EDITORIAL:

Observations on Social Inclusion and Exclusion, Resource Management, Transformational Politics, Developmental Practices, Gender Relations and Tacit Knowledge Om Gurung Laya Prasad Uprety Tulsi Ram Pandey The editorial board is pleased to help the Central Department of Sociology and Anthropology of Tribhuvan University to publish the muchawaited 11 th volume of the ‘Occasional Papers in Sociology and Anthropology’. In total, there are 14 articles in this volume. The fundamental themes they embody are six: social inclusion and exclusion, resource management, transformational politics, developmental practices, gender relations and tacit knowledge. Academically speaking, these themes demonstrate the areas of research in which the Nepalese sociologists and anthropologists have been involved. In other words, these articles reflect the types of contemporary sociological and anthropological research works in Nepal.The editorial board thanks all authors for their contributions to this volume. Prof.Om Gurung, in his paper entitled "Social Inclusion: Policies and Practices in Nepal", presents his critical observations on the policies and practices in Nepal vis-à-vis the issue of social inclusion. Given the fact that the present state is exclusionary, non-participatory and nonrepresentative and it discriminates indigenous peoples, women, Madhesis, Dalits and other marginalized communities on the basis of ethnicity, caste, language, religion, sex, class and geographical territory, he argues that these marginalized communities are demanding for an inclusive state through its restructuring along the line of federalism on the basis of national regional autonomy. He is sanguine that the recent election for the constituent assembly has paved the path for the formation of the inclusive state once the new democratic constitution is crafted by it. He has critically reviewed the demographic sturicture of various social

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groups, all past development plans and programs of the government, and the issues embedded in the regime of social exclusion. He has cogently argued that social exclusion of indigenous peoples and other marginalized communities in Nepal is one of the widely accepted factors of their impoverization and marginalization. Mr.Jailab Rai, in his article entitled "Socio-Cultural Subjectivities of Landlessness: A Case Study of Sarki People from Naubise VDC of Dhading District", deals with the socio-cultural subjectivities of landlessness surfaced among the Dalit people who are considered as the extremely marginalized group in the access to and ownership of land resources. He has analyzed the social, economic and cultural dimensions and processes of the issue of landlessness among the Dalits. He has suggested that such socially disadvantaged groups must be provided with alternative economic opportunities for the betterment of their social and economic lives by the responsible agencies. Dr. Keshav Kumar Shrestha, in his article entitled "An Ethnography of the Jhapali Rajbanshis", presents the classical ethnographic accounts of the Rajbanshi, one of the few indigenous people of eastern Terai. More specifically, he has provided the analysis on the history, social structure, economic system, rites de passage, and religion. Dr. Laya Prasad Uprety, in his article entitled "Migration and Its Implications on the Local Initiative of Management of Water Resource for Irrigation", analyzes the trends and causes of in-migration in a traditional Tharu community of western Terai that triggered the intensification of the local culture of water resource management for irrigation in the expanded command areas, and explicates the implications of in-migration on the local initiative of management of irrigation systems. He concludes that hill-Terai interface has not been impediment for the sustained irrigation management in the traditional homeland of the Tharu people because the hill caste/ethnic migrant water appropriators have completely learned and accepted the native Tharu culture of common property resource management as if they are a part of traditional social structure. He further argues that such unique migrant-native interface which can be a model of the common property resource management for other parts of Nepal Terai where similar social structure exists. Notwithstanding this brute fact, migration has also begun having the +

adverse effect on the reduction of the command areas of the farmermanaged irrigation systems through the process of urbanization. Ms.Shyamu Thapa Magar, in her article entitled "Magars and their Indigenous Knowledge Systems and Practices in Tanahu District", has tried to analyze the gender aspect of indigenous knowledge systems. She argues that both men and women are directly involved in resource utilization, management and protection by using their indigenous knowledge systems in their specific environments learned from their older generations for their sustained livelihood. These systems of knowledge have been continued because of the inherent organizational culture of underscoring the people’s participation in decision-making processes, group dynamism and people’s role in resource mobilization, cost effectiveness and sustainability. Hence, promoting valuable indigenous knowledge systems and practices for the sustained livelihood among the indigenous communities is the need of the contemporary world when they are deteriorating due to the interventions of the new modern technologies. Using the value chain analysis, Mr. Madhusudan Subedi, in his article entitled "Aromatic Plant Trade and Livelihood Strategies in the Rural Nepal: A Case of Wintergreen in Dolakha District", has assessed the opportunities for Wintergreen, a natural product's intervention for reducing poverty, strengthening local governance, and improving resource management. He concludes that natural resources are dynamic and perceptions regarding their ownership and access rights are socially embedded, and political forces determine the stake of various actors and stakeholders over such resources. People and their surrounding environment define resources and their use. The Nature, Wealth and Power Framework enables one to understand the various cross- cutting themes. It is a mutually inclusive framework for knowledge management, capacity building, organizational development and arrangement, competitiveness and efficiencies, policy and legal reforms, and integration. Mr. Chalaune, in his paper entitled "Water, Wealth and Power: A Case Study from Upper Mustang Nepal", examines the relationship between micro socio-political institutions and unequal access to water which are ultimately moulded by macro social world. He argues that the +

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indigenously managed irrigation system existing in Dhee-Upper Mustang is the manifestation or reflection of local kingship, village headmanship, polyandry, property inheritance system, access to and control over land, animal husbandry, state monarchical system, Bikas (development), and modus operandi of NGOs/INGOs and governmental officials. He cogently argues that the local unequal socio- political complexities led to age old indigenously managed irrigation system which is ultimately triggered and protected by wider social and political structure. Succinctly put in other way, he shows that the community or indigenously-managed irrigation system of Dhee is not isolated from micro and macro sociopolitical complexities. He has ascertained that it is highly exploitative system because irrigation water reinforces existing social hierarchy making rich the richer and poor the poorer. Mr. Jiban Mani Poudel, in his article entitled, "Cultural Understanding of Non-timber Forest Products among Bahuban Community People of Eastern Nepal", analyzes that all naturally available 'objects' are not 'resources' for all categories of people. He argues that these objects only become resources while people use them to fulfill their needs by interpreting the symbolic meanings, functions and use-values in their socio-cultural and religious lives. Along this line, he further argues that all non-timber forest products (NTFPs) have not the same use-values for all categories of people. There are caste/ethnic, religious, class, and age-group differences in NTFPs’ uses. Therefore, people’s interaction with nature (NTFPs) can be understood only with reference to culture and cultural perspectives. He has further argued that the local people have strong social sanction and tradition belief regarding the use of locally available resources. Such social sanction and traditional belief help to protect over and continuous exploitation of resources. Dr.Tulsi Ram Pandey, in his article entitled "Democracy in Cage:Towards a Framework for State Restructuring in Nepal", analyzes the meaning of state and democratic processes, explicates how the democratic processes were kept into cage by all previous waves of efforts towards restructuring the state, evaluates the contents and implications of current debates on state restructuring in Nepal by relating them with the characteristics of the democratic processes and makes

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efforts to identify some additional issues of importance in this regard. He concludes that one of the important fields requiring changes in bringing some reformulation of relationship between state, class and people is the organizational structure of the state and the pattern of distribution of power between its units working under that structure. Devolution of political and economic power of the state to village level units of the government helps to satisfy many of the problems raised in current debates on state restructuring in Nepal. It is a fact that many of the caste and ethnic people are concentrated in some specific parts of the country. As a result, the representative units of the governments in most of those specific localities could be formed of members representing those caste and ethnic people who live there in majority. Devolution of power of the state to these local units allows these members to use that power for the advantage of their community. Mr.Suresh Dhakal and Mr. Sanjeev Pokharel, in their article entitled "Local Movements, Political Processes and Transformation: A Case Study of Bhaktapur Municipality", have attempted to explain a story of partnerships, communities, political leadership, and management practices to show how with a political will good governance is possible even in a polity that is undergoing significant governability crises and an erosion of political institutions. By studying the transformation of the traditional city of Bhaktapur, they have sought to complicate and problematise the discourse on democracy so that we can look beyond the subtle rhetoric of democracy and draw different conclusions. They have concluded that a program of social transformation – towards more modernity, towards more democracy - can achieve its desired goals if it takes into consideration the social, economic and cultural experiences of the people concerned.Therefore, it is important for a program of social transformation to be compatible with the constraints and opportunities faced by the people in their everyday lives. They have cogently argued that ideologies hold no power in themselves to change a society. What is required is people’s active involvement in the processes of determining not only the contents but also the course of social transformation. If people actively participate in the process of determining what needs to be changed and how, desired social changes are not difficult to realize. In Nepal, few programs of social and economic transformation are based on people’s own perception about how they can be made fruitful to +

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them. Prof. Samira Luitel, in her article entitled "Dependency and Underdevelopment: The Nepalese Context", proffers the penchant criticism on the nature of underdevelopment in Nepal. She critically rivets her analysis on history of underdevelopment, foreign aid and dependency, dependency and donor interest, centralized planning and unequal development and traditional bureaucracy and global economy vis-à-vis Nepal. She concludes that the internal political system characterized by the political instability, traditional caste system, class system, fatalism, foreign aid and donor interest and traditionally-oriented bureaucracy have been some of the key factors for the underdevelopment of Nepal. Ms.Sujan Ghimire, in her article entitled "Macro Development and Micro Social Processes: Development as Discourse in Nepal", cogently argues that to understand development processes, examining aid impacts at local level is as important as studying the impacts of development at the macro level. She has tried to explore the intended and unintended impacts of Finnish aid in the Nepali forestry sector and link the impacts of aid at macro level with processes at the micro level following a genre of thought, known as post-development. She has inferred from the post-development writings that different social processes are set off by development at local levels. For her, understanding the context is crucial to ascertain the impacts of development aid. Ms. Mina Uprety and Ms. Sikshya Adhikary, in their paper entitled "Perceptions and Practices of Society Towards Single Women in the Context of Nepal", focus on problems faced by single women and specifically the widows in the context of Nepal. They argue that the problems faced by widows in Nepal are broadly related to the problems of gender relation. As widows, the social perceptions and practices towards them are much more severe in comparison to other categories of women. The patriarchical ideologies and male domination in social practices have imposed barriers to their happiness. However, they observe that circumstance is now slowly but unquestionably changing with new options, opportunities and hope for them to emancipate from patriarchical domination.

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John Gray, in his paper entitled "The Anthropology of Tacit Knowledge in the Domestic Mandala: A Case Study of Chhetris i n the Kathmandu Valley", tries to illustrate the tacit knowledge among the Chhetris, their equivalences between various planes of existence, the activities of everyday domestic life and the places where they take place (which are multifaceted such as corporeal, social and cosmological). He argues that their houses are multifaceted because they are the places to live their daily lives, they are maps of the cosmos, and they are machines for revelatory knowledge.

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SOCIAL INCLUSION: POLICIES AND PRACTICES IN NEPAL Om Gurung * Introduction Social inclusion is one of the most vibrant issues raised strongly by indigenous peoples, women, Madhesi, Dalits and other marginalized communities in Nepal. At present, this issue has been a political agenda among political leaders, a subject of academic discourse among intellectuals and a field of development priority among development practitioners. Given the fact that the present state is exclusionary, nonparticipatory and non-representative and discriminates against indigenous peoples, women, Madhesis, Dalits and other marginalized communities on the basis of caste, ethnicity, language, religion, sex, class and geographical territory, these marginalized peoples and communities are demanding for a inclusive state through its restructuring along the line of federalism on the basis of national regional autonomy. For this purpose the election of constituent assembly has served as a legitimate and democratic process in present day Nepal. Demographic Overview in Nepal Nepal is a country of great cultural diversity. The racial, ethnical, cultural, linguistic and religious diversities have characterized Nepal as what Toni Hagen (1961:59) calls "the ethnic turn-table of Asia". The national census of 2001 has identified 102 caste and ethnic communities and 92 languages and dialects in Nepal. These caste and communities are broadly divided * Om Gurung holds Ph. D. in Anthropology from Cornell University of Ithaca, New York. He is one of the founding faculty members of the Central Department of Sociology/Anthropology of Tribhuvan University at Kirtipur, Kathmandu, Nepal. Currently, he is a Professor of Anthropology and Head of the Central Department.

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into two major ethnic groups: the Indo-Aryan language speaking Caucasoid group and Tibeto-Burman language speaking Mongoloid group. The former group belongs to the Hindu caste communities while the latter group belongs to the indigenous nationalities of Nepal. As per the national census of 2001, Bahuns and Chhetris constitute 30.9 percent, indigenous peoples constitute 37.2 percent, Madhesis constitute 14.8 percent, Dalits constitute 11.8 percent and religious minorities and other unidentified group constitute 5.3 percent of the total population of 2.27 million. On the basis of religion, 80 percent of Nepal's total population is reported to be Hindus and 10 percent as Buddhists. The rest percentage of the population belongs to the Kirants, Muslims, Christians, Jains and other unidentified minority religious groups. The predominance of Hindu population is due to long political dominance of a theocratic Hindu state (Gurung, 2003). The Hindu caste people are of plain origin. They fled away to Nepal from India in early 12th and 13th centuries to escape from Muslin invasion in India. Most indigenous peoples are of hill and mountain origin who came to settle in Nepal from Tibet long time back. Geographically, we find more indigenous people in the hill and mountains (25) than in Tarai (18), whereas we find many caste groups in the Tarai (41) than in the hill (9). We do not find any caste groups in the mountain region. Status of MDGs in Nepal In the history of the planned development efforts, the Government of Nepal included, for the first time, policies and programs related to the development of indigenous peoples, women, Mdhesis, Dalits and other marginalized communities in the Ninth Five-Year Plan. In this Plan, the government has admitted its weaknesses to accommodate these communities in the mainstream development programs of the country. It has considered indigenous peoples and other marginalized communities as development partners. But in practice, these communities did not participate in the development planning and programming of the Ninth Five-Year Plan because the government never consulted them. The Tenth Five-Year Plan was the Poverty Reduction Strategy Program for Nepal that identified human development and social inclusion as one of the four main pillars of the poverty reduction strategy with objectives to: (i) improve access to and quality in primary education and (ii) provide +

OM GURUNG: Social Inclusion: Policies and Practices... 3 primary education in mother languages of the communities. But the government did not look honest and serious to implement the development programs for these communities. Instead, its development programs displaced indigenous peoples and other marginalized communities from their lands and territories. The land reform program, for example, converted the Tharu and Madhesis from land owing communities to Kamaiyas (bonded labourers) in western Tarai. The establishment of National Parks in Nepal has displaced indigenous Chepangs, Botes, Majhis, Darais, Rajis and Mushars communities from their land and territories. The community forestry program, a model of the most successful community-based development program in Nepal, has deprived many indigenous peoples off their customary use rights of forest resources. This has not only affected the economic life of the local communities but also their traditional knowledge, skill, technology, beliefs and practices which, in turn, has affected their ethnic identity. The report of National Living Standards Survey (NLSS) 2003/ 2004 shows that indigenous peoples and other marginalized communities have access to social services and other economic opportunities far behind the national average. For example, the national poverty rate is 31 percent, but 44 percent indigenous peoples, 46 percent Dalits and 41.4 percent Muslims are below poverty line. The national per capita income of high caste Hindu Bahuns and Chhetris is Rs. 18,400. But indigenous peoples’ per capita is Rs.13,300, Madhesis' Rs. 10, 461, Dalits’ Rs. 9,202 and Muslims' Rs. 8,483. The national literacy rate of Nepal is 53 percent, but it is 48.8 percent among indigenous peoples, 21.3 percent among women, 36 percent among Dalits, 32 percent among Madhesi and 27 percent among Muslims. Indigenous peoples occupy 12 percent of the administrative works, Madhesis occupy 5 percent, Dalits occuly 1.3 percent and religious minorities occupy only 1.1 percent. The majority of women work in informal sectors of subsistence economy. Indigenous peoples, women, Madhesis and Dalits sell their labour as production workers on daily wage basis to support their subsistence economy. On an average, indigenous peoples and other marginalized communites hold less than 0.5ha of agricultural land. Women manage land, but they do not hold any lands in their name as men control and own land and other properties in a patriarchical Nepali society. The available data show that

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only 8 percent women have landholding entitlement in their names. In total, indigenous peoples, women, Dalits and Madhesis are at the bottom of the composite human development index. Government of Nepal has now made national commitment to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). And as per the spirit of Poverty Reduction Strategy Programs (PRSPs), the Three-Year Interim Plan (TYIP) has fine-tuned the priorities related to the MDGs according to the national context with particular focus on indigenous communities, women, Madhesis, Dalits, and other disadvantaged communities. But several case studies reveal that MDGs have no significant impact on the life of poor peoples (cf. Bhattachan and Chemjong 2006, Bhattachan and Webster 2005). With the exception of the basic primary education, MDG-related programs have not reached the marginalized communities. The government and donor agencies have no meaningful policies and programs on consultation and participation of indigenous peoples, women, Madhesis, Dalits and other marginalized communities in the planning processes and implementation stages of poverty reduction strategy programs. The achievement of MDGs is severely constrained first by the decade-long Maoist armed conflict and second by the lack of political commitment and strong policies of the government. Indigenous peoples, women, Madhesis, Dalits and other religious minorities are still poor and marginalized communities in Nepal. Social Exclusion One of the widely accepted factors of impoverization and marginalization of indigenous peoples and other marginalized communities in Nepal is the social exclusion. The cultural discrimination, economic exploitation, social exclusion and political oppression have become the national characters of Nepali state politics ever since the formation of greater Nepal through territorial conquest by the Gorkha rulers in 1769 A. D. Soon after the territorial conquest, Prithivi Narayan Shah declared Nepal as the Ashali Hinustana, meaning Nepal as the true Hindu Kingdom. He further declared Nepal as the common garden of four varnas and thirty six castes. In practice, Nepal never became a common garden of all communities. In stead, it remained private vassal of so called high caste Hindu Bahuns and Chhetris. The territorial unification of Nepal through +

OM GURUNG: Social Inclusion: Policies and Practices... 5 military conquest did not unify the feelings and aspirations of non-Hindu communities. They were excluded from the mainstream national political life and deprived off the socio-economic opportunities. The indigenous patterns of communal life and economy that existed in the hill and mountain regions of Nepal were subjected to penetration by dominant Hindu caste people. Hindu rulers created conditions for perpetuating their penetration by the transformation of land tenure systems, codification of Hindu laws and imposition of Nepali language. The structure of Nepali society into a hierarchical segmentation along the line of Hindu caste system with the ritual claim of superior and inferior as well as pure and impure excluded indigenous peoples, women and Dalits from the national social, cultural, economic and political life. The political consolidation of Nepal under a feudal regime through the 19th and early 20th centuries set the stages of other significant changes. The Gorkha rulers confiscated the kipat (communal) lands from indigenous peoples and converted them into raikar (state-owned) so that the state could levy taxes on them to support ruling classes and military expenditure. The state also granted confiscated lands to non-local settlers under various forms of birta, jagir and rakam tenure. Birta land grants were made to loyal followers of the new monarchy as symbol of patronage or as ritual gifts. Birta receivers were usually from so-called higher caste and members of royal family. They did not have to pay the tax. Jagir land grants were made to civil and military personnel for their services and loyalty to the state in lieu of their emoluments. The vast majority of indigenous people cultivated agricultural lands under the rakam system. Unlike birta and jagir, rakam was not a form of land grant, It was a raikar land on which the cultivators were required to pay taxes to the state and provide unpaid corvee labor referered to as hulak, jhara, beth and bethi, on a compulsory basis to construct palaces, temples, bridges, roads, irrigation channels, transport military supplies and other materials, reclaim wastelands, and process and supply forest products. The extraction of taxes and compulsory labor services placed a heavy burden on the population, particularly indigenous peoples. Since land and forest were the main sources of socio-economic life of indigenous people, new land grant policy undermined the local autonomy of indigenous communities. The creation of national parks in the 1970s

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displaced many indigenous peoples from their ancestral lands and territories. The customary rights of indigenous peoples over their land, forest and water resources were confiscated by the state. In the name of conservation and development, indigenous peoples were displaced from their traditional lands and territories without guaranteed option of livelihoods. The government's land reform and park policies and uncontrolled hill-Terai migration have resulted in a progressive impoverishment of the indigenous and Madhesi peoples, particularly in the Tarai (plain). Until 1950s/60s, Tharus, for example, were land owners of west Tarai of Nepal. Now the process of migration and population pressure as a result of government's land reform policy has converted the Tharus into land tillers and eventually to agricultural laborers in the form of Kamaiyas, bonded laborers. Similarly, the community forestry program has forced many indigenous and poor peoples of hill and mountain villages of Nepal to give up their traditional occupation of animal husbandry and live a life of migrant workers in India and other parts of the world. These contributing factors are responsible for high rate of poverty among indigenous peoples, women, Madhesis, Dalits and other disadvantaged communities of Nepal. The high rate of poverty has threatened cultures of local communities that are so vital for their community identity. Indigenous peoples, women, Madhesis and Dalits experienced new form of domination and hegemony during the Panchayat (partyless political system) regime (1960-1990). Politics was dominated by Hindu Bahuns, Chhetris and few Newar elites and indigenous peoples, women, Madhesis and Dalits were excluded from the national political life. The new political system called Panchayat headed by absolute monarch was engaged in a new project to modernize Nepal and attain national integration. But rather than developing a new model of ethnic pluralism, the Hindu rulers of the new regime engaged themselves to officially promoting ethnic homogenization by imposing the concept of one nation, one culture, one language, one religion, and one national identity. To become a citizen of Nepal, one has to speak Khas language, observe caste system, follow Hindu religion and wear Nepali dress. Parbatiya Hindu values became the ingredients of pragmatic model of creating national culture. Under this type of cultural model or cultural

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OM GURUNG: Social Inclusion: Policies and Practices... 7 accommodation which Pfaff-Czarnecka (1997) calls "nationalistic model", indigenous and other non-Hindu peoples were forced to share a common culture. Sharing cultural elements of unity was proclaimed by suppressing the differences. Any claim to ethnic identity was reduced to political rebellion during Panchayat period, because it was supposedly considered to be a threat to nationalism. Though the legal code of 1963 was considered to be a dramatic change, it also declared Nepal as the Hindu kingdom and practice of untouchabiity and gender inequality continued to be unabted. Debate and efforts pertaining to ethnicity and culture other than national culture fashioned in the line with the high caste Hindu was discouraged as anti-national and communal and therefore met with strong official opposition. The impact of the state policy of Hinduization and homogenization of cultural diversity threatened identities and severely constrained indigenous nationalities and other marginalized communities to practice and promote their languages, cultural traditions and religions. Development was a promise of the state and school education system promoted Hinduization and sankritization as parameters of civilization and development. Those who retained their culture and languages were considered primitive. In many respects, Panchayat policy was even more rigid and orthodox. The advent of multiparty democracy of 1990 provided an opportunity for articulating the pains of historical injustice and long-standing legitimate grievances of indigenous peoples, women, Madhesis, Dalits and other marginalized communities in Nepal. The promulgation of new constitution of Nepal in 1991 states equality to all citizens of Nepal before law. Nepal was declared as multi-ethnic, multi-cultural and multi-lingual, democratic, independent, indivisible sovereign state. Thus, for the first time, the constitution of the kingdom of Nepal recognized Nepal as plural societies.In comparision to the constitution of Panchayat era, the constitution of 1991 looked more progressive. At least in principle, the new constitution guaranteed civic rights, freedom of speech, freedom of organization, freedom of religious practices and freedom of languages. For the first time in the political history of Nepal, Nepali people enjoyed political rights even in its limited form. Various indigenous groups, women, Madhesis and other disadvantaged communities became assertive in an organized form for their collective and ethnic identities. The

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multiparty democracy provided indigenous peoples, women, Madhesis and Dalits with an impetus to quest for equal participation in the national politics and policy-making processes. Nevertheless, the multiparty democratic system failed to address indigenous peoples’, womens’ and other marginalized communities’ hope to reduce socio-cultural and politico-economic inequalities and promote human rights. The declaration of Nepal as the Hindu kingdom legally prohibited indigenous peoples and other religious minorities from practicing their religions. Similarly, the state’s recognition of Nepali (Khasa) as the language of the nation and language of official business certainly discouraged the protection and promotion of various languages of indigenous peoples and other linguistic groups. The Supreme Court of Nepal issued an ordinance to Kathmandu Municipality, Rajbiraj and Dahnusa districts for not to use their local languages in the official businesses. This ordinance has prohibited the linguistic freedom and thereby human rights of indigenous and other linguistic communities.The elimination of the practice of untouchability based on Hindu culture and gender inequality promoted by the patriarchical Hindu society became rhetoric of everyday politics rather than a reality. Nepali people became much poorer even during post-democratic Nepal. Representation of Marginalized Groups in Decision-making Processes As stated earlier, indigenous peoples, women, Madhesis, Dalits and other marginalized groups are not proportionally represented in the state’s politics, legislative and executive bodies and judicial and civil and military services. This situation remained same even after the establishment of multi-party democratic system in 1990. The multi-party parliamentary democracy did not meet the expectations and aspirations of Nepali peoples. Although the new constitution of 1991 recognized Nepal as multi-ethnic, multi-cultural and multi-lingual country, the fundamental tenets of the Hindu religion and culture remained the same. This prohibits indigenous peoples, women, Madhesis, Dalits and other marginalized groups from religious, linguistic and political rights and thereby excludes them from mainstream development programs. The parliamentary record, for example, shows that the high caste Hindus (Bahun, Chhetris and Thankuris) who constitute only 30.5 percent of the total population, had

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OM GURUNG: Social Inclusion: Policies and Practices... 9 55.16 percent in 1991, 62.9 percent in 1994 and 59.5 percent seats in 1999 in the legislature. Indigenous peoples who constitute 37.2 percent of the total population (23million) of the country represented only 25.2 percent in 1991, 18.5 percent in 1994 and 18.4 percent seats in 1999 in the legislature. Similarly, Madhesis had 8.7 percent in 1991, 10.7 percent in 1994 and 14.1 percent in 1999. Dalits had only one elected Member in 1991 and no representation in 1994 and 1999. Similarly, women, who comprise 51 percent of the total population in the country, had no more than 5 percent representation in the parliament from 1991 to 1999. Madhesis and Dalits had less elected chairs and vice- chairs in the Local Self-government Bodies ( for example, indigenous peoples had 19% in DDCs and 39% in VDCs, Madhesis had only 31 elected chairs and vicechairs in DDCs and VDCs whereas Bahuns and Chhetris had 59% in DDCs). In reality, the elected members from indigenous people do not represent the interests of their own communities as they are elected from their affiliated political parties. In the executive bodies and bureaucracy, indigenous peoples and other marginalized communities have lower representation (indigenous peoples 12%, Madhesis 5%, Dalits 1.3% and religious minoirites 1.1%)). They also did not hold key position in bureaucracy and they do not occupy important Ministries. In civil services, gazetted civil service posts seem virtually the fiefdom of Bahuns, Chhetris and Thakuris. Janajatis excluding Newars occupy only 2.3 percent of the total positions in the civil services. In judiciary, indigenous peoples have only two judges and so is the case of the Madhesis. Indigenous peoples, Dalits and Mushlims have only nominal representation in constitutional bodies. After peaceful settlement of armed conflict, the Maoists participated in the legislature. The participation of Maoists in the legislature increased the percentage of the representation of indigenous peoples, women, Madhesis and other various marginalized communities. But an increase in the political representation has not necessarily solved the problem of poverty, health, education and unemployment, as Bahuns, Chhetris and Thakuris are still holding the major political power and control state's economic resources. Indigenous peoples, women, Madhesis, Dalits and other marginalized groups have neither any share in the resources nor do they have access to opportunities. Their share in the state resources and access to socio-economic

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opportunities has been constrained by political, legal and institutional barriers that need to be removed through the restructuring of the state in an inclusive manner. Constituent Assembly Election and Restructuring of the State One of the major issues raised strongly by indigenous peoples, women, Madhesis, Dalits and other marginalized communities is to increase their participation in the policy making processes and restructure the state of Nepal to make it inclusive, participatory and representative accommodating various communities in the state mechanism. The commitment to restructure the state has been reflected in 12-point understandings signed between seven political parties and the Maoist and 10-point peace accord signed between the government of Nepal and the Maoists. The Interim Constitution of Nepal (2007) has ensured the commitment of the political parties and the government to restructure the state. But the form and character of the state restructure was not clear until indigenous peoples' movement and Madhesi uprising forced the government to declare federal system of administration and amend the Interim Constitution accordingly. Like indigenous peoples and Madhesi communities, women and Dalits could not come to the forefront of the movement on their own due to their political partisan culture and lack of community-based organizations. Yet, with their own distinct and independent demands of property rights and elimination of caste and gender-based discrimination, they supported the on-going movement of indigenous peoples and other disadvantaged groups for federalism and proportional representation in the state mechanism. The collective voice of indigenous peoples, women, Madhesis, Dalits and other disadvantaged communities has partly been heard by the government through separate agreements with these communities and the government has made its political commitment to make federal state inclusive, participatory and representative through proportional representation in all bodies of the government at all level. The Nepali Congress, CPN-UML and CPN (Maoist) and many other small political parties have also promised, at least in their election manifestos, for the federal democratic republican government and an inclusive, participatory and representative democracy even though they +

OM GURUNG: Social Inclusion: Policies and Practices... 11 differ in the contents of federalism. According to the report of Election Commission, Nepali Congress has nominated 21 percent indigenous peoples, 13 percent Madhesis, 1 percent Dalits and 2 percent Muslims as the first-past-the-post candidates for constituent assembly election. Similarly, CPN-UML has nominated 24 percent indigenous peoples, 13 percent Madhesis, 5 percent Dalits and 3 percent Muslims as the firstpast-the-post candidates. The CPN (Maoist) has nominated 30 percent indigenous peoples, 13 percent Madhesis, 9 percent Dalits and 2 percent Muslims as the first-past-the-post candidates. For the proportional representation, Nepali congress has nominated 30 percent candidates from indigenous peoples, 13 percent candidates from Madhesis, 14 percent from Dalits, and 2 percent from Muslims, whereas CPN-UML has nominated 34 percent indigenous peoples, 9 percent Madhesis, 16 percent Dalits and 4 percent Muslims for the proportional representation. In the same way, CPN (Maoist) has nominated 36 percent indigenous peoples, 11 percent Madhesis, 15 percent Dalits and 2 percent Muslims for the proportional representation in the CA. Half of the total proportional candidates for CA come from women. Despite the government's political commitment and constitutional provision of 33 percent of women's representation in the state mechanism, these big three political parties have failed to nominate 33 percent of women as FPTP candidates. Thus, compared to indigenous peoples and Madhesis, only 30 (12%) women have been elected in the CA through the FPTP electoral system. But women occupy almost half of the total proportional seats in the CA. The election result shows that of the total declared 601 seats in the CA, women occupy 197 (32.77%) seats in the Constituent Assembly. Similarly, indigenous peoples occupy 219 (36.43%) seats, Madhesis occupy 117 (19.46%) seats, Dalits occupy 49 (9%) and Muslims occupy 17 (2.82%) in the constituent assembly. The rest percentage (34.29%) of the seats is occupied by Bahuns, Chhetris and Thakuris referred to as "others" in the Interim Constitution. Though marginalized communities, particularly indigenous peoples and Madhesis, are not satisfied with the election process as they demanded for full proportional electoral system, they are satisfied with the result of the election, because such a great representation even on ideological basis never happened before in the political history of Nepal. To a great +

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degree, the result of the CA election confirms the success of indigenous peoples and other marginalized communities’ movement for inclusive political and administrative system in Nepal. Of course, these elected members are more accountable to their political parties than to their own communities. Nevertheless, it is the major shift in the political history of Nepal. Government's Strategic Measures for Social Inclusion in Interim Development Plan The Interim Constitution has guaranteed Nepal as multi-ethnic, multicultural, and multi-lingual secular federal democratic republican state. The decade-long armed conflict has turned into a peaceful settlement. In order to eliminate caste, ethnic, linguistic, religious, gender, and regional discriminations and to address the issues of indigenous peoples, women, Madhesis, Dalits and other disadvantaged groups, the state restructuring has been committed in the Constitution. The basic education in mother language has also been ensured by it. The civil, political and human rights have been guaranteed. The Three-year Interim Development Plan also admits that the centralized and unitary structure of the state is responsible for the social and economic backwardness of indigenous peoples, women, Madhesis, Dalits and other marginalized communities. In order to improve the socio-economic condition of indigenous peoples and other marginalized communities, the Three-year Interim Development Plan has introduced a policy of inclusive development focusing particularly on poverty, health, education, culture, language, natural resources, environment and infrastructure development. It has promised a sectoral approach to address community specific problems. In order to avoid the institutional and legal barriers to the ownership and access of indigenous peoples to natural resources (land, water, forests and mineral resources), it aims to conduct a legal review for introducing the necessary refoms. In order to ensure the development, protection and promotion of indigenous peoples’ culture and languages, a trilanguage education policy has been adopted. Despite the equal sex ratio in Nepal, extreme forms of gender discriminations still do exist in Nepal. Life span of women is shorter by two and half years. Maternity mortality

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OM GURUNG: Social Inclusion: Policies and Practices... 13 rate is the highest in South Asia. Compared to men, they work for long hours (12-16 hours a day). They have a very heavy workload with high level of physical vulnerability. Despite the government commitment of 33 percent representation of women in the state mechanism (except in CA at present), their participation in public services is nominal. Poverty and illiteracy rate is the highest among indigenous women. Sex abuse, domestic violence and girl trafficking are reported high among them. Women also suffer the most from the political conflict. With such persistent suffering and discrimination, Nepali women are forced to live their lives. The Interim Plan has committed to eliminate gender inequality through the legal reforms. Women’s empowerment and women development programs have been initiated. Special rehabilitation and reconstruction measures have been committed for conflict-affected and displaced women. Dalits still suffer from the practice of untouchability and poverty. Their indigenous technology and traditional occupations have been displaced by modern technologies and open markets. They need constitutional reforms to eliminate untouchability and special economic measures including skill development and income generating programs to address their poverty. They need education and cultural awareness program. Their traditional artisan works should be protected and promoted and made dignified. The Madhesis have special problem of identity and economic poverty. They are socially excluded and they are deprived off the basic social services. The Three-year Interim Plan also aims to ensure the participation and representation of indigenous peoples, Madhesis and other disadvantaged Tarai communities in the development planning processes and implementing stages. The plan also urges the government of Nepal to implement various international covenants and conventions such as ICCPR, ICESCR, CEDAW, ICERD and ILO 169, UNDRIP to end all forms of discriminations and to promote multiculturalism. All these international covenants and conventions provide directives to the national governments and international development partners for the inclusive development in all aspects of social, economic, cultural and political life ensuring the peoples’ consultation and participation at the community level. Based on the concept of inclusive democracy, the Plan has also promised to empower the local bodies of government as per the policy of power devolution. +

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Main Challenge and Constraints At present, Nepal is undergoing a rapid social and political change. Autocracy has been defeated and democracy has been reinstated. The eagerly awaited election of constituent assembly was successfully over on April 10, 2008. The first meeting of the constituent assembly of May 28, 2008 removed the king from the political and administrative powers for ever. The meeting also implemented the federal democratic republic in Nepal. Constitutionally, now Nepal is a federal republican state. The president has been elected and the new government has been formed under the premiership of CPN (Maoist). The new government’s policies and programs for the fiscal year 2008/09 have been made public. But Nepali peoples have not yet been able to experience the changes in their day to day life as per their expectations. The government has not implemented its commitments to address issues raised by indigenous peoples, women, Madhesi, Dalits and other marginalized groups during their movements. The new government’s policies and programs look highly ambitious, but the new policies and programs have failed to satisfy the needs and aspirations of indigenous peoples, women, Madhesis, Dalits and other marginalized communities. This certainly has raised frustration among these groups. The new constitution making process ensuring the social, cultural, economic and political rights of indigenous peoples, women, Madhesis, Dalits and other marginalized communities is very challenging issue. The restructure of the state along the line of federalism on the bases of ethnicity, languages and geographical territory is another challenging issue. Indigenous peoples, women, Madhesis, Dalits and other marginalized communities have their own specific problems of identity, representation, participation, and social inclusion in every sector of their social life. They demand human rights-based development programs such as food security, education, health, decent works and income generating activities at the community level. Development infrastructures such as road, drinking water, hospital and electricity in the areas of indigenous peoples, Madhesis and Dalits are very poor. These development programs demand massive budget. But budgetary constraints usually limit the implementation of development programs targeted to marginalized communities. Thus, the new government will have critical time because +

OM GURUNG: Social Inclusion: Policies and Practices... 15 it has many challenges to face in the days to come. The fulfillment of basic needs of peoples, maintenance of law and order, rehabilitation of displaced peoples and families and reconstruction of destroyed development infrastructure are among many other serious problems to be solved by the new government. Under such circumstances, the issues of indigenous peoples, women, Madhesis, Dalits and other marginalized communities may be overlooked. In such a case, Nepal may face a serious social and political crisis. So the government, political parties, international communities and various development partners should be serious to such foreseeable social and political crisis in Nepal. Otherwise, Nepal will have to face another type of conflict in the near future. References Bhattachan, K. B. and Sarah, Webster.2005. Indigenous Peoples, Poverty Reduction and Conflict in Nepal . A Research Report Sumitted to ILO Office, Kathmandu, Nepal. Bhattachan, Krishna and Dambar Chemjong. 2006. Achieving the Millennium Development Goals among Indigenous Surels of Nepal. A Research Report Sumitted to ILO Office, Kathmandu, Nepal. CBS,2004. The National Living Standard Survey (NLSS) 2003/04. Kathmandu, Nepal. Election Manifestos of Nepali Congress, NCP-UML, NCP (Maoists) Election Commission's Website Gurung, Harka. 2005. "Social Exclusion and Maoist Insurgency" in Sarah Webster and Om Gurung (eds.) ILO Convention No. 169 and Peace Building in Nepal. NEFIN and ILO/Nepal: Kathmandu. Hagen, Toni.1961. Nepal: The Kingdom in the Himalayas. Berne: Kummerly &Frey. Geographical Publishers. Government of Nepal, 2007. Interim Constitution of Nepal. Kathmandu, Nepal. National Planning Commission, Nepal. 2008.Three-year Interim Plan 2007 2010. Kathmandu, Nepal. Pfaff-Czarnecka, Joanna.2000. " Vestige and Visions: Cultural Change in the Process of Nation" in Nepal in David-Gellner et.al (ed.) Nationalism and Ethnicity in a Hindu Kingdom. London: Harwood Academic Publishers.

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SOCIO-CULTURAL SUBJECTIVITIES OF LANDLESSNESS IN NEPAL: A CASE STUDY OF SARKI PEOPLE FROM NAUBISE VDC OF DHADING DISTRICT Jailab Rai * Introduction Land is a primary resource for an agrarian economy in underdeveloped countries like Nepal. More than 85 percent of Nepal’s population lives in rural areas and more than 60 percent of the economically active population is involved in agriculture (HMG, 2003). Rapid population growth and increasing pressure on land resources to earn the much needed calorie is a major challenge in the country (Graner, 1997). In this context, the study of landlessness remains an important aspect of national agenda (Shrestha, 2001), particularly in the national inclusion process (Gurung, 2006). Moreover, the study of landlessness has become a policy debate and an issue of concern in the debates on national economic development (Shrestha, 2001). The sociological and anthropological understanding of landlessness has its own importance since it requires the analysis of cultural dimensions (Caplan, 1970 and 1972) as socio-cultural subjectivities in a historical context. The access to land resources or landlessness is an important social issue, which can be linked with social and cultural aspects of landless people as socio-cultural subjectivities in drawing out the implication of their access to land resources. This study deals with the socio-cultural subjectivities of landlessness with a focus on the Sarki people in the central hills of Nepal who are among the extremely marginalized groups of people in terms of the access and ownership to land resources. It reviews the process of * Jailab Rai holds M. A. in Anthropology from Tribhuvan University. He teaches Anthropology at the Central Department of Sociology/Anthropology.

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JAILAB RAI: Socio-Cultural Subjectivities of Landlessness... 17 landlessness among the Sarki people and examines the social, economic and cultural process of the landlessness of Sarki people in the historical perspective. The paper is primarily based on a review of existing literature on the land resource distribution and management in Nepal supplemented by information obtained from a field study carried out during September to November 2007 at Naubise of Dhading district. The study has used both quantitative and qualitative information obtained from the field. The Study Area and Methodology Employed Naubise is one of the 50 VDCs in Dhading district, which touches the Tribhuvan Highway. Sarki people of this VDC are settled in four villages, viz; Tappu Danda, Charghare, Barthumki, and Subedithok. The climate of the study area (Naubise) is comparatively warmer than that of the other villages in the VDC. But in contrast, the lands settled and owned by Sarki people are dry terraces with less productivity. They are settled very closely even somewhere sharing the same compound, with the exception of scattered households in Charghare and Barthunki villages. The study village is purposively selected for the study because of the high density of Sarki population in the area, easier accessibility from the road and relative security during the political insurgency in Nepal. A total of the 96 Sarki clustered households are taken as sample households. The household survey was conducted to obtain the quantitative information and the formal and informal interviews were conducted to obtain the qualitative information. Similarly, participant observation was used as a basic ethnographic tool. This study methodologically excludes the other ethnic groups living vicinity of the study area. Sarki People and their Population The recent population census records a total of 318989 Sarki population in Nepal, which is 1.40 percent of the country’s total population. According to the population census 2001, Nepali society consists of 101 identified caste/ethnic groups and 1.78 percent unidentified people. Among them, Chhetri occupies the first position in the highest ranking order covering 15.80 percent of the total population. It is followed by 12.74 percent of Hill Brahmin and 7.14 percent of Magars respectively. Similarly, Sarki-which is one of the occupational castes in the Hills

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occupies the fifteenth position in terms of its population size (HMG, 2003). The population census 2001 shows the distribution of Sarki people in almost all of the Hill districts of Nepal. This population census records Sarki as one of the four largest caste groups in two districts in the country. They are Jumla district of Karnli zone occupying 3rd largest position (6.5% of district population) and Dadeldhura district of Mahakali zone occupying 4th largest position (5.35 of district population) in caste/ethnic composition. It is 7th in Dhading district (of total 338658 district population), which constitutes 4.02 percent of the total district population. In this district, Tamang occupies the largest proportion of district population. It covers 21.48 percent (i.e. 72746 of total 338658) followed by Brahmins (57449), Chhetris (52552), Newars (32429), Magars (28675), and Gurungs (26224). The Sarki household in study village occupies fifth position (3.72 %) in the largest category (VDC, 2004). It seems that Sarki population is not a larger compared to others, but their settlement history in the study area with the marginal landholding size and distinct socio-cultural history are more important in the anthropological study. Sarki People: A Context of Origin Nepal was legally a Hindu kingdom until 2006. The people’s movement of 2006 triggered to establish Nepal as a secular state. The discrimination of caste hierarchy rooted from the Hindu religious philosophy came to an end after this movement. The caste hierarchy based on Hindu religious philosophy has been deeply rooted into the socio-cultural, political, and religious domains of the people. It is historically imposed in the name of Varna system, 1 under which there was stratification of society into four Varnas. It was traced from the Manu’s version as bodily part of Brahma into a racial element as the ritual status (Chhetri, 1999). The Varna system introduced in 5th century was reorganized into four-fold-occupational hierarchies in 14th century.2 History shows that Ram Shah (1605-1633), the king of Gorkha, also adopted the caste systema function of his theocratic tendency. He also considered it as a bulwark against the Muslim hegemony in Mughal India and Christian faiths of

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JAILAB RAI: Socio-Cultural Subjectivities of Landlessness... 19 British colonizers later in South Asia (Gurung, 2005). Similarly, Muluki Ain-the first national legal code of Nepal, enforced in 1854 by the first Rana Prime Minister- Junga Bahadur Rana, classified the Nepali society into five hierarchical caste divisions.3 These historical evidences of Nepali society have introduced and continued the tendency of caste discrimination in Nepal. According the Muluki Ain, the first three caste groups are kept in the pure caste category (chokho jat) or water acceptable castes or pani chalnya jat and the last two caste groups are kept into the impure caste (paninachalnya jat) or water unacceptable caste. The historical construction of caste hierarchy in Nepal has placed the Sarki people into the untouchable caste category, which more recently is termed as Dalit (Gurung, 2005). Gurung says that the caste discrimination and untouchability has remained as a fact of everyday life in the Hindu kingdom. The term Dalit referring to untouchablility seems to reflect the reality of their relative political, economic and social dominance, which is a recent entry in the Nepali socio-cultural space. They are subsumed as disadvantaged, downtrodden, marginalized, and oppressed groups. There may be diversified meaning of Dalit but the explicit meaning of the term is accepted as "oppressed" with the etymological link of Nepali word dalai or dalnu, which means to cross, exploit, oppress or suppress. The bases of such oppression of Dalits are rooted in the caste discrimination in Hindu myths and practices, although the Dalits belong to the same racial (Caucasoid), linguistic (Indo-Aryan) and cultural (Hindu caste) group as the wearers of holy cord. Gurung (2005) has mentioned three Dalit categories comprising of 18 Dalit castes in Nepal. They are: (i) Parbate (Hill) Dalits (Badi, Damai, Gaine, Kadar, Kami, Sarki); (ii) Newar Dalits (Chyame and Pode); and (iii) Terai Dalits (Bantar, Chamar, Chidimar, Dhobi, Dom, Dusadh, Halkhor, Khatawe, Mushahar). The ideas of caste and concept of touchability-untouchability rooted from Licchhavi period to Malla period and there up to modern Nepal (i.e. after the unification in 1769) has numerous impacts upon the Sarki people. They are historically excluded from the prestigious occupation, access to the resources, participation in politics, and equal respect in religious domain. It is believed that they were de-hierarchized (Gautam, et.al. 1994:215) because they failed to follow the Hindu religious norms and values by breaking the religious +

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code set by their ancestors, i.e. food taboos of eating dead carcasses (Sino in Nepali) of animals. Such religious and cultural myths and history of caste system gradually have forced them into the down-trodden group. Political History of Land Resource Management in Nepal: ExclusionInclusion Context In Nepal, the ultimate ownership of the land is vested in the state. But the historical records show that the traditional land product was distinguished into two shares: “the Talsing boti, i.e. the share accruing to the state, and Mohi Boti, i.e. the share accruing to the tenant of a respective piece of land” (Regmi, 1978:660-660). It is essential to understand Nepals’ economic surplus extraction from land resource. The political history shows that the share accruing rights (Talsing Boti) was handed over to the individuals for remuneration that is traditionally for both settlement and economic purposes. But the traditional land ownership is limited to the state itself. The formal and organizational efforts on land resource management have obviously excluded the presently emerged and identified landless groups in the extraction of this resource and to hold the access upon it. In this process, the different forms of land tenure systems were introduced and practiced in Nepal (see Regmi 1978). The occupational castes throughout the country are directly and indirectly excluded from owning and cultivating more new land for the long history. The Jagir-landassignment,4 was limited only to the government employees, as state’s share accruing mechanism. Regmi (1978) states that there was 98 percent of irrigated land handed over to the Jagirdars.5 Interestingly, 83 percent of such land was given to the military personnel and other was for civil servants, which is not recorded for the occupational castes in the political history of Nepal. Table 1 shows patterns and extent of the distribution of irrigated land until 1852/3. The history of traditional land arrangement system reveals that the group of people who were excluded from the state functionaries were excluded from land ownership rights. The Birta,6 appears to have been started by king Prithvinarayan Shah in 1772. It is a form of land grant by the state authorities in favour of priest, religious teachers, soldiers,

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JAILAB RAI: Socio-Cultural Subjectivities of Landlessness... 21 Table 1: Jagir Land Distribution in Nepal, 1852/53 Category

Irrigated land (in Muri)

Army

%

3178110

83.37

Royal Palace Employees, civil servants, village employees etc

532135

13.96

Rana family Miscellaneous life time grants

59570 23003

1.56 0.60

Employees of Defense establishments

19002

0.50

3811830

100.00

Total Source: Regmi (1978:468).

members of nobility and royal family. In Regmis’ words; There was a tax exempt and inheritable land grants to learned Brahmins, teachers, and priests. A Birta grants made by a king of Jumla in western Nepal as early as 1358 stated that any person who bequeathed land to Brahmins would dwell in heaven for 60,000 years, while anybody who confiscated land granted by himself or by others would become a worm living in human excrement for the same period. Such injunctions are found in later grants also. In several cases, the grants also invoked the blessings of the recipients for the spiritual wellbeing of the donor as well as his relatives and successors (1978:269). Guthi 7 as land endowments by the state authority laid down the Hindu and Buddhist religious foundations on the basis of Talsing Boti system to the religious institutions (Regmi 1978:639/67). It shows the exclusion of occupational caste from the extraction of land resources. Similarly, Kipat 8 a form of communal land tenure system also accounted as the process of excluding occupational castes from accessing the land resources. These traditional land arrangement systems are abolished with the conversion of those land-holdings into the Raiker9. Caplan (1972:86) writes that the mortgaging of cobblers- that is pledging of the property to their high caste creditors as security for the payment of debt in west Nepal, became the process to enforce the cobblers to lose lands to the Brahmins and become landless. It was because of the mobilization of land capital and needs of the cash income.

