‘No Dalits in policy-making’

By a Post Reporter

KATHMANDU, July 8 - There is no participation of Dalits in the judiciary and policy-making, said a noted Dalit activist amid a function here today.

D B Sagar Bishwokarma said unless there is adequate representation of 4,500,000 Dalits in the mainstream, the nation cannot attain holistic development.

He urged the government to find alternatives for Dalits’ upliftment by reserving seats for Dalits in the state-level machineries. He also urged both the government and the private bodies to carry out socio-economic programmes for their upliftment.

Ranju Thakur, a social activist, presenting a paper on Violence Against Dalit Women said, "Dalit women face twin suppressions of being ‘Dalit’ and ‘women’". She strongly urged the government first to implement constitutional commitments and to form National Dalits Commission to oversee their problems. She said, "Religious revolution is essential for Dalit’s upliftment."

According to Divya Jha, a social activist, 25 percent of total Dalits smoke which constitutes 58 percent males and 42 percent females. She said Dalits spend 90 percent of their income in beer or cigarettes which is promoting domestic violence. "Terai Dalits are further exploited by other Dalits," she said.

Addressing the function, chairperson of Feminist Dalit Organization Durga Sob said, Dalits should not be looked as people of mercy but they should be given rights.

Vice Chairman of the committee for the Upliftment of Suppressed and Dalits Ganesh Bahadur Pariyar said, "Hindu religion is the core point for Dalit exploitation," adding "donor agencies are not being able to approach the targeted population."

Massive fee hike in private institutes

By a Post Reporter

NUWAKOT, July 8 - The schools and campuses running at the private sector in this district have made a tremendous increase in the monthly and admission fees of the students since the current academic session to increase the salary of teachers.

They have made the increase in view of the substantial increase made by the government in the salary of government employees and teachers in the budget for the fiscal year 2000-2001.

Nuwakot Adarsha Multiple Campus which was established in private sector in 2042 BS has decided to increase the monthly fees and admission fees by 40 to 90.48 percents.

A meeting of the campus held under the chairmanship of the campus management committee Chairman Thursday decided to increase the fees of Proficiency Certificate level and 10+2 classes by 100 rupees per month and that of Bachelor level by 190 rupees so that students of these two levels have to pay 350 rupees and 400 rupees respectively.

Similarly, students of Proficiency Certificate level should pay one thousand 265 rupees as against 995 rupees in the past and students of Bachelor level one thousand 970 rupees as against one thousand 375 in the past as their admission fees.

The private sector campus was compelled to make such a huge increase in the admission and monthly fees because the campus has no other source of income and they have to increase the salary of teachers at a par with the salary of the government employees and teachers and make up the deficit in the wake of salary increase announced by the government for the fiscal year 2000-2001, member-secretary of the managing committee and campus chief Bharat Raj Adhikari said.

He also informed that the campus management may have to further increase the students’ fees if Bidur Municipality and Nuwakot District Development Committee did not fulfil their pledge by paying 100 thousand rupees and 150 thousand rupees respectively to the campus.

The Free Students’ Union President Sriram Shrestha opposed this unexpected increase in fees and said students would build pressure on the campus management to withdraw this increase made at a time when the session was going on. He informed that they would also hold other programmes if their demand was not met.

Other schools and boarding schools running at different places of the district have also increased students’ fees by 75 to 90 percent.

Although the priority of the government in this year’s budget was poverty alleviation, the poor people have been more victimized due to huge increase in the expenses of different organisations and institutions following the substantial increase in the salary of government employees and teachers, social worker Lal bahadur Ojha told The Kathmandu Post.

Dhimal girls attend school in uniform

By a Post Reporter

BIRATNAGAR, July 8 - Girls of Dhimal ethnic community have started going to schools in shirts and frocks or kurta-suruwal like all the girls of other communities.

In the past, they were compelled by their guardians to wear their traditional dresses while going to school but the girls felt ashamed to go to school in these dresses which did not cover a half of their body. Dhimal’s traditional dresses include Dabona, Itangi, petani and lungi.

The most common traditional dress of Dhimal women is petani which covers their body from the breast down to their knees.

Since they were forced by their society to keep bare their body above the breast and below the knees, the girls felt ashamed to go to school until a few years ago and deserted school. However, they are now going to school in modern uniform like the rest of the girls at school as a result of modernization which is gradually entering their society.

Sarita Dhimal of Morang Katahari-2 says she was deprived of the schooling opportunity due to dress factor despite her desire for learning. She said, "I went to school in traditional Dhimal dress until I was in class five. When I passed class five I was quite grown up and I felt ashamed to go to school with half-naked body. Consequently, I left the school."

Sarita was then urged by her society to go to school in her traditional dress and her school friends and teachers advised her to come to school in school uniform. She could not disregard her society and left the school.

Sarita now sends her 12-year-old daughter, Anju, to school in school uniform. She says, " If we make the traditional dress compulsory for our daughters, they will not go to school." She wants to save her daughter from the injustice which she herself had to bear on account of traditional dress.

Another woman who could not pursue her studies due to traditional dress, Sita Dhimal, says, "We were forced to give up our studies due to traditional dress, but today we send our daughters to school in modern costume. Of course, there is still some pressure to wear traditional costume, but we disregard the pressure. If we yield to the pressure, our daughters will not go to school and we don’t want to repeat the mistake."

Dhimal girls are now going to school freely wearing their school uniform. The light of consciousness came to their society along with the changes of 1990, according to President of Dhimal Jati Vikas Samiti Lok Bahadur Dhimal.

"We should not stick to the traditional dress if it is a hindrance to development," he opined. It is perhaps due to this attitude that Dhimal women also freely wear sari, blouse, shirt, frock, kurta sural and other costume of their choice like the rest of the Nepali women. Only the elderly women wear petani, their traditional dress these days.

The elderly males continue to wear their traditional dress, dhoti and lungi, and the young generation has adopted modern attires.