rural Municipality Gorkha, Gandaki Province. As yoga instructor for a municipal healthy-living and mental wellbeing programme.
  • Appreciation — Newa Chhe Yoga Sadhana Kendra Tokha Municipality Ward 5, Kathmandu. For a five-day sound therapy programme delivered.
  • Appreciation — Kashyap Academy Kalanki, Kathmandu. As yoga instructor, countersigned by the Mayor of Kirtipur Municipality and the Minister for Youth & Sports.

Honoured by the Kathmandu Valley Police Office (Ministry of Home Affairs), with wellness programmes offered to the Nepal Army, Kathmandu Metropolitan City and schools across the valley.

“These are set down as a record of service given. It has been our blessing to be called, and that is the whole of it.”

Invited to serve

Institutions that have asked us

Each of these corresponds to a document the Foundation holds, or to a programme it was invited to deliver and can show you photographs of.

Kathmandu Valley Police OfficeMinistry of Home Affairs · Letter of Appreciation
Ministry of Youth & SportsNational Youth Talent Award 2078
Nepal ArmyYoga and sound healing sessions
Aarughat Rural MunicipalityMunicipal wellbeing programme · Gorkha
Panchpokhari ThangpalRural Municipality · Sindhupalchok
Newa Chhe Yoga Sadhana KendraFive-day sound therapy programme · Tokha
Kashyap AcademyYoga instruction · Kalanki, Kathmandu
Schools across the ValleyStudent and staff wellbeing sessions
Yogi Ji being honoured with a garland and shawl at an outdoor wellbeing programme in Kathmandu
Why the paperwork is on the page

You should be able to check us

Wellness attracts a certain amount of invention, and Nepal gets more of it than most places. If you are booking a retreat from the other side of the world with someone you have never met, the least we can do is be checkable. Every registration number, certificate and letter named on this page exists on paper and can be shown to you if you ask.

Equally, we have not listed anything we cannot show. Where a programme was delivered but no letter was issued, we say the programme was delivered, and we leave it there. Where an institution's crest belongs to the state rather than to us, we write its name rather than borrow its emblem.

If anything on this site is unclear, or you would like to see a document before booking, please write. We will send it gladly.