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Fragmentation of farm lands and wide disparities in land ownership has remained critical and problematic for the country (Seddon, 1987). After the abolition of land grants ownership, the redistribution of land resource has become almost exclusive in the form of Raikar (Graner 1997:81). Later, indebtedness and mortgaging have become important components in determining land ownership for the rural people (Caplan, 1972; Graner, 1997; Caplan, 1970). The needs for cash and the lack of access to a formal credit system have become a major cause of debt and mortgaging in most of the rural Nepal. In this context, the debtors agreed to hand over the land in case he is unable to repay his debts within the stipulated time period. The land reform program was implemented in 1964 with a view to do away with the prevailing disparities in land ownership. Prior to this, the government also promulgated the Birta Abolition Act in 1959 with the same objectives. More recently, the government has adopted the policy of eliminating the dual ownership of land with a 1997 amendment of the 1964 Lands Act. An official statement issued in 1951 declares: Unless the land tenure system is improved, the condition of the peasantry and agricultural production will not improve. Land-ownership is passing from the hands of peasants to those of money lenders and other rich people. But the actual cultivators do not have security of tenure. This has reduced agricultural production and increased the number of landless peasants (cf in Regmi, 1999:179). The tenancy rights granted under the promulgated Acts did not bring change in the peasantry life. The measure became largely ineffective because of the lack of appropriate measurement of land and ineffective implementation of land policies. The most notable decision in the Act of 1964 is its address to the prescription to hold up to 25 bighas of land by a family, which includes parents and unmarried children. Similarly, the compensation to the tenants at 25 percent of the value of the land (Regmi1987: 203-305) was non-divisible (i.e. no rights to alienate) and the full authority to increase and decrease agricultural rents by landowners weakened the tenancy rights. Such attempts just limited the undesirable pattern of land ownership which did not make the rights of the real tenants secure and could not increase the access to land for the alternative opportunities. +

JAILAB RAI: Socio-Cultural Subjectivities of Landlessness... 23 Demographic Feature of Sarki Population at Naubise The district profile (2003) has recorded 91 Sarki households in the study village, which has increased to 96 households at present. The 96 households comprise of 448 people with 205 (45.76%) females and 243 (54.24%) males. If the population between the ages of 20-59 years is taken as productive work-force, it will come to be 51.52 % of the total. Similarly, it will be 40.18 percent of 1-19 years of age and 8.3 percent are of 60 and above. The distribution of sample study population by their age group indicates the sufficiency of productive work-force. Table 2 presents clan-wise distribution of Sarki population at Naubise. Table 2: Distribution of Sarki Clan Households and Population in the Settlement Villages Clan Categories

Nubmer of Households Under Settlement Villages Tappu Barth Char Sube Danda unki ghare dithok

Rokka Acchami Tolange Ramtel Purkoti Magaranti Bisunke Bayalkoti Total (Hh) Total (Pop)

31 34 65 296

7 1 5 2 1 16 83

1 7 1 2 11 50

4 4 19

Total Households 37 37 7 5 4 3 2 1 96 -

Total Population 179 166 26 26 19 18 9 5 448

Source: Field work, 2007.

The settlement pattern of Sarki households in different villages is clan-based. Settlement pattern at Barthunki and Charghare villages shows that there are more diverse clan groups. However, the different clan groups inhabit in particular geographical areas of the villages. Ramtel, Magaranti, and Bisunke are the first Sarki settlers in the villages, whereas Rokka and Acchhami migrated from Tappu Danda village very recently (some about 30 years ago) because of the lack of agricultural lands in their previous settlement area. The average family size in 4 different +

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villages and 8 clan groups (out of the total 74 Sarki Clans identified by Jana Utthan Pratisthan 2007:63) are also not insignificant in comparison to national and district level. It is 4.67 persons on average (ranging from 3.71 to 6 persons) which is a bit less in comparison to 5.44 in national level and 5.40 persons in the district level (HMG 2003:1). Of the total 448 Sarki population, 315 are occupationally grouped Sarki population. Rest of them (133), handicapped (4), students (90) and children (39) are occupationally not grouped. Majority of the occupationally grouped population is dependent on the farming occupation. It means they rely on income or production from this sector. But none of the Sarki households produces sufficient foodgrains to meet their living. So the income from wage labor is identified as their main source of livelihood. Sarki people have almost given up their traditional occupation of leather-work. Those who are involved in leather-work are working in different private companies owned by non-Sarki or other people in Katmandu and other places. It indicates that they are only the employed labourers in the factories. Except farming, the other occupations (see Table 3) have recently emerged as easily accessible occupations. They Table 3: Distribution of Sarki Population by their Occupations at Naubise Occupation Categories

As Primary Occupation Number of persons

%

As Secondary Occupation Number of Persons

%

Farming Labour Driving/Conductor Bussiness Shoe-making

190 42 22 21 21

60.32 13.33 6.98 6.67 6.67

120 191 2 2

38.10 60.64 0.63 0.63

Servant/worker Catering Jana-Sena (Maoist) Guard Policeman (Govt.)

8 5 3 1 1

2.54 1.59 0.95 0.32 0.32

-

-

Abroad labour 1 Total 315 Source: Fieldwork, 2007.

0.32 100

315

100

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JAILAB RAI: Socio-Cultural Subjectivities of Landlessness... 25 are involved in these occupations as the option of their livelihood. Table 3 presents occupational distribution of Sarki population at Naubise. There is a stone-crusher at Tappu Danda village. In this working place, the stones are crushed into the pieces for construction materials. Sarki people are the major work-force in this stone-crusher. The large quantities of crushed stone are exported to Katmandu and other city areas. They receive 100 to 140 rupees per day from their work. Some of the Sarki farmers reported that they are also employed in the village as farm labor on daily wages. It is very notable that none of the Sarki has been employed in any of the government services except one aged 21 who is recruited into the Armed Police Force in 2006. It indicates that they were not employed in government services for generations. This has overwhelmingly affected in different facets of their socio-cultural life. Table 4: Distribution of Sarki Population by their Educational Attainments at Naubise Classes

illiterate

Primary

7

8

9

10

SLC

Total

Female Male Total

171 160 331

24 60 84

1 4 5

3 9 12

2 4 6

2 3 5

2 2 4

1 1

205 243 448

73.8

18.8

1.1

2.7

1.3 1.1

0.9

0.2

100

%

6

Source: Fieldwork, 2007. Note: Illiterate in this study means those who cannot read and write. And primary class means 2 to 5 classes.

According to Table 4, Sarki people have very low educational attainment. It is identified that, of the total 448 Sarkis, only one person is SLC passed (in 2007). The literacy rate of the Sarki population is very low compared to the national average. It is only 26.2 percent in comparison to 34.8 percent in total Dalits in the country, 54.1 percent in national population and 59.9 percent in higher caste Hill (Gurung, 2007). Moreover, the females of Sarkis are more disadvantaged from educational status. Among the illiterate Sarkis, majority are the females and the number of females in educational enrolment categories is also low in comparison to the males. Gurung (2007) writes that education is one of the basic indicators of the level of human development in which

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literacy provides access to information while educational attainment provides scope for new opportunities. It is an incidence of Sarki people that they neither have higher educational attainment nor do the access and involvement in good economic opportunities such as employment based on the regular salary and or with provision of pensions. They could not get employment in good and prestigious services because of (one of the many causes) the low educational status. They are compelled to be the labourers in different fields. Most of the Sarki people dropouts from their schooling at the primary level to join the work to meet their foodgrain needs. Social and Economic facets of Landlessness of Sarki People at Naubise The average annual foodgrain production of Sarki people roughly comes to be calculated as 4387 kgs per household, whereas their average buying of foodgrain is calculated as 487052 kgs. The rough calculation of annual per person production and buying comes to be a 94 kgs and 104.47 kgs, respectively. This calculation indicates that they are largely dependent on the market for their daily foodgrain consumption. If we relate their foodgrain production, consumption and buying with their occupation, it brings the picture of their socio-economic status. It is interesting that there is no Sarki household who does not buy foodgrain to meet the normal annual foodgrain demand in the family. It is because of the insufficient farm lands. The total land owned by Sarki people of 96 total households roughly comes to be calculated as only 274.1 ropani (i.e. 89.1 khet and 184.2 bari) which is only 13.98 hectares (ropani=0.051 ha). So, the man-land ratio comes to be 32.05 persons for per hectare land. It is very less compared to 5.7 persons at national level and 5.6 persons at the district level (HMG, 2003). Table 5 shows very minimal land holdings for majority of Sarki households. Moreover, 11 households do not have their own farm lands. It indicates that their land do not support their living independently. More than 50 percentt households own less than 2 ropanis (0.302 ha) of land. They seem to be very disadvantaged from the land ownership even though they are occupationally farmers. The landlessness of Sarki people is also reflected in the incidence of poverty. The national poverty incidence report shows the Sarki people

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JAILAB RAI: Socio-Cultural Subjectivities of Landlessness... 27 Table 5: Distribution of Sarki Households by their Landholding Size at Naubise Land Size (in ropani) No. of Households with Bari No. of Households with Khet No. of Households with Both Bari & Khet)

0

1

2

3 4

5

6

7

8

9 10 12 13 16 Tot

18 36 19 10

4

2

1

1

2

1

1

1

-

- 96

47 24 16

-

2

-

-

2

-

-

-

-

- 96

11 22 19 19 10

5

-

-

2

3

2

1

1

1 96

5

Source: Field work, 2007. Note: Bari means unirrigated field and Khet means irrigated fields.

with high poverty incidence. It is 65 percent compared to 34 percent for the Brahmins and 45 percent at the national level (HMG 2003). Harka Gurung (2007) has stated the landlessness of Dalits as economic problems of exclusion, identifying the alternative livelihood as agenda for inclusion. The traditional occupations of Sarki people could not uplift their economic status for the long history. Their living standard is very low in comparison to the per capita income. It is only $39 compared to $240 at the national level (CBS, 2003). It is obviously very low compared to the other caste/ ethnic groups too. The depressing status of Dalits in Nepal is evident in their low levels of literacy, low income and low life expectancy (Gurung, 2007). The caste discrimination has marginalized them from economic opportunities for the long history, which, in turn, is leading them to further dependence and destitution. Haka Gurung (2007:48) writes; According to the population census 2001, upper caste constitutes 35.4 percent of the total economically active population. By major occupation, they dominate in professional/technical (62.2%) and legislative/administrative (38.3%). On the reverse, Dalits who constitute 11.9 percent of economically active population have only a nomical representation in such occupations: 1.6 percent in professional/technical 1.3 percent in legislative/administrative, and 3.9 percent in clerical. Among those engaged in elementary occupation, 36.1 percent are Janajatis, 22.6 percent Dalits and 19.1 percent upper caste. The practice of Hindu caste discrimination in Nepal has discouraged Sarki people into a part of state functionaries. It is resulted into the less +

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access to economic resources like land resources. Consequently, the economic growth has become fruitful for only the state elites those who had already an access to the land resources. The Dalit people-like Sarkis, have used two alternatives; either to increase their access to land resources or to increase their access to other income generating activities to make their living in substitution of their traditional occupation. But Dalits-like Sarkis, could not dare to claim any possible opportunities and benefits (if any) under the caste discrimination. Dor Bahadur Bista (1991) discusses the fatalism persisting in the mind of people that is leading to the behavior of persons. He (1991:4) writes; The most important effect of this has been the absolute belief in fatalism: that one has no personal control over one’s life circumstances, which are determined through a divine or powerful external agency. This deep belief in fatalism has had a devastating effect on the work ethic and achievement motivation, and through these on the Nepali response to development. It has consequences on the sense of time, in particular such things as the concept of planning, orientation to the future, sense of causality, human dignity and punctuality. The Sarki people in study area are still fatalistic in their economic, social and historical change. The Hindu caste discrimination system based on the religious ideology is deeply rooted, because of which social, economic and cultural life of Sarki people are influenced. They could not claim their possible and justifiable rights to access on resources in response to their absence in the political and economic participation. The state functionaries promulgated a number of decisions, plans and policies on land resource management part. However, Sarki people are excluded in the distribution and ownership of land resources because of the discriminatory nature of religious, political, and historical processes. They have failed to access the land resources and other sectors as well. Sarki People: The Historical Facets of Landlessness The settlement history of Sarki people in the study area reveals a kind of compulsion to be migrated from their place of origin. The Sarkis in the study area are encouraged to settle by the Hindu high caste groups with the interest of encouraging them to cultivate their Birta land-fields. The

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JAILAB RAI: Socio-Cultural Subjectivities of Landlessness... 29 different Sarki clans are settled in specific villages and village area, which have the meaning of their settlement history and their kin networks to make them settle. Besides, their socio-economic life in their place of origin is another factor for this reason. By settlement history, Rokka people are the first settlers in this village followed by Acchami and others. The settlement patterns of the Sarki people in these villages have different historical evidences. It has then become the cause of settlement distribution of Sarki households in different villages. Among the 8 Sarki clan groups settled in this village, Rokka Sarkis were the first settlers. They had settled in this village in 1880s followed by the Acchami Sarkis in 1900s; Tolange Sarkis in1920s; Bayalkoti Sarkis in 1950s; Maganranti Sarkis in 1960s; and Ramtel Sarkis, Purkoti Sarkis, and Bisunke Sarkis in 1970s. Among them, Achhami and Rokka Sarkis are settled at TappuDanda village. They migrated from Sanga gorge (western coast of Katmandu valley) and Thansing Belaspur (a part of present Nuwakot district), respectively. They migrated to this village to cultivate the Birta land of a Brahmin. Additionally, Achhami Sarkis were brought by Roka Sarki as priest to perform death rite (they call it Jau Til Dinu). Tolange Sarkis were invited by Birta land holders to cultivate their Birta land. Thus, they migrated from Tamasatar-a part of Nuwakot district. Bayalkoti Sarkis, Ramtel Sarkis, and Bisunke Sarkis were brought by their maternal uncles (Maoli Mama in Nepali) to settle there because of the landlessness in their parental settlements. For instance, Ramtel Sarkis, migrated as their mother could not take care of them after the death of their father. Magaranti Sarkis were brought by Birta land holders from the western part of present settlement area. Similarly, Purkoti Sarkis were brought by Birta land holders. They migrated from the North West village of present settlement area. They all migrated to these villages because of their landlessness in the places of origin. They migrated to these villages in search of their survival means. Their migration was followed with no parental property and land but just for the survival. The Network Access of Sarki People for the Occupational Choices Sarki people have very less access to and recruitment in the governmental and other jobs to obtain regular income. The field work records 21 Sarki +

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people involved in vegetable business. It is to buy and sell vegetables from and to Kalimati market in Katmandu. The people involved in these works are mostly the close kins of Tappu-Danda village. They are inspired by their elder brothers. One of the Rokka Sarki in Tappu Danda has five sons. Among them, four are involved in vegetable business at Kalimati. They regularly supply vegetables to Kalimati. This business was started 20 years ago by their eldest brothers and followed by his younger ones. In the same way, the network access is also observed in shoe-making and driving. Of total 21 occupationally shoe-makers, 10 of them are in Katmandu valley. They accessed there through their kin networks for 13 years. Similarly, 22 persons are involved in transport service (driving and conductor) by their kin networks. Interestingly, a case in Tappu is found that there are 6 drivers in a family of two generations (i.e. two fathers out of 5, 4 sons out of 11). The next evidence of kinship ties is applied in catering services in Katmandu. Similarly, settlement history of 8 Sarki clans in this VDC itself is an initiation of kinship ties. The close kin network (for Berreman 1997, a function of kin groups) is a survival mechanism of Sarki people at two levels: (i) the first employee makes good relationship in his working field, and (ii) he can train his kin to be perfect in his task. So the Sarki people are found mostly working in Katmandu for driving, business, and shoe-making. Besides, they are also working in Chitwan, Pokhara and other places. The analysis of their occupational access through kin ties can help to bring a historical process of how they were excluded from the participation in the state functionaries and other prestigious occupations as well. It is a noteworthy instance of the lack of network access in the high status occupations for the more disadvantaged groups (Seddon, et al 2001). The field interaction concluded that they had no relatives to encourage and help them in recruiting into the governmental services. The new generation or the successors of Sarki people just have been socialized into the field accessed by their predecessors and have been enjoying it by their consent. But they have no access and expectation to be involved in the good jobs because of their perceptions and means of kin ties to influence them into the highly prestigious occupations. It is acknowledged that if the predecessors had access to the high status job, their new generation would have employed in the same sectors.

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JAILAB RAI: Socio-Cultural Subjectivities of Landlessness... 31 Concluding Remarks Sarki people are considered as the occupational caste, which are traditionally pronounced to be relied on their hand-skills, which confined them into a limited periphery for their economic survival. Consequently, it has affected upon their rest of the other dimensions of social life. The observation on the history of Hindu caste and caste discrimination indicates that it is surfaced into the multiple dimensions of the nation and the process of nation building, which is more often termed as syncretism (Bista, 1982) of diversities, resulting into the massive structural and functional inequalities (Sharma 1979). In this minute observation, the analytical opinion of Sharma (2004:135) "the law-makers showed great concern for reserving certain high Hindu value symbols throughout the kingdom," is more relevant in the context of ethnographic observation of Sarki people at Naubise of Dhading district. By the history, they are down-trodden group in terms of social, economic and political status. The state apparatus influenced by Hindu religious ideology has surfaced into the processual causality of Dalit mores and morality in relation to access on land resource. It has to be acknowledged that the Dalit people, including Sarkis are disadvantaged, downtrodden, marginalized and oppressed groups (Gurung, 2007). It began from the articulation of caste system into structural principle of "distinctive opposition" (cf in Pandey, 2005:64) in the form of an element of a larger system, which was and is responsible in putting and pushing them in the bulk of their walk over the years, decades and until recently. It needs to be changed for the smoothening of the state apparatus for the process of inclusion. A number of legal attempts are formulated and implemented to address the issues including landlessness of the peasants but in vain. The Sarki people are not an exception. The socio-cultural and historical process to look at Sarki people as "distinctive opposition" of the larger system has been impacted on the moral dimension of social system. The socio-economic condition of Sarki people in the study area is very worrying in comparison to that of the other groups in the same area. The settlement history which is influenced along with the kinship ties supplies the meaning of their nothingness in the the place of origin. Their acceptance of servitude (e.g. farming without own land) without any alternatives and the role of kin networks in the +

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access of resources and benefit accumulation are also a part of process to their marginalization. It indicates that the magnitude of social and cultural impact from religious and historical roots have largely deepened into the access to land resource, for which Harka Gurung (2007:35) has the opinion of providing the alternative livelihood as agenda for their inclusion. It is very difficult to make equal and equitable distribution of land resources since the different land polities, acts and plans have been formulated and implemented across the political, economic and cultural history in Nepal. Similarly, in the present socio-economic context of the world, the distribution of farm land itself is not an ultimate solution to such problems. The social and economic analysis shows that the Sarki people who are landless are categorized into farming occupation. The process of change, which more often is termed as "modernization paradigm" (Uprety 2005:169) of the world is very intangible, for which such of the marginalized group under the womb of history should be stepped along with the emerging new job opportunities, so that they may become a part of local, national and global paradigm to share the equal benefits, otherwise the history which has to be created again will have a chance to create the same cycle of exclusion. In this proposition, the notion of "putting people first" (cf in Uprety, 2005:169) may be a better method for the different stakeholders but which is a challenging job because of the recent political and economic liquidity in Nepal. Similarly, formulation and implementation of "socially-engrained" (Devkota (1994) policies for the social development of such groups are great challenges in Nepali society. The case of the Sarki people discussed in this study may be a more symptomatic tragedy of the larger society across the length and breadth of the country. Put in other words, Dalit people in the country are particularly subjected to the historical and ideological discrimination. This study is ethnographic description of Sarki people. But the interaction of Sarki people with non-Sarki people may be the important matter in decoding the reality of Sarki people. For Chhetri (2006), the behaviors and practices of different groups of people as their way of interaction are the most important for sociologists and anthropologists. Their interaction may be the result of their local adaptation strategy (like detailed study of the interaction of Sarki people with non-Sarki people) or the +

JAILAB RAI: Socio-Cultural Subjectivities of Landlessness... 33 influence of national and global process of change. For this study, these issues are not taken into the consideration, which may be the important dimension of sociological and anthropological study of landlessness in Nepal. Acknowledgments This article is revised version of project report submitted to SNV-Nepal in its initiation of apprenticeship research grant. I am grateful to SNVNepal for awarding me this opportunity. But first and foremost, I am grateful to my Guru-Dr. Ram Bahadur Chhetri, associate professor of Central Department of Sociology/Anthropology, Tribhuvan University, Kirtipur, for his guidance, suggestions and supervision from the very initial stage of this study and writing this paper as well. Sincere thanks go to Mr. Shambhu P Kattel-lecturer of Central Department of Sociology/ Anthropology, Tribhuvan University, Kirtipur for his valuable comments and suggestions; Ms Sita Rana (Program coordinator-SNV Nepal) for her regular cooperation and suggestions during the project run; and all of the faculty members at Central Department of Sociology/Anthropology, Tribhuvan University, Kirtipur for their direct and indirect inputs of the discipline. I also acknowledge Mrs. Heema Rai and Mr. Binod Prasad Sapkota for their assistantship in primary data collection in the field. Lastly, I also acknowledge the people of Naubise VDC of Dhading district and the informants for their patience and cooperation. End Notes i.

The Varna system as religious, cultural and political imperatives and the earliest inroad of Hinduism was introduced in 5th century A.D., i.e. during the Licchhavi rule in Kathmandu valley (Sharma 2004 and 1979; and Gurung, 2005). It was a result of Hindu religious orientation into the Nepali sociocultural and political milieu, which developed a hierarchical division of Nepali society influenced of Vedic (religious-myths) importance. It was philosophically imbedded into the origin of four Varnas from the lord Bhrahma i.e. Brahma from mouth; Kshatriya from arms; Vaishya from thigh and Sudras from feet. It is impacted into the social, cultural and political life of people (see Chhetri 1999 and Sharma 2004).

ii. Caste system was reorganized into the four-fold occupational hierarchies i.e. Brahmins as priest; Kshatriyas as warriors and administrators; Vaishyas as +

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traders and farmers; and Sudras as service providers, by Malla king Jayasthiti (1382-1395) of Katmandu. iii.

Muluki Ain- the first national legal code of Nepal, enforced in 1854 by the first Rana Prime Minister Junga Bahadur Rana classified the Nepali society into five hierarchical caste divisions: (a)

Wearers of holy cords or Tagadhari: Upadhyaya Brahman (Parbate), Rajput (Parbate Thakuri- Warrior), Jaisi (Parbate Brahman), Chhetri (Parbate-Warrior), Deo-Bhaju (Newar Brahman), Brahman (Tarai), Sanyasi (Parbate-asetic sects), Jaisi, lower (Progeny of widow), and Newar Castes (Various- Shrestha & equivalent).

(b)

Non-Enslaveable Alcohol Drinkers or Namasinya Matwali: Magar (Gorkha Army), Gurung (Gorkha Army), Sunuar (Hinduist), and Newar Castes (Jyapu, equivalent).

(c)

Enslavable Alcohol Drinker or Masinya Matwali: Bhote (Bhudhist), Chepang (Animist), Kumal (Animist-poters), Hayu (Animist), Tharu (Animist), and Gharti (Progeny of freed slaves).

(d)

Impure but Touchable or Pani Nachalnya Choi Chito Halnu Naparne: Kasain (Newar butcher), Kusle (Newar Tailor/musician), Dhobi (Newar Washerman), Kulu (Newar drum-maker/tanner), Musalman (Indian), and Mleccha (European). and

(e)

Untouchable or Pani Nachalnya Choi Chito Halnu Parne: Kami (Parbate blacksmith), Sarki (Tanner/shoe-maker), Kadara (Cross of Kami and Sarki), Damai (Parbate tailors/musician), Gaine (Parbate bard/minstrels), Badi (Parbate entertainer/musician), Pode/Pore (Newar scanvenger/skinner/fisherman), and Chyame (Newar scanvengers) (cf Andras Hofer 1978 in Sharma, 2004 ; and Gurung, 2007).

(iv) Jagir-Land-Assignment is the policy of the government to pay the salaries of civil and military employees, which is documented from 15th century onwards in India and 18th century onwards in Nepal, as share accruing to the state (see Regmi 1978). (v)

According to Regmi (1978) Jagirdar means Government employees.

(vi) Birta is an oldest existing form of land arrangement, under which the land was granted to individuals to enable them to make living. The term probably is derived from the Saskrit word ‘vritti’ meaning livelihood (see Regmi 1978).

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JAILAB RAI: Socio-Cultural Subjectivities of Landlessness... 35 (vii)The term Guthi is probably derived from the Sanskrit word ‘Gosthi’ meaning council, which was established in the time of Gorkhali conquest in 1769 in Katmandu valley. It was land endowment made to meet and operate the expenses arising from religious services and celebrations. This land grant was done for the charitable organizations, religious purposes or philanthropic institutions, held under the trust for specific objectives (see Regmi 1978). (viii) Kipat was a form of communal land tenure system, prominent for the people in eastern Nepal among the ethnic groups namely, Limbu, Rai, and other indigenous groups, until 1960s. (ix) Raikar was a law through which the state retains the land under its ownership and taxes the private individuals who operate it. It was by ending the privileged status into the orbit of normal taxation with the declared policy of the government since 1951 (see Regmi 1978).

References Berreman, Gerald D. (1997): Hindus of the Himalayas: Ethnography and Change. Delhi. Bista, Bor Bahadur (1982): The process of Nepalization: Anthropological and Linguistic Studies of the Gandaki Area in Nepal. Tokyo: Institute for the Study of Languages and cultures of Asia and Africa, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies. Bista, Dor Bahadur (1967): People of Nepal. Ratna Pustak Bhandar, Kathmandu. Bista, Dor Bahadur (1991): Fatalism and Development. Calcultta. Caplan, A. Patricia (1972): Priest and Cobblers: A Study of Social Change in a Hindu Village in Western Nepal. London, International Textbook. Caplan, Lionel (1970): Land and Social Change in East Nepal: A Study of Hindu Tribal Relations. London, Routledge and Kegan Poul. Chhetri, Gyanu (1999): "A Sociological Analysis of Dalit Occupational Caste Group in the Hill Nepal". In Anthropology and Sociology of Nepal: Culture, Societies, Ecology and Development (Eds. By Chhetri, Ram B.; and Gurung, Om P.) .Katmandu, SASON, PP. 56-68. Chhetri, Ram B. (2005): "The Plight of the Tharu Kamayas in Nepal". In Occasional Papers in Sociology and Anthropology (9), PP. 47-62. Chhetri, Ram B. (2006): "Changing Environments and Livelihoods in Nepal:

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An Overview". In Contributions to Nepalese Studies (33), PP.-1-14. Chhetri, Ram B. Sighdel, Harihar; and Malla, Yam B. (2001): Country Profile for the Forum on: The Role of forestry in Poverty Alleviation. Facilitated by the Forestry Department - Food and Agricultural Organization. DDC (2003): District Profile. DDC, Dhading, Nepal. Devkota, Padam Lal (1994): "Anthropological Perspectives on Grassroots Development in Nepal". In Occasional Papers in Sociology and Anthropology (4), PP. 50-71. Gautam, Rajesh and Thapamagar, Ashok K. (1994): Tribal Ethnography of Nepal (2). Delhi, Book Faith. Graner, Elvira (1997): The Political Ecology of Community forestry in Nepal. Verlag fur Entwick lungs Politic Saarbrucken, Heidelberg. Gurung, Harka (2005): "The Dalit Context". In Occasional Papers in Sociology and Anthropology (9), PP. 1-21. Gurung, Harka (2007): From Exclusion to Inclusion: Socio-political Agenda for Nepal. Social Inclusion Research fund Bakhundole, Lalitpur, Kathmndu. HMG (2003): The Tenth Plan: Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper 2002-2007. Kathmandu. HMG (2063 BS): Nepalko Anterim Sambidhan. Katmandu. HMG/NPC/CBS (2003): Population Census 2001, National Report. Kathmandu. HMG/NPC/CBS (2003): Population Monograph of Nepal (Volume I and II). Kathmandu. Jana Utthan Prakashan (2007): Dalit Bibliography. Kathmandu. Luintel, Samira (2003): "The Position of Dalit Women in Caste System". In Occasional Papers in Sociology and Anthropology (8), PP. 88-104. Pandey, Tulsi R. (2005): "Culture and Politics of Caste in Nepal Himalayan Kingdom". In Occasional Papers in Sociology and Anthropology (9), PP. 63-90. Regmi, Mahesh Chandra (1977): Land Ownership in Nepal. Dehli, Adroit Publisher. Regmi, Mahesh Chandra (1978): Land Tenure and Taxation in Nepal. Ratna Pustak Bhandar, Kathmandu.

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JAILAB RAI: Socio-Cultural Subjectivities of Landlessness... 37 Seddon, D.; Blaikie, P.; Camerom, j. (2002): Peasant and Workers in Nepal. Delhi, Adroit Publisher. Sharma, Prayag Raj (1979): The Caste Hierarchy and the State in Nepal. Himal Books, Kathmandu. Sharma, Prayag Raj (2004): The State and Society in Nepal: Historical Foundations and Contemporary Trends. Himal Books, Kathmandu. Shrestha, Nanda R. (2001): The Political Economy of land, Landlessness and Migration in Nepal. Nirala Publication, New Delhi. Uprety, Laya P. (2005): "Social Equity in Farmer Managed Irrigation in the Terai of Nepal". In Occasional Papers in Sociology and Anthropology (9), PP. 141-175. VDC Office (2004): VDC Profile of Naubise . Naubise VDC, Dhading District, Nepal.

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ETHNOGRAPHY OF JHAPALI RAJBANSHIS Keshav Kumar Shrestha * Introduction Nepal, despite being small in size, is a country with geographical and cultural diversities. The social system or structure of Nepal is based on the unity in diversity that integrates various caste, ethnic, religious, linguistic, and cultural groups. According to 2001 census, 102 types of caste/indigenous ethnic groups dwell in Nepal and 92 mother languages are spoken (C.B.S, 2002 :28-33). A comprehensive study about all the caste and indigenous ethnic groups dwelling in Nepal has not been conducted yet from the sociological and anthropological perspectives. Even today some minority ethnic groups are about to be extinct. Some even do not have the knowledge of their own cultural history. Such ethnic groups have begun to give up their ancestral cultures/traditions and adopt the customs of other castes/social groups and forget their own cultural history. According to Nepal's census held in 1991, the number of people speaking the Rajbanshi language was 85,559 which increased to 1, 29,829 in 2001's census. The Jhapa district located in the eastern Terai i n Nepal is inhabited by various caste and indigenous ethnic groups. This district consists of 3 municipalities and 45 VDCs. According to 2001's census, its total population is 6, 33,042. Apart from Rajbanshis, there are other tribes of people such as Dhimals, Jhangads, Meches, Koches, Tharus, Tajpurias, etc. Compared to other caste and ethnic groups such as Bahuns, Chhetris, Newars, Rais, Limbus, etc; the Rajbanshis are * Keshav K. Shrestha holds Ph. D. in Anthropology from Tribhuvan University. He is an Associate Professor at the Central Department of Sociology/Anthropology. Currently, he is serving as an Executive Director at the Curriculum Development Centre of Tribhuvan University, Kathmandu.

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KESHAV KUMAR SHRESTHA: Ethnography of Jhapali Rajbanshi 39 politically, socially and economically backward in every respect. Steady changes are found over the period of 50 years in every aspect of the life of the Rajbanshis who are simple, naïve and honest in nature. Their culture and social structure are gradually being changed and in this process, their cultural norms and values are gradually getting lost. Sociologically speaking, a number of powerful factors like modernization, westernization, sanskritization (due to the in-migartion of caste group people from hills) and globalization have contributed to the change in their society and culture. The Rajbanshis residing in Jhapa and Morang of Nepal are the oldest indigenous ethnic people of this region. They have been historically marginalized in the state political institutions and economic and social development sectors. Neither significant effort has been made to involve them in the state power institutions and mainstream them in the development process. Given this context, this paper aims at documenting the socio-cultural systems and the undergoing changes among the Rajbanshis for their holistic understanding. History In spite of the fact that the Rajbanshis are the indigenous ethnic people of eastern Terai, their origin can be traced back to India's Assam, Bengal and Bihar states of India. Even today, most of the Rajbanshis are found to have lived in Assam, Meghalaya, Tripura, Nagaland, and Manipur in India (Shrestha, 2064). Different scholars have expressed their own opinions about their origin. But one opinion is widely accepted among the Rajbanshis. Accodring to this opinion, Bodo people had entered India during the period of the commencement of the Bikram Sambat and they got settled along the bank of the Brahmaputra River and gradually migrated to Assam and north and east Bengal. Finally, they moved to Bihar of India and Nepal's various Terai districts such as Jhapa, Morang and Sunsari and settled there. The meaning of the word ‘Rajbanshi’ is the "dynasty of king". According to the local myths, their ancestor Koch king ‘Hajo’ established the kingdom of Kamrup by the end of the 15th century. Hajo's grandson Bishwo Shingh, the king of Koch, was powerful. Bishwo Singh had a significant contribution to the establishment of Kamatapur or the kingdom of Kochbihar. As Bishwo Singh, the Koch ruler, was found to be doing +

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the heroic deeds, he was given the title ‘Rajbanshi’, indicating the Chhetri caste status by the Brahmins. At that time, Bishwo Singh is reported to have converted into a Hindu. Not only did he convert into a Hindu, but also worked to make his relatives and people as the Hindus. In other words, the mighty king Bishwo Singh is said to have adopted the Hindu religion and culture and changed his name into ‘Bishwo Singh’, Hindu name (Snyal,1967:11). There is also another legend concerning the ancestry of the Rajbanshis. When Parshuram had started destroying the Chhetria dynasty in India as his father's revenge, the Chhetri kings and their people escaped to save their lives. Ancestors of Rajbanshis themselves being Chhetries fled and started living in the forests of Nepal's Morang and Jhapa by hiding (Upadhaya, 2060:56). In context of Nepal, King Prithvi Narayan Shah annexed the kindom of the Rajbanshis into a unified Nepal state. From the perspective of physical anthropology, the body structure of the Rajbanshis of Nepal looks like that of Mangol-Dravid people.Howerer, in complexion, they bear a resemblance to the Aryas. Settlement and Housing Pattern The Rajbanshis are found to have settled in most of the villages in Jhapa. They are professionally agro-based people. They have settled in the most fertile land. Their nucleated settlements are located at the upland. There are 10-15 households in the smaller villages and 50-60 houses in the bigger villages. They prefer to live in groups so that they help each other during the period of emergency or urgent needs. Most of the houses of Jhapali Rajbanshis have thatched roofs. They are erected with the help of locally available materials such as wood, bamboo and jute stalks. Houses are beautifully smeared with red clay, dung, and white clay. Visitors are not given direct entry to such houses. Instead, they are kept outside and if the purpose of coming is fulfilled there, they are sent back from there. However, the important people, if necessary, are taken to inside of the houses. In Rajbanshi community, it is also common that people consult Panjiyar (priest) while building a house. Devaniya (Dhani) Rajbanshis, +

KESHAV KUMAR SHRESTHA: Ethnography of Jhapali Rajbanshi 41 who are generally well-to-do, are found to have their houses built on the basis of the traditional Bastushatra (architecture) as per the religious tradition. But it is not possible for the poor families to do so. While bulding houses in the traditional pattern, the Rajbanshis focus on the following things: (i) north guwa (be a nut garden in the north; (ii) south dhunwa (be open land in the south for smoke access); 3(iii) east hans (be a pond in the east where ducks swim); (iv) west bamboo (be a bamboo grove in the west that may block the afternoon sun) (Sanyal, 1967). A Rajbanshi generally builds 3-7 houses as per the need and economic status. For instance, a rich family builds Thakbar (sleeping house), Nadanghar (kitchen house), Andighar (storehouse), Bhojawanghar (guest house), Bahiraraghar (meeting house), Gwalighar (shed), Thakurwadi (deity house), Mutherghar (grain house), etc. Poorer families have also compulsorily built 3-4 houses such as bed houses, kitchen houses, outer houses, sheds, etc. In most of the Rajbanshis' houses, toilets are not found. The families living in the towns have managed simple toilets. The non-toilet family members go to the streams, fields and open land for defecation. It happens due to the lack of the public health awareness. Lineage The Rajbanshis call themselves the desendents of Suryabansi and reveal their lineage(gotra) to be Kashyap.They follow Chhetri character and customs and add Singh and Rajbanshi to their names.The Koches call themselves the Rajput Chhetris.It is also said that Koch, Bhadai, Paliya, and Deshi including the Rajbanshi caste are the Dravidian castes of north-east and east Bengal.They are also thought to be the mixture of the Mongolian blood but they use Brahmins as priests in some of their religious rituals and follow the Hindu religion. There is no discrimination by status and level in their community. They can marry their co-lineage partners under the conditions of seven generations’ gap if the prospective partner is from the same village and 3-4 years’ gap in case of distant village. In the Rajbanshis' community, ‘Poruwa’ is significantly emphasized. They take ‘Poruwa’ as their family god (ancestral deity). Such ‘Poruwas’ are of 16 types, namely, Chaitan, Nitanand, Aadit, Satguru, Ramaut,

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Thunthunia, Lakhigadhadar, Chaturmaria, Bholoram, Chanatkhela, Udit, Jagbandhu, Dhadigar, Kabir, Sitaudit, and Tulsia. There are different kinds of Rajbanshis such as Koch Rajbabshi, Poundra Rajbabshi, Mech Rajbabshi, Newar Rajbanshi, and Khataha Rajbanshi. Like in Nepal, Ridge (1991), referring to Risely (1967), writes that there are also many types of sub-castes of the Koch Rajbanshis in the North Bengal, India such as Paliya, Sadhupaliya, Babupaliya, Deshi, Domasir, Modasi, Jaluwa, Tongriya, Khopriya, Gobriya, Kantai, Dhalai and Koch. These sub-castes of the Rajbabshis in India are not found in Nepal. Family Structure The survey conducted by the author himself in 2008 shows that there is the existence of two types of family, namely, nuclear family, and joint family. A slightly more than half of the families (53%) are nuclear followed by 47 percent joint families. Gradually, there is now the preference of nuclear families—a function of the fragmentation of the landholdings, education of the youths and quarrel among the daughterin-laws. These factors of the breakdown of the joint families are also ubiquitous among other caste/social groups in the study district. However, joint families are also equally emphasized due to the agrarian nature of the economy. Relatives in the Rajbanshi society have been classified into categories. These include: the relatives by blood as ‘Guthiyar’, and (ii) realatives by marriage as ‘Kutumba’. ‘Guthiyar includes the relations such as grandfathers, fathers, parental uncles, sons, nephews (brother's sons), grandsons and great-grandsons. ‘Kutumba’ includes daughter-in-laws and son-in-laws, nephews and nieces (sister's children), maternal uncles and aunts, brother-in-laws and sister-in-laws, father-in-laws and motherin-laws, etc. Besides these relations, there are other relations made by the society or social elites such as Mit, Mister, Mita, Gharamabapa, Dharamputra and Danguwa Dhokar Beta. Rites de Passage: Three ceremonies are briefly analyzed under the rubric ‘rites de passage’. These comprise: birth ceremony, marriage ceremony and death ceremony. +

KESHAV KUMAR SHRESTHA: Ethnography of Jhapali Rajbanshi 43 Birth Ceremony The birth ritual of the Rajbanshis is an important ceremony. The Rajbanshi society has the norm that a woman in pregnancy should not be physically and mentally tortured and troubled. They have the concept that if a pregnant woman has tension and trouble, it will badly affect the baby in the womb. They take caution thinking that ghosts may affect a troubled and tortured woman in pregnancy. The belief is that a woman in pregnancy should avoid seeing bad stuffs, hearing abuses, lifting heavy things, jumping over cords tethered to animals and looking at animals like monkeys and horses (these animals are considered as bad omens). They put a knife under the mattress and wear amulets in order to avoid ghosts and evil spirits. They have the custom that the natal home feeds a pregnant daughter or sister rice pudding before she has a delivery. A Haindi-caste Dayani (a delivery nurse) takes care of a woman in delivery. These days, a woman is also taken to a nearby health- post or hospital for the delivery (if possible). After the delivery, baby is kept on Nanglo (the flat basket) to greet family god, sun god, village god and all other gods in order to get blessings. A woman in delivery is supposed to be ritually pure after five days regardless of the sex of the baby. There was no traditional practice of giving name among the Rajbanshis in the past but there has been change in this regard for a couple of decades. These days the child is also named on the basis of the signs of zodiac. Traditionally, grandmother names the child. The naming practice in the Rajbanshi society is interesting. The child is named after the nature, events, months, days, time, seasons, cultural and social events and names of objects, birds and animals. Imitating the hills people, they also name a child on the basis of the names of gods and goddesses. Traditionally, only the first child has rice feeding ceremony in the Rajbanshi society which is held between five to nine months. The rice feeding ceremony is celebrated in a grand way regardless of the sex of the baby. Maternal uncle makes pudding from milk and feeds it to the baby. The uncles bear the expenses incurred upon for the celebration of the occasion. A person without completing Kanapindabar or ear piercing culture cannot get married. This culture should be completed even before the +

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marriage ceremony. The ear piercing of some of the babies is completed on the day of rice feeding. This ritual is performed by Gashain Thakur. In the Rajbanshi community, the menstruation is regarded simply as a natural process. Women do not take part in holy or worshipping activities for the first four days from the day of menstruation. Marriage Ceremony The Rajbanshi community is found to marry according to the Hindu traditions. People marry within their own community but outside their lineage. Marriage also does not take place within the three generations of the Mit (fictive kin) and seven generations of Guru (religious preacher). In the past, they had a system called ‘Chumana system’ under which bride's parents were given money or articles of wealth—a remnant culture of bridewealth. But now this system has almost disappeared. Arranged marriage is generally preferred in the Rajbanshi community, albeit there is the occasional occurrence of love marriage. In the case of arranged marriage, Karuwa (matchmaker) initiates the marriage proposal and Gasain Thakur performs the rituals. Once the zodiac of the prospective partners is found to be auspicious, the program of meeting the girl proceeds. Five people including the groom's father and his relatives on behalf of the groom visit the bride's home. The groom's father puts a pair of betel and nut (pansupari) on the bride's hand. At the same time, the groom's father examines the bride's nature, wisdom, and practical knowledge. Likewise groom visit program by bride’s father takes place at the groom's home. The bride's father puts betel and nut Rs. 101, shirt, dhoti, watch, finger-ring, on the groom's hand. Then the auspicious marriage day is fixed. Marriage is not certain until Darahaguwa ritual is fulfilled. Decision is made on the day of Daraguwa. On this day, the clothes and jewelry as demanded by the bride's father are brought and the decision is made. On the day of marriage or just before leaving for the marriage procession, Kasakuta ritual is to be held according to which married sisters, aunts, and sister-in-laws prepare a mixture of turmeric, a bhojo (a herb) and oil and anoint it on the groom's body. Kasakuta is, in fact, a ritual for soul purity. Before leaving for the marriage procession, Aam

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KESHAV KUMAR SHRESTHA: Ethnography of Jhapali Rajbanshi 45 Mohaliwa ritual is performed in which the groom has to go around a mango tree for five times and money, betel, nut and holy grass (dubo) are offered to worship the deities. On the day of marriage procession, Gashain Thakur takes the groom to a temple of family god and administers mantras in his ears for soul purification. Along with the preparation of the marriage procession, an object called Jivanchhuri (a full nut with a pierced knife) is placed on the hand of the groom. After this, the procession begins with bands and gunfire by riding buses or elephants in the past. Just before reaching the bride's home, children on behalf of the bride block the path to the people in the procession. They discontinue it only after the groom gives them some money. When the procession reaches the bride's home, the groom and bride get seated on Maruwa (dais or platform). Then, the bride's father offering his daughter to the groom asks-" Have you got my daughter?" and the groom says-" Yes, I have." These sentences get repeated thrice. Then the father-in-law hands over his daughter to the son-in-law and utters him," Sin if killed and piety if cared for". After this, the groom puts vermillion on the forehead of the bride three times. At the time of putting the vermillion, the bride's younger sister and the relatives prevent the groom from doing so by blocking the bride's head with a piece of cloth. When the groom gives them some money, they stop doing it. Thus, the marriage is held. In the evening time, the procession returns home. Then, with much fanfare, the groom's mother makes the entry of the daughter-in-law including the procession to her home. At the marriage party, relatives, neighbors and villagers are invited for a meal. On this day, the newly wed couple serve Haldibhat (yellow rice) especially to the people present there. This practice helps to establish the new bride's identity and social acceptance and be socialized in the new social ambience. Death Ceremony Among the Rajbanshis, dead body is either buried or cremated according to the Hindu tradition. A baby with no teeth is buried and there is no observance of mortuary rite for him/her.Three to five day long mortuary rite is observed for other minors with teeth. During the death of other people, it is observed for the 13 days. The eldest son sets fire to the +

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corpse of father or mother. The eldest or youngest son performs Malaluwa (mortuary rite) and other sons are just considered as ritually impure only. After burial or cremation at the funeral spot, the people in the death procession have a bath in the river and return home. Before a man participating in the procession enters his home, the dung or hay fire has to be placed in front of the main gate to his house for ritual purification. Along with it, a pot full of water with Tulasi (a holy plant) leaves is placed. All the men who have taken part in the funeral procession wash their hands and legs and touch fire and enter their homes. All the participants in the procession are served tea and lunch. The person who observes all the mortuary rites has to return home with a piece of white cloth tied to his neck. He observes ritual polluation for 13 days. Food Habits, Dress Patterns and Religion Rajbanshis are food-loving people. They principally consume rice, pulse, curry, beaten rice, and a variety of pickles domestically prepared. Traditionally, women wear Petani (a cloth similar to the loin-cloth which is tied up to the upper part of their chest) and men wear dhoti and shirt. But there have been changes these days. Women wear sari and blouse. Girls wear kurta suruwal, shirts, pants and skirts and boys wear all types of modern dresses. Women traditionally wear ornaments on the head, neck, waist, arms and legs. The Rajbanshis are one of the most Hinduized aboriginal people of the eastern Terai. Previously, they were the nature worshippers. Traditionally, they celebrate their own festival such as the Pawani. They also celebrate the Dashain and Tiwar like the other Hindus.

