Peacebuilding and Democracy Project

Project: Including Dalit women in peacebuilding and democracy

Location: Nepal: Chitwan, Makawanpur, Kailali and Kanchanpur.

Partner: Feminist Dalit Organisation (FEDO)

The Situation

Dalit women remain one of the most marginalised groups in Nepal. This is due to their caste (sometimes known as “untouchables”), gender and their low economic status.

Dalit women are under-represented in Nepal’s national and local political bodies, and are excluded from the political process due lack of education and skills.

The aim of this project is to increase the skills of Dalit women to participate in the peacebuilding and political processes in Nepal.

What Womankind is doing

The project focuses on advocacy, training and awareness-raising activities. The project has several dimensions which are designed:

• to provide rights and skills training and support for Dalit women to organise at a local level
• to increase the effectiveness of advocacy activities at a local and national level, to pave the way for future representation of Dalit women’s needs and voice in the political process in Nepal.

With FEDO we are supporting 2,390 Dalit women to more fully participate at local and national level. We are achieving this by:

• informing Dalit women of their rights and how to enforce these
• educating them how to engage with local decision-makers and to lobby for policy changes.

This in turn will improve the policies and practices of local government and service providers that will improve the situation of  yet more Dalit women.

What we have achieved so far

In the last year, 12 Women Peace Ambassadors have been successfully recruited from amongst the Dalit community. They have been trained on:

• human rights
• peacebuilding
• mediation
• basic counselling skills.

These women are now working within their local communities to train and support other Dalit women - and to organise women to join together to take action.