Got this in mail - thought of sharing with you.

http://www.pbs.org/now/shows/414/index.html

 Shirish, thanks for the link. Kudos to the NGOs involved.

Thanks

thanks

Thanks,

I am well known about the slavery system in Nepal, but didn't knew how these tharu girls came to kathmandu ! Yea, it was shame for us to see a foreign lady, taking the initiative to stop it. Anyways, the result are always good, no matter who started !

Thanks for sharing this !

Sampada

 

That was a good documentary. We have a mentality of ''not in my backyard" plaguing our society. Especially true for kathmnadu residents. Afno chori haru lai chai pulpulayera rakhcha arkako chori harulai chai bhada majhna lagaucha.

huna ta manche lai khanai napayepachi yesta darshanik kura irrelevant huncha, tara jasle gharma baccha servant rakhchan tiniharuko naitikta kata gayo thaha bhayena.

bihana beluka jai pashupatinath bhandai puja garchan ani gharma chai aruko baccha lai gali garne kaam garaune ani bagmatiko fohor pani ma paap bagaune re i don't follow the logic. Finally Gai ko masu khane aunu parne rescue garna.

 

felt like crying after watching it. That local 'so-called politican' is also the enemy of the society.

so many hypocrites exist in our society.

GOD BLESS THE WOMAN and NGOs working to help those poor kids.

Oncwe i went to one of my friend's home who is supposed to be from this high soceity class of kathmandu with her father in big government position.

They had several tharu girls working in their home who were kept in such a slavery i was shocked. They had to call every women (including guest) - Maharani

Can you imagine that and all men - raja sahab (even 2 yrs old) and everyone in the house including the 2 yrs old called them 'ta' and kicked her and they worked more than 12 hours a day and slept outside in a quarter that had no electricity.

I was shocked! We wonder where all the killings and revenge came from but our society has not been healthy for a while...

 

To add on,

When I grew up, we also had several tharu girls working in our house. But my Mom i guess was smarter than all these politicians and big shot people(maharajas). What she did(which i understand now) was went to all the rural areas in terai and brought 2-3 young tharu girls that had become burden to their family (as we all know how family in rural areas treat a new born baby when its a boy{asset} and when its gal{debt}) and bring them back to kathmandu with her. Then she sent about 300-500 Rs to their parents home every 2 months. Now while those tharu girls are helping my mom get her work done, the girls gets free meals(good & healthy food), free housing(sleep in a cozy bed right next to my Mom's bed) and the biggest thing is FREE SCHOOL( bal mandir or Nandi Ratri or Tangal school- cheap schools but its a school where you atleast have a chance to learn and become educated).

I can still remeber two of them got married when they became 19 and my mom paid them for the marriage thinking we(my family) have offsetted their hardwork.

I feel what she did was ten or thousand times better than how they are being treated right now...

 

 I think it is not possible to change the culture of 'Housemaid' in Nepal because of our lifestyle in Nepal that demands a lot of works in Kitchen, cleaning etc. But people can definitely be a little humane and give a change to the poor 'boy/girl' who is working in the home at least a fair chance of education. I think if every family do that, that would definitely bring a lot of change in our community. but all the abuse, treating maids like animals really need to stop.

It is so sad for these girls that there is hardly anyone on their side. I think even their families back home do not care for them at all.

I wonder what happens to 'us' when it comes to housemaids and why we are not even able to treat them a little better.

A young children or person will treat the poor tharu housemaids the way their parents teach them to behave. If the parent tell their children that the housemaids are not worth anything and can be treated as animals then thats exactly what they are going to do coz they aren't mature enough to think about it themselves...

Bored, kudos to your mom for her humane act...A smart lady indeed!  Would be glad to see you follow the same footsteps, son!  And Sheetalb, the maharani and raja sahib examples was highly disturbing!  Damn, at least in the Himalayan Buddhist houselholds, the domestic helpers are treated as part of the family.  The whole class/social strata issue of the helpers seemed non-existent in these households (at least in all I knew: mine, my relatives' and friends').

Another similar effort

http://www.dowusa.org/where-we-work/nepal

Is it okay for us to give food, shelter and education to children in return for their labor? I guess it is in a poor country Like Nepal? Right?

Thanks for the video.

Why would someone sell his daughter for 30 dollars and why would someone buy someone's daughter for 30 dollars? It's a shame...

Agreed with Birbhadra.

I think it depends on the conscience of the person. if someone thinks that they would definitely do a favor to a girl by giving her a home, secure environment and good education without overburdening in the household work, it is their decision. My mother on the other hand refused to have any household help because she did not want to discriminate between me and the girl who would be working for us and at the same time knew that she could not adopt her as well. Instead, she made us do a fair share of household work and i was always ashamed to tell me friends that i have to clean my home because we have no 'maid' when i was little. But as i grew up i understood my mother's dilema of using an underaged child's labor in the home. She kept repeating that she would not be able to sleep with a clean conscience if she hired some 'kid' to do work in the house and openly critized people who had household help to our 'embarresment'.

Shirish Dai and MazeMyan, thank you so much for posting those documentaries.

That is so true, it depends on how the kids are taught at their house to treat the housemaids/helpers. I had Tharu helper too. She was brought to my house when she was 7 years old. My baba and mami admitted her to one local school. Me and my brother were not allowed to raise our voice at her. She was always treated as a part of our family. Now, she goes to college and will get married once she is done with her studies. She takes care of my parents thousand times more than I do.  So, I believe doing good deeds is always worth it and there are some households who treat these poor kids nicely too.

Its not difficult to see that the root of this is poverty.

I am not sure if the issue is as dark as this documentary potrayed - "slavery" but its a very sad tradition. Even if the girls make some money for their family and get food and shelter, they are denied education and treated as a servant. I have seen many families use such child for domestic labor and none of them treat them well. In addition, child labor should be a big no! no!.

Good documentary ... they should use subtitles and televise it in Nepalese channels.

As long as people condone child labor in ANY shape or form, this issue will never go away. You can give all the excuses in the world: oh we provided good food, warm bed and sent them to school etc but child servitude is wrong and always will be wrong. If the child in question is getting the exact same treatment as your own child then it is acceptable otherwise if the child is doing work in return then its a labor bondage.

I am NOT trying to blame anybody and I am NOT trying to be holier than thou. We all know that Nepal is a poor country and bonded child labor is a big problem. Just because a child comes from a poor family you don't say: tough luck kid do this and this and that if you want food shelter and want to go to school.

The broker, also the supplier of tharu girls, also the influential person of that village was saying that the slavery doesn't exist, and the family is going to treat her as their own daughter. For the sake of saying, he also used the word 'grand-daughter' to the kid that he was going to sell. However, the documentary clearly shows the reality that exists in our society.