Economic System Rajbanshis predominatly practice agriculture as their profession. They are very laborious. Prior to the 1960s, they, together with the Satars and Dhimals, were the only indigenous farmers of Jhapa. But the eradication of malaria in mid-1960s and the subsequent migration of the clever Brahmins, Chhetris, Rais and Limbus triggered the grabbing of

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KESHAV KUMAR SHRESTHA: Ethnography of Jhapali Rajbanshi 47 their traditional land resources through fair or foul means. All this had, indeed, the direct bearing on the reduction of their landholding and landlessness in some cases. The political economy of the state turned many landlord Rajbanshis into the tenant farmers. Still they are eking out their livelihood from their reduced size of landholding and tenanted land. Some even work as agricultural laborers. Of late, some Rajbanshis have turned to be petty businessmen and white-collor job holders. Recapitulation: Rajbanshis are one of the indigenous peoples in Jhapa district who are very rich in their traditional culture. Howerver, the hill to Terai migration has had negative bearing on their traditional livelihood systems. Their culture is also fast being transformed due to the arrival of different social groups from the hills and therefore, more efforts are to be made for their detailed holistic study of their traditional culture before its disappearance. Bibliography Bajracharya, Gautam Bajra.2033. Hanumandhoka Darbar, Kathmandu, Nepal ra Asiali Adhayan Sasthan, T. U. Bajracharya, Ramesh. 2051. Rajbanshi Jati, Gaurabmaya Itihas Boker Pani Bartamanma Ojhel Pardai gayaka Chhan, Kathmandu, Madhupark. Bengal Government Press.1947. Bengal District Gazetteers. Darjeeling, West Bengal, India. Bhattarai, Hari Prasad. 1994. Cultural Strategies of the Rajbanshies for Adaptation: A Cultural-Ecological Case Study of Rajgadh Village in Jhapa District. Unpublished M.A. Thesis, Kathmandu : Central Department of Sociology/ Anthropology, T.U. Bista, Dor Bahadur. 2060, Sabai jatko Phulbari, Lalitpur, Sajha Prakashan. Central Bureau of Statistic,2002. Population of Nepal, VDC./Municipalities (Eastern Development Region). HMG, Nepal. Dahal, Dilli Ram (ed.). 2056. Nepalko Kehi Pichadiyaka Jatiharuko SamajikArthik Adhayan, Kathmandu; Nepal ra Asiali Research Center. Devkota, Padam Lal. 2001. "Anthropology, Society and Development in Nepal : A Native Perspective", Occassional Paper in Sociology/Anthropology, Vol. VIII, Kathmandu : Central Department of Sociology/Anthropology, +

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MIGRATION AND ITS IMPLICATIONS ON THE LOCAL INITIATIVE OF MANAGEMENT OF WATER RESOURCE FOR IRRIGATION: SOME ANTHROPOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS FROM WESTERN TERAI Laya Prasad Uprety * 1.0 Introduction: This paper has been written with two-fold objectives as follows: (i) to analyze the trends and causes of in-migration in a traditional Tharu community of western Terai that triggered the intensification of the local culture of water resource management for irrigation in the expanded command areas, and (ii) to analyze the implications of in-migration on the local initiative of management of irrigation systems. The study from which the empirical data were taken for writing this paper was conducted in 2003 A.D in the command areas of Sorah and Chhattis Mauja indigenous irrigation systems located in the plains of Rupandehi district of western Terai . The Sorah and Chhattis Mauja irrigation systems have the command areas of about 1,500 and 3,500 hectares of land, respectively. These were originally constructed by the Terai autochthonous Tharu people. Initially, the Sorah Mauja irrigation system served a total of 16 Maujas and Chhattis Mauja irrigation system served a total 36 Maujas. But the command areas of both the irrigation systems later expanded which has been a function of the population growth triggered by the Hill to Terai migration particularly after 1960. During the period of fieldwork in 2002/3, the Sorah Mauja irrigation • Laya Prasad Uprety holds Ph. D. in Anthropology from Tribhuvan University. He is an Associate Professor in Anthropology at the Central Department of Sociology/ Anthropology of Tribhuvan University, Kirtipur.

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LAYA PRASAD UPRETY: Migration and its Implications... 49 system had a total of 30 Maujas under its command area. It was also reported by the key informants that a couple of years back, it had a total of 33 Maujas. Similarly, Chhattis Mauja had a total of 56 Maujas under its command area during the period of the fieldwork. Like in Sorah Mauja, it had a total of 62 Maujas a few years back. The increase and decrease of the number of command Maujas is the function of the contribution and non-contribution of labor and cash, respectively, for the operation and maintenance (O&M) of the irrigation systems. Indeed, the right to use the water for irrigation as a common property by the water appropriators of a particular Mauja is entirely dependent on whether or not they have contributed labor and financial resources to the O&M every year. Despite the fact that both systems were originally developed in two different locations by the autochthonous Tharu people acquiring the water from the same source (that is, Tianu river), they have been sharing water from a single mega-canal since 1965. Since then, the megacanal has been jointly managed up to the point of bifurcation from where water has been divided between the two systems proportionate to the size of their respective command areas (Uprety, 2008). Ethnographic method was the principal data collection method which involved key informant interview and participant observation. In-depth study of nine Maujas (six from Chhattis Maujas and three from Sorah Maujas) was conducted. Using the non-probability sampling framework as practiced in anthropology discipline, a total of 90 informants representing the different cross-section of the population (mainly the functionaries of water users’ organizations and community leader farmers) were purposively selected for gathering the data. The qualitative data have been analyzed thematically. 2.0 Perspectives Used on Migration Analysis in the Traditional Tharu Community Review of available contemporary literature on migration has revealed that a number of perspectives can be used to analyze the migration phenomenon. Shrestha (2001) argues that most perspectives on migration focus on narrow disciplinary aspects and overlook the underlying relationships between migration and socio-economic formations and transformations. He basically discusses four perspectives to analyze the +

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phenomenon of migration in Nepal. These comprise: economicbehavioral, eco-demographic, anthropological-sociological, and neoMarxist dependency. He explains that the economic-behavioral perspective on migration mainly focuses on employment opportunities including the making of the rational decisions by the migrants by moving in the direction where they expect to get the highest benefits. The ecodemographic perspective focuses on population pressure and carrying capacity variables and argues that population pressure leads to outmigration. The importance of anthropological-sociological perspective on migration is no less important. It focuses on the role of a number of variables such as kinship and ethnic ties, economic networks, modernization, etc. This perspective argues that stronger the kinship ties and ethnic networks, the greater the propensity to migrate. To a lesser extent, the neo-Marxist dependency perspective primarily focuses on the socio-economic structure, mode of production and capitalist penetration. It argues that migration is conditioned/manipulated behavior, which is directly related to capitalist penetration. I have used these perspectives borrowing from Shrestha (2001) to explain the phenomenon of in-migration variable in this short article in a nut-shell with a modicum of efforts. 3.0 In-migration in the Traditional Tharu Community and Concomitant Changes in the Social Structure of Water Appropriators This section basically focuses on the in-migration of the hill caste and ethnic groups in the sample command Maujas of Sorah-Chhattis Mauja farmer-managed irrigation systems and its bearing on the social structure. Axiomatic is the fact that the phenomenon of migration has the direct bearing on the demographic composition of any society and the sample Maujas of both irrigation systems are no exceptions to this. It has a greater significance in the irrigation command area because it was a malarial area known as the "Kalapani" (death valley) inhabited by the Tharus only until 1940 A.D. But the in-migration of more than six decades in these command Maujas has changed its traditional social structure. Therefore, it is, indeed, necessary to analyze this phenomenon in a nutshell bearing in mind how it has affected the irrigation systems both positively and negatively from the perspectives of both migrant and indigenous water appropriators. +

LAYA PRASAD UPRETY: Migration and its Implications... 51 It is now contextual to have an analysis on the empirical data to see the volume of in-migration longitudinally in the sample Maujas that are more or less representative of the command areas of both farmer-managed irrigation systems. The data have demonstrated that of the 1028 water appropriator households from the nine sample Maujas of both irrigation systems, an overwhelming majority (90.3%) have been found to be migrants. If the data are disaggregated by systems, similar patterns are clearly discernable. Interestingly, there are still a few households of autochthonous people in the tail-end locations, which used to be the head-end locations prior to the influx of hill migrants and consequent forest clearance and the establishment of new settlements which have now become the present head and middle locations of the command areas of both irrigation systems. More specifically, slightly more than Table 1: Distribution of Migrant Water Appropriator Households by Sample Maujas in Both Irrigation Systems A. Chattis Mauja Location Head Middle Tail

Maujas

Total no.of HHs

Naya Shanker Nagar Pashupati Tole Tin Number Pande Tole

72 32 269 34

Kumari West Jamuhai

89 71 567

Sub-total

Total no. of migrant households 69 (95.8) 30 (97.7) 269 (100.0) 34 (100.0) 59 (67.3) 48 (67.6) 509 (89.7)

B. Sorah Mauja Location Head Middle Tail

Maujas

Total no.of HHs

Dinger Nagar Anandaban Madhuban Semari

96 263 102

Sub-total Total (A+B)

461 1028

Source: Field Survey, February-July, 2003 Note: Figures in the parentheses indicate percentages.

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Total no. of migrant households 96 (100.0) 263 (100.0) 60 (58.8) 419 (90.8) 928 (90.3)

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two-thirds and a slightly more than half of water appropriator households of the sample Maujas of the tail-end locations of Chhattis Mauja and Sorah-Mauja respectively, are migrants (see Table 1). Now it is also relevant to analyze the data of in-migration longitudinally. It has been revealed that the genesis of in-migration can be traced back to 1940 A.D. Looking at the aggregate data of 928 water appropriator households of the sample Maujas of both irrigation systems decennially, it has been observed that 1960s had relatively high influx of the migrants followed by 1950s, 1970s and 1980s (see Table 3). Table 3: Decennial Distribution of Migrant Water Appropriator Households by the Sample Maujas in Both Irrigation Systems A. Chhattis Mauja

Migrant HHs by Decades

Location

Maujas

1940- 1950- 1960- 1970- 1980- 19901949 1959 1969 1979 1989 1999

Head

Naya Shankar Nagar

0

14

Pashupati Tole

0

Tin Number

4

Pande Tole

Middle Tail

27

5

10

4

10

3

3

30

55

70

53

50

37

269

2

15

7

5

3

2

34

Kumari

0

4

8

22

14

11

59

West Jamuhai

3

4

8

22

14

11

48

Sub- total 9

101 (1.8)

B. Sorah Mauja Locations Mauja Head

Dinger Nagar

Middle

Anandaban Madhuban Semari

124 107 (19.8) (24.3)

18

69

107 61 509 (21.0 (21.0) (12.0) (100.0)

Migrant HHs by Decades 19401949

19501959

1960- 1970- 1980- 19901969 1979 1989 1999

4

10

19

32

20

15 110 79 41 14 0 10 23 5 15 19 130 121 78 49 (4.5) (31.0) (28.9) (18.6) (11.7) Total (A+B) 28 231 245 185 156 (3.0) (24.9) (26.4) (19.9) (16.8) Source: Field Survey, February-July, 2003 Note: Figures in the parentheses indicate percentages Tail Sub-total

5

Total

+

11

Total 96

4 263 7 60 22 419 (5.2) (100.0 83 928 (8.9) (100.0)

LAYA PRASAD UPRETY: Migration and its Implications... 53 The data furnished above have clearly showed that the sample Maujas of both irrigation systems have heterogeneous social composition of water appropriators-a function of hill to Terai migration. It has been revealed from key informants that there were only the autochthonous Tharu water appropriators in both irrigation systems prior to 1940 A.D. The field aggregate data from the sample Maujas of both irrigation systems have shown that majority of water appropriating households are the Brahmins (60.9%) followed by Chhetris (13.4%), Tharus (9.8%), Magars (9.6%), and others (6.2%). These data demonstrate that the Tharus, the only traditional water appropriators, have now been reduced to a minority community in the command areas of both irrigation systems (see Table 2). Table 2: Distribution of Water Appropriator Households by Caste/Ethnicity of the Nine Sample Maujas of Both Farmer-Managed Irrigation Systems-2003 S.N

Caste/Ethnicity

1 2

Brahmin Chhetri

3 4 5

Magar Tharu Othersm Total

No. of HHs of Nine Sample Maujas 626 138 99 101 64 1028

Percentage 60.9 13.4 9.6 9.8 6.2 100.0

Source: Field Survey, February-July, 2003 *Others comprise traditional low castes, Gurungs, Newars, Thakurs, Ahirs, etc.

4.0 Analysis of the Causes of Migration Phenomenon within the Perspectives: Having seen the pattern and trend of in-migration in the sample Maujas, it is now worthwhile to analyze and explicate the factors triggering it. Apropos of the factors of migration, National Commission on Population (1984:1) in its study quotes the theoretic formulation of Lee (1966) as migration is a result of “pushes” and “pulls” or “attractions” and “repulsions”, “attractions” and “repulsions”, at both origin and destination, balanced in terms of efforts or costs to overcome the obstacles lying between the individual and possible alternative sites. The same study considers migration as a demographic process because it plays an

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important role in the demographic change. It also considers migration as a social process. However, it is also critical of the adoption of reductionism to explain the phenomenon of migration and underscores the need for the adequate treatment of the social aspects of migration. It considers the inter-regional migration in Nepal as the "drift to the south" that started in the fifties. Now it is also relevant to discuss the phenomenon of migration of the sample Maujas in perspectives, albeit there is no unanimity in the adoption of one to explain the factor of causation. Borrowing the perspectives freely from Shrestha (2001), I have explained the factors triggering migration in the study area as furnished hereunder. 4.1 Economic- Behavioral Perspective Using the economic-behavioral perspective, it has been ascertained from the field that a myriad of "pulls" of migration have been identified. These comprise: availability of productive land at the cheaper rate; high productivity of land; rumor of the distribution of the public land even to the squatters (because land encroachment by the poor/landless was the survival imperative); business opportunities; need of the agricultural labor force for the cultivation of the newly reclaimed land and the consequent exhortation by the Jimidars and Zamindars to the hill and Indian immigrants for the reclamation of land for the agricultural purposes and generation of the revenue; higher cropping intensity, etc. More specifically, it was also revealed that the migration history of each sample Mauja was different. For instance, in Dinger Nagar, the head location of Sorah Mauja, the key informants revealed that a few hill migrants arrived in late 1940s and began to clear the forest themselves for the permanent settlement. But in Anandaban Madhuban, the middle location of Sorah Mauja, an influential Brahmin from Kathamandu (a government official known as Sardar during the Rana regime who was an historian, and a literary figure) and a few Dhital families from Gorkha district (who worked very closely under the Sardar) had come in the early 1940s for the development of settlements in the land under Birta tenure. It was revealed from the key informants that there was a dense forest until 1940 under the Birta tenure. A tender was published as per the permission of Birta grantee for cutting and selling the timber of the forest. The responsibility was handed over to the Sardar—the influential +

LAYA PRASAD UPRETY: Migration and its Implications... 55 Brahmin. In fact, he was given the Jimidari by the Birta grantee for the reclamation of forest for agricultural purpose by bringing the settlers and generate revenues. He cleared the forest with the help of the Dhital families and 12 new settlements were established, which were named after the numbers. But the area was generically called “Manigram”, named at a later stage. There was the rumor that land was available at cheap price at Naukatti -- meaning newly cleared land (with 1680 Bighas of land) under the Sardar, which attracted many migrants from hill, Terai and also from India. Apropos of the cheap price of the land, an octogenarian Thakuri of Pande Tole shared that, "land was available at 1,000 (I.C.) per Bigha in the 1950s”. Land was also given to the Tharus but they disappeared leaving the land looking for their own Tharu community close to the receding forest. In fact, the Anandaban- Madhuban sample Mauja of Sorah, and Tin Number and Naya Shanker Nagar sample Maujas of Chhattis were all developed by the Sardar. The settlers who developed the arable land were given 50 percent of the cultivated land by Sardar free of cost. As indicated above, the overall policy was to reclaim the land by bringing settlers and generate revenue for the Birta-grantee. This explains how the institutional policy of government on land works as the “pull” of migration. Similarly, a number of “pushes” have also been identified under the economic-behavioral perspective. These comprised: limited size of landholding; low productivity of the land; lack of irrigation; agrarian indebtedness; extreme exploitation by the feudal landlords by (charging usurious interest as high as 60 percent per annum) resulting in the progressive proletarization; food insufficiency; hard physical labor for the survival; unemployment and underemployment, etc. These "pulls" and "pushes" together with the rational decisions of the migrant people themselves with the anticipation of gaining the higher benefits in the study locale triggered in-migration. 4.2 Eco-demographic Perspective Under this perspective, the main “pull” identified in the sample Maujas has been eradication of malaria in the so- called “death valley” (with the

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collaborative effort of the government of Nepal, World Health Organization –WHO- and United States Agency for International Development –USAID-) in the mid-1950s and the immediate prospect of habitation due to the low density of population. But the "pushes" under this perspective included over-population in the carrying capacity of the hill districts of origin, gradual depletion of the forest resources and consequent ecological problems such as soil erosion and landslide. This is an important factor to be considered while analyzing migration because population cannot exist in the resource vacuum. In this regard, Shrestha (2001) posits that unless the population is engaged in a production relationship with natural (land) and development resources, it can neither support itself nor produce any economic surplus for indigenous capital accumulation, without which it is difficult to achieve sustained economic growth and development. Therefore, it shows that once there is the crunch of the resource in the hill such as land, people have a propensity to migrate to those areas where there is higher carrying capacity such as the command areas of two irrigation systems under study. 4.3 Anthropological-sociological Perspective Under this perspective, a number of "pulls" have been identified in the sample Maujas. These comprised: the availability of social infrastructures as the function of growing social modernization (such as development of road network system and emerging transport system, availability of better schooling and medical facilities both in the government and private sectors since 1960s, marketing facilities at Khasulee and Batuwali- the former being old bazaar across Tinau and the latter being the present day Butwal, indigenous irrigation canals, etc.), kinship, friendship and ethnic ties (increase of the in-migration as a function of the successful settlement of the fist migrant kinsmen/relatives, friends and people belonging to one’s own ethnic community), etc. Similarly, a few “pushes” have also been identified. These comprised: lack of better modern social infrastructures (as specified above) and consequent perception of people about dukha (physical hardship of life) due to its inaccessibility, growing family size and difficulty to support it, etc.

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LAYA PRASAD UPRETY: Migration and its Implications... 57 4.4 Neo-Marxist Dependency Perspective To a lesser extent, the growing capitalistic penetration at Khasulee/ Batuwali from the Indian territory by the trucks and lorries with merchandise looking for the virgin market in the western region and creating an ambience for the hill people to establish the commercial centers in the vicinity of the command Maujas of both irrigation systems for the easy access to these merchandise for household consumption have also been identified as the “pulls”. This phenomenon gave the impression to the first migrants about the relatively easy life, which was communicated to other friends/relatives in the provenance, which further attracted other hill migrants. Conversely, in the provenance, there was no facility of the availability of merchandise making the people feel that their life was easy even for consumption, which was also reported to be a “push”. Shrestha (2001) is also of the opinion that one useful institutional approach is to analyze underdevelopment and migration from a historical, political economy perspective. He views that such underdevelopment and migration are directly related to the institutional policies as reflected in the changing social formations, in which the social relations of productions and the corresponding modes of development are featured. Institutional policies of state land management such as granting of the Birta and the consequent interest of the grantee for the land development and the revenue generation, which was possible by motivating the immigrants from the hills and India, fall under the political economy perspective. The migration phenomenon was the function of the underdevelopment in the provenance. The provenance of the majority of the migrant people comprised the hill districts of western Nepal such as Palpa, Gulmi, Baglung, Parbat, Syangja, Arghakhanchi and Lamjung. But a few have come from Mustang, Ilam, Tanhau, Okhaldhunga, Dolpa, Humla, Rukhum, Terathum, Rauhat, Makwanpur, Dolkha, Nuwakot and Kathmandu. Some migrants were also from the neighboring Terai districts such as Nawalparasi and Chitwan. Some of the settlers have come even from Burma when the Nepali population could not stay there due to the political change in early 1960s. A few had also come from the neighboring districts

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of India who were brought by the Jimidars for the reclamation of the land and settlement. Mainly, the Brahmins and Chhettris from the hills were the early migrants. It was primarily so because some of these caste group people were employed by the state as well as the Birta-holders in the capacity of Jimidars for land reclamation, increase of the settlement and revenue generation. The Brahmins and Chhettris were followed by other ethnic groups such as the Magars, Gurungs, Newars, Thakalis, traditional low caste groups, and some social groups of Indian origin such as the Kewts and Ahirs from the neighboring state. Thus, the phenomenon of hill to Terai migration has played a direct role in the change of the social structure where there were only the Tharu autochthonous people until 1940s. Stated somewhat differently, the homogeneous ethnic structure was changed into the heterogeneous social structure, which has been bound together by a host of sociologicalanthropological variables. These comprised: the personal friendship, patron-client relationship, labor relationships and other forms of the economic interdependence, shared social obligations, fictive kinship, ties of kinship, political relationship, etc. The key informants have the perception that these factors have been contributing to maintaining the social relationships between and among the heterogeneous social groups after the influx of migrants in the sample Maujas of both irrigation systems. All these have the bearing on the conformance of the irrigation organizational norms and regulations. Anthropologically speaking, economic behavior of water appropriators cannot and must not be seen by disembedding it from the larger social context. The influences or consequences of the in-migration on irrigation management have been analyzed hereunder. 5.0 Implications on the Local Initiative for Managing Water Resource for Irrigation Gradually, the new social relationship that emerged out of the influx of in-migrants began to generate the changes among the traditional water appropriators with respect to the local initiative for irrigation management. The relationship between the traditional Tharu water appropriators and the migrants was, at the very outset, reported to be problematic and in isolated cases antagonistic because both communities had the claim on +

LAYA PRASAD UPRETY: Migration and its Implications... 59 water as ‘commons’ for irrigation in both irrigation systems. The traditional water appropriators of both systems did not have an experience of sharing water from a single canal with different social groups for agricultural purposes prior to the influx of migrants. Therefore, the Tharus shared the opinion that some of the consequences of in-migration were negative. One of these was the change of original Maujas of the head locations into the tail-end Maujas– a function of land reclamation in Birta land by the settlers and public lands by the squatters who were legalized by the state at a latter stage. This change triggered another associated problem, that is, rampant water theft at the beginning and thereby depriving the Tharu tail-enders of the adequate water for irrigation. This, in turn, increased the frequency of conflict between the traditional right holders and the new claimants of water rights. In a number of Maujas of both irrigation systems, water appropriators of the head and middle locations also began draining the water during the abundance causing harm to the cropland of downstream Tharu water appropriators. Though it is not explicitly articulated by the Tharu traditional water appropriators in public, they insinuate that their traditional leadership of the common property resource management based on the feudalistic relationship between the heads of community and common people was supplanted after the influx of in-migrants. The traditional leadership of Badgars (Tharu local headmen) responsible for the community development activities under the Chaudharis (local revenue functionaries prior to 1964 A.D) including irrigation management was changed—a function of the predominance of the hill migrant population and assumption of leadership by the active migrants for irrigation management. Initially, the Chaudharis were the influential people in the region. Even the senior government officials such as the Chief District Officers and zonal commissioners at the beginning of the Panchayat (partyless political system between 1960 and1990) regime were not in a position to do anything without garnering their support. Their words were considered as the laws within the community and the common people were called as the “Raitan” (meaning the subjects/ryots) who had to follow their words. But once the influx of the hill migrants was in full swing, the Tharus were outnumbered and consequently, the influential hill migrants became

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active in the irrigation organizations (which were informal at the beginning and formal at the latter stage). However, the Tharu key informants have also held the opinion that the introduction of the partyless Panchayat system, which began electing local representatives also triggered the gradual weakening of the traditional role of Badgars. This was primarily so because many of his traditional community development works were discharged by the local elected representatives of the wards. In the case of Chhattis Mauja, the hill migrants began squatting the forest along the sides of the canal which had the negative bearing on the condition of the canal, that is, the demolition of the alignment of canal by the rain water--a function of the removal of the ground holding trees. Despite the grumbling of the elderly Tharu key informants and their perceptions on the initial negative consequences of in-migration, the interrelationship between the hill migrant social group and autochthonous Tharus began to change from antagonistic to accommodative mode—a function of the intermixture and gradual cultural assimilation in the same ecological setting. In other words, the two social groupings began to interact gradually and learn each others’ cultural activities and understand each other, and thereby they began being supportive to each other in the community development activities, including local irrigation resource management. They also understood that the unceasing antagonism would take them nowhere. The intermingling created a congenial ambience for the community leaders of both migrant and autochthonous communities to devise ways for accommodating the competing interest for the utilization of water for the farm economy to sustain their livelihood. It followed as a corollary that the key informants and the participants of the focus group discussion also shared a number of positive consequences of the in-migration and changed social structure. These comprised as follows: (i)

development of the formal democratic irrigation organizations in both systems from informal systems for organizing the heterogeneous water appropriators belonging to different social/caste/ ethnic groups and ensuring the equitable distribution of water for sustained livelihhoods; +

LAYA PRASAD UPRETY: Migration and its Implications... 61 (ii)

codification of the traditional irrigation norms/rules/regulations into the form of the constitutional choice and operational rules in a collective fashion for governing the behavior of the growing water appropriators with diverse social and cultural background;

(iii) construction of the stable outlet structures for the division of water between and among the Maujas to minimize the occurrence of the conflicts with the community support as well as the financial, material and technical support of the state and local government units; (iv) more cash and labor mobilization for the repair and maintenance of the main canal and its distributories owing to the increase of the number of migrant water appropriators for the sustainability of both irrigation systems; (v)

consensual decision from both social groups for the change of time for the repair and maintenance of the main canal and its headwork from May-June to February-March (the former time is extremely hot to work and the autochthonous Tharus were only used to work during this period which is very inappropriate time for the hill migrants and the latter time is not that hot so the hill migrants can also work);

(vi) preparation of the water schedule for the water distribution within and between the Maujas (water began to be distributed on the rotational basis) which was not needed when there were fewer Tharu water appropriators in fewer Maujas in the past; (vii) introduction of the Kulara system in lieu of the Jharuwa for resource mobilization for repair and maintenance albeit it has the "social survivals" to some extent; (viii) occasional demand of the Maujas of the tail–end location for the reduction of the number of laborers required for repair and maintenance of the canal systems—a function of the scarcity of the water; (ix) institutionalized approach of conflict management through deliberation/discussion with a view to providing the justice instead of simply using the draconian approach to penalize non-conforming water appropriators in the pre-migration period with no consideration of justice; +

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(x) commencement of the organizational culture for maintaining transparency and accountability by the irrigation functionaries at all levels of the irrigation organization, etc. In addition to the above, migration also began triggering the urbanization in some Maujas, which, in turn, triggered the reduction of the number of Maujas in command area. The cases below amply demonstrate how urbanization triggered by migration affects the command area of irrigation systems.

Case 1: Impact of Urbanization on the Reduction of the Command Area in Chhattis Mauja A Bohara farmer of Shivapath, ward no.13 of Butwal municipality, narrates how the urbanization triggered by the migration from the hill has been impacting upon the reduction of the number of Maujas. The old name of his settlement was Majhuwa. This is located between the Sorah and Chhattis Mauja. In late 1960s, people did not want to live here because the land was sandy and was full of gravels. So people used to sell the land at the nominal price and migrate to other areas. Mr. Bohara’s father himself left the area temporaily and went to Khasuli bazaar in the late 1960s. But in early 1970s, his father and other 15 farmers approached the representatives of Chhattis Mauja to provide the water, which was accepted by the latter. As a corollary, they had to contribute one Kulara labor to repair and maintain the system. Mr. Bohara also worked as the Mauja Muktiyar since mid1985s. However, at the same point of time, an English medium school was established which contributed to increase the price of the land unprecedentedly and people again started selling the homestead land at higher price to other migrant people for building the houses for the permanent settlement. During the period of the fieldwork in February-July, 2003, there were only two water appropriators for the Kulahai. Mr. Bohara had 8 Katthas of land. In 2002, he went for Kulahai for 27 days. And he decided to discontinue to contribute the labor because the operation of the distributory canal by one farmer was impossible. Nor he was in condition to pay the Khara for not contributing the labor. And Chhattis Mauja was not ready to provide the water for only one water user. Thus, the Mauja left Chhattis Mauja for ever—a function of growing urbanization triggered by migratio

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Case 2: Impact of Urbanization on the Reduction of the Command Area of Sorah Mauja In the head portion of the command area, the traditional Maujas are gradually being urbanized. The land is being sold at higher prices for homesteads. Both the number of cultivators and the land for cultivation are gradually decreasing. This is more so in Majhgaon, Majhuwa, Kalikanagar, Sukhanagar, Devinagar and Janakinagar Maujas. During the period of the fieldwork in 2003, it was reported that Majhuwa and Sukhanagar had left the Kulahai. Those Maujas which had not left the system were also demanding for the reduction of Kulaharas.

6.0 Concluding Remarks Based on the empirical findings, it can be concluded that the inherent unique feature of the social structure of both irrigation systems is such that the hill caste/ethnic migrant water appropriators have completely learned and accepted the native culture of common property resource management as if they are a part of traditional social structure. Despite the initial tension for the leadership positions and sharing of the water between the Tharu natives and the migrants until there was full societal interaction and mutual understanding, there has been generally a good social relationship/interaction between them. The result is the sustained management of the irrigation systems for their livelihood because both native and migrant communities contribute their cash/ labor/material resources to the operation and maintenance without any serious conflict. This social setting studied demonstrates a unique migrant-native interface which can be a model of the common property resource management for other parts of Nepal Terai where similar social structure exists. Notwithstanding this brute fact, migration has also begun having the adverse effect on the reduction of the command areas of the irrigation systems through the process of urbanization. This also portends that as the process of urbanization increases at a fast rate in the command areas of both irrigation systems and people have begun switching to other cash-earning professions (such as businesses, small-scale industries and foreign employment), farmer-managed irrigation systems may be in a transition in another quarter century.

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Glossary: Bigha=

0.67 hectares

Badghar=

traditional Tharu headman in the community

Bhujabhandi= labor contribution with tiffin to work for full day until the repair and maintenance of main canal system and headwork is over Bighatti=

annual irrigation service fee per Bigha of land collected from the water users households who do not contribute labor to the repair and maintenance of the irrigation system

Birta=

tax-free land granted by the state to the individuals

Chaudhari=

local revenue collection functionary among the Tharus in pre-1964 Nepal

Chaukidar=

watchman-cum-messenger in the local context

Jharuwa=

contribution of labor for the repair and maintenance of canal system on compulsory basis by each water appropriating household until the work is over

Jimidar=

the local revenue collection functionary in the Terai

Jimidari=

a system of revenue collection system in pre-1964 Nepal under which a landlord was given large tract of land by the state as well as the Birta-grantees and he was responsible for attracting the settlers and maximizing the collection of revenue after deducting his proceeds

Kattha=

20 Katthas make one Bigha

Khara=

fine imposed

Kulahai=

labor contribution for system repair and maintenance

Kulahara=

laborers/workers

Kulara=

Kulara is the water allocation unit. One Kulara means one laborer to be sent for system repair and maintenance activities per 25 Bighas of land.

Mauja Muktiyar=

the staff of village level irrigation committee and in isolated cases, he can be the village level elected representative of water users

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LAYA PRASAD UPRETY: Migration and its Implications... 65 Mauja=

a settlement cluster which roughly corresponds to a village

Maujane Nath/Nap=

the measurement of main canal assigned by the Meth Muktiyar to each Mauja for the annual repair and maintenance which is proportionate to the size of its command area

Meth Muktiyar=

system level chief staff

Mukhiya=

the chief in the Mauja settlement who had to support the Chaudharis/ Jimidars

Muri =

20 pathis

Nath or Naj or Nap=

measurement of the main canal for repair and maintenance assigned to a particular Mauja

Naukatti=

newly reclaimed land

Panchayat=

non-party political system introduced in 1961 which continued till 1990. At the local level, Village Panchayat meant village council which consisted of the elected/selected representatives of people and at the meso level, district Panchayat meant district council which consisted of representatives of the Village Panchayats. At the national level, there was Rastriya Panchayat (meaning national level unicameral legislature), which consisted of selected/elected representatives from 75 districts of Nepal

Sardar =

a typical administrative post during the Rana regime

References National Commission on Population. (1984). Interregional Migration in Nepal: Problem and Prospects. Kathmandu: Nepal. Shrestha, N.R. (2001). The Political Economy of Land, landlessness and Migration in Nepal. New Delhi: Nirala Publications. Uprety, Laya Prasad (2006). Managing Water for Irrigation as a Common Property Resource: A Case Study of Sorah-Chhattis Mauja Indigenous Irrigation Systems of Rupandehi District. Unpublished Ph.D Dissertation. Kathmandu: Tribhuvan University, Nepal. +

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Uprety, Laya Prasad (2008)." Embeddedness and Its Role in Irrigation Management: Some Anthropological Observations from Western Terai, Nepal" in Kailash N.Pyakuryal et.al (eds.) Social Sciences in a Multicultural World: Proceedings of the International Conference Held on 11-13 December 2006, Kathmandu.

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MAGARS AND THEIR INDIGENOUS KNOWLEDGE SYSTEMS AND PRACTICES IN TANAHU DISTRICT OF NEPAL Shyamu Thapa Magar * Introduction: In every community, indigenous knowledge systems (IKSs) have been developed and practiced for the adaptation with the environment. People in the traditional societies are directly dependent on the natural resources in their daily lives. Both men and women are directly involved in resource utilization, management and protection using their indigenous knowledge system. Both have their own level of knowledge and practices for managing their resources. Their knowledge is also transfered from one generation to another though some indigenous knowledge has been forgotten without bringing it in practice due to various interventions. Both individuals and groups have been practicing these IKSs in their respective environments. People’s participation in decision-making, group dynamism and people’s role in resource mobilization, cost effectiveness and sustainability also contribute to continue and extend IKSs according to the context and situation. Research on indigenous knowledge system and practice explicitly sets out the connections between local people’s understanding and practice as well as understanding by the outsiders (as the emic and etic approach) like researchers and development workers in the field (Roades1984, et. al). For the benefit of the local people, promoting valuable traditional practices and culturally appropriate and environmentally sustainable adaptations during the exploitation of the resources by the local people shows the importance of the protection of * Shyamu Thapa Magar is a Lecturer in Anthropology at the Central Department of Sociology/Anthropology. Currently, she is pursuing her Ph. D. research work in Anthropology.

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the IKSs in the hill areas. In the recent years, IKS is deteriorating due to the intervention of the new technologies especially among the ethnic communities like the Magars. This paper aims at analyzing the gender aspect of IKSs practiced by both males and females as distinct knowledge legacies in the regime of forest products and local herbs. The rationale for this analysis is that women's knowledge and men's knowledge encompasses gender specific roles as prescribed by the society and supervisory functions for the conservation of particular biodiversity domains and cultural dynamics (Hugh-Jones, 1979, and Reichel 1980, 1993). Theoretical Stance: Empirical researches in Nepal have shown that the IKSs are found in the sustainable management of four natural resources such as water (for irrigation), forest, soil and herbal medicines. They have shown that natural resources management by the farmers using indigenous knowledge system have been found more effective than agency- managed systems especially in the community forestry and irrigation system in Nepal. Referring to Russel.L.Barsh, Andrew Gray (1999) asserts that local knowledge has important social and legal dimensions. Every ecosystem is conceptualized as a web of social relationships between a specific group of people such as family, clan or tribe and other species with which they share a particular place. So ecological model often appears in the stories of marriages or alliances among species through the negotiation order in which all species are bound together by kinship and solidarity, summarizing through five legal corollaries. These corollaries are: (i) every individual bears a personal responsibility for understanding and maintaining their relationship with the knowledge of ecosystem as moral, legal, and adaptations are not only expected to teach their insights to others, but also to mediate conflicts between humans and other species; (ii) knowledge confers heavy responsibility as well as the power to interfere with relationship between humans and non-humans, and must be transmitted personally to an individual apprentice who has been properly prepared to accept the burdens and to use the power with humility results together with the moral development of pupil by his/her courage,

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SHYAMU THAPA MAGAR: Magars and their Indigenous Knowledge... 69 maturity and sincerity; (iii) the knowledge is transmitted between kins which pertains to inherited responsibilities to their own ancestral territory; (iv) the knowledge must be localized and cannot necessarily be applicable to other ecosystems; sometimes knowledge can be shared with visitors to the territory so that they can travel safely and subsist from local resources but knowledge cannot be alienated permanently from ecosystem to which it pertains; and the misuse of knowledge might bring catastrophe for the good and harmony. IKS has been practiced in Nepal since time immemorial. Research studies on forest resources and their protection and management have made it clear that indigenous systems of forest management are widely distributed throughout Nepal (Tamang, 1990). Some argue that indigenous and traditional knowledge management systems use "effective management" based on the capacity of rural people to use in many ways their own environments (Fisher, 1991 and Gurung, 1987). They also suggest that there should not be any interventions from outside and people should be encouraged to manage natural resources as per their own interests and situations for their protection and sustenance. The Sherpas of Nepal have also been known for their IKS in the regime of forest management. For instance, Furer-Haimendorf (1964) gave one of the earlier accounts on indigenous forest management systems among the Sherpas in Nepal. He has given a good description of the ‘Shinggi Nawa’, a practice of communal system of the Sherpas of Solukhumbu. The ‘Shinngi Nawas’ were totally managed by people appointing officials for a fixed period after which they passed forest and pasture management on to others making confirmed individuals support to established rules and regulations for forest use. Haimendorf reported that the replacement of "Shinggi Nawa" by in-effective system imposed by the Forest Department led to the degradation of the forest resources of Solukhumbu. A variation of this system in the Khumbu region is that the watchers were called forest guardians who were elected or selected among the users’ households. These guardians have the duty and authority to protect forests (Haimendorf, 1964; Steven, 1993). According to Haimendorf, the Sherpas of Solukhumbu use their forest in their own ways and they have their own rules and regulations on preserving and protecting the forests. +

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This study is also based on local rules and their customs which is also based on indigenous knowledge system and management of resource management. Fisher (1989) and Gilmour (1991) also shared about forest resource management in many villages of in Sindhupalchok and Kabhrepalanchok districts where local people without outside guidelines made institutional arrangements for the protection and management of local forests. They had formed formal committees to establish and uphold rules and regulations. Forest watchers were appointed who were called ‘Chitadhars’ in local term. The forest users collected certain amount of money from each households and paid watchers. Forest products were collected during specified period and children were not allowed to cut green grass due to becoming less experienced, avoid damaging seedlings. This kind of indigenous management of natural resources has also been found to be practiced in far western of Nepal (Chhetri and Pandey, 1992). Devkota (1992), in his case study on traditional system of forest and pasture management in Thokarpa, found that traditional management systems of local natural resources were successful to prevent the local forest and pastures resources in Thokarpa from degradation and extinction. When cadastral survey took place, local management responsibilities of the natural resources were taken away from the local people by the government and the traditional rules were broken that led to the destruction and degradation of the natural resources. Local people have their own ways of utilization and controlling mechanisms while using natural resources (Gurung,1988) having cultural and religious practices such as restriction on women while entering into the forest for cutting grasses and fodder during menstruation. Not only women, men are also restricted on changing roof with thatched grass (khar) on the day of Sarun (Chhetri, 1994 and Thapa 1996). While dealing with popular participation, it has been important to deal local culture in the working area. Some aspects of forest protection and management are human-centered, human-controlled and humanmanipulated culture through specific norms, values and beliefs. It is normal to find differences in the strategies in different societies. Religious

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SHYAMU THAPA MAGAR: Magars and their Indigenous Knowledge... 71 fencing has been crucial in some places in far-western Nepal. People have different strategies to control resources; the most effective methods have been a process of sanctioning those users’ who go against the predetermined local decisions to close access to resources ((Chhetri and Pandey, 1992 and Tamang, 1990). Some strong controlling mechanism has been the threat of getting divine punishment when going against the local rules, seemed affective. Local people are using their unproductive land to generate income by using their indigenous knowledge systems and practices by planting cardamom inside community forest as well as in their private fallow land in eastern Nepal (Thapa Magar, 2000). Traditional indigenous knowledge systems were also practiced even after the promulgation of Private Forest Nationalization Act 1957, due to poor forest management by people for adequate protection, management and utilization by all people (Talbott and Khadka, 1994). The Forest Act 1961 was the first comprehensive forest legislation in Nepal’s history. It was an attempt to institute better management of the forest. After Nepal’s National Forestry Plan proposed in 1976 as the need of Community Forestry Programme for the management of the Forest (NNFP 1979), several laws were passed defining government authority over the forest and regulating use of those resources. In 1977 and 1978, Panchayat Forest (PF) and Panchayat Protected Forest (PPF) were introduced under the Community Forestry Development Programme (CFDP) with the purpose of handing back the protection and management of the forest to the community (Chhetri and Pandey, 1992) which restricted local indigenous knowledge systems and practices utilizing local natural resources. Study Locale and Methodology: This paper is based on the study conducted in two Village Development Committees (VDCs), namely, Sundhara and Bhagwatipur, in Tanahu District of western Nepal. Both qualitative and quantitative data have been collected to fulfill the objective of this study. Quantitative data have been collected by administering a total of 190 questionnaires through household survey with the help of field enumerators. Qualitative data have been collected through the participant observation, key informant interviews, and focus group discussions. Quantitative data collected from +

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the survey questionnaires were analyzed through Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) program. The data had been coded and entered into SPSS programme and analyzed by statistician. Qualitative data have been analyzed thematically by searching patterns in the data. The analyzed data have been interpreted by researcher. In Nepal, many traditional systems of natural resource management are not indigenous system because they have been set up as a governmental interventions (Rai and Thapa, 1993). In human ecological and ethnoscience perspectives, very few action research studies have been conducted in the context of Nepal though several researches have been completed in the development perspectives in indigenous knowledge systems especially in people’s participation in resource mobilization in forestry, irrigation and farming systems (Sillitoe, 1998). Rationale of the Study of the Indigenous Knowledge and Practice among the Magars: Numerous scholars and researchers have studied natural resources and common property resource management systems in Nepal. Moreover, some scholars have generalized theories on common property resource management based on their research findings. However, not a single study has been conducted on the Magars of Tanahu District about their indigenous knowledge systems and practices with a gendered perspective. Magars, one of the largest ethnic groups among 59 indigenous ethnic groups of Nepal, has been found settling from western to eastern Nepal, known as hill people of Nepal whose livelihood depends on natural resources such as forest and water for their living. They have an agrarian subsistence economy supported by remittance from military services such as Nepal Army, Indian Army and British Army. Magars constitute 7.14 percent among the 59 indigenous/ethnic groups in Nepal. The total population of the Magars is 16, 22,421 of which the number of males is 784828 and number of females is 837593 (CBS, 2002). Given the fact that Magars are the subsistence farmers, they interact with their environments for eking out their living. While managing, protecting and utilizing the natural resources in their respective environments, both men and women use their own level of knowledge as they have learned

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SHYAMU THAPA MAGAR: Magars and their Indigenous Knowledge... 73 in their communities. Hence, it is necessary to study indigenous knowledge system and practices of Magars for understanding their adaptation with environment in which they live. Demographic, Cultural and Economic Characteristics of the Magars: The total population of Bhagwatipur VDC, which was also known as Resing (a historical place ruled by Magars), is 7979 of which 3756 are males and 4223 females. The total population of the Sundhara VDC is 7471 with 3504 males and 3957 females (CBS 2002). Tanahu area has been known as Barha Magarath. Ale and Rana Magars with different sub-castes have inhabited the study VDCs. Magar language is predominatly spoken in these VDCs. Nepali language has been used as lingua-franca in this area while interacting with other caste group people. Magars of Bhagwatipur VDC identified themselves as Hindus whereas the Magars of Sundhara VDC claimed to be Buddhists (a relatively recent trend). Magars of the study VDCs are predominatly subsistence farmers. Howerver, their household economy is also supported by the overseas employment, recruitment in the Nepalese, Indian and British armies, teaching job, petty business, wage labor, etc. Land has been always a vital for the farmers for their living. However, as elsewhere, the ownership of the land resource is traditionally controlled by the males-a function of patriarchy. Animal husbandry has been the integral part of the agrarian economy of the study VDCs. Animals have been raised for meat, milk products, manure for agricultural fields, and sale for coping with the household cash-crunch situation. They are also raised for sacrificing to propitiate the local deities. Indigenous Knowledge System and Practices with Gender Perspective: The word "indigenous" refers to the point of origin, the source of initiatives. Indigenous systems may incorporate elements and processes from outside world, provided the initiative for their incorporation is local. Traditional systems are old by definition, but indigenous knowledge systems are often quite new and constantly evolving. Thus, although traditional systems may be indigenous and vice versa, this is not +

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necessarily the case (Gill, 1993). Studying indigenous system with gender perspective needs to understand the concept of gender which refers to those culturally assigned behaviors and meanings such as sex roles attributed to the distinction of all human societies make between male and females (Barfield, 1997). In this concept, understanding indigenous knowledge systems and practices with gender persppective tries to find out how males and females understand and use this system while mobilizing the resources for their living. Forest Management Systems in Study Area: Forest always plays a vital role in Magar people’s life in two VDCs of Tanahu District. The dependency on forest has compelled the Magars to maintain close relationship with environment while using forest products. Forest used to be dense in the past but after a haphazard utilization, forest in Bhagwatipur has almost disappeared. Later on, people started to protect forest in the name of the Sunaula Yuwa Club club after the plantation of Sal (Shoria robusta). Some years later, the process of handing over the government forest into the hand of Community Forest User Groups (CFUGs) had provision of restriction on entering into the forest for cutting Sal fodder but has allowed collecting floor grass and dried firewood even today. Due to young forest condition (which is not sufficient to fulfill the need of the people), they used fodder, firewood from their own private land as well as government land which is not handed over to the local people in the form of community forest. In Sundhara VDC, people are allowed to collect floor grass openly but firewood collection has been allowed only during the thinning and pruning time (a forest management process inside community forest decided by users twice in a year). Besides all these, users also use forest products from their own private lands to fulfill their needs. Fodder and floor grass are collected from the forest by users. Looking through gender perspective, both males and females (57%) collect firewood from forest in the study area. But on an average, nearly one third females (32.1%) collect firewood and grass as their main task which is done by an insignificant number of males (6.2%). When asked about the low percentage of male collecting firewood and grass from the forest, they claimed that males work outside home and village most of the time which +

SHYAMU THAPA MAGAR: Magars and their Indigenous Knowledge... 75 compels women to work more than males. Usually collected firewood is brought home with the help of neighbors and relatives. Sometimes parma or exchange labor is used for this purpose. Sometimes, money is paid to economically poor for fectching the firewood. Respondents were also asked about the purpose of collecting firewood. A large majority (75.8%) reported that they collect firewood for the household purpose. Only 24.2 percent answered that they collect to cook kudo (gruel) for the livestock. Females collect branches of trees and twigs, grass and leaves as fodder and leaf litter for animal beddings whereas males collect wood for timber, big trees branches, firewood, poles for house building as well as for supports for the vegetable climbers. Because of the young forest condition, people prefer to go to their own private forests and other government forests instead of Community Forest in Bhagwatipur VDC. Community Forest User Group (CFUG) Activities: Forest users participate in forest management, protection and conservation as well as supervision according to their Operational Plan (OP) based on their constitution. People are more protection-oriented than utilizationoriented which is more discernible in Bhagwatipur VDC. Membership in Forest User Group (FUG): All villagers who use forest products from community forest are members in community forest users’ group. As a member, every user has to contribute to community forest either financially or physically. In Sundhara VDC, users are more aware of community forest while using forest products. But in Bhagwatipur VDC, there has been the passive involvement of the users in forest management (because the forest there is young and unproductive). Theft of the Forest Products and Process of Controlling Mechanism: Scarcity forces a person to violate the existing rules and regulations to fulfill his/her needs. In rural area, those people who do not have sufficient private forest land and do not have enough time to contribute to the FUG

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and do not have enough money to buy firewood from CF, are forced to go against the rules and regulations of the community forest. However, such rule violators are often afraid of being apprehended by the CFUG community members. Awareness on Controlling Mechanism for Stealing Forest Products: The operational plans of community forests (CFs) have the provision that the theft/stealing of the forest products is punishable. An attempt has been made to determine the level of users’ awareness on controlling mechanism. A majority of the respondents (62.1%) reported their awareness followed by 20.5 percent reporting the lack of knowledge. But given the fact that there are no rules for the control of the extraction of herbs specified in the operational plan, the herbs are already overexploited and are on the verge of extinction. Awareness on the Responsibilities of Users in CF: An attempt has also been made to understand the awareness on the responsibilities of users in community forest. It has been found that a majority of respondents (63.2%) reported that they are aware of their responsibility as users in the CF. Females’ Role in Crafting the Local Rules and Regulations: Given the fact that the Magar community is also heavily influenced by patriarchal values, women are always seen as subordinated to men. Women’s voices are not heard—a function of lack of education and exposure to other places except the district headquarters. As a result, males have traditionally monopolized the the decision-making processes both in the household and community.Women are selected as the members of CFUG committee simply to fulfill the basic criteria of Forest Act and Policy. This is axiomatic of the fact that they have virtually no role in crafting the local rules and regulations. Women’s Role on Resource Mobilization: Women’s participation in resource mobilization has a vital importance for family. Mostly, social roles are divided along the lines of sex. Usually, +

SHYAMU THAPA MAGAR: Magars and their Indigenous Knowledge... 77 males work outside the house while dealing with the monetary issues and village social problems. Females are always focused in their own household chores and do not give interest to participate in group activities (Given the fact that males are taking part in these). User Group Fund and Its Uses: Finance plays an important role on development activities in a community. The CF fund is collected through community development programmes, fines, playing bhailo in Tihar, monthly contribution from the user households and sale of forest products. In this context, an attempt was made during the period of the survey to understand the knowledge of the users on their fund of CF. The survey has revealed that an overwhelming majority of the respondents (82.6%) reported their knowledge on it. It has also been ascertained that disputes related to the financial matters are solved within the group. The collected fund has been used for a variety of purposes such as for social activities (33.3%), purchasing utensils (32.3%), issuing loans (23.3%), etc. It has also been used for building rest houses for travelers and maintaining water taps in the community. Women’s Involvement in Forest Management and Protection: Participation in forest management by both males and females is essenial as members of the families. But it has not been compulsory for women to participate when there is a male member in a family. In the absence of males, females usually take part as a member of the family. Apropos of the division of work, they are assigned to clean forest floor and collect leaf litters, small twigs and branches of trees for fuelwood. Usually males’ work is seen as a difficult and hard such as climbing, felling tree branches, and measuring firewood for distribution.The survey has also revealed that a large majority of respondents (63.7%) have been in favor of women’s active role in CFUG activities. Dispute Settlement within a Users’ Group: Disputes are the functions of dissatisfactions among people when their interests are un-met. The survey has revealed a multitude of reasons of

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dispute occurrence. Thes include: unequal division of workload among user households, elitist attitude of leadership, financial issues (vis- a-vis transparency), inequitable resource distribution among users, less representation of deprived groups and authoritarianism. It has also been revealed that most of the disputes arise due to males’ irresponsibilities. Generally, males’ role in settling the disputes has been accepted but in some cases, the role of active females (as commuity leaders) is also accepted. Indigenous Knowledge about Local Herbal Medicine and its Management Systems: Herbal medicine plays important role in rural areas in the absence of allopathic and ayurvedic medicine for the treatment of stomach-ache, headache and other illnesses for both males and females in the study areas. Local people have different kinds of indigenous knowledge systems to utilize those local herbs available in their agricultural fields as well as in the forests. There are various types of local herbs which have been used by local people for cure of different illnesses and but there is no any kind of mechanism to protect them from haphazard utilization. Most of the herbs have been collected by faith-healers who are using them to cure local people but do not have any idea of protecting these valuable resources. Interestingly, the survey has also shown that a majority of the respondents (66.1%) have been found to be using these herbs for treatment. Generally, people use tree barks, roots, and leaves of the herbs for their treatment of illnesses such as gastritis, bone fracture, muscle sprain, tonsillitis, irregular menstruation of women, dog bite, snake bite, headache, fever, sinusitis, stomach-ache, abortion, uterus prolapsis and warding off the evil spirits from a person’s body for good health. Mostly herbs are collected by males, albeit women also collect a very few of them. But females are familiar with local procedures of using them (see Table 1 below). These herbs are collected from the government forest, community forest and the own private lands of local farmers. It has been ascertained that there is no institutional culture of protecting the valuable herbs from being extinct. Local rituals and beliefs lead people to continue their cultural practices but it has been learned that these have now disappeared. +

SHYAMU THAPA MAGAR: Magars and their Indigenous Knowledge... 79 Despite the fact that there is the haphazard collection of these herbs, locals have left the space in the forests and private lands for the benefit of their future generation by encouraging for the promotion of this indigenous knowledge systems in the study area. Recapitulation: Given the fact that Magars are the subsistence farmers, they interact with their environments for eking out their living. While managing, protecting and utilizing the natural resources in their respective environments, both men and women use their own level of knowledge as they have learned from their communities. Magars have reciprocal relationship with environment and hence, they are using their indigenous knowledge systems on utilizing, managing and protecting forest products from their immediate environment. References Bista, D. B. 1972 Peoples of Nepal. Kathmandu: Ratna Pustak Bhandar. Chhetri, Ram 1994 Indigenous and Community Forestry Management System: Reviewing the Strengths and Weaknesses. Kathmandu Chhetri, R.B. and Pandey, T.R, 1992 User Group Forestry in the FarWesternRegion of Nepal: Case Studies from Baitadi and Achham. ICIMOD, Kathmandu. Devkota, P.L. 1992: Traditional systems of Forest and Pasture. Kathmandu. Furer-Haimendorf, Christoph von 1975 Himalayas Traders: Life in Highland Nepal. London: John Murry. Furer -Haimendorf, Christoph von 1989 Exploratory Travels in the Highland Nepal.Sterling Publisher's Private Limited. New Delhi . Gray, Andrew 1999. Cultural and Spiritual Values of Biodiversity. A Contemporary Contribution to the Global Bio-diversity Assessment. Intermediate Technology Publication. UNEP. Gilmour, D.A.1989 Forest Resources and Indigenous Management in Nepal. Working Paper No.17. Honolulu: Environment and Policy Institute, EastWest Center.

