These municipal networks have conducted mass rally at local, municipal, and district level. The interaction titled “human right situation challenges and solutions of the indigenous and marginalized communities” was held on the occasion. The event was chaired by Laxmi Paswan, Chair of Municipal Network of Musahar women Empowerment Forums of Haripur. The event was conducted in presence of 140 participants including the ward and municipal government representatives, local CSOs representatives and media. On the occasion the WoMEF members expressed to the distinguished guest about the real human rights challenges faced by the Mushar women in day-to-day life. Speaking at the event, the government representatives committed to provide support to the Mushar men and women to attain their human rights along with solving their issues.

In the program, Santara Paswan, Secretary of Musahar Women’s Empowerment Forum, said that there is caste discrimination against Musahar girls even in schools and Dalits have to be deprived of education because they have to pay money to study in government schools. Urmila Majhi, president of Musahar Women’s Empowerment Forum, Chitain, said that the state has discriminated Musahar community. In the event, the participants informed the guests about their issues of vital registration, caste-based discrimination and extreme poverty. The government representatives in the program committed to solve the issues of Musahar community in the days to come. The participants complained to the chief guests about their community’s birth registration, citizenship, untouchability, discrimination against children in schools, poverty, etc.

Chief Inspector Sangita Pandel of Women’s Cell of Malangwa District Police Office said that women should raise their voices against all kinds of violence against women, and informed that if there is violence, one should call the 104 number which is free of charge. The chief guest of the program, Chief District Officer Thaneshwar Gautam, said that children of the Musahar community should not be discriminated and that action should be taken against who discriminates. He also said that a circular has been issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs to prepare the birth registration of Musahar children so that no child is deprived of vital registration services.

In Basbariya, the campaign was conducted on 5 December 2022 under the chairmanship of Sita Devi Majhi (Chair, Municipal level network of WoMEF groups of Basbariya) and in presence of Municipal head, Ram Sihasan Ray. The slogan of the rally was “Identification of civil society through campaign against gender discrimination. The awareness rally was actively participated by 110 Musahar men and women including media person, local police, school principal, students, ward chairs. During the rally, students including Musahar women were holding placards with statements- “stop violence against women, stop child marriage, stop drinking alcohol, stop discrimination against untouchables.” Speaking in the event, the municipal head expressed that he has been impressed by the initiative of WoMEF and stated that municipality would hold similar programs in the days to come. Similar event was conducted at local level in Barathawa, Chandranagar and Asanwa of Haripur Municipality on 2 December, 8 December and 29 November respectively with active participation of 110, 250 and 49 Musahar men and women respectively.

Speaking at the event, Param Devi Majhi said that sons and daughters should be equally treated and should have equal access in every sector. Rural women should be encouraged to come forward and should be organized to move forward in unity for their development. Sumitra Devi (Ward representative) committed in the program to help Musahar women who are facing various issues of gender discrimination, domestic violence, citizenship problems, and the ones who are deprived of the state facilities and services. According to SAP Nepal’s Project Coordinator, Janak Karki, the development of rural areas can only happen if women play an equal role. To solve the problems of rural women, all women should unite and conduct a campaign, he added. Both men and women should work together for income generation for solving problems of rural women. Also, a man should appreciate work down by the women even within the household that are unpaid.

Such election monitoring also provided opportunity for SAP Nepal to directly observe the real situation of voter’s rights of marginalized and specially women in the remote areas of Nepal. The sharing of such real experience to concerned stakeholders would further provide support to address the challenges that are hindering active participation of marginalized women in voting process as well as in political empowerment. Since, SAP Nepal has been working continuously for women empowerment of especially marginalized communities, the infield experience collection of women voters sheds lights on the interventions required for political empowerment of women of Nepal.

Dr. Shiva Prasad Rijal (Subject expert) presented a paper on “The goals, progress, and challenges of sustainable development and its localization” at the event”. He informed that Nepal SDG Forum established has been coordinating with the government, private sector, and CSOs responsibly and systematically for sustainable development. Janak Karki, Treasurer of NGO Federation Chitwan and representative of SAP Nepal, explained the purpose of the program and stated that cooperation of state, private sector and CSOs is necessary for achieving SDG goals. Speaking at the event, The Mayor of Madi Municipality, Tara Kumari Kaji Mahato, said that lack of coordination among the local, provincial and central government have become a challenge to attainment of sustainable development goals. Similarly, Mayor or Khairani Municipality, Sashi Khanal stated that limited budget is allocated to complete large number of programs at local level and hence goals of all sectors are unmet due to which goals of sustainable development has not been attained. The chief guest of the program, Narayan Adhikari, stated that since localization of the goal of sustainable development in Nepal is not progressing at the speed that it should be, such program has been organized to attract the attention of the stakeholders and make them accountable by organizing the program.

In all 32 WoMEF groups, field supervisors facilitated reflect session on social accountability tools on different dates from March to April 2022. In the sessions, the facilitator provided introduction to the social accountability tools such as citizen report card, citizen’s charter and other commonly used tools along with highlighting the importance of using such tools. Since, these tools are highly technical, Musahar where majority of them are illiterate practice of such tools in the groups was not possible therefore tools basics were only introduced. The basic information about the commonly used social accountability tools was provided to 1523 Musahar women of 32 WoMEF groups.

During the establishment of the Municipal level committee, Musahar women with leadership qualities among 32 WoMEF groups with more than 1500 members were selected for the positions of Chair, Vice Chair, Treasurer, Secretary, Joint Secretary and members for each of the 4 committee. Laxmi Paswan of Haripur, Shivakali Devi Majhi of Chandranagar, Sarita Majhi of Barathawa, and Sita Majhi of Basbariya was nominated as Chair of the respective Municipalities. In the coming days, it is anticipated that these committees will be the representative of the voice of other Musahar women to pressurize the service providers and elected representatives for the upliftment and development of the Musahar community. In addition, these committee will also lobby for the dalit rights to citizenship and vital registration to concerned stakeholders along with conducting mass awareness campaigns raising issues of the backward communities.

In the opening session, Mr. Janak karki (Project Coordinator, SAP Nepal) along with welcoming the participants highlighted on the project and the training objective. The core sessions included sessions on: social mobilization and highlighting on the achievements of the WoMEF so far. Some of the major achievements received by WoMEF after submission of plan and budget to local government were: 6 Families of Haripur Municipality has leased 10 Kathha land for paddy farming, WoMEF of Haripur received 4 lakh for construction of community building and received 40,000 for group vegetable farming. The participant’s attitude towards the training was positive and it is anticipated that this training would encourage 32 mobile trainers to engage more in community mobilization to pave their path to be a successful community leaders in the days to come.