Women of Nepal

Sukdaiya Chaudhari

Member of the Constituent Assembly, the Unified Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist)
Born in Patharaiya, Kailali, in 1978

Sukdaiya Chaudhari, who had lived a bonded life of a Kamlari (daughter of a bonded-laborer Kamaiya) from the age of eight, had never imagined that she would be a member of the Constituent Assembly one day. She was informed about it only after her name was selected as a proportional representative candidate of the Constituent Assembly by the CPN (Maoist). Now, she is committed to fight for the poor and backward Tharu society and to liberate freed Kamaiyas in real sense by contributing in drafting of a new constitution.

She was born in 1978 in a poor family at a Kamaiya settlement of Patharaiya village in Kailali district. She grew up working as a Kamlari at a local landlord's house. Her life during those days was not more than that of a slave. She used to get only leftover food. She not only had to obey her masters but also had to tolerate verbal as well as physical attacks frequently from her masters.

Living in such an inhuman environment she naturally developed a rebellious character. Tharus who worked as Kamaiyas were generally patient; however, Sukdaiya got a different character. She was only nine or ten years old when she expressed her anger in front of her master. She says, "They used to give me only leftover food. One day, I could not tolerate it and hurled the plate on their face." It was a groundbreaking event in the whole settlement of Kamaiyas at that time.

Landlords used to treat Kamaiyas and Kamlaris as their slaves. She worked as a Kamlari for three years. Physical exploitation on Kamlaris by masters was just common incidents in her region, where laws meant what landlords say. One day, her master tried to rape her when she went to his room with a cup of tea. "I could have defended myself but I know thousands of girls were victimized. Nobody listened to their cries," she adds. She quitted her job when her masters' torture crossed all the limits.

However, living in the parents' house was also difficult. Her parents forced her to get married when she was 12 years old. It was arranged without letting her know and she had no other option but to accept a person as her husband. "I heard that a group was coming for a wedding ceremony and went to see them. I was shocked when my mother told me that they came for my wedding ceremony," she remembers.

Her husband was eleven years elder than her. She said that she used to be afraid of her husband until after many years. Her in-laws were also unsympathetic with her. Soon after her marriage, a mother-in-law sent her to another landlord to work as a Kamlari. Marriage at that age was a nightmare for her. The family and the environment in the new home was so intolerable that she frequently ran away from her house and spent nights on a haystack or under a tree. "Life had become so intolerable that I consumed poison five days after I got married. But god knows how I was rescued. I think I must tell my story of agony so that no other Nepali sister may give up struggling," she says. She gave birth to her first daughter at the age of 15 and now she is a mother of three children. Her in-laws were insisting her to have a son and after she bore a son she went for a medical operation to prevent further pregnancy without informing her family.

Her desire to study in her childhood was so strong that she used to steal books from her landlord's children to read. Thanks to her inquisitive nature, she could speak Nepali fluently, though she belongs to a community where there are still many who don't speak Nepali well. Her will to study had never faded away even after she had grown up. She joined on an adult literacy class in her village in 1998. Though her mother-in-law did not permit her to attend it she went to a class secretly for ten days. She voluntarily played a role of a translator in the class because many of students did not understand Nepali language well that a teacher was speaking. Although she unfortunately had to give up her study after ten days, which became her only education, she has now no problem to read and write owing to her hard works in self study.

Kamaiyas were bonded-laborers who used to work for landlords from who they borrowed money. Daughters of Kamaiyas were kept for domestic works in landlords' houses separately. They used to be called 'Kamlari' or 'Buklari'. Before the government announced liberation of Kamaiyas in July 2000 this system was a common practice in five districts in the western Terai: in Kailali, Dang, Banke, Bardiya and Kanchanpur. She got the first information of liberation of Kamaiyas through a radio at landlord's house. She immediately went to her settlement to disseminate this news.

When this historic announcement was made public it was a rainy season and many Kamaiyas were afraid to abandon their masters' houses because many of them had no place to live and no food to eat. But she took it as a symbol of liberation that her community had been waiting for. She started helping Kamaiyas to come out of their master's houses and to construct their temporary huts. She was a source of inspiration for the whole settlement. Even her husband who was a Kamaiya was reluctant to quit the landlord's house until she started to load their belongings on the master's bull-cart.