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Gilmour, D.A and Fisher, R.J 1991Villagers, Forests and Foresters.The Philosophy,Process and Practice of Community Forestry in Nepal. Kathmandu. Gurung, Om p. 1987Interrelationships among Pasture, Animal Husbandry and Agriculture: Case Study of Tara. HMG, USAID. viz, Winrock Project, Kathmandu. CBS 2001 Population Census: National Report. Central Bureau of Statistics, Nepal Reichel, D.Elizabeth 1999.Gender-Based Knowledge Systems in the Eco-politices of the Yukuna and Tanimuka of Northest Amazon, Colombia in a Contemporary Contribution to the Global Bio-diversity Assessment. Intermediate Technology Publication. UNEP. Rai, Navin and Thapa M.B 1993:Indigenous Pasture Management System in High Altitude Nepal: A Review: Winrock Project, Nepal. Talbott, Kirk (WRI) and Khadka, 1994: Handing it Over. An Analysis of the Legal and Policy Framework of Community Forestry in Nepal. Kathmandu. Tamang Devika, 1990: Indigenous Forest Management System in Nepal: Review H.M.G. Ministry of Agriculture (Winrock). Tamang, P.et.al 2001Tamang Healing in the Himalaya: A Study on the Tamang Healing Knowledge and the Development Interventions In and Around Langtang National Park of Central Nepal. Milijuli Nepal.Kathmandu. Thapa Magar, S.2000.Cardamom Plantation inside Community Forest: Income Generating Activities: A Case Study of Sankhuwasabha District. M.Phil Dissertation Submitted to University of Bergen, Norway. ---------------1996. Forest Management in Legal Aspect: A Case Study of Manebhanjyang Village Development Committee in Okhaldhunga District. Master Thesis Submitted to Central Department of Sociology/Anthropology, Tribhuvan University.

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SHYAMU THAPA MAGAR: Magars and their Indigenous Knowledge... 81 Table 1: Local Names of the Herbs, Their Uses and Collection Practices Name of local herbs

Uses as medicines for treatment

Collected by Used by males/females males/females

Gurja gano

Used for treating gastritis

Amriso and its root

Broomsticks preparation Both sexes and to ward off evil spirits, treatment of poison swallowed and gano (gas formation)

Bongre

Bone fracture

Male

Males

Thuksusa root

For warding off Begar (evil eyes) which is stronger than red chilli.

Both

Both

Hadechook

Fracture or muscle sprain

Both

Males

Sikari lahara

For warding off Begar (belief on sending small reptile in stomach from food by a jealous person)

Both

Males

Akle Bir

Is used for liver infection.

Both

Males

Aankh

Used for muscle sprain/ bone fracture

Both

Males

A twin banana tree

For uterus prolapse

Women

Faith healers

Females

Faith healers

Dhayero flower, For menstruation irregularity pakhanved, hade kafal bark, thulo buhari ko jara, amala, tulasi ko pat, nim leaf,

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Both sexes

Both but collected more by males Both

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Name of local herbs

Kacho simrik (tree)

Uses as medicines for treatment

Collected by Used by males/females males/females

For warding off evil spirits, Both and doing abortion and bone fracture

Both

Bankainas root, Used for bone fracture snails, turmeric, sikarilahara, minia,

Both

Both

Bhuichap

Used for muscle sprain

Both

Both

Bojo

Used for tonsillitis/ thyroid Both

Females

Bikhamaha

Used for warding off evil spirits and curing dog bites/snake bites

Both

Both

Bark of rijal, Darshing, Fokshing

Used for stomach pain

Both

Males

Panch pate siule

Used for stomach pain

Both

Both

Rupila leaf, tapani grass

Used for fever

Both

Both

Raw turmeric, garlic, dubo

Used for irregular menstruation

Female

Females

Piru jhar, Used for irregular aklebir, menstruation Barhamase ko ful, bark of mahadan, dakebarani, shahadan bark, bankasturi bark, Kamar katuwa( parasites in sal tree and chilaune tree)

Female

Females

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SHYAMU THAPA MAGAR: Magars and their Indigenous Knowledge... 83

Name of local herbs

Uses as medicines for treatment

Collected by Used by males/females males/females

Sankata ko choop, rangsing, burjagana

Used for gastritis

Both

Males

Godhtapre, Badalpate

Used for pneumonia

Both

Males

Ardhakapale

Used for half headache

Both

Both

Rudila leaf

Used for fever

Both

Both

Pirpero

For sinusitis

Both

Both

Kali nigro

Used for easing the urination

Both

Both

Sankata flower

Used for labor pain before delivery

Both

Females

Ajambari jhar

Used for fire burns

Both

Both

Fieldwork, 2008.

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AROMATIC PLANT TRADE AND LIVELIHOOD STRATEGIES IN RURAL NEPAL: A CASE OF WINTERGREEN IN DOLAKHA DISTRICT Madhusudan Subedi * Introduction Collection and trading of non-timber forest products (NTFPs) is a traditional economic activity in Nepal. For decades, the rural poor in the mid-hills and mountains have been involved in the collection and sale of NTFPs for their medicinal and aromatic value. Utilization of plant resources is expanding as more people recognize their value for health, environment and social justice (Rawal, Acharya and Subedi 2001). These products constitute a significant portion of the rural economy and are locally consumed by communities living adjacent to the forest. Growing market opportunities for NTFPs provide real potential to raise local people’s income, contribute to the national economy, and provide conservation incentives. However, the current NTFP sub-sector in Nepal is characterized by low level of knowledge among the collectors/ producers, low domestic -value addition, and poor integration across the value chain. A number of stakeholder groups, ranging from collectors, local middlemen, urban traders, manufacturers, exporters, and government agencies have been involved in the chain with their own varied interests (Ojha, 2000). In the rural areas of Nepal where resources are relatively abundant and other income generating opportunities are limited, essential oil plants offer a good prospect for enhancing the livelihood and incomes of local * Madhusudan Subedi holds M. A. in Sociology from Tribhuvan University and M. Phil from the University of Bergen, Norway. Currently, he teaches Sociology at the Central Department of Sociology/Anthropology.

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MADHUSUDAN SUBEDI: Aromatic Plant Trade and Livelihood Strategies... 85 communities. Yet, these opportunities are tapped only on a limited scale owing to lack of knowledge on marketing, entrepreneurial capability and financial resources. For the past several years, development workers and policy makers have discussed the possibility of promoting non-timber forest products to reduce poverty. However, it has been difficult to find economically attractive essential oil products. To be successful, an essential oil product must have lasting market appeal and not merely be a ‘novelty item’, collectors must receive a good income from the product, and distributors must be guaranteed a consistent supply of the product. Case studies, publications and field visits on different enterprises undertaken in the past have demonstrated that investments addressing the above success factors have improved the economic situation of the rural poor as well as strengthened local governance (IIED 1998; Kaplinksy and Morris 2001; Ribot 1997; Shillington 2002). Against the above backdrop, the objective of this paper is to assess opportunities for Wintergreen, a natural product’s intervention on poverty reduction, strengthening local governance, and improving resource management. Framework of the Study Wintergreen is available in sufficient quantity to allow for sustainable commercial harvesting and has the potential to be brought under locally managed regeneration systems. Wintergreen oil has demonstrated commercial value at the national or international level in order to attract local participation which offers opportunities for value-addition and increased productivity at the local level, thereby leading to poverty alleviation. This paper is based on the nature, wealth and power framework and the analysis utilizes the concept of value chain. A value chain is defined as “a series of interlinked exchanges through which a commodity and its constituents pass from extraction through production to end use (Mendelson, Cowlishaw and Rowcliffe 2003:73)”. As such, this approach directly addresses issues of production, transport and sale of the products to the final destination. One strength of the commodity chain approach is that it emphasizes on the fundamental importance not only of identifying

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the actors involved in the trade, but also of elucidating the structure of market and tracing the dispersion of the benefit and power along the chain as determined by various interests and power relations. It is an explanatory tool that has its origins in the study of global trade relations and impacts of globalization, and has been extensively used to analyze agricultural and natural resource commodity markets. Thus, this is the series of relations through which an item passes, from extraction through conversion, exchange, transport, distribution and final use. Access mapping involves evaluating the distribution of profits among and within the groups along the chain; and tracing out, or mapping, from that distribution the mechanisms by which access to benefit is maintained and controlled. It also illuminates the practical issues surrounding establishment of community participation in benefits from and control over natural resources. This approach is based on the premise that a better understanding of natural, economic and governance dimensions of a natural product chain will aid in expanding options for value addition, improve distributional outcomes, and encourage sustainable resource management. One powerful tool for understanding a value chain is access mapping. This involves identifying the actors who extract, produce, process, exchange, transport, distribute and consume the commodity; evaluating income and profit at each level; evaluating the distribution of income and profit within each group; and tracing the mechanism by which access to benefits is maintained and controlled within each group (Ribot, 1998). Research Methods Used: The study is based on the primary data collected using key informant interviews, focus group discussions, key informant interviews, and group interviews with a range of stakeholders from grassroots to national level stakeholders representing government and non-government institutions. To supplement the primary data, documentations were reviewed for using the relevenat data. Dolakha district was selected for the study where a large volume of Wintergreen is currently harvested from this district, and potential exists for its expanded commercial activities. The unit of analysis is Wintergreen, a specific natural product.

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MADHUSUDAN SUBEDI: Aromatic Plant Trade and Livelihood Strategies... 87 Nature, Habitat and Ecology of Wintergreen: Wintergreen, locally known as Dhasingre/Dhasingare/Machino, is one of the widely available natural products in Dolakha district. Wintergreen is found between 1500-2700 meter feet in central Nepal and grows wild. It is a robust shrub with ovate to lanceolate evergreen leaves, and with numerous, axillary, spike-like clusters of small fragrant white or pink globular flowers. Flower clusters are 2.5-8.0 cm long, shorter than leaves; flowers are short-stalked; and corolla are 4 mm by 3 mm broad. Leaves are acute, 5-10 cm long, smooth above, dotted with the bases of bristles beneath, margins bristly-toothed; a branched shrub to 1-1.75 m. fruit 0.6 mm, with dark violet-blue fleshy pointed calyx-lobes. This plant is native of North America and is found in woodland and exposed mountainous areas (Acharya, 2003). It is commonly found in Nepal as wild vegetation. It is a fast growing, evergreen robust shrub, which can grow properly in areas having rainfall up to 700-1000 mm. It grows densely in the degraded, open and moist slopes (Acharya, 2003). The most useful and valuable part of the plant is leaf, which is dark green in color and yield 0.3 to 0.9 percent of yellowish essential oil, the well known "Wintergreen oil" in commerce. The essential oil of this plant contains Methyl Salicylate 95-97%, widely used in allopathic and Ayurvedic medicines, and in cosmetic products, flavors and medical preparations, including toothpaste to massage cream (ANSAB 2002). According to local inhabitants, Wintergreen plant has a good regeneration capacity. The plants, which are not harvested ever, have few leaves and the harvested plants regenerate more leaves. Actors Involved in the Value Chain of Wintergreen: Various actors are involved in the essential oil value chains of Wintergreen. These different actor groups exhibit a mixture of economic background and outside exposure, and possess years of experience in this field. There is a clear distinction in the role played by these groups (see underneath). The Harvesters Wintergreen harvesters are predominantly female local inhabitants

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who reside 2-5 km from the forest. Some males also collect Wintergreen but only occasionally. A typical Wintergreen harvester begins her day at sunrise by sharpening her hasiya (sickle) and trodding her way to areas where she will collect Wintergreen. She moves through the forest from one clump to another, cutting leaf-sheaths. The harvester returns and delivers the Wintergreen to a processing unit. Thus, the task of collecting is categorized into travel to and from worksite, searching for and cutting Wintergreen, and carrying Wintergreen to a processing unit. Productivity of an extraction episode varies from one community forest to another. Interviews with the collectors, executive members of the CFUGs and local informants indicated that, in a 4-6 hour workday, one can collect approximately 60 kg of Wintergreen twigs with fresh leaves. In Suspa distillation unit, the price of 1 kg of Wintergreen was Rs.1.00, whereas in Khari Khola it was Rs 1.50. The reason given for the difference in price was the distance factor. Collectors had to spend 6 hours to reach the Khari Khola distillation unit whereas the same amount of Wintergreen could be collected within 5 hours in Suspa. However, collectors at the Suspa distillation unit were expecting to sell Wintergreen at the same price the collectors of Khari Khola distillation obtained. The average annual income from Wintergreen varies from one harvester to another depending on the availability of surplus labor and socioeconomic condition of the collector. Generally, harvesters were able to earn Rs. 1,000-2,000 per month along with their daily work at home. This amount is higher than the local wage rate of unskilled labor (Rs.50 per day for 8 hours of work). Income from Wintergreen contributes 15-25 percent to the total household income of the harvesters. Most of the harvesters have limited knowledge about the end use of Wintergreen. Harvesters deliver raw Wintergreen to the distillation unit where a responsible person records the date received and weight of the product. Harvesters either keep this information in their memory or maintain it at home. The responsible person gives the total amount of payable money to each collector weekly or biweekly. If the calculation of the payable money differs between the records of the distillation unit and the collector, they go through their records and settle the problem. Collectors mentioned some examples of this practice in both distillation units. They also mentioned that they had managed such differences without any difficulty. +

MADHUSUDAN SUBEDI: Aromatic Plant Trade and Livelihood Strategies... 89 None of the collectors, however, had taken payment in advance from the owner of the distillation unit. The Community Forest User Group (CFUG) CFUGs are the key owners of raw Wintergreen because almost all Wintergreen is collected from community forests. There are a total of 278 CFUGs in Dolakha district. The role of CFUGs in the value chain has gradually increased in Dolakha due to the active role of ANSAB in promoting NTFPs by facilitating FECOFUN at the district as well as central levels. Without a close collaboration with the CFUGs, it would have been impossible to establish the Wintergreen oil distillation unit in the district. In close association with CFUGs in their respective catchment areas, distillation units can be established individually or collectively. Neither FECOFUN nor District Forest Office (DFO) has adequate data about the exact availability of Wintergreen in different community forests. However, available secondary data and discussions held with different stakeholders show that at least 6 distillation units can be managed in a sustainable manner in Dolakha district alone. Informants also mentioned that there are some potential areas for the establishment of distillation units in Sindhupalchowk district. The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certification process did assess for a few of the CFUGs the availability and suggested sustainable harvesting levels and also concluded that expansion could happen, but needed to be closely monitored. FSC requires annual field audits to check on forest and social conditions and as more groups can join the FSC certification, it is hoped that more CFUG areas will come under better management. The FSC certification report does give maximum harvest levels and monitoring and record keeping protocols to be observed. The initial areas that were certified for Wintergreen and other products just recently passed their first FSC audit. After entering into an agreement with a distillation unit, CFUGs give permission to collect Wintergreen from their forest. Harvesters do not have to pay a royalty directly to CFUGs. CFUGs get NRs 0.25 per kg of raw Wintergreen from the owner of the distillation unit. The relationship between the distillation units and CFUGs was found to be

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good. The CFUGs give a letter of clearance to the local traders or marketing cooperative to export Wintergreen oil to Kathmandu. Primary Processors Two types of1 primary processors are involved in Wintergreen oil production: privately owned and managed by cooperative. Cooperativemanaged enterprises are important not only for their financial benefits but also for their socio-economic benefits. This enterprise created parttime employment for about 300 community people through Wintergreen collection and fuelwood collection. It also employed six direct laborers in its daily activities. Wintergreen distillation units are located, as far as possible, near the community forest and villages. The processing unit is very simple where two laborers are required to work in each unit. Each laborer working at the distillation unit gets Rs. 3,000 per month (Rs. 100 per day) and two meals a day. These laborers are supposed to stay at the distillation unit for security reasons. One person puts fresh Wintergreen leaves in the upper part of the vessel, while another prepares the fire by putting the marc (wastage) of the previous distillation under the same vessel. It takes about 250 kilos of raw Wintergreen to produce one kilo of oil. The lower part of the vessel contains water that will be transformed into the steam. The passage between the drum and the condenser has to be tightly closed to maintain the water steam inside the drum. Hard leaves of Wintergreen take about 2-3 hours to macerate. After 2-3 hours the worker stops the fire for about 6-8 hours and lights it again for 4-5 hours. A skilled laborer opens the passage between the vessel and the condenser to let the distillation process take place. The steam charged with the essential oil is cooled in the condenser that contains a tube system where cold water flows. In this way, the distillation process lasts 8-10 hours for Wintergreen essential oil. The temperature of the tube connecting the second chamber and the condenser has to be steadily checked and the intensity of the fire maintained. The essential oil sublimes off, if the temperature exceeds 100 degrees Celsius. The steam transforms into liquid and flows from the condenser to a container or a separator. At the end of the process, the essential oil is

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MADHUSUDAN SUBEDI: Aromatic Plant Trade and Livelihood Strategies... 91 separated from the water. The essential oil from Wintergreen is heavier than water. The leaves are removed from the upper part of the drum and spread out to dry. They will feed the fire of the next distillation process. It was also mentioned that the amount of firewood required per day in Khari Khola and Suspa distillation unit were 25 and 10 kg, respectively. The cost of one kg of firewood was one rupee. Some leakage problems were seen during the separation process of Wintergreen oil. The amount of Wintergreen oil produced from each distillation process ranges between 2.2–2.5 kg per day. Had there not been the leakage problem, production of the oil could have been slightly higher. The oil produced is taken to Kathmandu. The traders do not have to pay any tax and royalty to others except the royalty to the CFUGs. District Level Traders District level traders buy Wintergreen oil from the primary processors. The price of one kg oil is NRs. 700 at the distillation unit. The village traders sell Wintergreen oil to the Herbs Production and Processing Company Limited (HPPCL), Kathmandu. The transportation cost per kg oil is NRs. 10. It was also mentioned that traders who can sell Wintergreen oil at the domestic manufacturer/retail market in Kathmandu get more benefits compared to selling to HPPCL. Domestic Manufacturers There are about 30 Nepali manufacturers who use Wintergreen oil in various medical and toiletry-related preparations such as massage oil and toothpaste. Nepali manufacturers prefer to buy Wintergreen oil from district level traders or cooperatives. They pay Nepali Rs. 950 (about US $ 13.50) to buy one kilogram of oil from HPPCL but can get oil from district level traders for only Rs. 850 (about US $12.00) per kilo of oil. National Trader and Marketing Cooperative The government owned Herbs Production and Processing Company Limited (HPPCL) in Kathmandu is one of the leading companies, which buys Wintergreen oil from district level traders and sells it to domestic

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manufacturers in Nepal. It also exports Wintergreen oil to India and European countries. HPPCL guarantees traders and cooperatives it will buy certain amounts of essential oil from different parts of Nepal. According to official information from HPPCL, Wintergreen oil comes to the company from Dolakha district directly from the district level traders or via cooperatives depending on the nature of the ownership of the distillation unit. HPPCL uses Wintergreen oil for Sancho production (liquid medicine used against upper respiratory tract infections like the common cold and throat pain), sells to a domestic manufacturer, and Table 1: Services and Skills along the Wintergreen Value Chain, Dolakha Market Actors

Number in 2004

National Trader

1

Buys Wintergreen oil from district level traders and cooperativeSell it to Nepali manufacturers, export to abroadExplore international market for higher value addition

Nepali manufacturers

30

Use Wintergreen oil in different products Buy Wintergreen oil from district level traders/ cooperative national trader

District level

3

Supply oil to Nepali manufacturers and traders national trader, arrange transport, store oil

Marketing cooperative

1

Gives opportunity for local people to invest small scale enterprises;Provides market information to CFUGs

Primary processors

5

Pay royalty to CFUGsBuy fuelwood from local inhabitants, process oil, pay harvester so must have working capital

Harvesters

350

Have skill to collect raw Wintergreen; Helps processors providing raw Wintergreen on time; Use surplus labor in income generating activities Conduct biological monitoring 10 with CFUGs

CFUGs (resource managers / producers)

10

Services and Skills

Give opportunity to local inhabitants to involve in income generating activities; Use royalty for the forest management and other social and economic development issues

Source: Field Survey, 2005

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MADHUSUDAN SUBEDI: Aromatic Plant Trade and Livelihood Strategies... 93 exports to India and abroad. However, export of Wintergreen oil from Nepal to third countries (other than India) is very small. With respect to market price, the district level traders and cooperative usually get higher prices from domestic manufacturers than the national trader. Thus, the domestic manufacturer/retailer is the first stop to sell Wintergreen oil in Kathmandu. It was also mentioned that the share of Wintergreen oil in the international market is less than 10 percent. International buyers have commented that while the Nepal Wintergreen oil is unique (harvested from wild sources, high quality and most recently forest stewardship council (FSC) and organic certified) it must be placed in specialty markets as Chinese Wintergreen oil of much lower quality sells for a fraction of the price. Bulk international users of Wintergreen oil buy almost exclusively on price and do not need the highest quality oil produced by Nepal. Gross Output Values Market shares of the harvesters have increased due to the interventions from enterprise-oriented community forests, better access to market information, and local communities' awareness about the new income generation opportunities offered by this product. Table 2: Price, Expenses and Margins for Wintergreen Oil Prices/Expenses/Margins (Rs./Kg) 2005

Actors Prices Local harvesters to local processing unit (250 kg raw Wintergreen to produce one kg oil) Local processing unit to marketing cooperative (oil) Local processing unit to district level traders (oil) Cooperative to national trader Cooperative to domestic manufacturers (oil) National traders to domestic manufacturers (oil) National trader to Indian Market National Trader to European and American market Expenses Harvesting and transportation to local processing units by local harvesters (local cost of labor)

+

312 700 700 800 850 950 1400 1700

250

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Prices/Expenses/Margins (Rs./Kg) 2005

Actors Conservation fee to CFUGs paid by local processors Handling, fuelwood, staff, machines depreciation, rents paid by local processors/cooperative Handling and packaging paid by local trader/ marketing cooperatives Transportation to Kathmandu paid by cooperatives/ local trader Storage, quality testing, insurance, repackaging, handling paid by national trader Export permit, Department of Plant Resources (DPR) tests and issues certification, sealed and other costs paid by national trader to export India Export permit, DPR test and certification, sealed and other costs paid by national trader to export Europe and America Margins Harvesters Primary Processor Cooperative District level trader National Trader (if sold to domestic manufacturers) National Trader (if sold in India) National Trader (if sold to Europe and America)

62 250 10 10 60

200

300 62 76 80 80 90 340 540

Source: Field Survey and information obtained from HPPCL and HBTL, 2005.

Employment and Sales Destination: Wintergreen harvesters are predominantly female local inhabitants who reside 2-5 km far from the forest. Some males also collect Wintergreen but only occasionally. Poor and marginalized local farmers are the main harvesters of Wintergreen. The Herbs Production and Processing Company, Limited (HPPCL), Kathmandu is one of the leading companies, which buys and sells essential oil in Nepal. It guarantees to buy certain amount of essential oil from different parts of Nepal. According to HPPCL, Wintergreen oil comes to the company from Dolakha District either directly from the traders or +

MADHUSUDAN SUBEDI: Aromatic Plant Trade and Livelihood Strategies... 95 via cooperatives depending on the nature of the ownership of the distillation unit. HPPCL uses Wintergreen oil for its own production of Sancho (liquid medicine used against, among others, upper respiratory tract infections like the common cold and throat pain), sells to retailers and Ayurvedic companies and firms, and exports to India and abroad. However, export of Wintergreen oil from Nepal to third countries (other than India) is very small. With respect to the market price, the local contractors usually get higher prices from retailers and market traders in Kathmandu who are trying to look for markets in Europe and America. Thus, retailers are the first preferred buyers of Wintergreen oil in Kathmandu. The share of Wintergreen oil in international market was reported to be less than 10 percent. Table 3: Vertical Income and Profit for Wintergreen Oil Actors

Income Per Kg (Rs)

Profit Per Kg (Rs)

312

62

Harvesters CFUGs

62

50

Processors

700

76

Marketing Cooperative

850

80

District level trader

850

80

National Trader (for selling in Indian Market)

1400

340

National Trader (for selling in America or Europe)

1700

540

Source: Field Survey, 2005.

Horizontal Distribution of Income and Profit : The average annual income from Wintergreen varies among the harvesters depending on their household labor availability and socioeconomic condition. Generally, harvesters were able to earn Rs. 1,000-2,000 per month along with their daily work at home. This amount is higher than the local labor wage rate (Rs.50 with meals per day for 8 hours of work). Income from Wintergreen contributes 15-25 percent to the total household income of the harvesters. The processors and marketing cooperative are not sufficiently motivated to establish new Wintergreen

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processing units due to stagnant market price and monopoly price fixing by HPPCL. Table 4: Power Mapping of Wintergreen MarketActors

Mechanism of Exercising Access

Access Status

Local harvesters

Access to forests, Direct access to CFUG resources

CFUG membershipLocal inhabitants

Community Forest User Groups

Access to local harvesters, traders, market information and various supporting organizations

CFUG membershipOwnership and management rights of community forest Networking with different governmental and non governmental organizations

Primary Processor

Access to harvesters and CFUGsAccess to district level traders Local social and eco-nomic network, Access to market information and other supporting Organizations

Good relationship with the harvesters CFUGs Employment opportunities for local community members Provide economic opportunities for locals

District level traders

Access to processors, domestic manufacturers and national traders

Good relationship with primary processors, DFO and FECOFUN Social and economic networking with primary processors

Co-operative Enterprises

Access to CFUGs, domestic Good relationship with FCUGs, FECOFUN and supporting organization. Support manufacturers and national traders Access to from local community market information and supporting organization

Nepali Manufacturers

Access to district level tradersAccess to international market on minimal scale Access to national trader Access to people on behalf their final product Knowledge on market information

Production popularity in national and international market. Good network with district and national tradersGood network with custom international markets Popularity of the product.

National Traders

Access to Nepali manufacturers, district level traders and international market. Access to market information

Network with international and Nepali manufacturers;Quantity of purchasing assurances to cooperatives, district level traders and primary processors; Network with international market

Source: Field survey 2005. +

MADHUSUDAN SUBEDI: Aromatic Plant Trade and Livelihood Strategies... 97 Wintergreen is comparatively a new product. Compared to its full potential, its utilization has been minimal. A detailed feasibility study of this product in different districts is yet to be done. However, the following table provides the actual quantity harvested and the estimated annual production capacity of raw Wintergreen in various districts. Table 5: Harvesting and Biological Capacity Status of Wintergreen in Nepal Wintergreen SN

Districts

1 2 3 4

Solukhumbu Sankhuwasabha Pachthar Okhaldhunga

5 6 7 8 9

Annual Harvested

No of Quantity (Kg) Harvesters (Average of Last 5 Years)

Annual Production Capacity Kg/Year (Potential)

0 0 0 0

-

400,000 30,000 7,000 150,000

Ilam Ramechhap Sindupalchok Nuwakot Rasuwa

0 100 50 0 0

100,000 75,000 0 0

50,000 400,000 200,000 400,000 300,000

10 11 12 13 14

Dolakha Kavrepalanchok Lalitpur Dhading Makawanpur

200 0 0 0 0

160,000 0 0 0 0

700,000 300,000 15,000 50,000 50,000

15 16 17

Bhaktapur Mygadi Baglung

0 0 0

0 0 0

50,000 20,000 15,000

350

335,000

1,437,000

Total

Source: Essential oil production chart obtained from HBTL and information from different DFO Offices, 2005.

Productivity of a Wintergreen extraction episode varies from one community forest to another. Interview with the harvesters, executive members of CFUGs and local informants indicate that in a 4-6 hour workday, one can collect approximately 60 kg of Wintergreen twigs with fresh leaves. The value of one kg of Wintergreen varies from Rs.

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1.00 to Rs 1.50. The average annual income from Wintergreen varies from one collector to another depending on the availability of surplus labor and socioeconomic condition of the collector. Generally, harvesters were able to earn Rs. 1,000-2,000 per month along with their daily work at home. This amount is higher than the local wage labor rate (Rs.50 per day for 8 hours of work). Income from Wintergreen contributes 15-25 percent to the total household income of the harvesters. CFUGs are becoming stronger to manage local resources in Dolakha. The government has given full authority to CFUGs to manage Wintergreen for income ingeneration. Coordination among DFO, FECOFUN, (I)NGOs and CFUGs is becoming stronger on market information, sustainable harvesting and ownership rights to the local inhabitants. Wealth/Economic Mapping: Collection and trade of NTFPs have played a key role in the economic development of the country where economic opportunities are severely constrained by difficult socio-economic condition and poorly developed infrastructures such as communication and transport facilities (ANSAB, 1999). For most of the communities, NTFP collection is one of the few or only ways to earn cash income without engaging in seasonal migration out of the area. Productivity of a Wintergreen extraction episode varies from one community forest to another. Interview with the harvesters, executive members of CFUGs and local informants indicate that in a 46 hour workday, one can collect approximately 60 kg of Wintergreen twigs with fresh leaves. The value of one kg of Wintergreen varies from Rs. 1.00 to Rs 1.50. The average annual income from Wintergreen varies from one collector to another depending on the availability of surplus labor and socioeconomic condition of the collector. Generally, harvesters were able to earn Rs. 1,000-2,000 per month along with their daily work at home. This amount is higher than the local wage labor rate (Rs.50 per day for 8 hours of work). Income from Wintergreen contributes 15-25 percent to the total household income of the harvesters. Power/Governance Mapping: CFUGs are becoming stronger to manage local resources in Dolakha. The government has given full authority to CFUGs to manage Wintergreen

+

MADHUSUDAN SUBEDI: Aromatic Plant Trade and Livelihood Strategies... 99

Table 6: Power Mapping of Wintergreen Market Actors Local harvesters

Access Status

Mechanism of Exercising Access

Access to forests, Direct access to CFUG resources

CFUG membershipLocal inhabitants

Community Forest Access to local harvesters, traders, market information User Groups and various supporting organizations

CFUG membershipOwnership and management rights of community forest Networking with different governmental and nongovernmental organizations

Primary Processor Access to harvesters and CFUGsAccess to district level tradersLocal social and economic network, Access to market information and other supporting organizations

Good relationship with the harvesters CFUGs Employment opportunities for local community members Provide economic opportunities for locals

District level traders

Access to processors, domestic manufacturers and national traders

Good relationship with primary processors, DFO, and FECOFUNSocial and economic networking with primary processors

Cooperative Enterprises

Access to CFUGs, domestic manufacturers and national traders Access to market information and supportingorganization

Good relationship with FCUGs, FECOFUN and supporting organization. Support from local community

Nepali Manufacturers

Access to district level tradersAccess to international market on minimal scaleAccess to national traderAccess to people on behalf their final product Knowledge on market information

Production popularity in national and international market. Good network with district and national tradersGood network with custom international marketsPopularity of the product.

National Traders

Access to Nepali manufacturers, district level traders and international marketAccess to market information

Network with international and Nepali manufacturersQuantity of purchasing assurances to cooperatives, district level traders and primary processors Network with international market

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for income ingeneration. Coordination among DFO, FECOFUN, (I)NGOs and CFUGs is becoming stronger on market information, sustainable harvesting and ownership rights to the local inhabitants. Corruption in the Government agencies is a difficult reality for collectors, traders, and processors to overcome. Those with the financial means to address the needs of government officials, police officials, and forestry and customs agencies can profit within the current environment. The government policy on forestry has enabled expansion of community forests across the country and devolved forest management rights and responsibilities to local community organizations (CFUGs). The community forestry program has significantly contributed to empowering the local people and ensuring sustainable utilization and management of locally occurring natural resources. It has been one of the most successful approaches in the forestry sector (Shrestha and Sharma 2004) in which the government transfers the responsibility of managing forests to the communities and recognizes the latter's right to use on a sustainable basis. Various writers have noted its achievements in terms of better forest condition, social mobilization and income generation for rural development, and institutional building at the grass-root level ((Kanel 2004; Luintel, et. al, 2004; Shrestha and Sharma 2004). Government policy with regard to NTFPs is not, however, perceived to be in favor of local communities in the same way as in the case of CF. It mainly tilts toward regulatory control in the name of maintaining ecological balance. As such, it has contributed little to solving problems affecting this sub-sector, and has often invited confrontation between the local people and the government. Luintel, et. al (2004) argue that such policies nurture a vicious circle of poverty. Conclusions: Natural resources are dynamic. Perception regarding their ownership and access right is socially embedded, and political forces determine the stake of various actors and stakeholders over such resources. People and their surrounding environment define resources and their use. The Nature, Wealth and Power Framework enables one to understand the various cross-cutting themes. It is a mutually inclusive framework for knowledge +

MADHUSUDAN SUBEDI: Aromatic Plant Trade and Livelihood Strategies... 101 management, capacity building, organizational development and arrangement, competitiveness and efficiencies, policy and legal reforms, and integration. The essential oil products are mostly harvested from the forest for commercial purposes and are carried away from the villages and districts and are sold to the national and international markets. In general, the actors in the value chain at each level derive some benefits from NTFP trade. Wintergreen is an emerging product. There are high potentials for promoting essential oil products for income and employment generation in Nepal, made possible by the country's unique geo-climatic and ecological diversity. Most of the collectors Wintergreen were from poor and marginalized groups. CFUGs are generating substantial amounts of forest products and income. Substantial potentials also exist for further enhancing income through better management of community forests in Nepal. However, fund mobilization guidelines should be prepared in consultation with different stakeholders so that income and expenditure of CFUGs become more transparent and geared towards pro-poor activities. In order to improve participation, inclusiveness, transparency and accountability in governance at the local level, more authority should be given to CFUGs with close supervision from DFO. It is very important to link enterprises with well managed CFUGs to generate sufficient economic incentives and promote biodiversity conservation. Based on the experience from Dolakha district, involvement of local people in establishing cooperatives appeared a preferred modality. Under-harvesting of Wintergreen was observed due to the presence of insufficient processing units, insufficient market demand, competition with Chinese products and insurgency. External support for the local communities is crucial in both conservation of biodiversity and reducing poverty within communities. Market information and strategies of various players, starting from local harvesters to international traders, are substantially different and information gaps exist at each stage. Proper market information could ensure due return for each actor. DFOs, CFUGs and entrepreneurs do not have adequate information on the availability of resources. The management plans are not based on +

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production capacity of the given area. Similarly, enterprise planning is not based on resource availability. Both collectors and district level traders suffer from poor market information, product price variation as well as uncertainty regarding future supply and demand of the products. As a result, business opportunities go untapped at the local level. It is exacerbated by inadequate fiscal incentives to community-based NTFP enterprises and bureaucratic harassment on commercial use of community forest resources. A favorable policy environment is a precondition in creating incentives and sustainable use of resources leading to biodiversity conversation. Acknowledgement: I am grateful to ANSAB for the financial support to conduct this study, and Dr. Devendra Chapagain and Mr. Binod Pokhrel for their valuable suggestion and cooperation.

References Acharya, Ram P. (2003). Assessment of Management Options for Economically Important Non-Timber Forest Products: A Case Study from Mid and High Hills of Nepal. An M. Phil. Dissertation Submitted to Indian Institute of Forest Management, Bhopal. ANSAB (1999). Subsector Analysis of High Altitude NTFPs in the Karnali Zone. A Report Submitted to Community-Based Economic Development Project CBED/CECI Baluwatar, Kathmandu, Nepal. ANSAB (2002). Inventory of Non-Timber Forest Products at Mimi, Melchham and Darma VDCs Humla, Nepal. Kathmandu: ANSAB IIED (1998). Participatory Valuation of Wild Resources: An Overview of the Hidden Harvest Methodology. London: Sustainable Agriculture and Rural Livelihood Program of International Institute for the Environment and Development (IIED). IRG (2004). Nature, Wealth and Power: Emerging Best Practice for Revitalization Rural Africa. Washington: USAID in Collaboration with CIFOR, WINROCK, WRI and IRG. Kanel, Keshav Raj (2004)." Twenty Five Years of Community Forestry:

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MADHUSUDAN SUBEDI: Aromatic Plant Trade and Livelihood Strategies... 103 Contributing to Millennium Development Goal" In 25 Years of Community Forestry: Contributing to Millennium Development Goal (pp 4-18). Kathmandu: Community Forest Division, Department of Forest. Kaplinksy, R. and M. Morris (2001). A Hand Book of Value Chain Research. IDRC. Luintel, Harisharan, Mani Raj Banjade, Hari R. Neupane and Raj K. Pandey (2004). "Sustainable Non-Timber Forest Product Management: Issues and Ways Forward". In 25 Years of Community Forestry: Contributing to Millennium Development Goal. (pp 42- 47). Kathmandu: Community Forest Division, Department of Forest. Meldelson, Samantha, Guy Cowlishaw and Marcus Rowcliffe (2003). "Anatomy of Bushmeat Commodity Chain in Takoradi, Ghana". The Journal of Peasant Studies, Vol.31, No.1, pp73-100. New ERA (2002). Final Program Performance Report of Ban Udyam. A Report Submitted to USAID. Ojha, Hemant R. (2000). Current Policy Issues in NTFP Development in Nepal. Kathmandu: ANSAB. Rawal, Rana B., Acharya, B. and Subedi, B.P (2001). Jaributi Marketing and Policy Issues in Nepal. Paper Presented at the National Workshop on NonTimber Forest Products, February 22, 2001, Kathmandu. Ribot, Jesse C. (1998). Theorizing Access: Forest Profits along Senegal’s Charcoal Commodity Chain. Development and Change Vol. 29. pp 307-341. Shrestha, Raj Bahadur and Sharma, Anuja Raj (2004). "Sustainable Management of Community Forests: Towards Betterment of Rural Communities". In 25 Years of Community Forestry: Contributing to Millennium Development Goal. Kathmandu: Community Forest Division, Department of Forest (Pp 31-41). Subedi, Bhisma P. (1998). Participatory Utilization and Conservation of Medicinal and Aromatic Plants: A Case from Western Nepal Himalaya, Kathmandu: Asia Network for Small Scale Bioresources. Yeh, Emily T. (1998). Forest Products, Foreign Markets, and Conflict Between Tibetan Mushroom Harvesting Villages in South West China. Asia Forest Network, Working Paper Series. 2.

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WATER, WEALTH AND POWER: A CASE STUDY FROM UPPER MUSTANG OF NEPAL Prem Chalaune * Background: This paper examines the relationship between micro-social political institutions and unequal access to water which is ultimately molded by macro social world. The indigenously managed irrigation system existing in Dhee-Upper Mustang of Nepal is the manifestation or reflection of local kingship, village headmanship, institution of polyandry, property inheritance system, access to land, bikas (green garden), animal husbandry, state monarchical system (which is now abolished), modus operandi of NGOs/INGOs and governmental officials. The local unequal social political complexities led to age old indigenously managed irrigation system which is ultimately manufactured and protected by wider social structure. Dhee village Upper Mustang is a semi-arid Trans-Himalayan region in western part of Nepal which is known for its water scarcity. The indigenous or community-managed irrigation system existing in Dhee-Upper Mustang seems highly exploitative and power-ridden. As irrigation water is a free gift of nature and held in common, rhetorically it is perceived as a ‘common good’, ‘public property’. In community-based water management system, it is presumed that nobody has the exclusive right over it. Water is allocated equitably among users, commoners or farmers making proper institutional arrangements (Trawick et al. 1994 and Uprety, 2005). The romantic statement of water as ‘common good’ sometimes discourages the idea that water can be owned, * Mr Prem Chalaune holds M. A. in Sociology from Tribhuvan University. Currently, he teaches Sociology at the Central Department of Sociology/Anthropology.

