That the latter is true in Nepal has become clear. It has also become obvious that the Nepali state of the brotherhood has not really understood what it is to provide security and protection to its citizens. One glaring example was made earlier this year during the height of the media coverage of the diarrhea/cholera outbreak in the western part of Nepal.
To recall, following massive media coverage and criticism, Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal announced a “relief package” in July. With the latter, families of each deceased were to get Rs. 10,000 with an additional Rs. 5,000 for poor families losing their kin in the epidemic. It was only three days after the Prime Minister’s valuation of the net worth of each citizen that the government decided to introduce a coordinated program to fight the outbreak in Jajarkot and surrounding districts.
Putting aside the fact that Rs. 15,000 at the most is all a citizen of Nepal is apparently worth to this state (or is it just the citizen of western Nepal?), placing monetary value on human life was not the security that was being sought. This was made clear in a newspaper report at the time that quoted a Rukum resident (suffering from diarrhea): “I don’t need compensation after the death of any of my children…Just convey to the government that I want to save my children’s lives.”
Clearly the state of the brotherhood has yet to understand and/or care about addressing the most elementary and legitimate security issues of citizens’ – basic insecurities of hunger, disease, inadequate shelter, unemployment etc. With the looming winter food crisis, this condition of ignorance and negligence bodes ill for the welfare of citizens.
Furthermore, while the state of the brotherhood has primarily focused on the protection and security needs of citizens in terms of law and order, this has also been found wanting. The latter applies not only in terms of the context of rising crime and violence, mob rule and a general feeling of anarchy. With a gendered lens, the issue of security and the state is particularly problematic, highlighted by the recent case of the alleged rape of a female policewoman by fellow policemen in Achcham during Dasain.
Media coverage and reports from various human rights organizations via their local offices have described the incident by which marijuana was mixed in with food given to the policewoman, who was then raped by six police officers while in a semi-conscious state. Women human rights defenders quote hospital reports of bruises and physical injuries alongside the alleged victim’s testimony, and have asked for an independent investigation. According to women human right defenders, the policewoman has received virtually no support from within the forces, apart from that of DIG Pabitra Thapa. As the state of the brotherhood closes ranks to protect its own – its own male police officers – the inevitable questioning of the policewoman’s character has emerged. Meanwhile, the security of the policewoman has only been secured via the personal initiative of DIG Thapa.
Women human rights defenders are rallying for justice over this case with the basic question “if a policewoman cannot obtain neutral investigation and justice from the state, what hope is there for the ordinary Nepali woman?” The case also highlights what women human rights defenders have long been trying to bring to the forefront: women are not safe from the state itself. Over the years, activists have struggled to make public the fact that many of the cases of violence against women involve state security forces – the police, armed police forces, and the army. State impunity is rampant, especially in cases of violence against women. To whom should women turn to if the very organs of the state that are meant to protect are themselves the perpetrators of crimes and sources of insecurity? In this context, for many women, the Home Minister’s security plan and the Prime Minister’s declaration of a National Campaign on Violence Against Women, and the Year 2010 as the Year against Gender Discrimination not only hold little real value, they contradict each other.
In the midst of the debates on state restructuring, it is important to hold the existing state responsible for the provision of protection and security in all its forms to all its citizens. For women, this is especially so, given the likelihood that the state of the brotherhood will be restructured on to the provinces; watching and pressuring the state in all its forms must continue. Clearly the patriarchal state will not change in a hurry despite the best constitution or laws. We only have to remember that while the all-important bill on violence against women was passed, it still has to be implemented through state organs, and that the 2000 ProPublic study on Gender and Judges had the following findings: 66% of judges believed that women shared the blame for violence committed against them; 69% of judges thought that “provocative dressing” can be an invitation for sexual assault, and most judges thought that slapping one’s wife was acceptable: “one or two slaps cannot be termed cruelty, sometimes it becomes a necessity.”
For women activists, what has become a real necessity is to hold this Nepali state of the brotherhood accountable and responsible. The Achham case is the key, as is the support of all those in search of a new and just Nepal.
Seira Tamang is a political scientist with Martin Chautari in Kathmandu.
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