Dangadi, October 10: It is in the dusty town of Dangadhi (Kailali district), in the far West of Nepal, that we find some Dalit who have figured out how to breach the temple taboo that is causing some trouble in Lahan, on the other side of the country. This form of religious discrimination is apparently widespread.

The Rastrya (Regional) Dalit Network is using several tools on behalf of Dalit, some of which are now familiar to me. It is making Dalit aware of their rights, trying to help them withhold labor, mixing dialogue with confrontation, and even exploiting the law. But unlike other groups, the Network is doing all of this in a strategic manner.

As Ganesh Bishwokarma, the Network’s team leader explains, it starts with temples.

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Temples have been closed to Dalit throughout this region, and the Network has been trying for several years to get them opened up. This has caused it to engage in some memorable campaigns, which could hold some lessons for others.

The Dalit of Malauli village, in Bhagwati district, chose a roundabout way of trying to gain entry to their temple. It was customary in the village for Dalit to eat buffalo, and for non-Dalit to eat goats, so the Dalit decided to stop eating buffalo and used this to argue that they no longer qualified as Dalit. Not so, said the other castes, who killed 69 buffaloes, and cut off their heads.

The Dalit took this as a gross insult and refused to eat the buffalo, at which point the non-Dalit started to bury the buffalo. A traditional doctor, known as a jakri, started to shake – an indication that a major pronouncement was on the way – and warned them to stop the burials. Within hours the carcasses began to smell. It was a stalemate.

By now word of this had got back to the government, but it took a visit from the Maoists, who are feared and respected in the remote villages, to put an end to these strange happenings. The Maoists said there was to be no more killing of buffaloes, only goats, and that the Dalit should be allowed to enter the temple.

Another temple confrontation, which has attracted international attention, involved the temple of Saileshwori in Doti district. A series of leading Dalit activists visited and tried to persuade the villagers to open up the temple but they refused. The case was even raised at the 2001 World Conference on Racism, in South Africa.

Faced by this impasse, Ganesh Bishwokarma and his colleagues from the Rastrya Network decided on a more indirect approach. They investigated, and found that the temple hosts a major ceremony every year which can only go ahead if a band of Dalit musicians plays. The Network persuaded the musicians not to play unless Dalit were allowed to enter the temple.

At first the non-Dalit were inclined to cancel the ceremony. This prompted another intervention from a shaking jakri, who this time ruled on the side of the Dalit. Both sides reached an agreement under which the Dalit would be allowed to enter the temple, in one file, while non-Dalit entered in another.

However bizarre they may seem, these religious confrontations have the capacity to cause deep wounds, and even physical violence, as we saw in Lahan. Ganesh Bishwokarma also sees them as a powerful tool of mobilization, and a point of entry into a large set of issues. It is, he says, a “way of breaking the silence.” He claims to have got 34 temples opened to Dalit, which would be a formidable achievement.

These temples confrontations also give Dalit the ability to withhold their labor. Dalit have an important traditional role at religious ceremonies and marriages, and this makes it easier for them to put pressure on the other castes (something that the Baligray cannot do). In one village, Mallau Devi (Baitadi district), Dalit refused to sew the wedding clothes or play music, until they were paid in cash. This wedding was suspended until both sides reached an agreement.

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The strategist: Ganesh Bishwokarma, from the Rastrya Dalit Network

The Rastrya Network is the first Dalit group that we have met which uses the law. It pays 1,500 rupees a month to a legal advisor, who takes the occasional case to court.

As we noted earlier, the law does not favor the Dalit, even though on paper conviction on the charge of discrimination can carry a stiff fine of 3,000 rupees and a tail term. One reason is that the law is open to interpretation. Another is that the legal system is weighted against Dalit.

In one recent case, Ganesh Bishwokarma took a senior government officer to the Lal Pur temple which was the scene of another confrontation. The party was stoned by villagers and the Rastya Network took them to court. There was little chance of this being misinterpreted but the court registrar – a non-Dalit – refused to register the case, so they went directly to the judge who found eleven villagers guilty and fined them each 100 rupees. This was a rare and important legal victory.

Early in 2005, the Rastrya Network started a new group, known as the Untouchability Crime Watch Center, which resembles a human rights urgent action procedure. This comprises activists who are drawn from different professions, including a lawyer, a journalist, a human rights activist, and a gender specialist. When they hear of an incident they try to resolve it in the community. If that fails, they take it to court.

So far this year they have taken three cases to court. In the most recent, filed the day before our arrival, the Network has charged a new dairy farming project, the Milan Dairy Farm, with discrimination. This could be embarrassing for the British Development Ministry (DFID), which funded the farm to provide a market for Dalit dairy farmers.

For the first three days, the farm took milk from Dalit farmers and then stopped when its customers refused to buy the milk. The Rastrya Network intervened and held a meeting with the farm’s steering committee, UN agencies, and representatives from the government. All of them urged the farm accept Dalit milk, but the managers refused and said they would have to lose the farm if pressed. Even though the project was intended to benefit Dalit, there is only one Dalit on the committee.

The Rastrya network went to court. Meanwhile we hear that the damage has been done. Three Dalit farmers have been forced to sell their cows, and more are expected to follow. This aid project could end up by impoverishing, rather than helping, its intended beneficiaries.

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Gently does it: behind the scenes at one of Kailali’s restaurants

The Rastrya Network is already a member of COCAP and would be a good partner for the Jagaran Media Center in an information project. They are so committed to advocacy, as opposed to services, that they have turned down an offer from the Lutheran World Service to start a goat project.

The network has 200 general members, who pay 100 rupees every 5 years, and 100 organizational affiliates who are charged 500 rupees. Together with a generous grant from Action Aid (1,800,000 rupees a year) this has allowed them to pay salaries to 38 staff (including 26 “activists” at the level of district and villages) and run five departments (women, human rights, student, publications and organizations).

They understand the value of information, but like the other groups we have visited they find it hard to produce information on a regular basis. This year they have only produced three reports this year, including an annual report and a pocket calendar. But they do send out press releases to the local paper regularly, and proudly keep a book of their clippings.

This output is meager for such a large and active organization, particularly as the Network itself receives plenty of information from its field reporters. Ganesh receives between 5 and 6 telephone calls a day with news. His problem is that he does not have the staff and means to collect the information and send it out. If he could manage that, the Jagaran Media Center in Kathmandu would willingly use it.

Ganesh is keen to expand his organization’s outreach, and he knows that by getting information out about his campaigns he will attract other activists and put pressure on the local authorities. He has seen that with the Network’s temple campaigns.

Ganesh is also interested in information technology, and has enough experience to understand how it could benefit their advocacy. Four out of his five staff know how to use email. Two have received three months of basic IT training, and two have personal accounts. The office also has an email account and a slow dial-up connection, but part of this may have to do with the fact that the computer is so old.

This would be another good partner for JMC in any information project.

Tomorrow: Standing up to the Maoists