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PREM CHALAUNE: Water, Wealth, and Power: A case... 105 controlled and appropriated by powerful actors in local level (Mehta 1999:19, Leach 1997:233). So there is an urgent need to unpack the notion of ‘users’, ‘farmers’ or ‘commoners’ that is not a homogenous group but a heterogeneous or inorganic group that comprises different classes, castes, ethnicities and gender and power groups. So prevailing social differentiation, power, and politics play a vital role on their water access and control in which powerful and prestigious people dominate the whole processes of institutional arrangements of water allocation and distribution. In such situations, landless and powerless become deprived of water on their dire need and only powerful landlords become benefited (Mehta, 1997). In a class-based society, all commoners are not equal. They are the multiple actors having multiple interests, purposes, and goals. Their position, authority, and power influence the whole processes of water access and control (Robbins and Agrawal, 1999). In an unequal social, political, cultural and economic system, irrigation system reinforces existing social hierarchy by making the privileged more privileged at the cost of powerless. It cannot address the needs and aspirations of small farmers and poor but becomes ‘blue gold’ and ‘individual possession’ of powerful actors in local realm. So we can say that ignoring existing social, political and cultural system is tantamount to making the rich richer and poor poorer. It cannot uplift the poor and small farmers’ life but rather exploits their labor in canal maintenance because they are powerless and voiceless in society. Within an unjust social structure, water enhances production, food security, wealth, power and social dignity of the local elites. Ultimately, water rights, access to and control over it are intricately tied with land rights Theoretical Perspectives: I have used environmental entitlement analysis, political ecology, and the theory of power elite to examine the access, rights to water and other environmental resources that are prerequisites to life. Entitlement approach was developed first by Amartya Sen. In his famine analysis, he has talked about food scarcity, famine and poverty. Famine and poverty are not the results of limited resources available in an environment but the causes of unequal distribution of environmental resources. When people lose command over the means of livelihood, they might suffer from famine and poverty. Environmental entitlement refers not only +

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rights to resources in a normative sense that people could have but a range of options, possibilities and choices that people can have with resources which are means of livelihood. Conventional community-based natural resource management approach treats people-environment relations in equilibrium, consensual, and balanced way. Malthusian interpretation overemphasizes on population pressure as if population growth were the sole cause for the imbalance of environment that disrupts the people-environment harmony. Afore-mentioned assumptions repeat the logic of evolutionists and functionalists. But entitlement approach treats people environment relation in more processual and dynamic way. Through the lens Amartya Sen, community is treated as differentiated, dynamic, and divisive social unit. Different actors have different self interests, needs, priorities, purpose and goals in community. Sen states that rights, entitlements, endowments, range of options or possibilities to environmental resources are always influenced by social institutions and power relations in which powerful, rich, and prestigious people appropriate the resources and powerless become deprive from it (Leach et.al. 1999). The political ecology developed from the root of Marx’s political economy also examines the people-environment relation in a more and processual and dynamic way. It avoids static, natural, historical and apolitical constructions of locality, rights, access to resources and its’ governance system. It states that local rules, customs, traditions are not isolated from wider social, political, cultural, and economic processes. So it examines uncertainty and scarcity of resources at local level linking with the global processes. Hence, the political ecology asserts that the means of production such as land, water, pasture, forests and labor are distributed and governed on the basis of power and social differentiation depending upon relation of dependence and dominance. Existing social differentiation, power, authority shapes not only the resource governance system but also the day to day live interactions, negotiations, the abilities of articulation, and manipulation and struggle. Thus, the heterogeneous nature of institutions and power is underscored under political ecology (Blaike and Robbins, 1998). The theory of power elite developed by C.Wright.Mills states that

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PREM CHALAUNE: Water, Wealth, and Power: A case... 107 some sorts of elites are universal in human society. The term ‘Elite’ refers to top ranked people of society and the term ‘power’ refers to the ability to impose will upon others. Mainly elites concentrate on social power to capture the economic resources for their own benefits through three ways, i.e. domestic, political and commercial. Elites capture power and resources domestically by means of kinship, politically by means of rulers and commercially by means of markets. In an elite-directed institution, judicious distribution of resources cannot be imagined. By creating own favored institutions, a minority of elites captures the resources and overwhelming people loose the command over them. Operational Conceptual Framework: Based on the afore-mentioned theoretical framework, I have developed my operational conceptual model. More specifically, inequality in equitable property rights to water and other resources is shaped by micro and macro social world. The interlocking relationships between micro and macro institutions have produced and sustained unequal distribution of property. In the case of Dhee- Upper Mustang, micro social institutions such as local kingship, chieftainship, polyandry, makpa (gharjwain), extended family, property inheritance systems, system of reproducing the illegitimate children, land, bikas, and cattle are the leading factors behind unequal rights to water and other resources. At macro level, state monarchical system (now abolished), its policies, programs, and bureaucracy have protected and legitimizeed local monarch and directed micro socio-political institutions. On the one hand, it is apparently seen that even after the abolition of petty kings in 1960, the state monarch had given the authority to the Mustang king to rule over Upper Mustang leaving Raja title untouched with some honorary position and allowances. The state monarch had bestowed the rank of colonel and the salary to the Mustang king. The Mustang king was also appointed in the standing committee of the state council of the state monarch. These instances show a glance about macro micro socio-political connection. On the other hand, the programs and policies of state are also indifferent towards the unequal distribution of resources available at the local level. For instance, NGO/INGOs and governmental officials always work together with local king and his allies being indifferent towards the misery of Morangbos/Forangs, Ngyalu/ Ngyamu and Ghenchang, the underpriviled +

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local communities. NGO/INGOs operated programs are chaired by local king and his men such as Jigme Foundation, Annapurna Conservation Committee, Monastery Restoration Committee and Saving Credit Program. The governmental and non- governmental officials have such mindset that they have to work with local bigwigs to succeed their programs. A brief account of conceptual framework can be seen as follows in figure 1. A. State monarchical system

C. Connection with broader social world, modus operandi of INGOs/NGOs and government officials

E. Access to land, bikas and cattle, right to be chieftain, social differentiation, process of rule making and daily life world

B. Local kingship and chieftain system

F. Unequal rights to water

D. Polyandry, Makpa (Ghar jwain), extended family, and property inheritance system

Methodology Used: I used qualitative methods such as participant observation, semi-structured interview and life history methods to know the practices, perceptions, cognitions, and the experiences of daily life world of inhabitants of Dhee Upper Mustang. Even though the main emphasis was on qualitative methods, census was conducted in the village at the end of fieldwork in order to identify household heads and categories of people based on local social differentiaton. Villagers were accompanied on their daily

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PREM CHALAUNE: Water, Wealth, and Power: A case... 109 chores including fetching, irrigating water, farming and grazing activities. Emphasis was placed on capturing the different layers of variation in the structure of the village’s social composition and people’s resource endowments. The Study Area: Fieldwork was conducted in Dhee, a village in Surkhang upper Mustang. It is located in the trans-himalayan region of the upper Kali-Gandaki in north-western Nepal. It lies in the Tibetan plateau. The Annapurna and Dhaulagiri mountain ranges separate this area from the other Himalayan mountain regions of Nepal. It is a rain shadow and cold desert area. It is situated in 3500 meters elevation point from the sea level. It is the third closest village of Mustang district towards Tibetan border. It is next to the king’s village Lomanthang which has been linked with Tibet by a community-built road. But it is very far from district headquarters and other cities of Nepal. Three to four days’ walk is required from Jomsom trail to Dhee village. The village possesses variation in topographic features; it comprises many colors of rock hills, pastureland, farm (khet), and Green Garden (Bikas). It lies within three potential villages where two season crops are grown. The main crops of Dhee are barley (uwa), and buckwheat (faper). It also grows potato, salagam, cabbage, tomato, pumpkin and other green vegetables. In fruits apple, arubakhada, khurpani and grapes are also grown here. Gurungs (Lopas) living in Upper Mustang, physically, linguistically and culturally, bear strong affinities with Tibet. There are 25 households in Dhee village Surkhang. It comprises 12 households of Dhongba, 12 households of Morangbo/Forang and one of old, isolated people Ghenchang. The total population is 110. Although eight people from the neighbouring villages are also living in Dhee working as herder and household worker at local bigwigs’ homes, they are not counted as family members of Dhee. So they are not mentioned on aggregate population. Social Structure of Dhee: All 25 households existing in Dhee belong to the same Gurung ethinicity. However, they are not homogenous but heterogeneous in terms of wealth,

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power, and social status. Polyandry, property inheritance system, local king system and other social sanctions create the different categories of people from the same clan. The state and other macro institutions legitimize it. Mainly, there are six categories of people which inclue the property holder brother (Dhongba), the younger and propertyless brother (Forang), the alone and propertyless sister (Morangbo), old men (Ghepo), old women (Ghemo) and illegitimate children (Ngyalu/Ngyamu), etc. Though they do not get respect from other members of their own family, the old men and old women (Ghepo and Ghemo) are not treated as badly as Forang/Morangbo and illegitimate children (Ngyalu/Ngyamu) are treated. Fifty years ago, the system of polyandry marriage was in dominant position. After the change in polyandry marriage and extended family system due to the connection with outer social world with monogamy marriage and nuclear family system, new categories of people have emerged in Dhee. Although there are so many changes in family, marriage, and occupations but the system of property inheritance do not become changed. The unequal distribution of property on household level and its forever continuation and protection by local king has produced the different categories of people. Old norms of polyandry and extended family are defended and manipulated for the sake of elder brother in the name of tradition and custom. The matter of resource has produced these different categories of people. Village head man, politician, king’s own man and the king remain on the top rank of the local social hierarchy. Among Dhongbas, those who are affluent and powerful, hold the highest position in the society. So access, and right to water is deeply rooted in local social differentiation and power relations. Property Holder Elder Brothers (Dhongbas): There are 12 households of Dhongbas. The Dhongbas are mainly the family of property holders. Among 12 households, ten have become Dhongbas on the basis of their background of elder brothers and the remaining two on the basis of property. The two younger brothers got chance to go to bride’s father’s home who had no son. In this way, they could get the land, bikas, and cattle and their father- in- law’s water turn. Thus, by getting property from their father-in-law, they reached the position of Dhongbas. So Dhongba is a synonym of property, power and social dignity which is produced by micro social and political +

PREM CHALAUNE: Water, Wealth, and Power: A case... 111 structure. The main basis of Dhongba is property which is fundamental to live the life. In this study village, only Dhongbas have the water turn. Among Dhongbas, king’s men and rich Dhongbas have the first and former turn to irrigate their land. Within households, the Dhongbas are in top rank. They are not unlike the king at their home. They decide the division of labor. For example, who among the family members should engage in business, herding and agricultural work. Traditionally, Dhongbas engage in business and public ceremony while their younger brothers engage in herding and agriculture. This division of labor gives more reward, power and prestige to Dhongba and triggers powerlessness among the Morangbos/Forangs. In such a way, Morangbos/Forangs are treated as meaningless people. They do not have the sense of dignity either. Forangs and Morangbos: There are 11 households of Forangs and Morangbos. The process of monogamous marriage and unequal distribution of parental property produce the Forangs and Morangbos. If younger brothers follow the monogamous system of marriage and stay being propertyless, then they turn into the position of Forangs. In the case of sisters, if they produce children in their parental home and become separate by getting a nominal piece of land from elder brothers, then they are known as Morangbos. Isolated females either from their ex-lovers or husbands after having children are called as Morangbos who stay in their elder brothers’ homes with their children. Such females are regarded as people belonging to lower stratum in Dhee village. There are seven Morangbos households and four Forangs. There is a social system that dictates that if the illegitimate children cannot earn cattle, land, and bikas, they also turn into the position of Forangs/ Morangbos. Non-possession of land, bikas (green garden), and cattle triggers their situation to turn into labor. They are living their life working as wage laborers, herders, and tillers. Sometimes, they work as salesmen of Dhongbas who invest in temporary sweeter business in Ludhiyana India. Some poor families from four Dhongba households also work as salesmen on sweeter business in India. All Forangs and Morangbos households have no water turn though canal is built and repaired by their labor. Thus, albeit they have no possession of land to irrigate, there is a compulsion to go on canal maintenance for +

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more than 40 days in each year. To irrigate their nominal piece of land, they are annexed with their Dhongba counterpart. Ghepo/ Ghemo (old isolated people): There are two households of Ghepo and Ghemo. The old people who separate from their sons and in-laws are called as Ghepo/Ghemo. Isolated male is regarded as Ghepo and female as Ghemo. They do not have respect both at home and in the community. These households are also in the situation of utter neglect. Such people are called as Ghenchang as well which gives the meaning of separated people from their own son and in-laws. Local King System: Local king is perceived as a form of Lord Buddha in upper Mustang. His voice is like a law till now. He has the land and palaces in all seven villages in upper Mustang. Being so powerful and prestigious, the local king is both the rule maker and implementer in upper Mustang. His position is perceived as a hub of wealth, power, and prestige. The local rights and privileges are determined and bestowed upon by him. His palace is equated with the Supreme Court and himself is considered as the ultimate judge. All kinds of disputes in relation to pasture, water, and firewood are settled by him and in so doing his allies get the justice and others do not. In the case of Dhee village, he has arranged the water turns as per his own will considering the local social differentiation in which 12 households of Dhongbas get the water turn while 11 households of Morangbos/Forangs do not. The king has directed that the 11 households of propertyless brothers and sisters have to go for canal maintenance for 40 to 45 days in each year. Among Dhongbas who are rich and have close nexus with the king have the first turns and those who do not have close ties and relatively less landholding have the later turns. Sometimes, it happens that when the buckwheat of Dhongbas who have the privilege of first turn of water gets green, the Dhongbas get their water turn to plant their buckwheat. Sometimes, they miss the planting season which results in the drastic reduction of their production and consequent is the suffering of the famine. Property Inheritance System: +

PREM CHALAUNE: Water, Wealth, and Power: A case... 113 Under the existing social sanction (which is heavily influenced by the local kingship), the elder brother (Dhongba) has the exclusive right over parental property such as land, bikas (green garden), and cattle. Except for the adoption of polyandry, it sidelines younger brothers and sisters from inheriting the parental property. Property gives the power, prestige and sense of dignity to elder brothers (Dhongbas) while powerlessness, hopelessness and meaninglessness are given to younger brothers and sisters (Forangs/Morangbos). It shapes their daily interaction, negotiation, contestation, capability of articulation, and manipulation in which elder brother becomes superior and younger brother and sister inferior in the social hierarchy. For instance, in public sphere, elder brother is seated in middle of the position who is offered good hospitality and younger brother has to sit down somewhere in the peripheral space bereft of hospitality. This weak and fragile position of younger brothers and sisters leads to the powerlessness in water governance system. They do not get any role in rule making to implement the water distribution. Neither they get any compensation nor any other benefit for their labor used for the canal maintenance. Illegitimate Children (Ngyalu/Ngyamu) System: Getting children in parental home by a girl before formal marriage is regarded as normal phenomenon in upper Mustang. In the past, the king, Bista family and other powerful persons used to produce such children despite having their own wife at homes. Such children were regarded as Ngyalu and Ngyamu in local vernacular. Boy is addressed as Ngyalu and girl as Ngyamu. In the past, if somebody produced such illegitimate children, then he would not have responsibility more than one word to say that, " I am his or her father ," and offer some Rs. 10 or Rs. 20 and one garland to girl’s parents. If girl can marry another person, then her children become isolated from mother and father. Then such children become dependent with their maternal uncle for their rearing and caring. Such children are treated badly because of propertylessness and lack of parenthood. If their maternal uncle is also poor, then they have to face double discrimination. If they cann not earn property in their whole life, then they cannot gain power, prestige, and social dignity. In their later life, especially after getting married, such Ngyalu/Ngyamu are also known as Forangs/Morangbos. Their fatherless and propertyless +

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situation makes them powerless, and worthless in every social sphere. They do not posses the right to be a village head. First, they become fatherless and later they do not get the water turn. Thus, they neither get their right to water nor any compensation despite having labor contribution to canal maintenance. They do not have any role in rule making to implement. So their isolated position in the social sphere reflects water governance system. Social Division on God’s Worshiping (Manepeme): The 11 Morangbo/Forang households have their separate worshiping system (Manepeme) from the 12 Dhongba women. Once it was done together but Dhongba women needed some wider place and especial seat with especial food, drinks and Tibetan butter tea. The Morangbos were unable to provide so in their homes as Dhongba women could. Lack of good homes, cattle and bikas is the main cause of their inability. So one day, Dhongba women told Morangbo not to come to their residence for God’s worshiping. They do not want to stay with landless, fatherless and poor. Since that day, they became separated from common God worshiping ritual. They tend to worship their God for the betterment of their life after death. They perceive Dalai Lama as a form of Lord Buddha and worship him. Thus, the religious ritual has divided them in two separate groups. Now they have separate religious institutions (Manepeme). It separates Morangbo and Forang from Dhongba and compels them to think that they are the second class citizen in the same community. Such cognitions and perceptions have made them weak on their daily interactions in public sphere and as a result, they have had the unequal rights to water. Process of Headman Selection: As per local social rule, only 12 households of Dhongbas have the traditional privilege to be the village headman. Each year, village headman is selected from Dhongba family through a lottery system. Eleven households of Morangbos and Forangs do not have right to be village head. They are locally regarded as "uncertain people" and are not considered as eligible candidate for this social position. The headman conducts the village meetings and works as a water judge. He also +

PREM CHALAUNE: Water, Wealth, and Power: A case... 115 possesses the right to implement the decisions. He is regarded as high ranking and prestigious official. Thus, Morangbos/Forangs have been sidelined from being headman and are deprived of water. Interface between Polyandry and Macro Social World: Traditional value of upper Mustang directs the young people to adopt the polyandry while modern values foster them to adopt monogamous marriage and nuclear family- a function of the social connection with the modern cities of Nepal such as Pokhara and Kathmandu and external world notably, India, China, and America. Due to this social connection, all younger brothers are adopting the monogamous marriage and nuclear family despite the fact that there are a very few cases of polyandry and extended family systems. Polyandry and extended family are on the verge of extinction now. But in the case of separate marriage, micro social political structure punishes the younger brothers by depriving them of parental property. In this way, scarce resources are monopolized by hands of elder brothers and younger brothers become deprived of them. Adoption of polyandry and extended family is prerequisite to use the parental property for younger brothers as per the local social sanction. Micro social system is manipulating the old norms of polyandry in the favor of elder brothers. This situation is also manifested in water in which elder brother becomes the rule maker for water right and has the access to and control over it while younger brother becomes the follower and has no access to water. They are annexed with their elder brother to irrigate their very nominal piece of land. Acess to Land and Bikas (green garden): Most of the land and bikas in Dhee are occupied by Dhongbas. Land refers to cultivable land while bikas refers to green garden. Among Dhongbas, king’s own men have large land holding. The Dhongbas, who have large landholding and have close ties with the king, have the first turn of water and those who have relatively less landholding and do not have close ties with the king have the water turn at a latter stage. The Morangbos/Forangs who have not land or nominal piece of land do not have water turn. Bikas is a name imposed by development agency such as Care Nepal and Annapurna Conservation Area Project (ACAP). Before +

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25 five years ago, there were no trees, fruit plantation, and greenery. Care Nepal had introduced tree plantation, kitchen garden, and fruit plantation near their settlements. This development innovation has been named as the bikas. In this village, access to land and bikas has been the Table 1: Description of Access to Land, Bikas and Water Turn Turn No. Social Access to Access to in lower Bikas (green Land in category canal garden) ropani

Turn No. in upper canal

S.N

Name

1 2 3 4

Pemba Gurung Kunga Pasang Gurung Nima Dhoma Gurung Chhiring Dhoma Gurung

Dhongba Dhongba Morangbo Dhongba

21 23 2.5 8

Y Y N Y

3 2 × ×

6 2 × 11

5 6 7 8 9

Chhiring Gompo Gurung Chhendi Gurung Pema Nursang Gurung Vitti Gurung Angjoo Gurung

Dhongba Morangbo Forang Dhongba Dhongba

36 0.5 0.5 18 11.5

Y N N Y Y

1 × × 7 10

4 × × 9 11

10 11 12 13 14

Pasang Gurung Tharchen Gurung Karma Samduk gurung Dhuduk Gurung Balu Gurung

Dhongba Dhongba Dhongba Dhongba Forang

8 15 21.5 19 2.5

Y Y Y Y N

12 8 4 9 ×

12 7 7 6 ×

15 16 17 18 19

Samden Gurung Dhenden Gurung Chhiri Angmo Gurung Rinja Ange Gurung Ongdi Gurung

Morangbo Dhongba Ghenchan Ghenchan Dhongba

0.7 17 3 3.5 17.5

N Y N N Y

× 5 × × 6

× 3 × × 1

20 21 22 23 24

Tenjing Gurung Dawa chhiri Gurung Bhujung Gurung Sonam Gurung Angmo Gurung

Forang Forang Forang Morangbo Morangbo

0.2 0.7 1.3 0 0.6

N N N N N

× × × × ×

× × × × ×

25

Ngldi Gurung Total

Morangbo

0.4 252.4

N

×

×

Source: Fieldwork, 2005

Notes: Yes (Y) , No (N) +

PREM CHALAUNE: Water, Wealth, and Power: A case... 117 the main determinant of water right. The interface between land, bikas, and water turn can be clearly seen in the following table in a descriptive way. Daily Life World: The poor Dhongbas, Morangbos/Forangs and illegitimate children cannot raise their voices for their own rights and against their exploitation. In every day life, they are perceived powerless/worthless people while king’s men, rich Dhongbas and village politicians are perceived as powerful and prestigious people. It is legitimized in social daily interactions, rites, rituals, feasts, festivals, village meetings and selection of village head man. In public gatherings, there are different forms of social hierarchy discerned. Dhongbas, king’s men and village politician sit on the middle position with especial seat, table and cup and illegitimate children, Morangbos and Forangs sit somewhere in the peripheral space with their cups and tables. While serving them the barley beer and other dishes, the hospitality and manner is also shown different towards the people sitting on the middle position but Morangbos/Forangs are treated offensively. The treatment for illegitimate and Dhongba children is also different. In village meetings, the role of Morangbos and Forangs is perceived as meaningless. Their presence is not mandatory in the process of rule making. So the weak position in everyday life makes them worthless/powerless in the process of rule making and holding village meeting. In this way, the daily life world of subordination and superordination led to unequal rights to water. King’s Love Story behind First Turn of Water: Existing water rules and turns were renewed 40 years ago in a period of former king Ghyalchung Parval Bista. During his period, he fell in love with a rich man’s daughter, Tasi Angeya Gurung (name changed). One son and two daughters were born from his relation. Although he could not marry a daughter of his ordinary subject, nobody could show the courage to resist against this kind of love. Later, the king married a Tibetan girl. His lover also married another man in Dhakmar V.D C. It is reported that such kind of love with ordinary girl by the powerful king was tolerable in Upper Mustang. The love between the girl and the king +

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made girl’s father closer to the king and he manipulated that relation on his own benefit influencing all decisions and arranging water turn in number one among all villagers. He reached on top rank being decisive person. The Dhongba, king, and village headman’s nexus became powerful and influenced the turns of water distribution. Modus Operandi of INGOs and Government Officials: The INGOs/NGOs and the government officials who sporadically visit the communities always work with the king and his allies. They never paid attention towards the woes, problems, and miseries of Morangbos/ Forangs and Ngyalu/Ngyamu. They think that working with the local king, and Dhongba allies is necessary for making their program successful. For the underprivileged segment like Morangfbos and Forangs, the INGOs and governmental officials are there only to ride the horses and making the king and his men staying only in their hotel and thereby make them rich. The Annapurna Conservation Area Project has invented the old festivals Teejee in which prosperity for the king is prayed by the local people. These kinds of modus operandi of officials are sometimes are responsible for the unequal rights to water and other resources. State Monarchical System: Local king and state monarchy (now abolished) had very close ties. Ultimately state monarchical social and political structure had given the authority to local king with some traditional rights. The ‘Raja’ title with some traditional rights and allowances was left untouched by the state king even after the promulgation of the Act to abolish the petty kings and principalities in 1961. The rank of colonel and equivalent salary was given to the king of Mustang by state authority. He was appointed to the Standing Committee of the State Council to advise the king of Nepal. Fifteen years ago, two especial horses were given to the king of Nepal by the king of Mustang. The crown prince used to visit Mustang each year. The palace of the local king used to be his place to stay. It is reported that the crown prince used to encourage the local king to rule the upper Mustang as per his desire. He used to assure the local king for giving arms and ammunitions if he needed to suppress common people +

PREM CHALAUNE: Water, Wealth, and Power: A case... 119 (who wanted to reject the rule of Mustang king). Strongly backing the local king to rule over upper Mustang explicitly or implicitly, state monarchy was connected with local rules and social political complexities. So elite-centered rules, rights and old norms are somehow state-driven and directed. Without state’s backing, unequal rights, rules and institutions could not be sustained over upper Mustang. Water Allocation and Distribution: Water is distributed here according to the fixed rotational turn system. Only 12 households of Dhongbas have been given the turn. The turns are arranged on the basis of local social hierarchy in which Raja’s own man and rich Dhongbas have their first turn. Relatively poor and disempowered Dhongbas have the later turns. The 11 households of Morangbos and Forangs have no turn. They have to use their Dhongba’s turn to irrigate their nominal piece of land. The fixation of water turn to irrigate their land is arranged on the basis of local socio-political system. The dominant and large land holders have the first turn while the disempowered have the last. Such distributional norms are framed by the Raja, his men and chieftain. The turn system of water arranged in Dhee village is not arranged on the basis of the location of land (i.e from head to the tail). As irrigation water is also the main source of drinking water, there is no any bar and exclusion in drinking purpose. But in the case of irrigating their land, the Morangbos/Forangs do not have legal rights. Each Dhongba has three day’s turn. Resource Mobilization: Very uneven and unjust labor contribution system is prevailing in this king-dominated socio-political structure at the local level. The inhabitants of Dhee have to go for canal maintenance not on the basis of landholding size. More specifically, local households have to contribute the labor for canal maintenance regardless of their possession or non-possession of land. All members from each household from the age of 13 to 59 (except students and old people) are required to contribute labor to canal maintenance. In this system, two persons from the bigger households with large landholding size and four persons from the landless households are required to contribute the labor. This kind of system is made and +

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enforced by local king, his men, village politicians, and Dhongbas. Those who do not go for the canal maintenance have to pay fine. Each year, due to the heat of the sun in the summer, Mustang stream increases and brings the misery for the inhabitants of Dhee by ruining their dam and filling the canal with sandstones. During June/July, the local farmers harvest the naked barely and plant the buckwheat for which water is required. During that time, they have to participate regularly for one month for the canal maintenance. Due to the increasing volume of water in the river every year in the summer, the river gorge is deepening every year. State has always become indifferent towards Mustang and has never paid attention to build an ecologically sustainable canal. The direct result is the uncertainty, water scarcity and overburden of labor contribution by the poorer sections of the communities. But these poorer people have followed these exploitative rules by calling them as the traditional rules. Their violation results in the payment of the fines. The cash, kind, and fine are collected by village chieftain for operating the canal on a sustained basis. Fine (Tshepa) System: As indicated above, non-attendence for the canal maintenance results in the payment of the fines which is decided by the village chieftain, rich men and politicians. But the rate of fine is different. If the Dhongba becomes absent, then he should pay either one Pathi naked barley or 100 Rs. cash and if Morangbo /Forang is absent, then he/she should pay either half Pathi naked barley or Rs. 50 cash. The interesting aspect of the fine system here is that he or she has to pay fine in absence even if he or she is not at home. For instance, if somebody is in India or America, he or she has to pay fine for being absent on canal maintenance. But students and ill people are waived of this obligation. All cash and fine is collected by village chieftain and consumed on God’s worshiping acivities and village parties are organized to legitimize their social differentiation. All labor contributors and villagers attend the village gatherings and parties. So they consume all collected resource communally and do the work communally for canal maintenance.

+

PREM CHALAUNE: Water, Wealth, and Power: A case... 121 Process of Rule Making : Water rules existing in Dhee are made, amended and enforced by the allies of village politician, king and his henchmen. During the village meeting, important decisions are made by the local elites but the Forangs/ Morangbos are only passive listeners. The monopoly use of water in the past by rich and powerful men has also changed due to the resistance of later turn’s Dhongbas. This resulted in the allocation of three day’s turn to per household. Role in Village Meeting: In Dhee village, most of the village meetings are conducted for water purposes, primarily for canal maintenance. Canal maintenance more than one month in the summer season is the routine work. Although meetings are held for other purposes too, decisions on water- related tasks dominate the others. If household head is present at home, then mostly he has to participate at the meeting. In the absence of male (household head), the women attend the meeting. In the case of meeting for the canal maintenance, the poor Morangbo’s/Forang’s presence is also mandatory but their participation is not necessary in the decision-making process. In a village meeting, rich and powerful Dhongbas tend to speak more. Women, poor Dhongbas and Morangs/Forangs attend mere physically. They never speak even a single word in front of their rich Dhongbas, village politicians, chief and king’s men. Their role indicates that they are only the passive listeners who agree and clap on discussed, passed, articulated and manipulated agenda due to the nexus of the village headman, politician, Dhongba and the king’s man. Thus, the have-not segment of Morangbos/Forangs only participates at village meeting physically. Conclusions: The unequal rights to water existing in Dhee village are the manifestations of local king-initiated social sanctions, institutions, social hierarchy and power relations which were not isolated from the state monarchical and broader social systems. They are protected and sustained on the ground of broader social relation. So indigenously managed or farmer-managed

+

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irrigation systems are built and sustained on the foundations of power relation and social differentiation. So water rules, rights prevailing in indigenously or community-managed irrigation system, are exclusively power-ridden. In a hierarchically ordered class-based society, equal and equitable rights for all cannot be imagined. Water rules, rights existing in Dhee are just the manifestations of access to land and bikas, village head system, local king system, polyandry, property inheritance system, production and reproduction of illegitimate children, social sanctions, daily life world, every day interactions, state monarchical system and the modus operandi of INGOs and government officials. In this kingdominated socio-political system, rights or access to and control over water are king and his ally-centered. At the village level, village head, politician and king’s men are not unlike the king. At the household level, elder brother is like the king. So the local elites have access to and control over precious, scarce and non-substitutable resource, that is, water. Ultimately, the local king and his men are the creators of existing social institutions and rules. So community or indigenously-managed irrigation system which is perceived as decentralized one is centralized up to local nobles/elites in Dhee-upper Mustang. In such system, neglecting unequal social, political, economic and cultural aspects of irrigation water reinforces existing social hierarchy making the rich richer and the poor poorer. So there is a pressing need to develop a more judicious, egalitarian and decentralized watershed development strategy. End notes: This learning wouldn’t have been possible if Prof. Chaitanya Mishra had not been my M.A thesis supervisor. So I sincerely thank him from the bottom of my heart for his matchless and brilliant guidance and supervision. I am equally grateful to Dr. Ram B. Chhetri who showed me the different world within Nepal. I earnestly thank to Dr. Laya Prasad Uprety for his meticulous corrections and suggestions by being my external examiner. I am equally grateful to Prof. Om Gurung, Dr. Tulsi Ram Pandey and Dr. Uprety, the editors of this volume, for their incessant encouragements to write this paper. I would like to thank Dr. Govinda Basnet for choosing me his Research Assistant for his doctoral research and giving me the opportunity to be engaged in the academic research. I also thank all my informats from my heart for trusting me and sharing +

PREM CHALAUNE: Water, Wealth, and Power: A case... 123 their pain and sorrow. This article is based on the fieldwork carried out from April to October 2005 in Dhee village upper Mustang as a part of the partial fulfillment for the thesis requirement in Master Degree in Sociology. Glossary Amtsi: Aani: Bikas: Chhyang: Dhongba: Dhujang: Forang: Ghemo: Ghempa: Ghenchang: Ghepo: Lakpi: Lama: Manepeme: Morangbo: Ngyalu: Ngyamu: Para: Pata khane: Tshepa: ACAP DDC INGO MRMG NGO VDC

Traditional doctor Nun Green garden comprising of trees and fruits Barley beer Eldest and property holder brother A kind of leisure party Propertyless and isolated brother Separated old women from their own son and in-laws Village head or chieftain Common term for separated old man and woman Separated old man from their own son and in-laws Communal labor exchange Monk God’s worshipping Isolated unmarried sister Illegitimate boy having no own father Illegitimate girl having no own father Name of a kind of gambling Contract party A kind of fine in the case of absence on canal Annapurna Conservation Area Project District Development Committee International Non-Governmental Organization Mountain Resource Management Group Non-Government Organization Village Development Committee

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CULTURAL UNDERSTANDING OF NON-TIMBER FOREST PRODUCTS AMONG THE BABUBAN COMMUNITY PEOPLE OF EASTERN NEPAL Jiban Mani Poudel * Introduction This paper presents a short analysis of human-nature relationship among the Bahuban community people of eastern Nepal based on the use of non-timber forest products (NTFPs1). The paper basically describes perceptions and understanding of different categories of people towards NTFPs based on symbolic meaning and use-value of these products in their lives. In addition, the paper also shortly discusses indigenous practices for NTFPs management in the study area. Forest is an essential natural resource for human beings especially for those who depend on agriculture and animal husbandry. It commonly provides timber forest products (TFPs) such as timber for construction, firewood for fuel, fodder for animal feeding and leaf-litter for manure. In addition, forest also provides fruits, vegetables, tubers and shoots for foods, barks for fiber, herbs for medicine and so on which are commonly known as NTFPs. NTFPs have multiple usages among the rural inhabitants in Nepal. The most important use of NTFPs are herbal medicines, foods and vegetables, ornaments, fiber/lokta, sacred plants for performing rituals and religious activists, raisin/turpentine, leaves, and grasses, etc. * Mr Jiban Mani Poudel holds M. A. in Sociology from Tribhuvan University. Currently, he teaches Anthropology at the Central Department of Sociology/Anthropology. 1

NTFPs are defined as all the biological materials that are derived from forest other than timber (Edwards, 1993/ 1996, Gurung, 2001 and Chaudary, 2001). NTFPs are also known as minor forest products (Hertong, 1997), non-wood forest products (Chandrasekharan, 1998).

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JIBAN MANI POUDEL: Cultural Understanding of Non-Timber... 127 People's perception may be varied towards NTFPs. Different cultural people generally give meanings to NTFPs differently on the basis of their use value and symbolic interpretations (Geertz, 1988). Therefore, it is essential to understand the cultural perspective of different people to understand the use of NTFPs in socio-cultural context of a particular community. In rural setting of Nepal, different caste/ethnic, religious, and occupational group may have different perceptions and understanding towards the NTFPs. Such perception and understanding are developed by human beings in course of time of human development through trial and error methods to cope with their surroundings. In anthropological sense, such perceptions and understanding are called ‘cultures’ which are followed by members of a society. Thus, anthropologists interpret culture as means of mediators between human beings and their environment/nature (Steward, 1955 and Ingold, 1992). In other words, culture prescribes the way of exploitation of the environment including NTFPs. This article is based on the fieldwork carried out from January to February, 2002 in the Bahuban community of Irautar VDC of Ilam district in the eastern Nepal. Moreover, I frequently visited the field and talked to the key informants for understanding their perception regarding NTFPs until 2007. Cultural Construction of Resource: A Framework of Analysis The ecological anthropology is one of the dominant approaches/subfields that emerged in anthropology for understanding the relationship between human population and their environment.The classical ecological anthropologists pointed out that the environmental factors are prime factors for shaping culture whereas other approaches emphasize on the cultural possibilism and vice versa. In anthropology, a turning point took place in mid-1950s with the emergence of new approach, cultural ecology by the contribution of Julian Steward and later followed by other anthropologists like Marvin Harris, Roy R. Rapport, and Andrew P. Vayda with some modifications. However, all these approaches explain human-nature relationship from +

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outsider or observer’s point of view, which is commonly known as etic perspective in anthropology. Meanwhile, the contributions of Charles Frake, Harold C. Conklin and Brent O. Berlin helped develop new methodological program for conducting fieldwork. This approach criticizes the former approaches and describes human-nature relationship from insider’s perspective, participant’s point of view or local people’s perspective which is known as emic perspective in anthropology. This approach concentrated itself for better understanding of people’s perception towards their environment (Milton, 1997, McGee and Warms, 2004). The understanding of people towards their environment (biotic and aboitic) has also been different through time and space. Moreover, it also varies from culture to culture, from society to society and even within family members at a given time in the same space. Ortner (1989) noted that the variability may exist in the relationship between actors and their cultural universe, at every level – between individuals, across the spectrum, and across time. In the past, for instance, people generally understood resource as a gift of nature to fulfill their basic needs of human beings. Believing on this concept, many societies in the world worship the earth as mother or goddess. In this sense, Shiva says that earth bestows gifts on humans who, in turn, do not suffocate her generosity (1992). With the emergence of industrialization, commercialization and colonialization, people’s perception towards earth and resource is converted into container and raw material for trade and industry respectively (ibid). Human beings do not use all things or objects available in nature as resources. Nature is seen by humans through a screen of beliefs, knowledge, myth and purposes rather than the physical present of nature (Rappaport, 1979 and Parkin and Carrol, 1992). People, therefore, convey their cultural imagination to utilize resources. In this regard, Shalin says utility of the things or plants will depend upon its incorporation within a system of symbolic values (cited in Ingold, 1992). The object/ plant is nothing itself but it becomes use-value i.e., resource only through a system of culture and cultural understanding of human beings. Plurality in culture and cultural practices determine the relationship between local people and their surroundings. This way, people’s interaction with nature, can be understood only with reference to their cultural maps of nature +

JIBAN MANI POUDEL: Cultural Understanding of Non-Timber... 129 (Nasheim,1995), that is called use-value or symbolic meaning given by human beings (Ingold, 1992). Similarly, people in different social positions will obviously have different relationships to a given cultural form– different interpretations of it, different feelings about it, different sense of its meaningfulness (Ortner, 1989). People’s understanding, their interpretation, meaningfulness and relationship, therefore, with NTFPs may be varied among different soico-cultural groups within the same community. Using this conceptual framework, this paper attempts to seek humannature relationship through the use of NTFPs among Bahuban villagers of Ilam district, in eastern Nepal, based on the culture and cultural perception of different caste/ethnic, religious and occupational groups. The use of NTFPs is seen here as a 'symbolic meaning' and 'use-value' in the life of local people in general. In addition, the paper also seeks the local/indigenous management practices of NTFPs. The Study Area Irautar VDC is one of the 49 VDCs of Ilam district, located in the southeastern part. The village is heterogeneous in term of its caste/ethnic composition consisting of Brahmin, Chhetri, Newar, Sunuwar, Gurung, Rai, Magar, Lapcha, and Damain. The Brahmin and Chhetri are the dominant population in the study area which consist of 30.30 percent. The second largest group is Sunuwar (20.07%), followed by Rai (17.29%), Gurung (17.29%), Magar (8.36%), Lapcha (4.47%) and Damain (1.3%) respectively. Hindu is the dominant religion (45.24%) in the study area which is followed by Brahmin, Chhetri, Newar, Magar, Rai, Sunuwar, and Damain. The second largest religion is Kirant (29.76%) practiced by Sunuwar, Rai, and Magar. Similarly, Gurung and Lapcha followed the Buddhism which covers 21.43 percent and Christians constitute 3.57 percent (who are mostly Rais). Majority of Bahuban people depend upon agriculture and animal husbandry and very small population is also dependent on other activities such as services, tailoring, business and wage labour. Using the adaptive strategy, the agriculturists are also involved in other occupations such as wage labor (38.27%), craft (23.46%), carpentry (13.58%), service (8.64%), trade and business (7.14%), priestly work (2.47%), and tailoring (1.23%). +

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Inverntory of Forest Resources in Bahuban Bahuban is in tropical zone of the inner Tarai located in less than 1000m elevation from the sea level. Different varieties of evergreen trees, creepers, shrubs, herbs and colourful flowers are available in the forest. The villagers categorize the forest products broadly into two categories i.e., TFPs and NTFPs. The TFPs are further classified into four subcategories i.e., timber for house construction and agricultural equipment making, fodder for animal feeding, leaf-litter for animal bedding and manure, and firewood for fuel. Similarly, NTFPs are categorized broadly into 4 sub-categories: medicinal plants, edible plants, domestic items making plants and plant use for ritual and religious performance (see detail under the heading of relation of people with NTFPs). Saal (Shorea robusta) is the dominant tree species. Barro (Terminalia bellirica), Budhidhagero (Woodfordia fruitcosa ), Chanp (Michilia champaca), Harro (Terminalia chebua), Jamuna (Syzygium cumini), Karam (Adina cordifolia), Kaymuna (Syzygium cerasoides), Khamari (Gmelina arborea), Kimbu (Morus alba), Kutmiro (Litsea momopetala), Malato, Rajbriksha (Cassia fistula), Sirish (Lbizzia lebbek ), Tanki (Bauhania purpurea), Thekikath (Erithrina arboriscens), etc. are among other available TFPs species of study area. Moreover, some of the products like barks, leafs, fruits, roots, etc; of these TFPs are also used as NTFPs in the study area (see detail in next heading). The dominant bushes are Angeri (Lyonia villosa) and Banamara (Eupatorium adenophorum) which are staple leafs-litter in Bahuban. Similarly, Ashare (Lagerstroemia parviflora), Phul-dhagero*, Simali (Vitex negundo), etc; are other bushes and shrubs available in the forest which are commonly used for firewood. There are several varieties of non-timber products found in the surrounding forests of Bahuban. The commonly usable medicinal plants are Amala (Emblica Officinalis) Apamarga (Achyranthus asperal), BanGhiraula*, Bheise-kanda (Rosa brunonii), Hadajod/Chokatajod*, Chandmaruwa*, Jethimadhu (Ghucyrrhiza glabra), Kali-niguro (Dryoathyrium broyanum), Sikari-Lahara*, Titepati (Artemisia) etc. Likewise, the normally used edible plants are Aanp (Magnifera indica), Aiselu (Rubus ellipticus) , Bantarul *, Bayar (Zizyphus mauritiana), Chatela (Momordica cochinchininensis ), Chyau*, Chiuri (Bbassia +

JIBAN MANI POUDEL: Cultural Understanding of Non-Timber... 131 butyracea), Gante*, Gurbo (Alcea rosea), Kafal (Myrica esculenta), Kurilo (Asparagus officinarum), Niguro*, Sisnu (Urtica dioica), shoots of wild bamboos, etc. The Bahuban people also use several plants for arranging ritual and religious activities which are Apamarga (Achyranthes bidentata), Bar (Ficus bengalensis), Ban-kola (Musa sapientum), Betalauri*, Bel (Bengal quineel), Bhalaya (Semicorpus anacordium), Bhim-Sen-Pati (Buddleia asiantica), Bhorla (Bhuheni vahlii), Dudhakeshar (Hedychium coronarium rose), Dumri (Ficus racemosa), Jhankri- syauli/Kaaulo (Machilus odoratissima), Kaulo (persea udorantissima), Koiralo (Bauhimia variegate), Kukur-daino (Smilax menipermodes), Musore-katush (Castaropsis tribuloidas), Nagabeli (Ycopodium clavatum), Paniamala (Nephrolepis cordifoli), Pipal (Ficus religiosa), Sunakhari*, Sunkeshar (Hedychium coronarium Koenig) , Swaami (Ficus rumphii), Totela (Oroxylum indicum), etc. There are also other plants such as Ban-bas (Dendrocalamus hamiltonii), Bhorla (Bauheni vahlii), Marcha-Mane*, Salimo/Sabai grass (Themeda triandra), Sareto*, etc; which are used for preparing domestic items like rope, leaf-plates, bamboo baskets, and yeasts. Relationship of People with NTFPs Plurality in terms of caste/ethnic, religious and occupational structure is the socio-cultural reality of Bahuban community. These various groups of people have their own socio-cultural practices and perceptions on the use value about NTFPs. As Ingold states that all things or objects are not resources themselves without giving them symbolic meaning and use-value by people in their socio-cultural life (1992). I also found the same in the study area that all plants, particularly NTFPs available in forests, are not resources for all categories of people. In Bahuban, normally different caste/ethnic, religious, occupational and age group people give meanings to the available natural resources of their surroundings based on their socio-cultural practices, perceptions and use-value in day-to-day life. Therefore, the natural resources are not just "objects" but are socially and culturally defined values (Zimmerman, 1951 cited in Lino Grima, and Berkes, 1989, Ingold, 1992, Chhetri, 1999). +

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The people of Bahuban are using barks, leafs, fruits, roots, flowers and creepers, shrubs, and grasses for different purposes. On the basis of the use value, they classify available NTFPs into four categories; medicinal plants (Jadibuti or Ausadhi ko rupama prayog hune biruwa), edible plants (Khana hune biruwa), plants for domestic uses (Gharayesi Prayog ka Biruwa), and sacred plants used for religious and ritual activities (Sanskarma Prayog Hune Biruwa). Each of these is described below in greater detail. Medicinal Plants and Their Use There are 37 kinds of herbal plants commonly used in the study area. Among the 84 households, 69 percent use these plants for curing different human diseases such as fracture, cut-wound, dysentery, fever, pneumonia, cough and cold, irregularity in menstruation, pyorrhea, asthma, gastritis, diarrhea, urinary problem, eye cataract, sinusitis and so on. The plants are also used for curing the similar kinds of animal diseases. But the dose of the medicine for animals is more than human beings. Similarly, they also apply some medicinal plants as pesticides for removing or killing harmful insects from their agricultural fields. However, all households do not use the medicinal plants. Out of the rest 31percent households, 11 percent do not believe in the curing properties and 20 percent households state that they do not have any knowledge about medicinal plants and their use. In the study area, the traditional healers like Baidhya and DhamiJhakri are the authentic users of medicinal plants. Authentic in this sense that the general people have faith on them as knowledgeable persons about the use of herbal plants. Indeed, in my field observation, I also found that these persons have sound knowledge regarding the name of medicinal plants, their use and availability. They are also familiar with dose, frequency of use and its use period for various diseases. In Bahuban village, sometimes the traditional healers use more than one herb for curing a single disease and a single herb can be used for different diseases. For instance, bark of Khamari, Kutmiro, Kapase*, Karam, Jamuna or whole part of Sikari-lahara*, Hadjor/Choktajor or root of Hadachur, Bhaise-kaande are used for curing fracture of the bone. Normally, Baidhya and Dhami prepare paste of bark/root of those +

JIBAN MANI POUDEL: Cultural Understanding of Non-Timber... 133 plants and put the paste in the affected area of the body and bandage for 15 to 22 days by the nature of fracture. Similarly, the paste prepared from the root of Bhaise-kaande or Hadjor is used for curing the cut wound. On the contrary, Titepati is used for healing various diseases like irregularity in menstruation, gastritis, headache, fever, and bleeding from nose and for the protection of agriculture products from harmful insects. Thus, the herbs can be applied for healing different diseases. In my observation, traditional faith healers do not always collect medicinal plants. There is a strong belief among the healers in the study area that medicinal plants are effective if they collect such plants on Tuesday and Saturday. This practice and perception regulates the behaviour and management of NTPFs. The use value of medicinal plants is not same in all times. It changes due to the change in people’s perception and attitude. Medicinal plants, therefore, are not ‘herbs’ for all categories of people in all times. In the case of Bahuban, different people have different perceptions regarding herbs. Some perceive them as just a 'neutral object' whereas other take them as 'resource' due to their socio-cultural perceptions and use value in their life. Here, I have presented a fieldwork observation to support my argument. Box.1 Trend of the Disappearance of the Use of Herbal Medicines among the Younger Genaration People During my fieldwork, one day I sat with Magar-Ba, who is nearly 80 years old, in his veranda and began a conversation regarding the use of herbal medicines. During the course of chatting, he informed that the use practices of medicinal plants were almost stopped among the young generation people in the study area due to the easily available modern medicines and therapy practices. After hearing his opinion, it made me more interested to know the perception of the younger generation. The next day, I asked a question about knowledge of medicinal plants to the school children but found a readymade answer, "We do not know. You better ask this question to our grand-father". When I asked the same question to young people, who were between 30 to 40 years’ of age, they replied, "We know some of the medicinal plants and their use practices but do not believe in medicinal plants and use modern medicines because they are more effective".

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Against this backdrop, I can conclude that there is a variation in cultural perception regarding the medicinal plants among the different age categories of people. The relationship between actors and their cultural universe may change over time, evolving into new interpretations, new feelings, new sense of meaningfulness – or meaningless (Ortner, 1989). In the case of Bahuban, the available various wild plants have medicinal value for older generation but would be nothing for younger generation. Moreover, the younger generation is steadily losing the knowledge associated with medicinal plants on the one hand and on the other hand, they cannot not pay any attention for their protection what the older generation had and did. Here, I have presented a case that is related to negligence of executive committee12 for the protection of NTFPs in the community forestry. Box.2. Negligence of Executive Committee for the Protection of Herbal Plants One day, I visited the southern part of community forest with some executive members where they had planted several varieties of plants species such as fodder species [like Malato*, Tanki, Kimbu, Stailo*, Dinanath*, bamboo], fruits species [like banana, mango, jack-fruit, and guava] and cash crops species [like bamboo and broom grass] in an approximately 20 hectares of forestland by clearing and burning the existing bushes and shrubs. In my observation, I found that the committee had great pride of their deed. A few days later, I met a traditional faith healer from a Rai group who used to collect medicinal plants from the surrounding forests and prepared herbal medicine. After that, we began to talk about the situation of the surrounding forests and its products including NTPFs. He claimed that the executive committee had destroyed all kinds of NTFPs including the herb plants in the name of forest protection by clearing, thinning and pruning, new plantation and agro-forestry activities in the forest.

