Ever heard of miserable woes of children who have been separated from their families?
Unnati Chaudhary : Centre for Investigative Journalism-Nepal
An NGO-run Surakshit Griha (Safe Home) at Attariya in Kailali has been sheltering around 14 conflict-affected people, including 10 children. Among them are Ramesh, 7, and his sister Sushma Saud, 6, who have been staying there for the last one-and-a-half years away from the warmth and care of their great-grandmother.
Their great-grandmother (mother’s grandmother) has been raising them with the support of her old-age allowance and by selling firewood in Godawari-8, Kailali, after the disappearance of their parents. However, unable to withstand frequent complaints, grudges, and pressure from her daughter-in-law, the great-grandmother shifted these two kids to the Safe Home. For these second graders–, Safe Home is their permanent home now.
Dhauli Saud, their great-grandmother, said Ramesh was not even a year old, and Sushma still in her mother’s womb, when their father went missing. Their mother, Laxmi, who moved to her parent’s house in Doti after her husband’s disappearance, too went missing two years after Sushma’s birth.
Dauli’s granddaughter-in-law, who was direly against meeting with these two kids, forced this 75-year-old lady to leave the house alleging her of repeatedly doing so. This old lady, who makes her living by selling green vegetables at the Attariya market, frequents her grandchildren to the Safe Home and requests the staffers not to chase her kids away from there.
Meanwhile, for six-year-old Asmina Chaudhary of Laxmipur, Kanchanpur, the Safe Home is like a hostel. She has been staying here for the last three years after her father’s death due to jaundice. Unable to tolerate frequent tortures from her husband’s family, her widow mother Sita Dagaura suddenly disappeared by leaving her daughter Asmina with her elder sister Saraswati, who later took Asmina to the Safe Home. “I had to take her (Asmina) to there for her safety owing to death threats from her grandparents to seize the one-bigha land, which was registered in the name of Asmina’s father.” Saraswati says, “They have even threatened me with dire consequences.”
Though third-grader Asmina visits her aunt during holidays, she is unaware of her mother’s whereabouts. Surprisingly, her younger sister, too, is missing. Gopal Sijapati, another second grader, has also been staying at the Home for the last two years, since he became an orphan. His father Chabilal — working in India — was murdered in Ghaziabad, India, on April 16, 2016. However, he got another shock when his mother died of electrocution on January 7, 2017. Soon after his mother’s death, his uncle brought him to the Safe Home.
Basanta and Ritesh Baijali of Gauriganga municipality-11, too, are no exception. While their father died of tuberculosis when Ritesh was three-months-old, their mother eloped with another man putting all burden on the shoulders of their grandmother, who despite being poor raised them with care. However, Man Bahadur Nepali, an employee at the National Human Rights Commission, took the boys to the Home thinking that they would lead a better life there.
Children, victimized by their family members despite having parents, too stay in the Home. One among them is Sanu, 13, who was earlier admitted to a hospital after complaints of ‘swollen belly’. Surprisingly, when the doctor said she was pregnant, her mother fainted. Later, it was revealed that her 55-year-old grandfather had raped Sanu. The police and the Women Rehabilitation Center (WOREC) took her to the Safe Home in Kailali where she delivered a baby. While Sanu and her baby are in the Home, the grandfather is behind bars at the Kailai jail.
Binu Rana of WOREC says, “We are facing problems in rehabilitating them (mother and child) and in acquiring the birth certificate of the baby, who is now five months old.” Sanu’s father is willing to take her home but is not ready to accept the baby.
Besides having two Safe Homes for women and children, Kailali boasts of six other orphanages, which shelter around 195 children. Besides, 27 other orphans stay in a hostel. The children staying in different NGO-run orphanages, shelters, and hostels are referred by the Children and Women Office, Kailali.
The shelters and hostels are run and managed as per the government’s criteria and directives. However, Sandhya Singh, an official at the Children and Women Office, Kailali, says they have not been able to effectively monitor these shelters and orphanages due to a lack of funds and manpower.
Janaki Malasi of Safe House, Attariya, said that they would rehabilitate the children with their guardians once they complete their high school education. So far, six children of this Home have already been rehabilitated after necessary formalities at the Women and Children Office.
Malasi, a single woman, earlier gave shelter temporarily to the victims of domestic violence in her own house. However, upon realizing later that this compromised on her privacy, she registered an organization at the District Administration Office, Kailali, on June 13, 2015 by forming an 11-member executive committee. A mother of two daughters, Malasi, who was widowed at the age of 29, too, was a victim of domestic violence. This inspired her to establish a Safe Home where she could take care of the victims of domestic violence. Five people, including Malasi along with her daughter Geeta, have been serving voluntarily at the Home–run by collecting food grains.
Meanwhile, WOREC Nepal has been running a Home to provide temporary shelter for the victims of domestic violence in Kailali for the past two years. Among the 97 domestic and sex-related violence registered at WOREC in 2017, it has sent 34 victims to the shelters. During this period, 61 cases of domestic violence, one case of human trafficking, one case of polygamy, nine rape cases, three cases of attempted rape, eight cases of sexual assault, seven cases of social violence, eight cases of violence related to ‘witchcraft’, and nine cases of abduction have been registered at the WOREC, Kailali. Of them, 21 victims of domestic violence, two victims of polygamy, six rape victims, one victim of rape attempt, and four cases of sexual assault are currently in the safe home.