Three days after the liberation Sukdaiya made a hat to live in Patharaiya. After some time, she and her colleagues formed an organization to manage the chaos of resettlement of the freed Kamaiyas. The organization made a long journey of liberating Kamaiyas from their landlord's houses and making logistic arrangements for their resettlement from place to place. It was later expanded to other districts, thanks to her commitment and a strong teamwork. 

"I used to have threats of life frequently from unknown persons when I was working for the freed Kamaiyas. But I was never discouraged. Rather, I became more committed to work for the liberation of the Kamaiyas," she says. She thinks that the freed Kamaiyas have not yet been able to live common people's life. After being freed from the clutches of the landlords they have to fight with the state, demanding their due resettlement. She says that the government always provides same old assurance of meeting the demands but the implementations are still far away. "They are freed technically but they have not been able to feel the joy of liberty. They are still suffering because of lack of management. See, they still have to live under the open sky both in rainy season and in freezing winter," she adds.

Women are in some kind victims of discrimination in any community in Nepal. Even in the Kamaiya movement there is another movement of women. For this, they have a separate organization named Kamaiya Women Awareness Society, which focuses mainly on the problems of the Kamaiya women. According to her, many Kamaiyas have been officially recognized by the state; however, around 80,000 Kamlaris and Buklaris have not yet been recognized. "This is an example of the state's discrimination on the basis of gender," she insists. Sukdaiya further says that in the Kathmandu Valley alone there are some 5,000 to 6,000 daughters of freed Kamaiyas, who still work as Kamlaris. She stresses that the state must guarantee their right to education for those who want to continue studies and similar trainings for others.

Kamaiyas who worked for the landlords eventually got their identity cards but those women who worked in the same houses and whose husbands died failed to get them just because they are widows. "Our movement is for equal pay for equal jobs. And we will continue to fight for this cause as well," she declares.

She thinks that the People's Movement of 2006 was made successful only because of the participation of the poor and marginalized communities. "Being inspired by the movement and its result I would move ahead taking the people from my community along with me. My entrance to the Constituent Assembly is not enough for liberation of entire Kamaiyas and women," she says. She strongly recommends that all marginalized women's participation in all structures of the state should be guaranteed to make a new Nepal in real sense, adding that it is not possible to make a new Nepal only by expelling the king out of the Narayanhiti Palace.

Hardly any women from Kamaiya's community could have achieved the target as she did. She became a member of the Constituent Assembly with a long story of sufferings, discouragement, harassments and hardships. Her accomplishment can be a model of all women who experienced hardships, but through which they could have achieved their success. "When landlords from my locality, for whom we used to work, greet me I feel proud of myself as a member of the Constituent Assembly. But I also learnt that there are other kinds of difficulties," she says.

Although there are many members in the Constituent Assembly to talk about the national issues few will focus their voices on the sufferings of Kamaiyas, Kamlaris and Buklaris. She wants to be named as representative of the freed Kamaiyas. She thinks that the constitution will be perfect if all the members in the Constituent Assembly represent their sectors and raise voices of their concerned communities. Along with another woman CA member from Kamaiya community, Shanti Chaudhari, she has determined to take the task of raising the issue of freed Kamaiyas and guarantee their liberation in the constitution to be drafted. Though she lives in the capital to participate in the assembly meetings, she returns to her village whenever she finds time. In addition, even when she is in the capital, she spends most of her time in making appointments to the ministers for people from her community. 

Furthermore, she suggests all Nepali women to participate in the politics. She thinks that women should participate in politics to show their presence and to make pressure on decision-making bodies of the state mechanism.  Though she does not have any experience of having worked with any political party her experience to have worked for the social problems could be meaningful to her presence in the Constituent Assembly.

Now, she has determined that she will work for the rest of her life for raising voices of 'real victims' and for providing a platform for women to work in politics. "Apart from working in the field of women's rights, I want to make an environment where women could easily find a platform to exercise their rights and develop their leadership skills," she said.

Written by Laxmi Basnet