From this narration, we can see that shrubs and bushes are ‘nothing’ for some people but they have great ‘medicinal value’ for others like the traditional faith healer. Therefore, one can easily guess that different people have different perception regarding the available plants. Some perceive them as just ‘neutral objects’ whereas others take them as ‘resources’ for their socio-cultural and use value in their life (see Chhetri, 1999 also). +

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Use of NTFPs for Domestic Purpose In the study area, more than 70 percent households use barks of creepers and bushes for preparing ropes, leaves of creepers and trees for making leaf-plates and covering the Ghums (skeletons of bamboo-raincoat). Similarly, they use bamboo for making baskets, winnow-fans, leafraincoats, mattresses and so on. Some of the households also use Sabai grass (Salimo/Khar) for roofing houses and cowsheds. In my observation, I also found that some ethnic groups (who offer local brewed beer/ alcohol to their ancestral gods/goddess in rituals performances) also collect Marcha-mane for preparing yeast (which they use for making homebrewed beer/alcohol). Wild-bamboo is famous for Choya in Bahuban. In the study locale, it is used for making skeletons of leaf-raincoats, baskets, mattresses, winnow-fans and ropes. However, Sunuwar, Gurung and Rai people only use Choya from wild bamboos. These people prefer to use wildbamboo rather than others due to their perception that it lasts longer. Similarly, they use the lokta of Sareto/Thakre* (a kind of bush plants like broom-grass) for preparing rope which is used to tie the circle of winnow-fans and baskets. According to them, winnow-fan tie with Sareto’s rope is in higher demand in local market than tie with plastic rope. In the study area, I also observed that all caste/ethnic and religious people use leaf-plates for offering foods to their gods/goddesses. The leaf-plates are particularly required to offer the food and other items to their ancestors during the period of recitation of Puran, celebration of Dashian, Tihar, Saptaha, Chabang, Sakela and life- cycle rituals. They collect leaves of Bhorla, and Saal for making such plates. There is a concept of 'purity' and 'pollution' regarding the use of plates. The leaf-plates of Bhorla, and Saal are considered 'pure' to offer the foods and other items to their gods/goddesses in religious and ritual activities. Moreover, they also use leaf-plates to offer foods to their relatives and neighbours in their religious and ritual activities and other feasts and festivals. Moreover, Saal’s leaf plate is essential for Brahmin, Chhetri, Magar, Sunuwar, Newar, Gurung, Rai and Damain people during the Tihar festival when sisters offer delicious foods to their brothers. +

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Regarding the collection and use of NTFPs, the local people follow a rigid traditional belief. Local people believe in the Sharan13 and they do not collect available forest products during that period. It is believed that Sharan is an inauspicious period for harvesting the resources. If they harvest, they would be destroyed by fungus and would not last longer. Similarly, people normally harvest wild-bamboo on KartikMangsir (November-December). Bamboos are fully matured and do not reproduce new shoot at that time. Moreover, it is also believed that bamboo harvested at that period cannot be destroyed by fungus and can last longer. This cultural practice has been contributing to manage the continuous exploitation of the NTFPs by the local population. In the study area, people have different uses of their products. Most of the items like yeast, leaf-plates and ropes are used for their own purposes. However, some of the items, for instance, bamboo-baskets, winnow-fans and leaf-raincoats are sold in their surrounding villages and local hat-bazzars by Sunuwar, Rai and Gurung people. In Bahuban, I observed that most of wealthy households use corrugated sheets for roofing their houses and cowsheds whereas poor use thatching grasses. These people collect thatching grasses either from surroundings villages or from forests. On the other hand, some wealthy people, having the livestock, collect Sabai-grass as fodder for their animals. In my study area, one poor Brahmin household who had recently migrated from hill was found to be using Sabai-grass for preparing the ropes. Edible Plants Edible wild plants are plenty in the surrounding forests of Bahuban. The local people identify 27 kinds of edible plants like Aanp, Aiselu, Bankera, Chiuri, Jamuna, Kafal, Ban-bas, Sisno, Bayar, Chatela, mushroom, Gurbo, chili and so on. These plants are used for several different purposes. Anap, Bayar, Ban-kera, Kafal , Churi , and Jamuna are consumed as fruits. Ban-bas, Chatela, Cyau, Niguro, Gurbo, etc; are used as vegetables. On the basis of use, Bahuban people categorize edible plants into three groups, namely, fruit, vegetable, and spices. Furthermore, fruits +

JIBAN MANI POUDEL: Cultural Understanding of Non-Timber... 137 are also sub-categorized into four sub-groups: common fruits, pickle preparing fruits, oily fruits and liquor preparing fruits based on their end uses. Similarly, vegetables are also categorized into three sub-groups; shoot-vegetable (Thosa-tarkari), fruit- vegetable (Phal-tarkari) and leafvegetable (Pat-tarkari). Moreover, the wild yam is also categorized into three groups such as Ban-tarul (wild yam), Byakur (cush-cush yam), and Panglang on the basis of its size. The people collect wild yams during the Maghe-sankranti (the first day of Magha month in Hindu calendar). Edible wild plants contribute a supplementary source of fruits, vegetables and spices among the Bahuban people. Basically, they collect these items during festival occasions and ritual ceremonies. The poor people gather these plants throughout the year whereas rich people collect them at the time of scarcity of the domesticated vegetables, roots and fruits. In addition, the poor people also sell these items in the local hatbazaars for fulfillment of their basic needs. All kinds of plants cannot be available in all seasons and all parts of the forest. Local people, however, have sound knowledge about the available area and their fruit-bearing seasons. In this sense, local people are called eco-systemic people (Eder, 1990). Anap, Ashare, Chiuri, Gurbo, and Bandar-jhulla* are available in June and July only. Similarly, Ban-tarul and Jirekhorsani are found in January and February, and Aiselu in April and May, Bayar in February and April, Kafal from March to May. In addition, Ban-tama are available from June to August and Chatela, Sisno and Niguro from June to September. Wild edible plants are not ‘just foods’ but they signify more than nutritional value. Food including wild edible plants is culture (Oestigaard, 1999). It is closely interwoven with the social relation and culture (Subedi, 2003) and cultural perspective of people in society. In Bahuban, different caste/ethnic groups have different perceptions regarding edible wild plants. The Brahmins do not collect and eat mushroom. In this regard, a popular saying, "bahunle cyau khaosh na cyauko bat janosh" is common among the Brahmin as well as other caste/ethnic groups. Literally, Brahmins do not eat mushroom and do not know its variety. They consider mushroom as Tamasi14 (polluted) food and do not take into their kitchen.

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Brahmins believe that mushrooms are spontaneously grown from stale food, rotten things or dead bodies of insects which are considered polluted in Hindu ideology. Moreover, as a Tamasi food, mushroom falls under the lowest rank of food taxonomy15. Thus, for maintaining the sanctity of the high caste in the social fabric of society, Brahmins avoid eating mushrooms to maintain their caste status by giving the cultural meaning. Food, therefore, affects and creates identity in human relation. Lapchas do not collect younger shoots of bamboo for vegetable, pickle and other usages. When discussing on the food taboo regarding the shoot of bamboo, one Lapcha informant interpreted an oral history. In the past, the ancestor of the Lapcha people used to live on the bottom of the sloppy hill. Above their house, there was a large wild bamboobush. One day, there was a great landslide and it was not possible to save the lives. But the bamboo bushes saved their lives by controlling stones and soil, that is, the debris of the landslide. Since then, they began to plant wild-bamboo above their house and prohibited to collect the shoot of wild bamboo for pickles and vegetables. In Bahuban area, all caste and ethnic people have a common belief regarding the collection and use of the green chili. Once upon a time, some of the villagers fetched the green chili from the forest and used them as a spice immediately. After few days, they also went to the forest to collect the chili. At that time, all the chili plants were found dead from where they had collected last time. Thereafter, they gave up using fresh green chili as a spice. Thus, such traditional belief among the Bahuban people helps to protect the available NTFPs i.e., chili in their surrounding forests. Use of NTFPs for Religious and Ritual Purposes Bahuban people have great faith in their religion and are used to their elaborate ritual practices. I observed some difference in religious and ritual practices and belief among the people of Bahuban. For instance, the Hindu people performed Bratamanna, Puran, Rudri, Teej, Swastani, whereas the Kirant people perform the ancestor worshipping ritual, Sakela/Sakewa (Udauli and Uvauli), Chabang, and Buddhist people mostly preformed Buddha-jayanti and ancestral worshipping ritual.

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JIBAN MANI POUDEL: Cultural Understanding of Non-Timber... 139 Christian people do not practice any kind of ritual in the study area. Those who follow different religions and practice rituals are found rigid in their practices because of their consciousness to protect their own religious identity. As a variation in their religious and ritual practices, one can observe the difference in the use of NTFPs too. In Bahuban, the Hindus worship some species of plants i.e., Kush*, Tulasi (Ocimum basilicum) and Pipal as a symbol of God Vishnu. The Bahuban people use such plants to worship their deities by giving meaning. I also found that Hindu people of Bahuban also worship the banyan plant as a symbol of God Vishnu. One of the informants shared that during the time of catastrophic event, one of the Rishis, named Markandya, saw the God Nara-narayan (Vishnu) sleeping as a child on the leaf of the tree in an island. Thereafter, people began to believe that banyan tree is the living place of the god Vishnu. Believing on that concept, the Hindu people of Bahuban still worship the banyan tree as a part of God Vishnu. Similarly, Hindu people of Bahuban offer the milk mixed with water to the deceased father and mother on the 11th day of the death on 365 numbers of white latex leaf plates. That is called ‘Khocha bagaunu’. The white latex plants like Dumri and Pakhri* are considered pure in the ritual and other plants are considered impure. The white latex plants symbolize the milk in Hindu society that meaning may be varied in other society. In Ndembu community of Zambia, the milk tree stands for human breast milk and also for the breasts that supply it. Furthermore, the tree gives the meaning of matrilineal relationship i.e., between mother and daughter (Turner, 1976). However, in Hindu society, offering the milk mixed with water on the plants of such tree leaves is offering the milk to the deceased father/mother for a year. That symbolically stands for the unity and continuous relation between deceased parents and their children. In the study area, leaves and branches of Pipal, Bar, Dumri, Bhalayo, and Chiuri are commonly used by Hindu people to perform rituals such as Puran, Pooja, Bratamanda, marriage and death rituals, etc. Some other ethnic people like the Gurungs, Rais, Sunuwars and Magars identify themselves as Buddhists and Kirats (by religion) and also invite Brahmin priests to perform various rituals and use sacred plants which are necessary for performing the Hindu rituals. The worshiping of Hindu gods/

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goddesses and performing Hindu rituals through Brahmin priests is common among non-Hindu groups in Nepal (Sharma, 1997). Rais invite Brahmin priests to perform Satyanarayan pooja (worship of Vishnu). Similarly, Gurung, Magar and Sunuwar also invite Brahmin priests for performing various rituals such as naming, marriage, death ritual, Satyanarayan pooja, Rudri pooja (worship of Shiva), and Bastu pooja (worship of house). In Bahuban, those people, who invite Brahmin priest, use Pipal, Bar, Aanp, Dumri, Pakhari* for making Toran (sacred garland) in Bastupooja. The Toran hangs around the house by covering the four walls. The villagers perceive that Toran helps to protect the house from inauspicious, evil eyes, fire, thunder, and other unpredictable natural calamities. Similarly, the leaf of Pipla and Bhalayo are needed during the Narawan (naming ritual) for all people including the Christians. All Hindu people and some non-Hindu people invite the Brahmins priest to perform naming ritual. The Brahmins write the name of newly born child on the leaf of Pipal by calculating time-period of birth based on Hindu calendar. It is believed that the name written in the leaf of Pipal is not destroyed for a long period. Similarly, the branch of Bhalayo is burnt and the ash is smeared in the forehead and other parts of the baby with the belief that it protects the baby from itching. Similarly, in the study area, the Hindu believers also commonly use leaf of Bel tree to worship God Shiva. They offer leaves of Bel tree to god Shiva in different rituals such as Rudri and Swastani. It is believed that if someone offers a leaf of Bel tree to the Shiva, he/she can get the emancipation from the sinful deed. Similarly, the Newar people perceive Bel as symbol of god Vishnu which is needed in their initial marriage ritual called Ihee. They marry their daughter with the fruit of Bel, symbol of the god Vishnu, before their menarche. Thus, the Newar women never become widow after the death of their husbands (Nepali, 1965). Rishi Panchamee Pooja is a ritual performed by the Hindu women where all women gather in the bank of river and wash their body with soil and clean their teeth and vagina with 65 numbers of twigs and leaves of Apamarga. I also found the meaning for using soil of different places and the

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JIBAN MANI POUDEL: Cultural Understanding of Non-Timber... 141 twigs and leaves of Apamarga for bathing their body. According to the local belief of the Hindus as elsewhere, first three days of menstruation period of women is considered polluted. Therefore, the polluted women have to distance themselves from pure matters including other individuals. Thus, it is prohibited for women to touch males, gods/goddesses, green fruit plants and visit the religious places during her polluted period. If it happens unknowingly, a most serious sin is committed in their religious life. Therefore, the women believe that brushing teeth and cleaning their vagina by twigs and leaves of Apamarga helps them to be emancipated from such unknowingly committed sin. The Rai people commonly used Chibung (Koiralo), Tarawobung (Sunkeshar, Dudhakeshar), Lolowa (Paniamala), Wahi (Musore-katush), Amlabung (Sunakhari), Nagatungpu (Betalauri), and wild-bananas while perfoming the rituals; Sakela/Sakewa, Chabang and ancestor worship. There is a mythical and oral history regarding the use of these plants in their rituals. Chabang is one of the most important rituals arranged during the Koiralo flowering season. The word Chabang is composed of two Kirant syllables ‘Che’ and ‘Bang’ meaning water and god, respectively, meaning ‘god of water’. To perform this ritual, they gather different varieties of wild plants such as Koiralo, Sunkeshar, Dudhakeshar, Paniamala, Sunakhari, Betalauri, and wild-bananas. Among them, Koiralo is essential and compulsory. One of the informants shared that during the time of creation of living beings including human beings, Sungnima and Parohang16 were traveling throughout the world. At that time, Sungnima saw a beautiful white flower in the forest. Then, she requested her husband for that flower. He also put down those flowers with bow and arrow and offered to her wife. Then, Sungmina decorated her body with the flower of Koiralo including other flowers like Sunkeshar, Dudhakeshar, Paniamala, Betalauri and began to perform the worship of nature for the creation of living beings. Thereafter, Rai people began to believe that such plants are the ornaments of the mother creator. Believing that concept, the Rai people of Bahuban still use these plants while performing their ritual. In Rai community, Sunakhari is essential in marriage ritual. They decorate the bride head with Sunakhari flower that is called Siliseli. +

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The leaf of wild-banana is essential to perform various ritual and religious rites among the Rais in Bahuban. They use it to offer foods and drinking items to their ancestral deities. One elderly person told an oral history regarding the symbolic value of leaves in their group. During the creation of human beings, Parohang was angry with Sungnima and converted the greenery world into a desert. Then, she moved hither and thither in search of food and water but in vain. At last, she reached the bushes of wild-banana. Thereafter, she cut leaves and stems and drank latex that came out from banana’s tree. Consequently, she survived herself. In this way, Rais gave their symbolically constituted meanings to the banana tree. That is, it stands as a ‘life-giver’ to their mother creator, Sungnima, who gave the birth of Rai people. Kirant believers also commonly use branch of Musore-katush tree in Sakela ritual. It is a ritual of nature worship. Before starting the ritual, they establish a place for ancestral deity where some branches of Musore-katush are planted by giving the meanings. It is believed that after the creation of living beings in the world, Thaspung-diwung, father of witch doctor, arranged Sakela ritual. At that time, Thaspung-diwung and his disciples began to sing and dance. Meanwhile, the temperature surprisingly increased and disturbed them. Thereafter, Thaspung-diwung, who had a supernatural power and enchanted mantra upon the branches of Musore-katush tree. Consequently, the branches spontaneously grew up and provided shadow to the participants and then they completed their ritual. Believing this mythical history, Kirant people still plant Musore-katush’s branch while performing Sakela ritual. That is, Musorekatush tree is the symbol of shadow provider among the Rai people. In Bahuban, Hindus and Kirants perform ritual and religious activities to earn ‘religious merits’ in their ‘after life’ whereas Buddhists do not believe in it. Buddhists have followed the ideology of Buddha to get rid of the cycle of rebirth. In this regard, there is no need of wild plants in their religious life and all plants are taken, theoretically, as a part of ecosystem. However, their understandingof all plant species is not same. That means, some plants like Bar, Kush, Jamuna, Pipal, Saal, bamboo and mango are taken as holy trees in Buddhist religion because various events of Buddha’s life are directly interconnected and interwoven with these plants. For instance, Buddha got first knowledge +

JIBAN MANI POUDEL: Cultural Understanding of Non-Timber... 143 about life under the Jamuna tree. Similarly, the four events i.e., the birth, the enlightenment, the spreading out of enlightenment and Mahaparinirvana (salvation) in Buddha’s life took place under the Ashok*, Pipal, Bel, and Saal trees. Moreover, Buddha spent most of his life under the mango tree and bamboo bushes between the period of leaving the palace and attaining enlightenment of life. Believing in this concept, the Buddhist people also perceive the Ashok, Bar, Bel, Jamuna, Kush, Pipal, Saal, bamboo and mango trees symbolically meaningful in their religious life. Hindu and Buddhist religious people give different meanings to the same NTFPs. For instance, I have already mentioned that Hindu people perceive Bar, Pipal, Kush and Bel as symbols of Gods whereas Buddhist understand these things differently. The plant of Kush is taken as Bodhi Ghansh (grass of enlightenment), that is, Buddha attained enlightenment after sitting on the mat of Kush. Similarly, Bar, Bel and Pipal are taken as Bodhi-briksha (trees of enlightenment). In this way, the people’s understanding on NTFPs is varied according to variation of cultural background. In this regard, Milton (1996) says that culture and cultural variation are not just matters of different symbols with similar meanings but different ways of expressing the same things. Likewise, Magar, Sunuwar, Gurung, Rai, Lapcha and Newar are keeping flowers of Totela, stalk of Nagbeli, whole part of Kurilo, and vein of Kukurdaino on the lintel of their main door. It is believed that these plants play the role of protector so that the evil spirits do not enter the house. Similarly, some Brahmin/Chhetri are also found to keep these plants on lintel of their main door. All habitants of Bahuban have same meaning for using these plants. Local Strategy for the Protection of NTFPs Local people are taken as eco-systemic people because they actually live as a part of eco-system rather than just exploiters of the natural resources (Eder, 1997). They are not only the consumers of resources but guardians too (Milton, 1996, Stevens, 1999). They have held a set of articulated knowledge and belief system regarding the protection of the resources. In the case of Bahuban, locals have started different protection activities of NTFPs for the last few years as depicted below. +

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1.

Sareto, Kali-niguro , Choktajod/Hadjod , Sikari-lahara , Chandmaruwa, Kurilo, etc; are also decreasing in the forest land due to the open grazing of the domesticated animals and over-exploitation by the local people in the forest area. For the last one and half decades, Bahuban people have been domesticating these valuable NTFPs in their private lands, particularly in the kitchen gardens.

2.

The general trend of the protection of some of the useful NTFPs in the agricultural land like Totela, Amala, wild bamboo, Bhalayo, Simali, etc; is laudable.

3.

Some religious trees (Bar, Pipal, Bel, etc.) brought from the forest and neighboring areas have been planted in private and public lands by the high caste Hindu people. These plants are considered 'sacred' plants and needed in their religious and ritual performance.

4.

A general trend of protection of medicinal plant is that the local shamans do not introduce medicinal plants to their clients. Rather, shamans collect these items carefully once or twice a week by considering the auspicious days. Such activities of shamans on the subject of exploitation of the medicinal plants minimize the ecological impacts of human exploitation of medicinal plants.

5.

They do not harvest NTFPs such as wild bamboos, and Sareto when they are premature, particularly during the rainy season. They collect these plants in November and December only when they are mature.

Conclusions All naturally available 'objects' are not 'resources' for all categories of people. These objects only become resources while people use them to fulfill their needs by interpreting the symbolic meanings, functions and use-value in their socio-cultural and religious life. However, all NTFPs have not same use-value for all categories of people. There is caste/ ethnic, religious, social class, and age-group specific difference in NTFPs’ use. Therefore, people’s interaction with nature (NTFPs) can be understood only with reference to culture and cultural perspectives. The local people have strong social sanction and traditional belief regarding the use of locally available resources. Such social sanction

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JIBAN MANI POUDEL: Cultural Understanding of Non-Timber... 145 and traditional belief help to protect over and continuous exploitation of resources. Moreover, the nature of plurality in cultural practices and perceptions regarding the use of resources among the different caste/ ethnic, religious and occupational groups of people creates a symbiotic relationship. Such plurality in cultural practices on the subject of plant exploitation minimizes the adverse ecological impacts of human exploitation on resources. References APROSC, 1991. Glossary of Dome Important Plants and Animals Names in Nepal. Kathmand: Agricultural Projects Services Centre. Chandrasekharan, D., 1998. NTFPs, Institutions, and Income Generation in Nepal: Lesson from Community Forestry. Kathmandu: International centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD). Chaudhary R. P., and S. B., Karmacharya, 2000. "Conserving Traditional Phototherapy and Medicinal Plant Diversity and Nepal," in Jha, P.K., Baral, S.B., Lekhak, H.D., Lacoul, P. and Bnya, C. B. (ed.) Environment and Agriculture Bio-diversity, Agriculture and Pollution in South Asia. Ecological Society (ECOS), Nepal. Vol. 2. Chhetri, R. B., 1999. "The Rhetoric and Realities of People's Participation in Conservation and Development in Nepal: An Anthropological Perspective", in R.B. Chhetri and O. P. Gurung (ed) Anthropology and Sociology of Nepal: Cultures, Societies, Ecology and Development. SASON, Kathmandu Nepal. Pp. 192-211. Croll E. and D. Parkin, 1992. "Cultural Understandings of the Environment". In E., Croll, and D., Parkin, (ed.), Bush Base: Forest Farm Culture, Environment and Development. New, York. Pp. 11- 36 Daniggelis, E., 1994. "Jangal Resources use: Adaptive Strategies of Rais and Sherpas in the Upper Arun Valley of Eastern Nepal", in Allen Michael (ed.) Anthropology of Nepal: peoples, Problems and Process. Mandala Book Points, Kathmandu, Nepal. Eder, J. F., 1997. Batak Resource Management: Belief, Knowledge and Practice. IUCN- The World Conservation Union World Wide Fund for Nature. Edwards, D. M., 1993. Non-timber Forest Products from Nepal: Aspects of the Trade in Medicinal and Aromatic Plants. FORESC Monograph No. 1/96,

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Forest Research and Survey Center, Ministry and Soil Conservation. Kathmandu. Edwards, D. M., 1996. Non-timber Forest Products from Nepal. Forest Research Center, Ministry of Forest and soil Conservation, Babarmahal Kathmandu. Geertz, C., 1988. "Thick Description: Towards an Interpretive Theory of Cultural", in P. Bohannan and M. Glazer (ed.) High Points in Anthropology. New York: Alford A. Knopf, pp 531-552. Gurung, O., Y., Raut, and M. B., Khatri, 2001. Livestock Production System in Upper-slop of Karnali Region. An Initial Fact-Finding Research Report Prepared for International Fund for Agricultural Development, Kathmandu. Hardin, G. 1977. "The Tragedy of the Commons". In G. Hardin and J. Baden (eds.) Managing the Commons. W.H. Freeman and Company, USA. Pp. 16-30. Hertong, W. H.and K. F. Wkersum, 2000. "Timber Production in Nepal: Dynamics in Non-timber Forest Resource Management," in Mountain Research and Development. ICIMOD. Vol. 20, No.2. Ignold, T., 1992. "Cultural and the Precipitation of the Environment," In E., Croll, and D., Parkin, (ed.), Bush Base Forest Farm: Culture, Environment and Development. New, York. Pp 39-56. Lino Grima, A.P. and F. Berkes, 1989. "Natural Resources: Access, Right-to Use and Management", in Fikret Berkes ed. Common Property Resources: Ecology and Community Based sustainable Development. Belhaven Press, London. Pp. 33-54. McGee, R. J. and R. L. Warms, 2004. Anthropological Theory: An Introductory History. McGraw Hill Companies. New York. Milton, K., 1996. Environmentalism and Cultural Theory: Exploring the Role of Anthropology in Environmental Discourse. Routledge, London. Milton, K., 1997. "Ecologies: Anthropology, Culture and The Environment." In International Social Science Journal, Vol. 154:477-495. Neshelim, T., 1995. "A Tree is a Tree is a Tree? What is Resources?" Paper Presented on the Fifth Common Property Resources Conference- Revienting the Commons, 24-28 May 1995, Bodoe, Norway. Olsen, C. S., 1997. Commercial Non-timber Forestry in Central Nepal: Emerging Theme and Priorities. Ph. D. Dissertation Presented to the Royal Veterinary

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JIBAN MANI POUDEL: Cultural Understanding of Non-Timber... 147 and Agricultural University, Denmark Department of Economics and Natural resources Units of Forestry. Ortner, S. B. 1989. High Religion: A Cultural and Political History of Sherpa Buddhism. Princeton University Press. Poudel, J. M., 2003. Socio-cultural Process and Use of NTFPs among the Bahuban People of East Nepal: A Human-Nature Relation. An Unpublished M. A. Dissertation submitted to the Department of Sociology/Anthropology, Tribhuvan University, Kathmandu. Sharma, P.R., 1977. "Caste, Social Mobility and Sanskritization: A Study of Nepal’s Old Legal Code," Kailash. Vol 5, (4): 277-300. Ratna Pustak Bhandar, Kathmandu. Shiva, V. 1992. "Resource". In W. Sachs (eds.) The Development Dictionary: A Guide to Knowledge as Power. Orient Longman, New Delhi. Pp. 276292. Stevens, S., 1999. "The Legacy of Yellowstone". In S. Stevens (eds.) Conservation through Cultural Survival. Island Press, Washington, D.C. Pp. 13-32. Steward, J. 1955. Theory of Cultural Change. New York. Turner, V., 1976. The Forest of Symbol. Cornell University Press.

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DEMOCRACY IN CAGE: TOWARDS A FRAMEWORK FOR A STATE RESTRUCTURING IN NEPAL Tulsi Ram Pandey * Introduction "State Restructuring" has appeared as one of the important issues currently in vogue in public debates of Nepal. The "People’s War" waged by Maoist political organization against existing system of governance has been the most important contributory factor to intitiate this type of debate. The failure of existing state organization to settle the issues raised by people by way of this rebellion is also equally responsible for further stimulating this debate. However, a chain of political events happened in the country in a series of sequences during the period covered by this rebellion. Consequently, there has been a progressive growth in the number of participants involved in this debate and the type of demand posed by them towards restructuring the state. Indeed, state restructuring is a continual process. It appears in all systems of rules at all contexts and conditions. In the case of Nepali state, the need to reformulate its structure formed after the termination of Panchayat rule in 1990 was formally voiced for the first time by Samyukta Janamorcha (United People’ Front) party in 1996. It had done so by placing a forty-point demand in this regard before the government. However, it was a political organization which itself had representation in the then parliament of the country. As a political force sharing power of existing state organization, it was unable to take any effective strategy to pressurize the state for the fulfillment of this demand. Later on, the * Tulsi Ram Pandey holds Ph. D. in Sociology from Delhi University, India. Currently, he is an Associate Professor in Sociology at the Central Department of Sociology/ Anthropology.

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TULSI RAM PANDEY: Democracy in Cage: Towards a Framework... 149 issue was raised more vigorously by Nepal Communist Party Maoist (NCPM). It was a political organization operating from outside the framework of prevailing system of governance. It placed its demand in the form of a revolution wedged against that political system. Until a political movement was launched collectively by a number of political organizations in April 2006 against the active rule of monarch, NCPM was the only organized force of the country to make effective demand for the need of a restructured state. As a political force operating from outside the structure of existing state organization, its activities and hence its demands for restructuring the state were defined by all other types of political forces belonging to the establishment side as "terrorist" activities until this time. The political instability faced by people under such a belligerent situation gradually provoked the interest of intellectuals, media-persons and civil society personnel in their personal capacities to participate in this type of debate. The king had established his active rule on 4 October, 2002 by dissolving the "representative" form of elected government. Even after this event, he had provided an opportunity almost rotationally for more than two years to leaders of different political organizations, which were in power before this event. This strategy of the king allowed The auther would like to mention that the earlier version of his paper was presented in the International Conference on "Social Sciences in a Multicultural World" held in Kathmandu in December 2006.an opportunity for some political leaders of these organizations to satisfy their interests at least personally. Consequently, issues related to restructuring the state could not emerge in the form of a unified agenda of those organizations until the king took a next step in 2005 to reduce further their political role in the state apparatus. The king, in February 2005, had taken a second step of his involvement into active politics of the country. He replaced the multiparty leaders from formal power structure and dragged in their place the political workers of Panchayat era. He formed the government under his own leadership and improvised to file the cases against many of the multiparty leaders alleging them of being involved into different types of corrupt behaviors. This move of the king created a suffocation for many of the

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multiparty leaders, as it deprived them from the opportunities to have share in formal structure of the power. Consequently, it motivated them to come together and develop a unified force to go against the king’s move. The political movement launched in April 2006 was an outcome of such a situation. It was a unified attempt initiated by leaders of seven political organizations, which were in power before this time. This type of political effort gained support even from the Maoist organization, which was labeled as "terrorist" until that time and from the activists of different types of civil society organizations. Such a combined effort made by these different categories of forces became able to deactivate the political role of the king. The political forces which formed this unity to go against the king had, however, no uniformity of interest among themselves. The diversity of interests among these political categories was not conducive to bring these groups into an easy type of compromise. Of course, their victory against the power of the absolute king has opened the chances for diffusion of power of society into multiple types of political categories. However, this type of diffusion of power also made the political atmosphere very liquid in society in the absence of a structural mechanism that could harmonize these diversities. The advantages available from such a liquidity developed in political environment are now being tapped by both political and non-political types of social organizations. They have started to place their demand on the type of structure they want to see in the Nepali state. Some of these social units want the state to have a structure that could solve the problems rooted in caste, ethnicity, region, religion and gender-based divisions of the population. Some others want its reformulation in such a way that it could increase the facilities provided to people. The political forces that were helping the king to suppress the movement launched against him have also started to tune up their voice in favor of the need for restructuring the state. The Comprehensive Peace Agreement concluded between the State and the NCPM in November 2006, their endorsement of an Interim Constitution requiring to form an elected body of Constitutional Assembly vested with the authority to prepare

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TULSI RAM PANDEY: Democracy in Cage: Towards a Framework... 151 constitution for the nation, together with the formation of such an assembly through the completion of such an electoral procedure have all contributed to convert the issues related to "restructuring the state" in the form of formal political agenda at the moment. There is no question that all the political and non-political categories participating in this debate have an interest to see a restructured state. They all agree to a point that such a restructuring is necessary due to the failure of existing state organization to operate in democratic way. However, the diversity of interests among different types of social categories in matters of their relation to the restructured state has posed a question as to what should we mean by the state itself and about its democratic procedures. Given this context, it is important, firstly, to be familiar about the meaning of social reality symbolized by these concepts. It would, then, be appropriate to explore the reasons of the failure of existing structure of state organization to satisfy those processes. It is also important in this moment to evaluate the extent at which the current demands for restructuring the state are contributory to satisfy those processes. In this regard, this essay is organized as follows. The next section immediately following this introduction highlights on the meaning of the state. The third section seeks to understand the meaning of democracy and/or the democratic processes. The fourth section aims to discuss on how the democratic processes were kept into cage by all previous waves of efforts towards restructuring the state. The fifth section intends to evaluate the contents and implications of current debates on state restructuring in Nepal by relating them with the characteristics of those democratic processes. The last section concludes the paper by identifying some additional issues of importance that deserve to be discussed. Meaning of the State Weber defines the state as "a human community that (successfully) claims the monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force within a given territory" (1948:77-78). Hobbes is of the conception that such a community is needed for humankind to relieve itself from the problems associated with its life in the state of nature, which appears "solitary,

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poor, nasty, brutish and short” (quoted in Jordan 1985: 26). Alternatively, it is required, as perceived by Lock, to preserve the natural right of equality and freedom gifted by god to all members of this human population as they were in the original state of nature (Dunn 1969). There are, of course, no uniform views as to the reasons for the emergence of state as a form of human community. All of those who have expressed their views in this regard have an agreement that it exists by the very fact of human need for having a sovereign institution that is able to pose some limits on activities of members of the humanity as is required for the protection of their own rights and promotion of their welfare and abilities. There are no uniformities of tasks performed by individual states working in different types of social situations. As a result of these differences of tasks of the individual states, there is no uniformity of the meaning of this institution in different types of contextual situations. The contextual differences of the meaning of the state can be grasped much adequately by identifying this meaning through conceiving it in the form of an institution, organization, class and processes. The state as an institution is the repository of supreme power over the people and resources located within a territorial unit. This supremacy of power enjoyed by the state is manifested in its authority to formulate rules and regulations prescribing for patterns of behaviors of those people and for control and distribution of those resources. It retains ultimate right to implement those policies and rules into practices. In this process, it can resort even to use of physical force to oblige people and other types of their institutions located within its territorial domain to abide with those rules. However, individual states may hold no uniform types of objectives and obligations to the people. Consequently, there may be differences of policies and rules of the states formulated by them to satisfy those objectives. The ultimate authority hold by the state makes it solely responsible to arrange for the maintenance of law and order in society. Maintenance of law and order is the conventional role of all states. Most of the rules formulated and implemented by this institution in all contexts are geared towards the fulfillment of this role. However, the growth of marketbased activities in economic spheres of life in societies, the expansion of +

TULSI RAM PANDEY: Democracy in Cage: Towards a Framework... 153 these activities across the boundaries of local communities, the formation of nation states in different parts of the world as a result of political processes induced by the expansion of this economic process, and the needs of these states to come into contact with each other in defense of the interests of their own and their respective population have demanded them, at least recently, also to involve in developmental practices. The developmental role of the state can be understood by classifying them into regulative and investment oriented categories. Since the beginning of market based transactions in the economies of European continent, involvement of the state has remained highly expected to formulate rule and regulations in support of operation of the market. The emergence of socialist economy in Eastern Europe after October Revolution of Russia and the adherence to welfare state model of economy by many states of the world following Keynesian ideas boosted up the involvement of these states to formulate plans and programs for related change of their respective societies. The beginning of the era of foreign added "development" induced in developing countries of the world by cold war politics following the Second World War further required these states to define the path of change of their societies in line with interest of donor communities. The developmental roles of the state are, however, not confined only to regulative tasks. In many contexts, they have been actively involved as entrepreneurs in activities requiring investments from their parts. This type of involvement is not a recent experience in many of the nation states. As early in the eighteenth century, Adam smith, the founding father of liberal economic ideas, was himself of the view that the states would have to invest in the development of human capital and other type of infrastructural services for the promotion of market-based economic activities in their respective societies (Rosenberg, 1960). He had recommended that it can use even the physical force, if required, in support of entrepreneurs to expand these activities. Indeed, colonial rules in many parts of the world were established by the liberal states. They had accomplished this task through military encroachment in technologically weak areas. They had followed this strategy to convert these areas as a source of raw materials and as markets for commodities produced by entrepreneurs of their own societies.

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In socialist economies like those in China, Cuba and others, the states have remained as owner of most of productive resources of their respective societies. They are engaged in use of those resources in production processes and distribution of goods and services produced through those processes. Even the liberal states which are sensitive to present themselves in an image of the "welfare state" have begun to operate as the sources of financial capital, investors on major infrastructural services, purveyors of basic facilities and resources, and the suppliers of a number of social services including social security measures to people of their respective areas. The policies and rules are the manifestations of ideological commitments made by the state at its institutional level. However, it requires a set of organizational structures for the formulation of those policies and rules and implementing them into practices. Taken in this context, the state is also "a set of organizations invested with the autonomy to make binding decisions for people and to implement those decisions" into practices as needed (Ruschemeyer and Evans 1985: 66-67). Accordingly, we can observe the state in the form of a structure having different types of organizations deputed with tasks to perform legislative, executive, and judicial functions needed to fulfill its institutional objectives. These organizational sets are distributed to different layers of hierarchies from the centre of power to micro level units like villages. The type of objectives defined for a state by way of formulation of its policies prescribes the shape of its organizational structure required for the implementation of those policies. This is the reasons why we encounter a number of variations in the organizational framework followed by states in different types of societies. Some of these differences can be noted in the form of unitary or federal types of state organizations, monarchical, military or multiparty type of their organizational arrangements, together with the specific framework of their bureaucratic organizations. In the case of Nepal, these organizations are distributed to central, regional, district and village level units. The state needs a crew of officials to run these organizations for the fulfillment of its tasks. In this context, the state may be defined also as a

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TULSI RAM PANDEY: Democracy in Cage: Towards a Framework... 155 ruling class of society placed in different positions of power distributed in hierarchies of organizations established within its structure. Of course, there are differences in the volume of power and other types of privileges enjoyed by individual members among these officials. However, they all assume the characteristics of a class in view of the fact that their power and privileges are derived from their membership in this ruling segment of the population. Their characteristics as a class are manifested also in the sense that the interests and initiatives taken by these officials highly influence the objectives of the state and its operational strategies. The state is, therefore, a specific pattern of relationship of these officials with the people. Differences found among states in the pattern of such a relationship determines the differences of their forms. The democratic, feudal, military or any other types of dictatorial rules are the ministrations of differences of forms of this type relationship found between the state and the remaining part of its society. The state also defines a set of procedures for its staff and organization to follow in the course of their operations. It also defines the procedures of relationships of those staff and agencies with general mass of the population. In this context, the state is also a process of relationship of its staff and agencies with the people (Migdal, 1988). Differences of processes prescribed by different types of the states for their staff and agencies in their relations with the people reflect the differences of their forms. It is this type of difference that some states appear much dictatorial to take the form of what Hobbes calls a Leviathan state. Some others allow some level of freedom to their respective population and manifest themselves into the form of a democratic state. Democracy and the Democratic State Referring to fields covered by the broader concept of socio-economic "development", Sen perceives the meaning of this concept in terms of "freedom" (Sen, 2000). While freedom taken in this broader sense of development denotes to a particular pattern and process of distribution, control and use of power among members within and between all categories of social units, "democracy" as a term has been used to denote the features of those patterns and processes as they occur in the context of operation of the state. A democratic state is, therefore, the one that +

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exercises a minimum level of control over the activities of its citizens and democratization is a process of political development leading to formation of a democratic state. One important criterion which is normally used to identify democratic status of a state is the locus of sovereign power exercised by this institution. In a democratic state, as mentioned above, people are considered to be the source of such a sovereign power. Based on this criterion, the states in which such a power is located in the hand of a ruler or ruling groups of the population are termed as authoritarian or the dictatorial states. However, the authoritarian or the dictatorial forms of the state also differ among themselves in terms of the patterns of their organizations and the mode of their exercise of power. One such a variety of this category of the states is represented by the feudal states. In feudal state, authority structure is established in a chain of hierarchy formed on the basis of differences of power over the control of productive resources, particularly the land. In this type of the state, sovereign power is rooted in the hand of the ruler placed at epicenter of its authority structure. This ruler, as a source of sovereign power, is also the owner of productive resources available in respective society. It distributes these resources in the form of various types of grants and assignments to its own relatives, different grades of nobilities, and functionaries of the state in exchange of their loyalties. The general mass of the population is provided with a means of subsistence to work on them in the payment of tax and various forms of rents to these rulers, nobles and functionaries. The sovereign power, even in military or other forms of dictatorial rules, is located in the hand of rulers placed at epicenter of power. However, the strength of these rulers is generated either on military might of the country or on organized bureaucracy established in their own command. Indeed, all the above mentioned forms of state structures -- feudal, military or other dictatorial/authoritarian forms -- are dictatorial in nature in the sense that the state structures in those systems are formed to dictate the interest of those rulers. However, the state having feudal type of structure is possible only in agrarian societies. The military or any other forms of dictatorial rules embedded on organized bureaucracy can exist in agrarian, industrial or any other forms of advanced economies. +

TULSI RAM PANDEY: Democracy in Cage: Towards a Framework... 157 Scholars have held a perception that the multiparty type of political and administrative structures found in countries like the United States, United Kingdom and others retain many democratic features. They retain this perception in view of the fact that the systems of rules established in these states take people as the source of their sovereign power. They also hold the belief that multiparty types of political processes allow the people to exercise this power by way of electoral process. Through participation in this process, they can elect the representatives of their choice to formulate rules and regulations required for the operation of the state (Hood 2004, Lindblom 1988). There is no doubt that the recognition provided by any state to its people as a source of its sovereign power satisfies one important type of its democratic character. Similarly, people can avail an opportunity to exercise this power by way of electing their leaders through participation in politics of votes only in states having some level of democratic features. However, it is misleading to consider that the opportunity available for people to participate in such an electoral process can serve as the sole criterion for defining a democratic structure. Participation of people in electoral procedure mainly helps to legitimize the path of access to power for political elite of society. Whether such a participatory process becomes able to be translated into democratic practices depends upon the behavior of elected leaders. It is not unlikely that this group of elite, after being elected through such an electoral procedure, may seize this opportunity to frame the structure of the state and its rules for its own advantage. Evidences in regard to formation of such a class in the state have been discussed much elaborately by scholars even for the case of states adopting multiparty type of political practices (Miliband, 1969). These scholars have put forward the arguments that even in countries like the Great Britain and the United States of America, voting practices are followed in the form of a means for mirroring the existing balance of power situation among elite group of society. The elected “representatives” in these states form a corporate power and act to suppress the interest of general people by formulating policies and rules in favor of bourgeoisie (Jessop 1990, Poulantza 1973). Such a situation opens the possibility that even the states favoring multiparty type of political structures may emerge into multiparty type +

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of dictatorial rule. Democracy in this context should be viewed not only in terms of processes established for access to power, but also in terms of outputs of the state. It should be measured also in terms of issues related to responsiveness of its structure and its elected group of political elite to the interest and needs of people who have voted for them to legitimize their stay in the power structure of the state. This type of issues covers a wider field ranging from the forms of policies and rules of the state, its organizational structure, and ways followed by it for implementation of those rulers that affect the life of its people. If the features of a democratic state are measured in terms of the means prescribed for elite to have access to positions of power on its structure and also in terms of the type of policies as well as their implementation procedures followed by it to affect the people, the boundaries between democratic and dictatorial type of states may not be tightly closed to each other. They may share some features in common that "democratic" and "dictatorial" tags have to be fixed in the scale of a continuum for any type of the states after measuring their specific features. Indeed, history has shown that the feudal aristocracies or the bourgeois in some context of East Asia and Western Europe had taken charge in themselves to replace the authoritarian type of feudal political structure by multiparty type of political rule (Moore, 1966). This type of argument gets some level of support from some existing facts of societies. We can notice that a wide variety of states following different system of governance make a claim for themselves to have the democratic structure. Some of these systems include the "Panchayat Democracy" of pre-1990 Nepal, "Basic Democracy" of Pakistan, "People’s Democracy" of socialist states like China, North Korea and others, and "Multi-Party Democracy" of India, Japan, United Kingdom, United States of America and a host of such others. These states make such a claim in view of the fact that they possess either or some of the following democratic ideals. They may have: (a) recognized the people as a sources of sovereign power of the state; (b) allowed them to participate in competitive political processes; (c) formulated at least some rules and regulations addressed towards making a positive change in conditions of life of the population; (d) established

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TULSI RAM PANDEY: Democracy in Cage: Towards a Framework... 159 an administrative order congenial for implementing those regulations, and (e) set some specific procedures to ease the people in taking services from the state. While a democratic system needs to have all these ideals, it is important to measure the degree at which Nepali state in the past retained these ideals within its structure and operational procedures. This type of measurement will be useful to find justification of current demands for restructuring its structure. Democracy in Cage: An Overview of the Structure and Operational Procedure of the Nepali State It has already been mentioned that current demands for restructuring the Nepali state are the demands for strengthening its democratic processes. These types of demands are not necessarily new in the history of this state. State restructuring as a political event has occurred in Nepal in a series of sequences since the beginning of its territorial unification process. This process was initiated by King Prithivi Narayan Shaha of Gorkha principality around the middle of 18th century. Since then, a number of political events have happened in the country affecting the structure of the state. In the scale of a continuum of the features of democratic or dictatorial rules, all these events towards restructuring the Nepal state can be understood much meaningfully by classifying them into four different waves. The political events that come into sight with an appeal towards restructuring the Nepali state in all period before 1950 may be termed as events of the first wave of its restructuring process. Indeed, the territorial unification was itself one important event of this wave of political process. It brought together a number of small principalities to give the shape of a single Nepali state (Stiller, 1973). There used to appear a number of clashes among different factions of the nobility in the processes of their search for power of the state. The shifts of favor received from the king also used to create a shift in the factions of nobility having access to that power. At occasions, some factions of the nobility also used to keep the power of the king in suspension and rule the country by themselves in his name (Kumar, 1961). However, the operation of the state through all this period was

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grounded in feudal type of political and administrative structure. The king was regarded as a source of sovereign power of the country. He was the ultimate owner of resources existing within its territory. He used to distribute these resources such as land and forest to its relatives, nobility and various grades of its functionaries to gain their support and loyalties (Regmi, 1978). Even when some factions of the nobility seized power from the king by keeping his active role into suspension, they also followed similar type of political and economic practices to entrench their own power in the state. There was a sharp divide of status and opportunities enjoyed by members of this ruling class and mass of people. This type of division was not based on competitive successes gained through achieved qualities and status. Rather, they were grabbed by members of this class by virtue of their ownership of the state and hence its power. The relationship of masses with this ruling group of society was mediated mainly by fixing them a number of liabilities to pay for various grades of these overlords. The state had not granted any right to people to participate in political process. It had not taken any responsibilities to involve itself into tasks addressed towards improvement of condition of life of those subject communities. It was completely a dictatorial state organized under the feudal structure. The political events that happened in the country around and during the 1950s may be termed as the second wave of Nepal’s state restructuring process. The events that happened in this period dismantled the oligarchic type of feudal dictatorship of the Ranas. The Ranas were one important faction of nobility. They came into epicenter of power in 1846, and from 1854 onwards, they managed to keep the active role of the king into suspension. By seizing his de facto power, their families ruled over the country for more than a century until a political movement threw them out from power in 1951. The political movement against the Ranas was launched by an urbanbased educated middle-class of the population. This section of the population was the one which had no share in formal power structure existing in the country before this time. The leaders which had managed to launch this political event had sought some support even from the

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TULSI RAM PANDEY: Democracy in Cage: Towards a Framework... 161 King who was denied by the Ranas to involve into active type of politics. As a result, the downfall of Rana rule brought two different types of forces to operate in political life of society. One such a force was represented by the king. His political role no longer remained into suspension. He was placed into his original place as a sovereign head of the state. Another type of political force was represented by the multiparty leaders. They were representing the emerging political force of society. There was no space for this force under existing organization of the state. A separate political niche had to be carved out for the accommodation of this force. This task was accomplished through the introduction of the multiparty type of political structure. This was the major event of this second wave of Nepal’s state restructuring process. The introduction of multiparty type of political structure helped to inject some democratic ideals into political sphere of society. It no longer allowed the politics of the nation to remain into property domain of the nobility. It opened an opportunity for the expansion of ruling circle of society. It demanded that the political leaders be recruited to run the government through electoral procedures (Joshi and Rose, 1966). The electoral type of political procedures required for the recruitment of governing elite of society made it necessary for them to win the favor of people to get access to power. The pressures generated by such a requirement motivated them to bring some changes also in the objectives and activities of the state. Now the role of the state was enlarged. At least in theory, it was obliged to commit to take some developmental responsibilities, apart from its conventional role for the maintenance of law and order in society. In line with this redefined role of the state, the governments represented by multiparty leaders during the 1950s made it mandatory for the state to involve into "developmental" practices through the introduction of a planned process (Stiller and Yadav, 1979). They formulated rules to establish an organized bureaucracy in view of its need to implement those processes (Agrawal, 1976). They also formulated policies and rules aiming at reforms of existing agrarian structure.