Manisha Shrestha, 18: A representative story
My mother eloped when I was just two months old and my father was abroad, people say. My grandmother raised me. My father came home and took me to the New Life Children’s Home in Pokhara when I was three years old. After six months, he went back. He regularly contacted me from abroad and even came to meet me once or twice. Unfortunately, one day the news of his death came to me. There was no one to take care of me. I stayed at the Home until I was 11 years old. After I completed Grade 7 from Indra Rajya Laxmi High School, I became all alone. Then an American couple adopted my friend Yashoda Giri and took her to the United States. Out of the 35 children in the Home, some were elder sisters. One day, the police raided the Home and arrested the owner since he was making money by sending boys to the elder sisters’ rooms for physical relationship. Since that day, the centre closed down. I don’t know the whereabouts of Tek Bahadur Thapa, the owner.
All the physically-fit were moved away from the Home except four of us, who were driven out to the streets. We spent three nights on the pavement near the tourist bus park in Ratna Chowk, Pokhara, surviving on leftovers. Two among us, 11-year-old MuskanThakuri of Dharan and 10-year-old Ritu Baral of Baglung, died. Nobody came to claim the bodies. My friend Samikshya Shrestha and I ran away from there.
Fortunately, we encountered a hotel owner, Amrita Giri, who took us to her hotel at Lama Chaur, Pokhara. Soon, Samikshya went with a boy. I have never seen her since that day. Amrita washed dishes and did other chores at the hotel for two years.
One day, Amrita asked me to accompany a boy, who she said was her cousin. “I can’t tolerate you anymore. You go with him. He will take care of you and find a better job for you,” she told me. I was 13 years old then. I happily accompanied the boy with the hope of getting a better job.
We roamed around Mahendrapul bazaar that day. With the fall of night, he took me to his windowless room and started abusing me. I screamed but in vain. I had no option but to endure it and stay with this boy, Subash Thapa Magar of Dhading.
In fact, he had no work othern than strolling around the whole day and returning in the evening. I started working on daily wages. We frequently quarreled. One day I was taken aback when he told me that the hotel owner had sold me to him for Rs. 100,000. “Be ready to be my wife,” he told me. Later, he started coming home with other girls and even had physical relationship with them in my presence. He often thrashed me.
To my surprise, I was pregnant, which I conveyed to him. He coerced me into aborting it. A few days later, police arrested him for theft. The court asked for a bail amount of Rs. 200,000. That was a big amount. I had only Rs. 30,000 with me. However, I released him from the jail by depositing the bail amount which I borrowed from Gyan Bahadur Gurung, a contractor, as a loan with the assurance of refunding it within six months. Soon, I became pregnant again. He then started screaming at me, thrashed me, and accused me of having an extra-marital affair. Meanwhile, after a few days, he was jailed for theft, this time without bail.
When I visited him in the jail, he unnecessarily tortured me, charging me with having an extramarital affair. He said that the baby in my womb was not his. He only talked about money.
Fed up with his attitude, I wanted to become independent since I was already working on daily wage. I gave birth to my daughter and stayed in the rented room for 14 months struggling for survival with my daughter. As soon as he was released from jail, he married a girl. My daughter then was two years old. I had to struggle even harder to raise my daughter. Fortunately, I got a job at a plastic company, Himalayan Life. One morning, I found a SIM card, which I put on my mobile phone to find a phone number. I dialed the number to inform the owner about the SIM card. However, my gesture of being good brought further misfortune.
The card belonged to Aashish Chaudhary of Guleriya, Kanchanpur. He came to Pokhara to meet me on the pretext of getting his card back. He proposed me for marriage, which I initially rejected. However, later I bowed down to his insistence and went to Butwal with him and got married. Life after marriage was cordial for around six months as we came back to Pokhara. This cordiality, however, did not last long.
Aashish ran away leaving me. I went to Kanchanpur with my daughter looking for him. He was at home. I was pregnant again and coming to know it, he and his family members started torturing me. I filed a case at the district police office, which later resolved the issue. I then stayed with the family.
However, my stay there was no better than hell. I was tortured both mentally and physically. They alleged me of being a witch and even called a witch doctor, who then hit me with rice grains on my head. The family ignored me in all terms and often called me a “characterless” girl. But, I was compelled to endure all these excesses.
Suddenly, I had high fever. My husband and mother-in-law took me to the Seti Hospital and admitted me there. The hospital aborted my baby at their request. Following heavy bleeding, I was shifted to Asha Dhangadi Hospital where I was kept for three days.
When I returned home from the hospital, Aashish was missing. My parent-in-laws then chased me away. I have filed a case of domestic violence at the District Police Office. I am currently staying at the Women and Children Safe Home in Attariya, awaiting justice. I am planning to get beauty parlor training from CTEVT and to be self-reliant. However, I don’t have a citizenship certificate. I don’t know what I have in store. Sometimes, I get disappointed.
(Names of the children have been changed)
