"I don´t want to go away from home. But there is no one else to earn," the 21-year-old explains. Many youths of Budagaun-1, Rolpa like Nepali are now climbing down to Dang to go to India after the completion of plantation season. [break]
Around 20 youths of Budagaun left Nepal on Sunday on assurance of job from one Raju Rana of the village, who is a contractor in Dharampur, Himachal Pradesh, when he returned home last month.
Rana´s younger brother Hira Singh, who is also going to India for a second time, says another 20 had left with his elder brother on July 6. Many Rolpalis, who don´t have enough land to feed them round the year, go to different Indian towns to work as security guards, labors and dishwashers.
"We do whatever we get," says Kul Bahadur KC who has been working in different Indian towns for the last decade. "We even have to suffer humiliation while working," adds the 31-year-old who plans to go to Chandigarh this year.
Jit Bahadur Pun, who carried pilgrims through the stairs of Kedarnath Temple last year, is banking on landing a job of digging roads in Himachal Pradesh this year. "They say they are digging roads there for telephone lines," says the 21-year-old who is leaving his four-year-old son and wife behind.
Deviram Pariyar, on the other hand, is going for a change having worked in brick factories in Kathmandu in the past and plans to return to Nepal for Tihar after earning a few rupees.
Most of the hundred thousands male out of around 225,000 Rolpalis leave Nepal every year after end of plantation season.
This is not just the story of Rolpa. Many youths of Rukum, Pyuthan, Salyan and Dang similarly go to India after the completion of rice plantation. The youths of these districts who could not stay in their villages due to the Maoist insurgency in the past are still leaving home to work in India.
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