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However, the king and the multiparty leaders could not go beyond the formulation of these policies and regulations. The king was always eager to retain back his absolute position into power. The multiparty leaders also battled among themselves and hold the conception that their access to power was itself an indicator of the fulfillment of all goals hold by them during the process of their political struggle. Consequently, politics of Nepal during the 1950s’ witnessed an intense struggle for power among these different categories of its stakeholders. One such a conflict was that between the king and the multiparty leaders. The king always wanted to weaken the multiparty procedure. He was strongly convinced that the opportunity for his absolute control of power would be possible only through breaking the chances of any level of unity of the multiparty force. Accordingly, he adopted a strategy to allow the leaders of different political organizations to form the government on a rotational basis. Another type of conflict appeared among the multiparty leaders. Their hunger for power could not make it feasible to develop a common political agenda of the multiparty politics (Gupta, 1964). Thus, democracy during the 1950s emerged in Nepal mainly in the form of a political ideology. The king and the multiparty leaders kept this ideology into cage and struggled among themselves for the stability of their access to position of power. The administrative structure remained highly centralized. The developmental programs, if implemented, could not appear in the form of regular activities of the state, but were used only in the form of their patronage. The king took advantage of such an unstable political situation. In 1960, he dissolved the multiparty type of political processes and seized all executive powers of the country to exercise it by himself in absolute terms. This step of the king may be taken in the form of the third wave of state restructuring in Nepal. In one sense, it was a retreat from the democratic ideals introduced in the country after the downfall Rana rule. Through this move, he blocked the operation of plural type of political organization and introduced one party type of Panchayat rule. However, the king was fully aware of the fact that it would be difficult for him to establish the legitimacy of this move without showing the commitment

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TULSI RAM PANDEY: Democracy in Cage: Towards a Framework... 163 that the governments headed by him were also sensitive to the problems faced by the people. Consequently, he gave continuity to the process of implementation of planned development practices. He did not lag behind to give his government a hue of representative character. In this process, he divided the country into a number of political units and introduced an electoral procedure to select his supporters required to run them. He also established a tightly organized bureaucratic structure by dividing it into central, regional, zonal, district and village level units (Agrawal,1976). It is true that some of the steps taken by the king towards restructuring the political and administrative organs of the government made a longlasting effect to shape the organizational base of the state. The organizational structure operating in the country even today owes its origin to that established during Panchat period by the king. This type of structure was created to extend centralization of power of the monarch in different parts of the country. It was mobilized for the control of local level resources and for the expansion of terror of power of the monarch in different sectors of society. The king’s strategy to expand political and administrative structure of the country enlarged the volume of ruling class and his supporters in society. It enlarged the size of that segment of the population who could have a share over the perquisites distributed by the state.The political supporters which were recruited by the king had to come through facing an electoral procedure. However, they had to attend this competitive process only in term of differences of their personalities rather than that of their values and objectives. They had the duty to fulfill the interest of the king through working under his absolute command. The bureaucratic structure of the country was used to implement this command into practical fields. Therefore, the state class working in Panchayat period was responsible to the king and not to the people. It owned the institutions and activities of the state on behalf of the king and used them to satisfy its interest and to legitimize the need of its own existence. The result was that, the development programs implemented during this period retained the status of rutinized tasks, or annual or periodic regularities

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of activities of this class. They could not emerge in the form of wants and rights of people distributed in different sectors of society. They appeared as targeted tasks implemented by members of this class to legitimize its existence. The developmental activities implemented under the ownership of state class of the country resulted to promote a number of disparities. For those deriving perquisite from the state, or others having access to sufficient amount of resources, they were supplied with multiple options for enjoying the luxuries. They opened roads and established the markets for bringing different qualities of consumption materials to the doorsteps of their houses. They opened opportunities for them to earn cash through investment on supply of these materials to different corners of the country. They also opened an opportunity for this segment of society to invest on educating their children in advanced academic institutions enabling them to become the members of this class in the generations to come. They reduced the rate of mortality of their children and ensured them with the guarantee for having the comfort of living in small size family. For the poor and marginal sections of the population, the developmental activities implemented under ownership of this class contributed to increase relative level of deprivation and poverty. The expansion of market exposed them with additional types of consumption necessities and increased the economic burden of their respective families. This event also led to reduce the local employment opportunities by compelling the indigeous enterprises to decline in face of competition with market-based commodities. The decline in indigenous enterprises together with the decline in mortality rate of the population increased the volume of unused labor in their families, reduced the per capita size of their resources, and increased the level of their poverty. Such a situation forced them to reclaim on marginal type of resources or to migrate out of the country in search of income and employment to satisfy their subsistence necessities. The multiparty leaders suspended by the king during the Panchayat period took this misery of the people as a motivating force to generate their support to wedge a political movement against the Panchayat rule of the king. The termination of Panchayat rule and the reintroduction of

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TULSI RAM PANDEY: Democracy in Cage: Towards a Framework... 165 multiparty type of government in 1990 was an outcome of such a political move. With the introduction of multiparty type of political structure, the Nepali state inserted new democratic ideals to be followed within its structure. As a result, this type of political event may be said as the fourth wave of state restructuring in Nepal. The democratic ideals introduced by the Nepali state during the post 1990 period may be understood by breaking them into institutional, organizational and procedural levels. At the institutional level, the state after this political event recognized people as a source of sovereign power of the country. It reduced the king into constitutional status. It eliminated all legal barriers on people’s right to freedom of expression and organization. Hence, it entertained political pluralism in the country and opened opportunity for people to organize into different types of political, social and cultural units. With these changes in institutional values of the state, some changes were made also in its organizational character. Particularly, it established multiparty types of political organizations as the pillars for the conduction of political activities of the country. It also incorporated some caste, ethnicity and gender-based social and cultural organizations in the form of its structural units. The installment of multiparty type political structure also produced some changes in its operational procedures. It required the political leaders to go through electoral processes to have access to power. Unlike in Panchayat system, these types of elections were to be faced not on differences of their individual personalities but on that of their political values and ideological goals. These changes in ideological components as well as in structural elements of the state made some tangible effects on reorganization of ruling class of society. Particularly, the introduction of multiparty type of political structure displaced the Panchayat leaders from the positions of power. It installed multiparty leaders in those positions and enlarged the population of this class. The opportunities for the enlargement of ruling class of the population was further enhanced through the incorporation of some caste, ethnic and gender-based social units within the structure of state organization. +

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The opportunities opened by the state through its ideological commitment to follow democratic values in its operation were harnessed quite adequately by the state class of Nepal. Indeed, the freedom provided by multiparty type of political structure for the enlargement of this class was itself one important type of advantage available from the state for this class. This type of opportunity helped to expand the volume of that segment of the population who could derive some privileges through occupying the positions of power. Together, the state class of Nepal, even in the post-1990 period, derived some other types of advantages through the use of these privileges and power. It used the freedom of emerging type of "democratic" environment to mobilize its power to formulate policies and rules to allow the members of the class to import luxuries of life on a tax-free basis. It used this power to create opportunities of foreign visits for its members in reward of their commitment to keep continuity of their membership in the class. It also used this power to increase the level of other types of facilities and privileges supplied for them from the state to enhance the comfort of their life. However, the democratic ideals committed by the state were manifested only nominally if they are evaluated in the context of relationship of this class with people. The multiparty leaders developed a misconceived notion that the sole criteria for defining a democratic type of socio-political structure was the level at which it provides chances for members in the elite to file their candidacy in elections and for people to caste their votes in favor of candidates of their choice through participating in those electoral processes. . The adoption of competitive type of electoral procedure is, of course, a form of democratic practice in itself. It offers opportunities for the potential claimants of power to occupy related positions of society in circular way through allowing them to contest on election in a competitive basis. However, the general mass of people experience the advantage of such a competitive political process only in the form of activities performed for them by those leaders’ communities. The multiparty leaders considered the periodic electoral process (and the success emanating from it) as an end in itself rather than a form +

TULSI RAM PANDEY: Democracy in Cage: Towards a Framework... 167 of responsibility and behavior. They were interested mainly to bring a change in elite circle of society. In matters of their relationship with people, they followed political values and administrative procedures similar to those followed by leaders of the Panchayat rule. They inherited without change the administrative structure developed by the king in Panchayat period. They inherited from Panchayat rule the substance and strategies of developmental procedures. They also upheld the prevailing system of centralization of power of the country. They did not bring any change in existing pattern of distribution of power between different types of political and administrative units. They were not inclined to manage for devolution of power and economic resources to political and administrative institutions working with people in village communities. . The adoption of political and administrative values of Panchayat rule motivated multiparty leaders keep democracy in cage and transform the multiparty type of state system into multiparty variant of dictatorial rule. Through concentrating all powers under their administrative command, they, as managers of the state, held its authority to define themselves the problems and needs of the people, to devise programs for addressing those needs and to implement them into practices through the use of their administrative mechanisms. Thus, the developmental activities dispensed by the state even under multiparty type of its structure could not appear in the form of right of the people. They were dispensed as targets of the state in the form of its administrative regularities to legitimize its structure. They were distributed in the form of patronage granted to people by those who got hold over power of the state. The state class of Nepal even in the post-1990 period manipulated the power, resources and organizational framework of the state for the expansion of its own advantage. The problems of the poor remained unchanged even in this period. Like at the time of Panchayat rule, people in rural Nepal continued to face problems associated with scarcity of productive resources and absence of local employment opportunities. They continued to claim over the marginal natural resources or to migrate out from the country for the

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sake of income and employment to satisfy their subsistence necessities. The multiparty leaders who were in power not only failed to present themselves with people in a democratic manner, they also failed to generate their active support whenever they starkly needed it to give continuity of their rule. They also intensely fought to each other for getting control over the state to use its power in absolute way. Their conflict of power frequently led to breakdown of their mother political organizations as well as the governments run by themselves. The political instability generated by these events provided a fertile ground for the Maoist to expand their organization. The expansion of organizational base of the NCP (Maoist) further contributed to expand the unstable political situation at the moment. Before 2005, it was working outside the framework existing state organization with a desire to bring in its structure some form of change. However, the state organization from its side was neither interested to transform its structure by accommodating the demands of this political organization, nor was in a position to calm its operations through use of its physical power. The conflicts of interests between the state and the Maoist political organization further intensified the unstable political situation. The state failed even to satisfy its minimum task to ensure security of life of general population. The failure of the multiparty leaders to generate an active support of people for their rule and the political instability generated by conflict for power among themselves and that between the state and Maoist organization motivated the king to use the situation to make a trial at least once again for the establishment of his absolute rule. This move of the king appeared useful in the sense that it brought together all other forms of political forces to wedge a movement against this step of the king. However, this movement was concluded with an agreement between different types of political forces to bring another wave of change in the structure of state organization. The Emerging Demands and Their Implications The political forces that came together to wage this movement against the king have come to a compromise that the structure of Nepali state to +

TULSI RAM PANDEY: Democracy in Cage: Towards a Framework... 169 be formed in the immediate future will be determined by the Constitution prepared by Constitutional Assembly formed of representatives elected by the people. The state organization that has been operating at the moment is simply an interim arrangement. It has already fulfilled the responsibility to form the Constitutional Assembly through holding an election which is now ready to work to prepare the Constitution. The Constitutional Assembly will have the task mainly to glean and formalize the possible structure of the state from among multiple demands posed in this regard by different sections of the population. Many of these demands are already in floor and many of the political parties have declared through their election manifestos the level of their commitments and the type of strategies to be followed by them for the fulfillment of these demands. The major issues covered in these demands and related political commitments can be summarized into three broader categories. One of these demands relates to the position of power of monarchy as a living institution. The issues associated with this type of demand are already resolved through scraping the existence of this institution. Now there exists no king and the former king of Nepal has agreed to spend a normal life by living in the form a citizen of the country. The second type of demand relates to establish a balance in distribution of power between regional units, and the third type of debate relates to establish this type of balance in the context of groups divided in terms of caste, ethnicity and gender-based attributes. The demands related to balancing the distribution of power between regional units have been raised since 1950s (Gaige, 1976). They have been raised mainly by those political organizations, which are interested to raise the problems of people of the Tarai region. The Tarai Congress in the past and the Nepal Sadbhawana Party, the Madhesi Janadhikar Forum and the Tarai Madhesh Loktantric Party in present are among the important political organizations, which have posed this type of demand. However, this type of demand gained momentum to emerge in the form of a dominant debate of the country once the Maoists had made its support to this kind of demand. Currently, a number of local, sectoral and/or sub-regional organizations are also actively involved to raise this demand focusing in the case of the Tarai as well as other parts of the country.

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The demands for balancing the distribution of power between caste, ethnic and gender -based social categories were raised at the political level by the Maoists at the beginning. However, the national and foreign scholars and donor institutions are also intensely involved in the country to explore its reality and promote to this kind of debate (eg.DFID and the World Bank: 2006, Bhattachan et al 2003, Dahal et al 2002, Gellner 1997, FWLD 2005, Pandey et al 2006, and Subba et al 2002,). A number of other social organizations are also formed by people of respective social categories to provide additional support towards the advocacy of these demands. As a result of these developments, this type of demand has been able to emerge as one of the dominant agenda of public debates of the country. Currently, it has taken even the shape of demands of sub-regional units formed of specific types of ethnic categories distributed in different parts of the country. These three groups of demands differ to each other in one important point. They raise problems focusing on issues of alternative types of social categories. Those who argue in the issue that monarchy as a problem focus their discussion by placing the king in one side of the dichotomized reality and the rest of society in another side. The demands on balancing the distribution of power between regional units also perceive the problem from the point of the Tarai or other regions by comparing them with other parts of the country. The demands related to issues of caste, ethnicity and gender-based categories also appear in similar way. They compare each of these social categories with the rest of society. However, all these demands hold some level of uniformity as well. They all have the conception that disparity in distribution of power between them and another flank of their dichotomized realities is the basic cause of problems faced by each of these social units. Accordingly, they make the suggestion that the type of problems raised by them can be resolved though creating a balance in distribution power between those dichotomized categories (Bhattachan 1995, Gurung 1997, Lawati 2005, Whelpton 2005). Indeed, equity in distribution of power is one important indicator of democratic features of society. Equitable distribution of power among different types of social units enables them to enjoy the opportunity of

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TULSI RAM PANDEY: Democracy in Cage: Towards a Framework... 171 life available in society on an equitable basis. It allows them to decide themselves the areas of their choice and devise the related type of strategies. The demands posed by these social units for equitable share in power are, therefore, the demands for enhancing a democratic procedure. A satisfactory fulfillment of these demands of the population can help to reduce chances of concentration of power. However, the possible effects of these demands for promoting a democratic environment should be understood very cautiously. It has already been mentioned that the perceived cause of problems faced by all members of each of these social categories is the unequal share of the group over distribution of power of society. Consequently, it has been proposed that the problems faced by all members of these groups can be resolved by allowing these groups to have equitable share in distribution of that power. This type of conception is based under the assumption that each of these groups constitutes a homogenous entity. Its members are equal to each other and they do not hold any diversity. The leading advocates of this idea of internal harmony of each group have the perception that the appropriate mechanism to reduce inter-group level of inequality is to ensure for each group to have equitable share over executive, legislative and other types of positions of the state on a proportionate basis (Khanal, 2004). Thus, the current debates on restructuring the Nepali state have attempted to address the issues of social inequality from the vantage point of ruling circle of society. It puts forward the type of argument that social inequality is a problem mainly faced at the level of ruling elite and its solution should be sought by way of creating a balance in the distribution of resources among different categories of social units. There is no doubt that a change in composition of ruling circle of society is itself a form of change in the structure of the state. It places one group of people into positions of power by displacing the others from having the privilege. It creates a shift in the political and administrative elite of society, which is endowed with power to enjoy different types of privileges. It is important to mention in this context that some level of attempts had been made after the introduction of multiparty type of political rule

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in the country to open opportunities for different segments of society to have access to these types of privileges through the involvement in competitive processes. However, it is easier for members of the elite to get control over those privileges if the society can preserve the position of power for its members without requiring them to involve into those competitive procedures. Issues related to the need of restructuring the state can have a different type of meaning in the context of problems emerging at the level of relationships developed between the elite and the mass of general people. In the context of relationship between the ruling elite and general people, state restructuring may require some level of change even in the objectives and policies of the state. It may also require some change in distribution of power among different units of this organization, in feeling of liabilities among members of ruling section of the population, and in the process followed by members of this class in the course of their relationship with the people. The current debates on state restructuring in Nepal do not take into account these of issues of relationship between ruling elite and people in their discussions As a result, these types of debates are of limited importance if they are evaluated from the point of view of the problems faced by people in their relationship with the state. Such a situation indicates to a possibility that the state class of Nepal still wants to keep democracy into cage and own the state to use it for its own advantage What Still Remains to Be Done? The detraction of current debates on state restructuring in Nepal to take into account the issues of the patterns of relationship between state class and people indicates that these types of debates need to be oriented also to bring into floor the discussions of problems faced by people through their encounter with this type of relational procedure. It has already been mentioned that the problems emerged for people from this type of relational procedure can be resolved by introducing some change in objectives and policies of the state, in distribution of power among different units formed within its structure, in feeling of liability among members of ruling class of the state, and in the process followed by members of this class in the course of their relationship with the people. +

TULSI RAM PANDEY: Democracy in Cage: Towards a Framework... 173 The policies and rules define the line of relationship between state organization and people. They define authority and privileges of ruling segment of the population. They specify rules related to people’s access to resources, their liability to the state, and the types of services they may avail from it as citizens of the state. Debates hold on existing policies related to these and other types of issues and on matters of their impacts on ways of life of the people can help to identify the relevance of those policies and requirements for their change to satisfy the interest and needs of the general people. One of the important fields requiring changes in bringing some reformulation of relationship between state, state class and people is the organizational structure of the state and the pattern of distribution of power between its units working under that structure. Until recently, the power of Nepali state is highly concentrated. It is located in the central organs of the government. The local units of the state organization are used mainly for the expansion of terror of this centralized state in different parts of the country. They are used for the expansion of its control over local level resources. Similarly, they are also used for the dispense of patronage of state class of the country to people of rural localities by way of using them in the form of a mechanism to control and regulate the developmental processes (Pandey, 2004). Redistribution of power from the center to local units refers to devolution of executive, decision making and economic power of the state to its representative organs of village areas, as they relate to issues and problems of respective localities. This type of change in distribution of power of the state allows some level of freedom to people to identify by themselves the problems faced by them in their localities. It allows them opportunities to allocate and use their resources in a way as they think it appropriate in the context of their problems and other necessities. It is only through this process of redistribution and execution of power that the state appears more accessible to the people. Issues related to such a form of redistribution of power of the state are not raised in the current debates. Even the debates demanding for autonomous existence of regional units have not paid any attention to define the pattern of relationship

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between them and the local units. Reformulation in existing structure of the state through providing an autonomous authority to regional organs of the governments opens chances for formation and growth of regional elite in society. However, this type of change hardly helps to provide some level of freedom to local population until the relationship of local units with the central and regional units of the governments are separately redefined. Indeed, devolution of political and economic power of the state to village level units of the government helps to satisfy many of the problems raised in current debates on state restructuring in Nepal. It is a fact that many of the caste and ethnic people are concentrated in some specific parts of the country. As a result, the representative units of the governments in most of those specific localities could be formed of members representing those caste and ethnic people who live there in majority (eg. see Furer-Haimendorf 1964, Macfarlane 1976,etc). Devolution of power of the state to these local units allows these members to use that power for the advantage of their community. It also offers an opportunity for the people to monitor and control the tasks performed in their area by the representatives of their choice selected from their own local society. Devolution of political and economic power of the state to its local level units also helps to bring some change in the existing pattern of relationship between state class and people. Until recently, the state class of the country positioned beyond the village localities has controlled the resources deputed for the development of rural communities. By virtue of its right to control over those resources, it has established for itself in the form of patron of the people to dispense them the "development" activities. The devolution of power to local units can reverse this situation. By providing authority to local people for the control and use of resources allocated for their locality, it brings state class of the country under their administrative command at least in areas of activities performed in their respective communities. However, current debates on state structuring in Nepal are less interested to raise issues of relationship of power between local units of the state and its central and regional level organizations. Its interest to

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TULSI RAM PANDEY: Democracy in Cage: Towards a Framework... 175 discuss mainly on issues of distribution of power among different categories of the national and regional elite of society has reduced the issues of relationship of this class with the general people to have hold only a trivial type of importance. Redistribution of power among different segments of the elite simply helps to redistribute the composition of this segment of society. A meaningful restructuring of the state can happen only when the power is redistributed between this elite category and the local people. If this type of issue appears silent in the current wave of state restructuring in Nepal, it leaves room for the next wave to come to bring about this level of change. References Agrawal, Hem Narayan 1976, The Administrative System of Nepal: From Tradition to Modernity, New Delhi: Vikash Publishing House. Baral, Lok Raj (ed.) 2006, Nepal: Quest for Participatory Democracy, New Delhi: Adroit Publishers. Bhattachan, Krishna, B. 1995. "Ethnopolitics and Ethnodevelopment: An Emerging Paradigm" in Kumar, Dhruba (ed.) State Leadership and Politics in Nepal, CNAS, T.U Bhttachan et. al 2003. Existing Practices of Caste-Based Untochability in Nepal and Strategy for a Campaign for its Elimination, Kathmandu: Action Aid Nepal Dahal, Dilli, R. et al 2002. National Dalit Strategy. Kathmandu: Action Aid/ Care Nepal DFID and the World Bank 2006. The Unequal Citizens, Kathmandu: DFID and the World Bank Dunn, John 1969. The Political Thought of John Lock, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Evans, Petter, Detrich Ruschemeyer and Theda Skocpol, (eds.) 1985. Bringing the State Back In, USA: Cambridge University Press. Forum for Women Law and Development (FWLD) 2005. An Update of the Discriminatory Laws in Nepal and Their Impact on Women (Draft). Kathmandu, Forum for women, Law and Development Gellner David N. Joanna Pfaff-Czarnecka and John Whelpton (eds.). Nationalism and Ethnicity in a Hindu Kingdom: The Politics of Culture in Contemporary

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Nepal, The Netherlands: Hardwood Academic Publishers. Gupta, Anirudha 1964. The Politics of Nepal: A Study of Post-Rana Political Development and Party Politics. New Delhi: Allied Publishers. Gurung, Harka 1997, "State and Society in Nepal" in Gellner David N. Joanna Pfaff-Czarnecka and John Whelpton (eds.) Nationalism and Ethnicity in a Hindu Kingdom: The Politics of Culture in Contemporary Nepal. The Hethrelands: Hardwood Academic Publishers. Gaige, Fredrick H. 1976. Regionalism and National Unity in Nepal. New Delhi: Sage Publication Hood, Steven J. 2004. Political Development and Democratic Theory: Rethinking Comparative Politics, New Delhi: Printice-Hall of India. Jessop, Bob 1990. State Theory: Putting the Capital State in Its Place, Cambridge: Polity Press. Jordan, Bill 1985. The State: Authority and Autonomy. New York: Basil Blackwell. Khanal, Krishna 2004. State Restructuring in Nepal. Kathmandu: Nepal Centre for Contemporary Studies Kumar, Satish 1961. Rana Policy in Nepal: Origin and Growth. Bombay: Asia Publishing House. Lawati, Mahendra 2005. Towards a Democratic Nepal: Inclusive Political Institutions for a Multicultural Society. New Delhi: Sage Publications Lindbolm, Charles 1978. Democracy and Market System. Norwey: Norwegian University Press. Migdal, Joel S. 1988. Strong Societies and Week States: State-Society Relations and State Capabilities in the Third World: New Jersey: Princeton University Press. Miliband, Ralph 1969. The State in Capitalist Society. New York: Basic Books. Moore, Barrington JR. 1966. Social Origin of Dictatorship and Democracy: Lords and Peasants in the Making of the Modern World. USA: Penguin University Press. Poulantza, Nicos 1973. Political Power and Social Classes. Translated by Gagan, Timothy O’, Bristol: Western Printing Services. Pandey, Tulsi R. et al 2006. Forms and Patterns of Social Discrimination in Nepal, Series of Monographs and Working Papers No. 8, Kathmandu: UNESCO.

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TULSI RAM PANDEY: Democracy in Cage: Towards a Framework... 177 Pandey, Tulsi R. 2004, Household, Community and the State: A Study of Modes of Livelihoods in the Hill and Tarai Villages of Western Nepal, Ph.D. Thesis Submitted to Delhi School of Economics, University of Delhi Regmi, Mahesh . C 1978. Land Tenure and Taxation In Nepal. Kathmandu: Ratna Pustak Bhandar. Rosenberg, N. 1960, "Some Institutional Aspects of Wealth of Nations" in Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 18, No. 6, pp. 557-570. Sen, Amartya 2000. Development as Freedom. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Stiller, S.J, Ludwig F. 1973. The Rise of the House of Gorkha: A Study in Unification of Nepal, New Delhi: Manjushree Publishing House. Stiller, S.J, Ludwig F. and Ram Prakash Yadav 1979. Planning For People. Kathmandu: Sahayogi Prakashan Subba, Chaitanya, Amrit Yonjan, Nilambar Acharya, Laxmi Limbu, Shyam Krishna Shrestha, Sangini Ranamagar, Dwarika Nath Dhungel. 2002. Adivasis/Janajatis in National Development : Major Issues, Constraints and Opportunities (Plan of Action Proposed for the Tenth Plan, 2003-2007) Weber, Max 1948. Essays in Sociology, Translated by Gerth H.H. and C Write Mills, London: Rutledge and Kegan Paul Whelpton, John, 2005. A History of Nepal. Cambridge University Press: UK

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LOCAL MOVEMENTS, POLITICAL PROCESSES AND TRANSFORMATION: A CASE STUDY OF BHAKTAPUR MUNICIPALITY Suresh Dhakal * Sanjeev Pokharel ** Introduction “A small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world”. - Margaret Mead, Anthropologist The people of Nepal have witnessed a number of political shifts within a comparatively short period of the country’s history. The political revolution of 1950, which precedes all important political movements, eliminated the century-long Rana oligarchy and established the multiparty system. In 1960, late King Mahendra abolished the newly established multi-party system and implemented his own model of governance called the Panchayat system. The Panchayat system was designed to allow the King to rule the country according to his will, and the system alienated ordinary people from political processes. This system, too, came to an end after the popular movement of 1990 (widely known as jana andolan) which re-established the multi-party system in the country. Every political transformation provided the Nepalese people with hopes about social progress and prosperity. However, no government established as the result of the political change could pay adequate attention to the inequalities inherent in Nepalese society. As a result, in spite of *

Suresh Dhakal holds M. A. in Anthropology from Tribhuvan University and M. Phil from the University of Bergen, Norway. He teaches Anthropology at the Central Department of Sociology/Anthropology. Currently, he is pursuing his Ph. D. research work in Anthropology from Tribhuvan University. ** Sanjeev Pokhrel holds M. A. in Anthropology from Tribhuvan University and M. Phil from the University of Bergen, Norway. At present, he is a free-lance consultant.

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SURESH/SANJEEV: Local Movements, Political Processes... 179 the changes in the system of governance, the problems faced by the Nepalese people have remained unchanged. Even after the reestablishment of multi-party democracy in 1991, the traditional structures of poverty and deprivation continue to affect everyday lives of the majority of Nepalese. The low-caste groups, women, ethnic populations, etc. continue to suffer from the traditional systems of hierarchy, and were deliberately structurally excluded from the political processes, and thereby the economic and social opportunities it could provide (Lawoti, 2005). If democracy is to be considered an environment which allows people to participate in the process of social and economic transformation for achieving social progress and prosperity, it can be said that Nepalese people have not been able to experience democracy (Pandey, 1999). One of the possible reasons behind this problem could be the lack of participation of people in political processes. The political parties of Nepal as well as the governments do not seem to be serious about involving people in political processes. As Dhakal (2004) argues, even after the re-establishment of democratic system, no political party has spent serious efforts in listening to the people about their desires, choices and priorities.The government’s reliance on technocratic and bureaucratic knowledge in the process of social transformation have produced little, if not negative impacts, for the lives of poor and underprivileged Nepalese. As a result, majority of the population seems to be highly reluctant about the activities of both governments and political parties creating for them a serious crisis of legitimacy. In spite of this critical situation, Bhaktapur Municipality (BM), we argue, should be considered as one of the exceptional cases. The BM presents a unique case in which the local government functions as the machinery giving spaces for the local people to actively participate in the process of social and economic transformation (cf. Hachhethu 2004, Baral et. al. 2004, Grieve 2002). In other words, the people of BM have established social institutions through which they discuss on and prioritise their choices, expectations, and knowledge as parts of their social planning. The story of the construction of such institutions is both interesting and significant. This study attempts to explain a story of partnerships, communities, political leadership, and management practices to show how with a +

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political will good governance is possible even in a polity that is undergoing significant governability crises and an erosion of political institutions. By studying the transformation of the traditional city of Bhaktapur, we seek to complicate and problematise the discourse on democracy so that we can look beyond the subtle rhetoric of democracy and draw different conclusions. By focusing on the relationship between political processes and the management of fohor (dirt/waste/garbage), we seek to understand the role of the local government in the social, cultural and economic transformation of Bhaktapur and her inhabitants. Following Laporte’s (1985) historic analysis of the history of management of waste (‘shit’) in Paris, we seek to analyse the social and cultural changes in Bhaktapur through changing discourses concerning the management of the city’s waste. We hope that this analysis will lead us to understand how the grounds for people’s participation in social transformation were formed in the history of Bhaktapur’s political movements. This study is based mainly on our own observations of the Bhaktapur city across time, and, an intensive fieldwork period during 2004 and 2005. We interviewed some key persons such as the political leaders including the Chairperson of the Nepal Workers and Peasants Party (NWPP); some prominent scholars from Bhaktapur; and some local residents of different ages and backgrounds. In addition to this, we have also utilized a range of relevant literatures. Bhaktapur: An Image under Transformation In spite of being situated hardly 13 kilometres far from the main hubbub of the capital city, the image of Bhaktapur persists in the minds of most Nepalese as a traditional Newar city lying in the far corner of the Kathmandu Valley. Old pantheons and monuments situated in the narrow streets and exotic jatras (celebration of festivity after the worship of local gods and goddesses) predominantly constitute the prima facie image of Bhaktapur. For example, the people of Kathmandu tend to believe that the people of Bhaktapur live their traditional lives in isolation (Grieve, 2002) having little interaction with the rest of the world. For them, Bhaktapur holds no capacity to stand the pace of recent changes which are taking place in Kathmandu and other big cities of Nepal. +

SURESH/SANJEEV: Local Movements, Political Processes... 181 Scholarly studies on Bhaktapur also tend to glorify Bhaktapur as a ‘bounded’ and ‘unchanging’ territory. For instance, anthropological studies on Bhaktapur describe and analyze either the rigid caste-based hierarchy or the exotic cultural practices. The ethnographies of Bhaktapur often tend to describe it as an integrated, homogenous, and territorially bounded community (Levy, 1990). Bhaktapur, as some of these studies seem to suggest, is conditioned by pre-industrial forms of production (Gutschow and Kölver 1975 quoted in Hachhethu 2004). In addition to this, anthropological studies on Bhaktapur show a tendency to deal with the downtrodden such as sweepers, farmers, craftsmen, potters, musicians, and so on (Parish, 1997). Thus, Bhaktapur exists in many scholarly books and articles as an isolated community in which people are comfortable more with traditional culture than with changes (Halaand, 1982). Not to surprise, the view that Bhaktapur is not ‘modern’ compared with the nearby cities such as Kathmandu and Patan is held by the locals of Bhaktapur themselves. The academic discourses which describe the people of Bhaktapur as ‘yet to be modern’ category may be understood as the necessity of the discipline (Marcus and Fischer, 1986). However, Bhaktapur is not a ‘living museum’ as the brochure published by Nepal Tourism Board mentions. Significant progress achieved by Bhaktapur in areas such as education; health and hygiene; trade and commerce; and the development of infrastructure (such as roads, telecommunication, electricity, etc) contradict such description. A native political scientist Dr. Krishna Hachhethu, for instance, disagrees with the view that Bhaktapur is a timeless and unchanging city (Hachhethu 2004). Grieve’s (2002) study of the recent changes in Bhaktapur suggests that the romantic image of Bhaktapur as a traditional city seems misleading when we observe significant changes in the economic and social relationships of the local people. In our first field visit to the downtown Bhaktapur, we asked Lalkaji Hada, a local bookseller, about what had actually changed in his place over the years. He replied, ‘Bhaktapur is no longer fohor now. I think this is the biggest change’. Fohor and the Politics of Identity "During the end of my first year’s study, I was thinking over the possible

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topics for my project work. Still in dilemma, I met Dr. Bimala Shrestha who is from Kathmandu to discuss on my project work. Upon hearing that I was from Bhaktapur, Dr Shrestha promptly said, ‘Why don’t you write something on the effects of dirty and filthy surroundings on the health of people? You can do your field study in your own city as the people there have been affected by their dirty environment.’ I felt very bad to hear her impression about Bhaktapur. I told her that Bhaktapur is now cleaner than any other city of Nepal". -Ramila Silpakar, who stood first among girls in the SLC Examination Board held in 2002, talking with us about her recent experience at Bharatpur Medical College. The remark of the bookseller may be a bit exaggeration. The doctor’s remark, on the other hand, may have been based on the traditional and biased opinion about Bhaktapur and her people. However, their remarks suggest that fohor (dirt) is the most significant of all images associated with the identity of Bhaktapur and her people. The people from other parts of the country commonly hold that the people of Bhaktapur look dirty and have no knowledge about how to manage their waste. Therefore, according to the general perception, the people of Bhaktapur dispose their private wastes such as faeces, garbage, animal blood, etc. on the public places such as streets, squares, meeting places, etc. The image of Bhaktapur as a ‘dirty’ or ‘filthy’ city, we argue, forms the basis for describing the city and her people as ‘unchanging’ and ‘isolated’. However, today’s Bhaktapur does not fit within the conventional image of a fohor sahar. These days Bhaktapur has a well-functioning system of garbage collection and waste management which seem to have been successful in transforming the meaning of dirt/garbage from public burden to private responsibility. Although few ethnographic studies have focused on Bhaktapur’s transformation in terms of its uniquely developed institutions of waste management, a simple observation of Bhaktapur’s ‘new face’ suggests that such institutions are extraordinarily strong. The new reputation of being a safa sahar (clean city) has a significant place in the new identity of Bhaktapur. People who have recently visited +

SURESH/SANJEEV: Local Movements, Political Processes... 183 the city or heard about its recent changes often describe it as the cleanest among all big cities of Nepal. Not only the outsiders, the inhabitants of Bhaktapur themselves describe the recent safai (cleanliness) of the city as their biggest achievement so far. We observed a deep interest among the people of Bhaktapur to distinguish their city from other cities almost invariably on the basis of its safai. A statement by Narayanman Bijukchhe, the supreme leader NWPP, well reflects this interest: "We need to work more actively towards making Bhaktapur the first clean, transparent and free-from-corruption municipality of the country." -Comrade Narayan Man Bijukchhe in his speech given on the occasion of the general assembly of his municipal level political workers. In addition to constructing a new and elevated image, the transformation of Bhaktapur as a safa sahar has yet another most important function. The idea of safai and the activities involved in the process of cleaning the city have provided a means for the people of Bhaktapur to dissociate themselves from their past; to communicate with outsiders with a new capacity; and to create an image of their future. The efficient management of waste and the mass mobilization towards cleanliness are deeply embedded in the political and economic processes of Bhaktapur. Therefore, a careful examination of the transformation of political and economic processes may lead us to understand the story of transformation of Bhaktapur from a fohor sahar into a safa sahar. This story, we assume, can reflect the role of political will in the good governance of Bhaktapur. Political Processes and Safai Abhiyan The process of problematising the waste and/or associating it with human health seems to have started in Bhaktapur out of the political interest of a few communist youths. In 1962 comrade Narayan Man Bijukchhe, who is now the chairperson of NWPP, was elected as the member in Bhaktapur Municipality17 in the local level election conducted under the erstwhile Panchayat system. An ardent supporter of the communist system of governance, comrade Bijukchhe was a member of the Youth League, +

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a youth wing of then Communist Party of Nepal (CPN), instrumental in popularizing the values of communism among the masses. Comrade Bijukchhe saw this victory in the local level election as his opportunity to make people ‘aware of their real constraints and possibilities’. Moreover, that was an opportunity to ‘reach the people and to organise them.’ Bijuckhhe and his fellow comrades were prompted to participate in the local level election by the noble idea of Lenin: ‘serve the people by utilising the state functionaries of the reactionaries’ (Com Bijukchhe in personal communication). However, given the political environment of the Panchayat period, the task was difficult and risky. The autocratic Panchayt system had banned all political parties and their activities. The government was not tolerant of any political campaigns in which people directly or indirectly debated on and/or criticized the Panchayat system, and anyone involved in such activities could be imprisoned or lose even her/his life. Moreover, the administration was well aware that comrade Bijukchhe was a communist activist in spite of being a member of the Panchayati municipal council. Therefore, in order to avoid unnecessary hassles from the central government, comrade Bijukchhe involved himself in the safai abhiyan (cleanliness campaigns) vis-à-vis development activities in his ward. These included the construction and renovation of roads, sewers, and irrigation canals; educating children and elderly people; opening of health posts; and cleaning of the neighbourhood. The efforts of comrade Bijukchhe and other members of the Youth League were directed towards receiving strong support and participation from among the local people to such programs. To meet this objective, comrade Bijukchhe and the members of the Youth League also organised frequent meetings of the local people mostly during nights. The local people also showed interest in participating in such programs and gathered to discuss the development activities undergoing in their community. For comrade Bijukchhe and his staunch supporters, the regularly held meetings and working together for development works were significant in two important ways. Firstly, this was an opportunity to spread the communist ideology to the masses in a more comfortable and

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SURESH/SANJEEV: Local Movements, Political Processes... 185 effective manner. The political issues and ideologies (Ferguson 1994) could now be communicated and discussed while people were collectively involved in public meetings to clean neighbourhoods, maintain sewers, etc. Secondly, the danger from the administration had now been reduced to the minimum. The local administration could not intervene in such meetings and activities as they had to be considered the ‘people’s participation in the local development’. Such policy of the communist party members seems to have developed a new kind of public sphere in Bhaktapur where people could analyse, discuss and debate the issues concerning various spheres of their lives. Among these issues, safai was considered the most prominent. The communist party workers developed and popularized the idea that Bhaktapur needs to be cleaned, and it needs to be cleaned by the efforts of Bhaktapurians themselves. In the political scenario of the time, this idea had great political relevance for the communist party workers. On the one hand, people’s voluntary participation in safai of their own tol (neighbourhood) could be a message to all that the existing government was not responsive to people’s needs. On the other hand, it was a powerful method of organising people towards constructing a distinct identity of Bhaktapur. Com. Bijukchhe argues that the construction of this new identity of Bhaktapur was possible mainly because of the changes in the livelihood of poor farmers after the land reform movement in 1960s and 70s. Bhumisudhar Andolan and Changes in People’s Livelihood Conditions The Land Reform Movement (Bhumisudhar Andolan) needs to be considered as vehicle for the most significant economic transformation which has changed the whole system of social relationships of the people of Bhaktapur (Hachhethu, 2004). The Land Reform Act implemented by the erstwhile Panchayat government in 1964 had little consequence for the traditional pattern of land distribution in the country. Although the Act was said to be designed to empower the real cultivators by providing them with cultivating right (mohiyani hak) as well as the agricultural land, it fell short in achieving its objectives (Mishra 1987). In Bhaktapur, however, the effects of the Act were immensely positive for the livelihood conditions of the local people (Hachhethu, 2004). The +

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political processes initiated by the communist party workers of Bhaktapur, we argue, have played crucial role in this regard. Unlike other communist factions in the country who criticized the Act it being ‘Royal Land Reform’, promulgated as a hoax ‘to strengthen the autocratic regime’, Com Bijukchhe and his group in Bhaktapur welcomed the Act and decided to utilise the opportunity in favour of marginal farmers, Jyapus in particular. They participated in bhumisudhar andolan by persuading the local farmers demanding formal registration of the mohiyani hak (tenants’ right) to the mohis (tenant farmers) who had been traditionally suffering from exploitation due to the absence of such rights. The local people’s increasing participation in safai abhiyan as well as local development activities had already constructed and developed a strong public sphere which could effectively be utilised for the process of social and economic transformation. In this scenario, the Land Reform Act announced in 1964 provided the people of Bhaktapur with an opportunity to ameliorate their livelihood conditions. This opportunity was actualised, thanks to the leadership provided by the communist party members. A great number of Jyapus (low-caste Newars most of whom are farmers)18 most of whom were landless and often exploited by the local high-caste landowners obtained the cultivating right as well as land. Some elderly Jyapus still describe with great agility the peasants’ movement after the declaration of the Land Reform Act in 1964. Their eventful stories include descriptions of how the peasants captured agricultural produces from the landowners with force; how they obliged the landowners to register the names of the tenants while measuring and formally registering the land; and how the peasants forced the landowners to provide them with the receipt of the share of crops received by the latter. These stories suggest that the social movement had had significant consequences for Bhaktapur’s social and economic scenario. To borrow comrade Narayan Man Bijukchhe’s expression (personal communication, 2004), the peasants’ movement was unique in the history of Bhaktapur as it had great positive consequences for the economic status of the underprivileged Jyapu community. Hachhethu (2004) argues that, "The Land Reform Act 1964 was a

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SURESH/SANJEEV: Local Movements, Political Processes... 187 benchmark in bringing a substantial improvement in the economic conditions of Bhktapurians, the Jyapus in particular." He further observes, "Since 95 percent of farming households were tenants, the impact of the Land Reform Act in improving the conditions of masses of Bhaktapur city is quite obvious" (Hachhethu, 2004). Krishna Bahadur (60), a local farmer from Jela tol of BM thus recalls his own experiences about the Bhumi Sudhar Andolan: Krishna Bahadur tells history! I can still remember that after the Land Reform of mid-1960s, the local peasants started renovating the roof of their houses, frequently appeared in new clothes, and many started wearing shoes, enrolment in schools increased, new shops in the neighbourhood were being opened and so on. Likewise, farmers started buying improved seeds, chemical fertilisers, and harvested increased production. This eventually increased the purchasing capacity of the ordinary farmers. I think, if communists of Bhaktapur had not launched a peasants’ movement at that time, we could not have come out of that harsh living conditions, instead would have continued the life of das (serfs) like earlier. I myself was a participant of the peasants’ movements of that time. By 1968 AD, Jyapus of my neighbourhood started organising meetings at nights, which later resulted in a series of movements like Bharpai aandolan (asking for receipt of land tax from landowners), mohiyani hak (tenants rights), reduction of kut (land tax to be paid to landowners), saadhe dhapaune andolan (chase away the bulls) and so on. The results of all these movements were that we could acquire tenancy rights as provisioned by the Land Reform Act, 1964. Earlier we were just halis, kind of ‘bonded agricultural labour’. Later, we could retain the larger share of the production. For example, previously we used to submit two third of paddy and half of wheat production to the landowner; in addition to that, farmers had to offer ‘free but compulsory’ labour to landowners. Later, we just started submitting 23 pathis per ropani, (i.e. approximately one-eighth of the total production in two crops), no other productions and no ‘free but compulsory’ labour to the landlords. If we wanted to discontinue tilling the landowners land, we could claim our share up to 50 percent of the land we had been tilling. My living condition which you see today would never have been possible if there was no Bhumi Sudhar.

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The success of the bhumi sudhar andolan in Bhaktapur was consequential not only for the social and economic lives of the local people but also for the political will of the communist party members who wanted to spread and strengthen their ideology among the masses, as elsewhere (Donham, 1999). It was mostly through this decade long andolan that the communist party members of Bhaktapur came into close affinity with the local people. As the andolan vis-à-vis the active participation of the communist party workers were seen positively by the Jyapu community who are a majority in Bhaktapur, the communist party members were successful in carving out their niche in the local politics and establishing themselves as the gurus of social transformation of Bhaktapur. Bhaktapur Development Project, Public Toilets and Local Perceptions Bhaktapur Development Project (BDP), locally known as the ‘German Project’ started in 1974 with the broad objectives such as ‘improve the living standards of the local people’ and ‘preserve and renovate the historic city and its religious architecture’ (Grieve, 2002: 285). The BDP worked in Bhaktapur for almost 20 years to fulfil those objectives. During that period, it renovated nearly two hundred ancient temples; and paved many kilometers of city road with bricks. Besides, the project helped in improving the lives of city dwellers, of Jyapus in particular, by providing temporary jobs to many labour-based manual workers; and providing training for construction, the skills thus learned could be used for income generation in the future (Hachhethu, 2004). Some local people as well as the scholar studying Bhaktapur claim that the BDP’s contribution in changing the physical appearance of the city and introducing social and economic changes of Bhaktapur was quite significant (cf. Hachhethu, 2004). Hence, BDP gained a wider recognition and popularity, outside the Bhaktapur in particular. In addition to these developmental and conservationists programmes, the BDP had paid significant attention to the cleanliness of the Bhaktapur city. The fact that seventy percent of its development budget was allocated for conservation and cleanliness shows the concerns of BDP about the importance of safai in Bhaktapur. Even the individual households of inner city received NRs1, 500 under BDP project to build the private +

SURESH/SANJEEV: Local Movements, Political Processes... 189 toilets. Besides, the BDP built sewers inside the city, and constructed more than twenty public toilets (Grieve, 2002). For many of the people of Bhaktapur today, the success of BDP was a constructed reality, a ‘myth’. Most of the development activities of the BDP were marred with disbelief and resistance from the local people, and its activities directed towards safai are not exceptions. The comment that the BDP did not consult any local ‘experts’ while planning and implementing development activities and renovation programs is often put forward as an evidence to show that it was not participatory, people friendly, and, culturally oriented therefore not serious about preserving the history and tradition of Bhaktapur (Sagar Shrestha, BM Heritage Conservation Department). The BDP’s decision to pave the roads with the bricks instead of stone slabs, for example, is considered to be an evidence of the thoughtless and ‘stupid’ work. The local people’s description of the toilets constructed by the BDP is even more interesting. Some local people told us that the public toilets constructed by the BDP were used by the pigs! As the local people would like to describe, the people of the Bhaktapur city were not interested in using them for two important reasons. First, the communist party of Bhaktapur did not want the local people use the infrastructure built by the ‘reactionaries’ of which BDP was considered a part. Secondly, the local people did not find it comfortable to go to the toilets ‘along with others’. Such analysis of the BDP’s efforts to clean the city suggests that the management of fohor in Bhaktapur is not only a development agenda but also a way of expressing dissent. During our fieldwork, we were made aware about the fact that the people who did not like the local communist party, and for that matter the BM, used to throw their garbage to the streets through their windows. This makes it easier to understand why the local people did not like to use the public toilets constructed by the BDP. The public toilets constructed by the BDP were later demolished, and the local people were encouraged to make their private toilets inside their houses.

