{"id":126671,"date":"2019-01-28T12:00:58","date_gmt":"2019-01-28T12:00:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=126671"},"modified":"2019-02-04T11:40:55","modified_gmt":"2019-02-04T11:40:55","slug":"destroy-period-huts-or-forget-state-support-nepal-moves-to-end-practice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2019\/01\/destroy-period-huts-or-forget-state-support-nepal-moves-to-end-practice\/","title":{"rendered":"Destroy \u2018Period Huts\u2019 or Forget State Support: Nepal Moves to End Practice"},"content":{"rendered":"

After the custom of consigning menstruating women to outdoor sheds claimed three more lives, a new system of penalties offers hope of change.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"\"<\/a>

A woman enters a \u2018period hut\u2019 in Mastamandali village in Nepal\u2019s Accham district, where local authorities are now withholding state support from families that practise the custom.
Photograph: Narendra Shrestha\/EPA<\/p><\/div>\n

14 Jan 2019 – <\/em>Chhaupadi, the practice of banishing girls and women to a hut or shed when they have their periods, is common in Dilu Bhandari\u2019s village in Nepal<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But two months ago Bhandari, a 26-year-old mother of four, watched as her husband destroyed the tiny hut in which she had previously been sent to live once a month. The family had been told by local authorities that if she continued to observe the custom, they would no longer receive state food support. Forced to choose between a food allowance for her twin boys and abandoning the traditional practice<\/a>, the choice was effectively made for them.<\/p>\n

The withdrawal of state support services is one of the penalties being brought into force as the country tries to tackle chhaupadi, which was banned by the supreme court in 2005 and criminalised by the government last year. Forcing a menstruating women into a \u201cperiod hut\u201d is now punishable with three months in prison and a 3,000 rupee (\u00a333) fine.<\/p>\n

Reports nonetheless emerge each year of women dying in huts from snake bites, smoke inhalation or fire. The practice has also been linked to death and illness among mothers and newborn babies.<\/p>\n

Only this week, a woman and her two sons suffocated to death<\/a> in a windowless hut while practising chhaupadi in the country\u2019s Bajura district.<\/p>\n

But local authorities in some of Nepal\u2019s more remote regions, particularly in the west of the country, where the practice is still common, are determined to act.<\/p>\n

Watch: The menstruating Nepalese women confined to a cowshed<\/a> <\/em><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been a year and we are trying to make people aware about chhaupadi,\u201d says Janak Bhandari, ward president for Bhandari\u2019s village in Achham district. \u201c[When someone] comes to my office to get government services and facilities, like nutrition allowance, old age allowance, birth registration, citizenship recommendation, loan recommendation etc, we ask them first whether they are practicing chhaupadi. If they say yes, we ask them to destroy the hut and come again to claim government benefits and use facilities.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bhandari says there has been a 20% drop in the number of women sleeping in huts during their periods.<\/p>\n

In Dadeldhura district, meanwhile, local government support is now denied to families who keep their daughters out of school during menstruation. The chairperson of the district\u2019s Bhageshwor rural municipality, Kaushila Bhatta, says: \u201cIn our area, many girls are not allowed to go to school during their menstruation, which is putting our girls behind. We decided to cut off government services and facilities to those families who stopped their girls going to school during their period.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis ill-practice has to end soon and we are working on this.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ramaroshan rural municipality in Achham district is running a major awareness programme under the banner \u201cInside chhaupadi, outside god\u201d.<\/p>\n

The vice-chairwoman of the municipality, Saraswati Rawal, said: \u201cWe are building a big temple in the middle of a village and have asked people to keep their gods respectfully at the temple and let woman and girls stay at home during their period.\u201d<\/p>\n

In some parts of Nepal, people think they will be punished by God if women enter the home during menstruation.<\/p>\n

\u201cHere, we solved our problem,\u201d says Rawal. \u201cKeep god at the temple, let woman stay at home then god will be happy and women will be safe too.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rawal says that, since the campaign started five months ago, between up to 20% fewer women stay in huts.<\/p>\n

But Pasupati Kunwar, who runs Sama Bikash Nepal, an organisation that champions marginalised women, says progress has been slow.<\/p>\n

\u201cAlmost 95% of people used to practise chhaupadi when I started a campaign against it 10 years ago,\u201d she says. \u201cBut now I can say it\u2019s 60%.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kunwar says the authorities need to look at people\u2019s living arrangements, particularly those who share their homes with animals. \u201cThey keep animals on the first floor and the second floor is for them, for god, eating and sleeping. Lack of space leads woman to go to huts during menstruations. The government needs to come up with a solution to this,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

Read more: Mother and two boys suffocate in Nepal’s latest ‘period hut’ tragedy<\/a> <\/em><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Tham Maya Thapa, Nepal\u2019s minister for women, children and senior citizens, believes it will take time to end a custom so deeply entrenched in Nepalese society. \u201cThe practice of chhaupadi has been going on for hundreds of years,\u201d she says. \u201cThe tradition is not easy to break in one or two years.<\/p>\n

\u201cSince last August, it\u2019s a crime to force a menstruating woman into seclusion, punishable by up to three months in jail and a fine. But law and rule always don\u2019t work to break such a long-running tradition.\u201d<\/p>\n

After Dilu Bhandari was told she couldn\u2019t get food benefits, she went home and told her husband and her mother-in-law. \u201cI was so surprised and angry at that time. I thought: \u2018What kind of rule is this?\u2019 You know how important it is to get nutritional food for us, as we are very poor. My husband works as a labourer and I\u2019m a housewife. We don\u2019t earn enough money to buy it.\u201d<\/p>\n

After the chhaupadi hut was destroyed, Bhandari started staying on the second floor of their house during her period.<\/p>\n

Dilu\u2019s mother-in-law was not happy at first. She worried that God would be angry and punish them. \u201cBut nothing bad has happened to us yet,\u201d says Dilu.<\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 theguardian.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After the custom of consigning menstruating women to outdoor sheds claimed three more lives, a new system of penalties offers hope of change.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":126672,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[224,56],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-126671","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-human-rights","category-asia-pacific"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126671","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=126671"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126671\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/126672"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=126671"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=126671"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=126671"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}