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The Twenty Years That Changed the Image of Bhaktapur The transformed image of Bhaktapur, we argue, has a long historical process evolved along with the emergence and strengthening of communist politics led by NWPP. Now, we try to present the changes that took place in the last 20 years which eventually gave a transformed image to Bhaktapur. When we interviewed a number of local people in Bhaktapur about what are the major changes they have observed in the last twentyfive years: a generation, they categorically told us that changes have taken place in the spheres of politics, and consequently, in garbage management, health and sanitation, education and awareness, living condition, and so on. A native scholar and a political scientist Dr. Hachhethu argues, "The modernization in social and economic spheres of Bhaktapur has a cumulative effect in bringing change to politics in the city. The 1982 local election, held under the partyless [P]anchayat regime, is a benchmark for transformation of the leadership of the BM into the Jyapu community" (Hachethu, 2002). Transformation of Leadership: Shifting of Power Relations The NWPP continued its domination in BM for 20 years, a ‘striking feature’ (Baral 2004). Nonetheless, people have a common feeling that now they have their own people as representatives in the municipality and other local bodies. Prior to NWPP’s participation in the local election under partlyless Panchyat system, such authorities used to be high-caste Newars and non-Newars. Those who introduced the communist politics in Bhaktapur some half century ago also belonged to the upper-caste Newars. Hence, domination of upper-caste Newars continued until the local election of 1982. A sudden and apparent shift in the leadership from the upper-castes to the local Jyapus, the peasants which was apparently a non-political entity was a break-through in Bhaktapurian politics. After the popular movement of 1990 and the restoration of democracy, the participation and representation of Jyapus in Bhaktapur Municipality increased significantly. The underlying reasons of this can be found in the political processes of Bhaktapur in which NWPP was +

SURESH/SANJEEV: Local Movements, Political Processes... 191 actively involved in protecting the rights of the poor and landless Jyapus during the bhumisudhar andolan of 1960s and 70s. This had given a sharp increase in the participation of Jyapu farmers in the political activities of NWPP. Therefore, it is quite natural that when NWPP participated and achieved success in the local level election after 1982, most of its elected representatives belonged to the Jyapu community. The Jyapus comprised of 68.42 per cent of the total local level representatives of BM formed after the local level election of 1982, which continued to increase in subsequent local level elections to reach 78.94 per cent in the election of 1999, when candidates of NWPP won 15 out of 17 ward chairpersons; Mayor and Deputy Mayor of BM. The change in the leadership have affected many spheres of social and economic life of the people of Bhaktapur most of which are highly appreciated by the local people. BM which has been represented mostly by the Jyapus for the last 20 years seems to have been successful in acting as the agent to bring about those positive changes. Such changes are well manifested in the lives of Jyapus and overall development of the BM. The paragraphs to follow will highlight some of such changes which can be regarded as the result of political will of the leading political party and its distinct policy for the development of the BM. BM has championed in maintaining democratic practices in its everyday functioning. Transparency International has awarded BM with recognition of "Island of Integrity’ for its decade long anti-corruption standing and transparency. Safa Bhaktapur However, the only area in which the local government has earned wide popularity is the safai. Clean Bhaktapur has been the agenda as well as outcome of efforts of BM. As there is a longstanding history of safai movement in Bhaktapur, the aim has been changed. If the safai movement was used in the past to organize people and disseminate the ‘communist’ ideology to the masses, the emphasis on safai is concerned today with public health and attracting more tourists. However, in both of these cases, people’s participation has remained a key issue. Safai now has turned out to be a measuring rod of the performance of municipality.

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To manage the dirt of the municipalility area, the BM has employed 196 staffs who are traditionally called ‘sweepers’. Among these sweepers, 64 belong to the traditional sweeper castes known as podes, who are supposed to be the untouchables. The rest 132 belong to the Jyapu and non-Jyapu Newars whose caste ranks are comparatively higher than the Podes. For the Newars living outside Kathmandu, this might seem strange. The Newars consider it a taboo for anyone except the Podes to be involved in the collection of garbage. The involvement of the Newars other than Podes in garbage collection in Bhaktapur is an outcome also of a political event of the past. After the NWPP swept virtually all the elected posts in the local level election of 1982, the traditional pode sweepers of the BM held a strike. These Podes who were supporters of other than NWPP had put forward their demands which were difficult to be fulfilled. To solve the immediate problem, the BM decided to replace the traditional Pode sweepers by the local non-pode Newars. The new occupation of the non-Podes as the garbage collectors was, however, a strong move which could be considered a revolt against the traditional norms of the Newars. The non-Pode employes of the BM, therefore, had to bear heavy criticisms and sometimes social boycott because of their involvement in garbage collection. At this difficult juncture, the BM tried to portray garbage collection as the ‘pure’ task and also tried its best to dissociate garbage collection with the traditional caste status of the untouchable Podes. To fulfil this objective, the BM, drawing events associated with the lives of Mao and Gandhi, encouraged and even glorified the task of garbage collection as a significant social service. The BM even published the photographs of the garbage collectors in its monthly magazine titled Bhaktapur vis-à-vis the pictures of great political leaders, writers, and other important personalities. Similarly, the BM made it an obligatory provision for the chairman of all wards and encouraged the high-caste people including Brahmins and reputed citizens such as doctors, engineers, etc. to sweep the roads occasionally. According to BM statistics, now 72 percent of the households in the city has well managed toilet. Transformation of Bhaktapur from fohar (dirty) to safa sahar (clean)

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SURESH/SANJEEV: Local Movements, Political Processes... 193 is not only a prima-facie fact for an outsider but it also the most acclaimed fact for Bhaktapurians themselves. Janata Prasad Mitra, an old political activist, now runs a book stall near Durbar Square, remembers that previously, every year Bhaktapur town used to suffer from plague of cholera which used to claim several lives during the rainy summer seasons. Now the dwellers have got rid of that, just because the town has been clean now. Education and Safai In addition to safai, the BM has played equally crucial roles in the promotion of education among its inhabitants. Probably BM is the only municipality in the country which has undertaken different successful projects to enhance the educational capacity of its people. Comrade Bijukche justifies why his party, and consequently BM gave so much emphasis on education. He recalls the difficulties he faced when he had to organise people who were non-literate, and therefore, could not read the parties’ documents and pamphlets. From this difficult experience, the communist party workers started a campaign of ‘non-formal education’ so that in Bijukchhe’s words, the people are aware of what is happening within the country and in other parts of the world. The BM’s success in the educational fields can be realised by the fact that the literacy rate of Bhaktapur city has more than doubled in every twenty years – 27 percent in 1971, 33 percent in 1981, 62 percent in 1991, and 74 percent in 2001 (CBS 2001), which supposedly rises by a few percent up to the date, is an outcome of ‘mass educational awareness’ (Hachhethu, 2004). This, for Comrade Bijukchhe, could not have been possible, if his party men had not oriented their efforts towards this direction. Non- Formal Education (NFE) campaign they initiated while the political parties and their political activities were still banned, during the Panchyat regime, or the efforts they made through a legal platform, i.e. municipality, after 1980s, and more prominently after 1990s in particular. There can be many factors which have motivated the local communist party and the BM to work towards promoting education in Bhaktapur. However, the most important of such motivating factors seems to be

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safai. As the chairperson of NWPP, Com. Bijukchhe told us, " They felt that literacy and education was necessary for the people of Bhaktapur because without education they would not be able to understand the texts in the pamphlets of the BM and NWPP". Com Bijukchhe also feels that investment in education is directed to transforming Bhaktapur into an ‘imagined city’ as envisioned by him in his acclaimed work Saya Barsha Pachhiko Bhaktapur (Bhaktapur after 100 years). Tourism Tradition and Safai Tourism has remained an independent and perennial source of income of BM which is not controlled and regulated by the central government. Considering the economic benefit BM gets from tourism, BM has put all the possible efforts to attract tourists in Bhaktapur. The transformed image of Bhaktapur from a fohor sahar to safa sahar is both reason as well as outcome of ‘tourism.’ For its architectural richnessxii Bhaktapur is known as the Rome of Asia. It has been one of the major attractions of tourists coming to Nepal, for those who come for cultural tourism in particular; Bhaktapur has remained an unavoidable destination. For others, too, this cultural city – a living heritage - has remained equally favourable destination. Bhaktapur, a monthly magazine published by BM quotes in every issue: "Were here nothing else in Nepal save the Darbar Square of Bhaktapur. It would be amply worth making a journey halfway round the globe to see. From the stand-point of the architect and the artist, Bhaktapur is a cave of Alladin. It is jumble of architectural fantasies, a vast store-house of the treasures of Newars art. In the Darbar Square alone are enough of carvings & statues to fill up a score of great museum to overflowing." (E.A. Powel, 1929.The Last Home of Mystery. London.). Not surprisingly, tourism has been the biggest source of income for the BM. It introduced tourism service charge from 16 July 1996, which is 10$ for non-SAARC tourists and NRs 50 for SAARC tourists now. In the year 2003/04 BM collected NRs. 1706250 from tourists from SAARC countries and NRs. 62984778, that is total of NRs. 64691028 from a

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SURESH/SANJEEV: Local Movements, Political Processes... 195 total of 119039 tourists and this is the highest share of BM’s income source. For its outstanding efforts in preserving cultural heritage, BM has been awarded ‘First Honourable Mention from Asia for 1998-99’ by UNESCO; and has been recognised as ‘Good Standing Member’ by Organisation of World Heritage Cities (OWHC). Most importantly, the income from tourism is expended according to BM’s overall goal of making a Bhaktapur an ideal city following NWPP’s broader ideology and interest. BM’s larger share of income comes from tourism but larger share of expenditure is allocated for safai and education. The members of the BM have a vision of making Bhaktapur a cultural city – an ultimate tourist destination, for which the city has to be clean and all NWPP members have invariably acted in that direction. Unlike the local governments of other tourist centres of Nepal, the BM is successful in maintaining safai which is both the cause and effect of successful promotion of tourism industry in Bhaktapur. The overt and excessive interest of the BM in maintaining safai is, thus, directly related with the tourism industry which is again directly related to the health and well-being of the people. The difference between the tourism industry of other parts of the country and Bhaktapur’s tourism industry lies in the fact that Bhaktapur has developed a concrete method of utilising its income for the welfare of the local people. Safai, we argue, should be considered one of such methods. Conclusions A program of social transformation – towards more modernity, towards more democracy - can achieve its desired goals if it takes into consideration the social, economic and cultural experiences of the people concerned. It is, therefore, important for a program of social transformation to be compatible with the constraints and opportunities faced by the people in their everyday lives (Ferguson, 1994). This is what motivates people to be both the agents and beneficiaries of social changes. Hence, ‘grassroot participatory democracy’ – builds on indigenous political traditions, based on the tradition of voluntarism and self-help, and a spirit that extols the committed and total involvement of all the members of a

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community in the formulation and implementation of policies for the community’s welfare’ (Paley,2002:474). Otherwise, “unless democracy becomes participatory in both nuance and substance it is always in peril” (Baral, 2004). The case of Bhaktapur clearly illustrates this. During the Panchayat era, the communist party workers went among the people with the agenda to improve their conditions of living. Their participation in Safai Abhiyan and Bhumisudhar Andolan are prime examples in this connection. After 1990, when the same communist party members rose to power and formed the local government,they tried their best to give people what they needed most-such as safai, education, healthcare, employment and so on. Ideologies hold no power in themselves to change a society. What is required is people’s active involvement in the processes of determining not only the contents but also the course of social transformation. If people actively participate in the process of determining what needs to be changed and how, desired social changes are not difficult to obtain. In Nepal, few programs of social and economic transformation are based on people’s own perception about how they can be made fruitful to them. The BDP’s failure in winning co-operation from the local people can be interpreted as the result of its reluctance to involve the local people in its development and renovation programs. The BM, as we see it, is different in this regard. Even today, the BM implements a program after the concerned people adequately discuss and debate, and reach to the conclusion about how it should be designed and implemented in their respective areas. The case of the unparalleled success achieved by the BM suggests that transparency and easy access to information are preconditions for the success of any program of social change. The BM is probably the only municipality of Nepal which is transparent about its every activity. It publishes not only its monthly incomes and expenditures but also the decisions made by the municipality board in its monthly magazine titled Bhaktapur. Similarly, the BM publishes in Bhaktapur every important issue which concerns the life of the city and its inhabitants. For example, when the plan for the renovation of Pachpanne Jhyale Durbar (an old palace with fifty-five windows) was undergoing, the BM published the complete architectural design of the proposed building including its +

SURESH/SANJEEV: Local Movements, Political Processes... 197 estimated cost. In our view, this custom has helped create a constructive a democratic public sphere where people openly think and discuss about how their local government is working and should work. Another crucial aspect of the functioning of the BM is its leadership pattern. As we see it, the leaders of the BM possess practical knowledge about social, economic and cultural conditions of the people with ‘historical sensitivity’ (Donham, 1990) and are committed to bring about positive changes in these conditions. The NWPP’s traditional policy of involving the low-caste Jyapus in the leadership of the municipality seems to have contributed to creating such a welcome environment. The high participation of Jyapus in the leadership of BM (nearly 90 per cent of the BM’s elected representatives belonged to the comparatively less privileged Jyapu community until the last local level election of 1997) has played important roles in promoting the participation of the real beneficiaries in the programs of Bhaktapur’s social change and economic development. If Bolman and Deal (quoted in Baral 2004) are to be followed, leadership is an ability to pursue others to do what you want (power); to motivate people to get things done through persuasion; and vision. Leadership is, thus, facilitation which empowers people. In this regard, leaders of the BM and guiding party NWPP seem to have possessed all these qualities in them. Thus, our study of the ‘history, power and ideology’ (Donham 1990) involved in the management of fohor in Bhaktapur suggests that freedom of expression, free elections, etc. are the means but not the ends of any democracy. A democratic environment can be established by strengthening the public spheres where people freely discuss and evaluate the conditions which affect their everyday lives. However, the success of democracy is judged by the people in terms of the substantive changes in their conditions of living. In the BM, we can see a unique scenario in which freedom of expression and free elections have been successfully utilised for the progress and prosperity of the municipality and its inhabitants. The most important preconditions for the success of a democracy, as we described above, are transparency of the government, participation of people, and commitment of the leaders. The BM, as we see it, to a large extent qualifies in all these regards.

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When people have the opportunity to discuss the problems and opportunities associated with their everyday lives among themselves, it is likely that they can also discover the measures to reduce the problems and utilise the opportunities. One of the most important reasons behind the active participation of the people in BM seems to be the long political process initiated and strengthened by NWPP. As we described above, the NWPP’s policy of involving local people in development works to organise resist against the erstwhile Panchayat system sowed the first seeds of people’s participation in the process of social transformation. Finally, if good politics and good governance are synonyms phrases: development is possible only through the good governance, and good governance is possible only through good politics. Good politics and good governance could rise up from participatory politics and sense of responsibility towards people and become transparent (www.ndf2004.gov.np). BM establishes a distinct example of this, despite the fact that there are still a lot more uneasy but ‘right questions’ are yet to be answered. Acknowledgements: Centre for the Studies of Developing Societies (CSDS), Delhi, commissioned this paper to us under its 'Democracy in South Asia' study project. We are indebted to LokNiti, CSDS , Delhi, and, NCCS, Kathmandu for entrusting this study to us. We are particularly thankful to Dr. Krishna Hachhethu, (NCCS), Edzia Carvalho and Peter Ronald deSouza (CSDS), Comrade Narayanman Bijukchhe, Chaityaraj Shakya, Ishwor Khowju, Ramila Shilpakar, Sagar Shrestha (Bhaktapur) for providing us valuable information and support. Many people in Bhaktapur have shared their valuable ideas and opinions with us; we would like to thank them all. We are grateful to Dr. David Gellner, Oxford University, who, upon our request, provided pertinent comments and suggestions. An abridged version of this paper was presented in the International Seminar in Kathmandu ('Social Sciences in a Multicultural World', December 11-13, 2006) organised by Sociological Anthropological Society of Nepal (SASON), we are thankful to all those who commented

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SURESH/SANJEEV: Local Movements, Political Processes... 199 on our paper. We take sole responsibility for all shortcomings and remaining errors. Endnotes: i

Bhaktapur is the smallest of 75 districts of the country in terms of geographical area. It is 119 square kilometers in size. There district has two municipalities (Madhyapur Thimi and Bhaktapur Municipality) and 16 Village Development Committees. Total population of Bhkatapur according to 2001 census is 2, 25,561 where 51.29 are male and 48.71 female (CBS 2001). In terms of land use, out of 13846 ha, 80.21 percent of land is cultivable land, 14.06 percent forest area, and, 5.74 percent is settlement area. Bhaktapur Municipality covers 6.88 square kilometers with a total population of 73, 790, i.e. 32.71 percent of the district population (CBS 2001).

ii According to available source, municipality in Bhktapur was established back in 1949. It was called as municipality from July 1949 to July 1950. Then it was called as Nagar Panchyat from July 1950 to May 1953, Nagarpalika from May 1953 to September 1962, again Nagar Panchyat from September 1962 to September 1988, then this was called as Nagar Panchyat Samiti till May 1990 which then was termed as Nagar Palika under the multiparty democracy. However, all those terms are almost synonymous for Municipality. iii More than 60 per cent of Bhaktapur’s total population comprises of Jyapus (see Hathechhu 2004 p38). However, the term Jaypus is not preferable term for Bhaktapurians, rather they use the term Kishan, the farmer. Gellner (1997) views in case of Bhaktaopur that ‘communism can be an ideology which masks a kind of Jyapu ethnicity). iv There are more than 172 temples, 36 ponds and kundas, 77 stone taps, 19 mathas (monasteries), 37 sattals, 152 wells, all with religious and social cultural values in Bhaktapur city.

References Baral, L.R., Hachhethu, K., Khanal, K.P., Kumar, D., Sharma, H. 2004 Nepal:Local Leadership &Governance. New Delhi: Adroit Publishers. Bhaktapur Muncipality Bhaktapur Monthly Magazine published by BM. Various Issues. Bijukche, N.M. 2059 BSSaya Barsha Pachiko Bhaktapur (Bhaktapur after a hundred years, in Nepali). Bhaktapur: Kendriay Prakashan Samiti, Nepal Majdur Kishan Party. +

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Bista, D.B. 1990Fatalism and Development: Nepal’s Struggle for Modernisation. Calcutta: Orient Longman. CBS. 2001Population Census (National Report). Kathmandu: Central Bureau of Statistics. ----------------Population of Nepal (Central Development Region). Kathmandu: Central Bureau of Statistics. ---------------Population of Nepal (Village Development Committees/Municipalities) Kathmandu: Central Bureau of Statistics. Dhakal, S. Sangroula, K. Bataman, G. 2004 Whose War? Economic and Sociocultural Impacts of Nepal’s Maoist-Government Conflict. Kathmandu: NGO Federation Nepal. Donham, D.L.1999 Marxist Modern: An Ethnographic history of Ethiopian Revolution Berkley: University of California Press. ---------------- 1990History, Power, Ideology; Central Issues in Marxism and Anthropology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Ferguson, J. 1994TheAnti-PoliticsMachine: "Development," Depoliticisation, and Bureaucratic Power in Lesotho. London: University of Minnesota Press. Gellner, D.N. 1997‘Caste, Communalism, and Communism: Newars and the Nepalese State’, in David N. Gellner, Joanna Pfaff-Czarnecka, & John Whelpton (eds.) Nationalism and Ethnicity in a Hindu Kingdom: The Politics of Culture in Contemporary Nepal. harwood Academic publishers. Grieve, G. 2002‘Signs of Tradition: Compiling a History of development, Politics, and Tourism in Bhaktapur, Nepal’, Studies in Nepali History and Society, 7(2): 281-307 Hachhethu, K. 2004‘Social Change and Leadership Building: A Case Study of Bhaktapur City’. Paper presented in a Workshop on The Dynamics of Social and Political Change in Nepal, organized by ILCAA, Tokyo, 28-29 February. Haaland, A. 1982Bhaktapur: A Town Changing: Process Influenced by Bhaktapur Development Project. Bangkok: Craftsman Press. Laporte, D. 1978 History of Shit. Cambridge: MIT Lawoti, M. 2005Towards a Democratic NEPAL: Inclusive Political Institution for a Multicultural Society. Delhi: Sage Publication.

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SURESH/SANJEEV: Local Movements, Political Processes... 201 Liechty. M. 2003Suitably Modern: Making Middle Class Culture in a New Consumer Society. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Levy, R. 1990Mesocosm: Hinduism and the Organisation of a Traditional Newar City in Nepal. Berkley: University of California Press. Mishra, C. 1987‘Development and Underdevelopment: A Preliminary Sociological Perspective’, Occasional Papers in Sociology and Anthropology. Kathmandu: Central Department of Sociology/Anthropology, TU. 1:105134. Paley, J. 2002‘Towards an Anthropology of Democracy’. Annual Review of Anthropology 2002 (31): 469-96. Pandey, D.R. 1999Nepal’s Failed Development: Reflections on the Mission and the Maladies. Parish, S.M. 1997 Hierarchy and Discontent: Culture and Politics of consciousness in Caste Society. Delhi: Oxford University Press. Scheibler, G. & Scheibler-Shrestha, N. 2000 ‘On the Urbanity of Traditional Newar City’, in Ram Pratap Thapa & Joachim Baaden (eds.) Nepal: Myths and Realities. Delhi: Book Faith India. Vaday, A. 1997 Events, Causes, and Explanation: Studies in Anthropology and Human Ecology. New York: Guilford Press. www.ndf2004.gov.np

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DEPENDENCY AND UNDERDEVELOPMENT: THE NEPALESE CONTEXT Samira Luitel * Background The World Bank report (1991) mentioned that “Nepal is one of the world's poorest countries. It ranks 115th in per capita GNP out of 120 countries. With respect to life expectancy, it ranks 103rd out of 118 reporting countries. It is one of the constellations of countries characterized by rapid population increase, low or negative per capita GDP growth and a slow transition out of a subsistence agricultural economy. It exhibits many of the characteristics of similar sub-Saharan African economies, including a limited productive land base, a land-locked location, and a very low level of exports.” The reasons behind it comprise the geographical isolation, poor internal communication system and difficult terrain. It is in its early stage of development characterized by an unskilled work-force and weak managerial capacity and a failure to transform agricultural productivity. Nepal is a land-locked country and is a high cost economy that suffers from higher border prices for imports and exports of goods due to transportation costs. But unlike other landlocked countries (Switzerland, Austria, etc), Nepal has not got any compensating advantages. For this reason, Nepal has to depend totally on India for the transfer of goods, and is obliged to trade from a position of weakness which is the function of geographical, economic and political reasons. The other main factors of underdevelopment are internal inequalities in the spatial and social distribution of resources and income and investment in low productive areas. Deterioration in the general * Samira Luitel holds Ph. D. in Sociology from the University of Alberta, Canada. She is a Professor in Sociology at the Research Center for Education and Development of Tribhuvan University.

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SAMIRA LUITEL: Dependency and Under-Development... 203 economic base often obscured by financial support from outside the country and by excessively heavy use of the crucial but limited resource of the country also is a contributing factor. Underdevelopment, in the context of Nepal, apart from the geographical, economic and political reasons, can be explained in terms of the exploitation of the masses by the ruling class, both in Rana and Panchayat periods and its total dependence on foreign aid and on neighbouring countries. There is little concern for resource mobilization e.g., the natural as well as human capital resources. In this regard, Frank (1967) writes: In all capitalist underdeveloped countries, the power behind the throne, be it military or civil, rests with the people who occupy the top roles in the economic organizations and particularly with those who have commercial and financial ties to the developed metropolis. The above remark of Frank could be applied in the case of Nepal during Rana regime and Panchayat period. Though Nepal was never colonized, the alliance of the then British rulers in India with the Rana oligarchies (prior to 1950) was able to siphon off the vital human resource in the form of soldiers (which could contribute to national development) and also small and scarce natural resources (raw materials and primary products). Nepal was then in virtual insulation from outside pressure for change (Blakie et.al,1980). With total ban on public education and with no accessible road to link the country, the rulers were able to keep the public in complete darkness and thus could use the scarce natural resources for their own benefit and luxury consumption. The power relation of the ruling class with the British imperialist in India was the main cause of economic stagnation in the country. This served the purpose of both the ruling class in Nepal, who were interested in staying in power at the expense of the people, and the British to exploit the poor nations. Baran (1975) explains how these power relations work to exploit the small nations where he says that "the Imperialist countries are opposed to the industrialization of the underdeveloped countries and consequently they try to maintain the old ruling classes in power. “Development in Third World, according to him, can only be achieved through a

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determined struggle against the internal conservative forces which are propped up by imperialism. The History of Underdevelopment During both the Rana and Panchayat periods, the government bureaucracy was concerned to maintain internal security and to appropriate the surplus produced by farmers and others in the form of taxes, and profits made by traders, to maintain the state apparatus and the continued control of the ruling classes. Blakie et al (1979:22) illustrate this situation as follows: The echelons of the bureaucracy, particularly in central government and administration, derive overwhelmingly from the land-owning classes, especially from the aristocracy; they also include a significant number of what might be termed 'traditional officials', predominantly of Brahmin and Chhetri castes, employed under the Ranas as civil servants but acting in effect as ‘clients’ of the aristocracy, and still in post despite the formal termination of Rana rule in 1951. The Panchayat system, which was imposed in 1960 by dismantling the parliamentary system, was not different from the Rana oligarchy in the sense that a few of the elites and upper class people were able to exercise their monopoly rule by exploiting the masses under the umbrella of the throne. The rule of aristocratic Panchayat system for 30 years had ultimate control over state affairs and over politics, with the involvement of substantial landowners and aristocrats in the higher ranks of both the army and the administration.At the top decision making level was the King who was above constitution assisted by the palace secretariat. Beenhakker (1973:23) has described the system in the best way: During the past decade, the Crown has become the pivot around which the traditional interest groups, the sacred elite, the military, and the landowning aristocracy, still revolve. These groups gain access to the Royal Palace through their supporters and representatives on the staff of the Palace Secretariat. The Palace Secretariat has become the nerve-centre of administration and political structure in Nepal, even though its dominant policy and decision-making role is not defined via the law or within the Constitution of this country. The function of the Palace Secretariat can be closely compared with the previous, all-powerful +

SAMIRA LUITEL: Dependency and Under-Development... 205 function of the hereditary Rana Prime Minister's Office. That is, the Palace Secretariat today functions not only as a relay station between the King and the government, but also as a decision-making component, frequently using the Central Government's Secretariat as an instrument for the implementation of decisions. This situation has led to a 'dual government' structure. The Panchayat bureaucracy reflected most of the inequalities prevalent in Nepalese society as a whole. The perpetuating of privilege, patronage and discriminating attitudes adopted by the system was responsible for the damage to the country's prospect. The structure was mainly based on ascriptive roles where the recruitment of the officials and even the technical staff were made by the politically appointed administrators or by their transient bosses. The theorists in the dependency school explain the very nature of the system based on ascriptive roles as the cause of 'keeping underdeveloped countries underdeveloped'. This example can be found in case of Nepal. Blakie et. al (1979:23) have illustrated it very well: In its social and spatial structure, the bureaucracy reflects most of the inequalities prevalent in Nepalese society as a whole. But the perpetuation of privilege, patronage, discrimination, regional and ethnic inequality within the apparatus of state is damaging to Nepal's prospects because of the fact that, it is this essentially conservative apparatus that would have to conceive, plan and implement measures capable of preventing the coming crisis. So far, despite the existence of some men of high caliber and commitment in the higher reaches of the bureaucracy, the overwhelming tendency has been conservative and 'traditional' in the worst sense, and effectiveness of state intervention limited. Such a situation made the technichal elites find it necessary to be involved in the game of intra-Secretarial politics, to the detriment of conditions in their fields of specialization. This very situation was able to affect the programme of modernization and industrialization in Nepal without the proper recognition and utilization of the technical elites. Dependency and Donor Interest Nepal's poor economic condition and lack of natural resources has made +

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it dependent on foreign aid. Within the decades of sixties and seventies, the volume of aid to Nepal was increased substantially, and the major aid donors were India, China, and the USA. Experiences have shown that the donor agencies provide aid with their own vested interest. For example, The American aid projects in the early years were specifically designed to fight communism with the encouragement of the American system of education. Another example was that the major part of the aid given by India and China was to road building projects that linked their boundary with Nepal again for their own political interest. Shah (1973:225) argues: It is only natural for the Chinese and the Indians to be interested in the roads connecting Nepal with their own territories and also in those that make a quick push towards each other's territories. The Indian aid for the construction of the Kathmandu-Raxaul road and the Chinese aid for the construction of the Kathmandu-Kodari road can be easily explained in these terms. The geographical position of Nepal as a land-locked country limits and restricts its policy of total dependence on India, as well. The longestablished dominance of Indian capitalists in the industrial sector of Nepal has pushed back the Nepali entrepreneurs to work as the petty traders. The Nepalese have become the cheap labour force for the Indian business groups as well as to other interest groups in India. Pointing out the situation, Rana and Malla (1973:223) write: While the very small size of Nepal makes trade essential, the landlocked position of the country chokes its ability to trade. Not only is it land-locked, but land-locked in an extreme fashion. Other land-locked countries- Switzerland for example may choose among several avenues of access to the sea through different countries. Thus, the competition between the several countries offering transit facilities provides most land-locked countries with the ability to bargain for easy terms of transit. But in Nepal's case even the building of the Kodari road from Kathmandu to the Chinese border has not altered the Indian monopoly over access to the sea. This dependence for trade and transit on India, according to Rana and Malla, has virtually served to reinforce India's monopoly position +

SAMIRA LUITEL: Dependency and Under-Development... 207 in the Nepalese market and the ability to perpetuate that monopoly through international trade agreements which Nepal has little choice but to accept. The relationship between India and Nepal can be characterized as one between centre and periphery or metropolis and satellite according to the term used by dependency theorists in the context of exploitation. Frank (1982:240) explains such relationships in the following way: The same historical process of capitalist expansion generates the continuous development of the metropolis and the continuous underdevelopment of the satellites and the development of the metropolis necessitates the underdevelopment of the satellite, or ‘development of underdevelopment’ each cause and are caused by the other in the total development of capitalism. In this context, the structure of domination and exploitation as characteristics of relations between developed and underdeveloped countries can be applied in the case of India and Nepal. But the relationship between India and Nepal cannot be simply described as one between two spatially defined regions, one dominating and exploiting the other but rather to the complex structures representing differing and often conflicting economic and political interests. So far as the trade relation with India is concerned, it is in the interest of Indian industrialists, as a class in India, to penetrate Nepalese markets and encourage their expansion which keeps Nepalese industrialization to the minimum because of the limited resources. The poor Nepalese are then compelled to work as a cheap labour force for the Indian Industrialists. The interest of the ruling classes in Nepal and the capitalist Transnational Corporations (TNCs) in India play an important role in these relationships. Blakie et. al (1980:76) illustrate this relationship as: In so far as these interests do not conflict with the view of national interest held by the Indian government (itself representing the interest of several different classes within Indian economy and society), the realization of these business interests is facilitated by drawing up treaties between the Indian and Nepalese governments relating to matters of trade and tariffs. Within peripheral Nepal, it is clearly in the interests of the dominant fraction of ruling class to accept the terms of such treaties in order to maintain amicable relations with India and thus to ensure a

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substantial flow of foreign aid to support a failing economy, and to finance enterprises not antagonistic to the interest of the aristocratic landowning class still in power in Nepal. According to dependency theorists, such a situation is perpetuated because political leaders in the dependent countries are generally reduced to being mere pawns of international capitalism. Given their structurally subordinate position within the system of international capitalism, these leaders come to recognize their class interests as bound up with those of foreign capital. As Gunder Frank (1973) argues, they “accept dependence consciously and willingly” and as “junior partners of foreign capital”, they impose policies that increase dependence on the imperialist metropolis. Much of Nepal's dependence on India has often created disturbances and turmoil in the country. Instances have occurred which have shown that disagreement upon certain matters in the renegotiation of a previous trade and transit treaty, India threatened Nepal by holding up fuel supplies in 1971 and 1988. This situation perhaps was instrumental in helping Nepal to reinstall democratic government in 1990. Foreign Aid and Dependency Nepal's dependency, apart from that on India, is on foreign aid and this dependency has been increasing. There is a danger of institutionalization of such aid and donations which might diminish the motivation of the people for personal achievement and hence undermine people's participation. As Nepal, being a poor and helpless country, the ready provision of foreign aid emulates an expected pattern reinforcing a sense of dependence and a helpless mentality leading to slackness in motivation for self-improvement. In the observation of D.B Bista, it is a threat to the country. He (1972:147) sumps up this situation as: The threat is not simply of economic dependency but of a form of ingrained social and psychological dependency as well. There increases the danger of developing a syndrome of being 'a poor nation', so that it becomes a matter of fact for people; cultivating a sense of pride and confidence in themselves becomes an extremely difficult task for the majority of people at any level. +

SAMIRA LUITEL: Dependency and Under-Development... 209 Most of the foreign aid goes back to the pocket of the donor agencies in the name of seminars and expertise. The salary of a foreign adviser is ten times higher than the national consultant. Shrestha (1983) argues that "foreign experts and advisors are overpaid, more than thirty to fifty times their counterparts in the Nepali government." He further commentsNepal is 'over advised and under-nourished'. Nepal's excessive dependence on foreign aid, with no proper infrastructure, is leading to underdevelopment itself. Lohani (1983) shares the observation of a National Planning commission as follows: The transplantation of foreign aid in a country without a social structure that is conducive to development can result in a cancerous type of growth ... The problem is that only a few countries among the bilateral donors to Nepal have contributed aid in a manner that can lead to selfsustained growth... Foreign aid usually helps produce generalists who attend seminars but who do not work in the field. According to Allahar (1989), too much dependence affects the major decisions regarding what to produce, how much to produce, and what prices to charge are often made outside of the countries in question. He further argues that the economies of the peripheral countries are thus distorted or biased toward activities that favour development in the centres of advanced capitalism. It reinforces a vast bulk of the population in the country to live in backwardness with low levels of skill, education, health care, and housing which he calls 'economic rape' of the country's wealth as directly related to its continued dependence and backwardness. Nepal had no proper economic planning of any kind prior to 1951 and priorities were given to the urban sectors which was one of the major causes of underdevelopment in Nepal. As education was totally banned till 1950 by the then ruling class, there was lack of trained personnel at all levels to implement any kind of development programmes. Even though commitments were made by the government's bureaucrats such plans would achieve a little success without systematic planning and priorities in implementation. Despite the various efforts, the Fourth Five Year Plan (1970-1975) recognized that; "although a number of developmental works have been undertaken in different sectors of the economy, there has not been virtually any noteworthy changes in the

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basic condition of agriculture" (National Planing commission 1970: 5). Even in planning some of the urban areas were prioritized with special consideration to Kathmandu valley and the fruits of development could be extracted by the most elite groups residing in the valley rather than the rural masses. If the concept of centre and periphery can be applied within the country, the uneven development in Nepalese context can be explained very well. Malla and Rana (1973:20) explain this in the following way: In terms of development expenditures, a disproportionately large part of the total investment in the last two decades has gone to Kathmandu and its surrounding areas and to a lesser extent to the eastern Terai. This has gone so far that the gulf between Kathmandu Valley and the subsistence economies of the hill areas of Nepal is growing similar to the gulf between the developed countries and underdeveloped 'third' world. To the problem of cultural heterogeneity, the process of development is adding the problem of economic heterogeneity to such degree that truly disturbing dualities may emerge in the nation. These differences between areas are echoed by differences between social strata. The two decades of development have seen the emergence of a privileged stratum which skims the cream of development opportunities and benefits. The obvious result of this was that in many respects Kathmandu was provided with better facilities; such as education, health and public works, than any other parts of the country. Kathmandu thus became richer and more developed while the rest of the country had to face the crisis of even obtaining the essential commodities. The main reason behind this is the vested interest of the capitalist class who mainly reside in Kathmandu. In this context, Sklair (1991:5) shares: Between 1970 and 1990, the distribution of income on a per capita basis in some Third World countries became more unequal, the top 10 percent got relatively more and the bottom 10 percent got relatively less, while the average per capita income roughly doubled in this period. Were these countries becoming richer or poorer? The rich in these societies certainly became richer, on both measures. The sky-scrapers in the Kathmandu valley and the scarcity of even +

SAMIRA LUITEL: Dependency and Under-Development... 211 basic facilities such as health and essential commodities in most of the rural parts of the country are the examples of this situation. Centralized Planning and Unequal Development Planning was usually undertaken by the bureaucrats in Kathmandu. In most cases, it was done with the assistance of the foreign experts, who were either not familiar or not very much serious about the geographic condition of the country. They also failed to take into account the peculiarities of the geographical areas. In addition to this, when a concrete action was taken, it was "often simply a response to the genuine planning initiative begun at the local level, or in response to a political decision or an agreement made under the chakari system, which has been passed on to the planning bureaucracy as a directive." Bista,1992). Thus enormous financial resources devoted to planning in the past have ended with fewer results. In this regard, Pandey (1983:282) who himself was a bureaucrat has commented: In spite of almost four decades of foreign assistance, agriculture has not benefited; the poor have been bypassed; the needs of women have not been understood; the relations of production and distribution of power have become worse; and technical assistance has not contributed to the improvement of administrative capability. The policies made so far were not based on the principle of self reliance or of raising the capabilities of the people but meeting the deficit budget. The bureaucrats and the policy advisors (mostly the donor agencies) decided to borrow whatever loan they could get. The introduction of structural adjustment programmes with World Bank/IMF loans is such an example. As for the World Bank, it does not make unconditional loans; where the borrower has to agree and some of these conditions require policy changes. In case of Nepal, the World Bank report (1990: x) writes: During the Sixth Plan (1980/81-1984/85), growing frustration with past economic performance manifested itself in surging public expenditures to accelerate the pace of development, causing the overall budget deficit to rise from 6.1% of GDP in 1980/81 to 12.3% in 1982/

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83. This led to strong demand pressures reflected in higher domestic prices, a doubling of the current account deficit and a substantial fall in international reserves. While GDP growth was higher than in past years, it became clear that the growth was not sustainable. Consequently, towards the beginning of the Seventh Plan, the Government implemented a stabilization programme, which was supported by a Fund Standby Arrangement in 1985. Realizing that macro-economic stability by itself would not lead to accelerated growth, the Government implemented a structural adjustment programme (SAP) to address some longer-term constraints to growth. Simultaneously, the Government launched a farreaching initiative to meet the basic needs of the populace. The stabilization measures of SAP programmes included actions to relieve pressures on the budget by restraining public expenditures, especially in the regular budget, increasing revenues, and tightening monetary policies. The money was devalued by about 15% to strengthen Nepal's external position (World Bank, 1991). Does it really strengthen the position is a big question? Pointing out this situation, P. Sarkar (1991:2309) writes: Devaluation is not an appropriate policy to tackle this type of structural payment deficit. In many cases, devaluation has an inflationary impact with little effect on balance of payments deficits, as due to structural reasons, total export supply cannot be stepped up while demand for import goods remain price inelastic. The IMF/World Bank policy, in the condition of Nepal, does not seem to achieve the purpose because of the poor infrastructure, lack of entrepreneurs and National commitment which may lead even to a worse condition. To quote Sarkar (ibid:2308) again: The IMF/World Bank policy of reduction of state influence on the economy also hampers development as it does not automatically lead to an increase in private investment. In many LDCs, due to the absence of a national entrepreneurial class, only the state can take the initiative for economic development. A reduction in state investment frequently leads to a reduction in aggregate investment." Giving the example of the study done by Mosley et al (1990), he further elaborates that "SAL" conditionality, in conjunction with IMF demand-related conditionality, +

SAMIRA LUITEL: Dependency and Under-Development... 213 has given rise to a decline in the adjusting country's investment as a share of the GDP. This contradicts their much published objective of adjustment with growth. Much criticism has been made on the IMF policies and programmes. Some have claimed that the IMF policies have helped to create impoverishment and a collapse of world commodity prices. In this context Chossudovsky (1991:2527)) writes: The IMF sponsored macro-economic stabilization and 'structural adjustment programme' (SAP) constitutes a powerful instrument of economic restructuring which affects the livelihood of millions of people. The SAP bears a direct relationship to this process of global impoverishment. The application of IMF's 'economic medicine' has lead to the compression of real earnings and to the reinforcement of the cheap labour export economy: the same 'menu' of budgetary austerity, trade liberalization and privatization is applied simultaneously in more than 70 indebted countries in the Third World and eastern Europe. Debtor nations forgo economic sovereignty and control over fiscal and monetary policy, the central bank and the ministry of finance are reorganized, state institutions are undone and an 'economic tutelage' is installed. A 'parallel government' which bypasses civil society is established by the international financial institutions (IFIs). Countries which do not conform to the IMF's 'performance' targets are blacklisted. Traditional Bureaucracy and Global Economy Nepal entered the global capitalist economy when it became the member of UN at a stage of transition, from traditional to modern value system that needed a highly disciplined and cultivated leadership cadre. But the historic trend of dictatorship followed by the Panchayat system where the Palace Secretariat played a key role in making the decision of the Central Government's policies.This value system was communicated to the Central Government's Secretariat and the influential Palace Secretariat frequently appeared to be one of the central institutions maintaining a status quo in order to preserve the elite's vested interests. This value system was not the only impediment to the further rationalization of the administrative machinery but was a factor resulting in a frustrated and

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demoralized attitude of the new administrative elites in Nepal. The engineers, scientists, doctors and other specialists, who had spent years abroad and were really enthusiastic in the development of the country could not use their potentials in that bureaucratic structure. This situation curtailed the further progress of development structures in Nepal. Joshi and Rose (1966:517) explain this situation: ... Instead of being valued for their specialized skills, they (the new administrative elite) are often treated with contumely by the politically appointed administrators and even more so by the administrator's transient political bosses. In such a situation, the technical elites often find it necessary to devote attention primarily to the complicated and fascinating game of intra-Secretariat politics, to the detriment of contribution in their fields of specialization. Without the proper recognition and utilization of the technical elites, however, it is inconceivable that any of the programs for the modernization and industrialization of Nepal can achieve any substantial success except for the few essentially symbolic industrial projects established by the various foreign aid programme. Apart from this, the predominance of the vested interest groups in the key position through the system of Chakari (sycophancy), seem alien to modern economic thought and systems, and can in no way support genuine development. In such a situation, the newly established democratic government had to face various economic, political and social problems. The economic survey (1991:5) pointed out these difficulties as follows: Large imbalance occurred between revenue and expenditure, investment and savings, and imports and exports as a result of Panchayat government's rudderless economic policies, lack of clear priorities, uncontrolled government expenditures combined with over dependence on external loan assistance as against revenue mobilization to bridge the expenditure gap. These imbalances were also attributed to unplanned mobilization of internal loans, predominant use of personal fiats rather than orderly development of market oriented economy, and to excessive borrowing from the Rastra Bank at minimum interest rates. With the proliferation of smuggling and commission-cracy, few noveau-riches succeeded in controlling the strategic sectors of the economy.

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SAMIRA LUITEL: Dependency and Under-Development... 215 The newly established democratic government aimed at adopting the free market policy with emphasis on involvement of private agencies and the Transnational Corporations. But such policy without the national infrastructure was in question for benefiting the poverty ridden masses. Thus those who were already involved in such business (mostly the International and national TNCs) monopolized the economy of the country for their benefits. The poor had no choice but to become cheap labour within the country, or even leave home to find better jobs in India or other countries when they got options of foreign employments. This way Nepal is losing its main economic human resources, which is the major resource of the country.It is also losing its natural resources either not extracting by national source or by involving outsiders who will have their own vested interests. The experience of TNCs in many countries has proven to be a source of exploitation as Sklair (1991:68) describes: The transnational capitalist class, fraction of the labour force, and other support strata that the TNCs have created, will all increasingly identify their own interests with those of the capitalist global system and, if necessary, against the interests of their 'own' societies as the transnational practices of the system penetrate ever deeper into the areas that most heavily impact on their daily lives. The specific function of the agents of transnational political practices is to create and sustain the organizational forms within which this penetration takes place and to connect them organically with those domestic practices that can be incorporated and mobilized in the interest of global capitalist system. In order to do this, the transnational capitalist class must promote, outside the First World heartlands of capitalism a 'compador' mentality throughout society. The effect of modernization which has already created the compador mentality in the context of Nepal is another source to underdevelopment. In the Panchayat regime, Nepal was affluent with all the imported foreign goods. Even education was imported from America. Foreign goods were made available at very cheap prices so that people get its taste. Acquiring foreign commodities added to the prestige even if the price is increased ten times higher. With the involvement of TNC's in the business community, we can see the advertisement of Japanese, Hongkong, Korean etc. produced goods on TV and radio which is increasing the consumer +

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mentality in the mind of Nepalese people who already have developed a foreign taste. Any thing foreign is a symbol of prestige and a sign of becoming modern. A person's status is measured on the capacity to acquire possessions of such and other goods rather by their physical or mental capability. In an attempt to explain the consumer culture, Featherstone (1987:22) writes: The end result of these processes is a new concept of lifestyle, enhanced self-image. This 'glosses over the real distinctions in the capacity to consume and ignores the paid, the unemployed, the old', though the ubiquity of the culture-ideology of consumerism actually does include everyone (or, at least, all urban dwellers) however poor, because no one can escape its images. And it must be added, very few would choose to escape its images and what they represent in terms of the good, or better, life. Summing Up To sum up, the underdevelopment in the context of Nepal can better be explained with the quotation from Sklair. He (1991:5) shares that, “Where a country is largely isolated from the rest of the world, the state-centered approach does seem more plausible than where it is located within an identifiable system of global relationships”. Though Nepal entered into the global community since 1950 with the restoration of democracy, its geographic condition and the political system kept the people away from the matter of national affairs.The caste system (typically based on an ascriptive value system) imposed by the ruling class and legitimized by the class system has an adverse effect on the development of the country. The caste system imposes the fatalistic belief that nothing is in a person's control and everything is divine. In this way, the ruling classes were successfully able to manipulate the people in their own interest without any danger of public discontentment of the system. Such a belief system helped further degeneration of the social, economic, political and ethical values of the total Nepalese society. Nepal was well known for its indigenous skills of mercantilism and the sophistication of its technology in past ages but now it has been a history of the past. Today, the fatalistic beliefs coupled with unethical +

SAMIRA LUITEL: Dependency and Under-Development... 217 behaviour have permeated in all the Nepalese society. This belief, according to Bista (1991:146), is: Connected to dependency, robbing the people of personal control, and the sense of individual competence, their willingness to assume responsibility, thereby diminishing their motivation for personal achievement undermines the possibility of instrumental social action, without which economic success cannot be realized. It substitutes instead the perception that power and responsibility are qualities invested only in powerful others and, in the case of Nepal's dependence on foreign aid, those powerful others are the foreign aid donors. The unlimited amount of wealth entering in the country in the form of aid, and not a part of an exchange of Nepali productivity has helped mask widespread economic abuse and corruption. The transference of much of the responsibility to the donor agencies has even hampered the self-sustained growth. Pointing out the condition of Nepal Blakie et. al (1979: 26-27) wrote: Nepal is in crisis today with no proper development of infrastructures and a crisis associated with the particular form of relations of production (class relations), with the failure of any social class to develop the productive forces sufficiently to provide the necessary expansion of economic base to support a rapidly growing population and with the particular form of the contemporary state (then Panchayat Government). Elements of that crisis, in manifest form, include growing food shortages; environmental deterioration; and unemployment, resulting from the structural underdevelopment of the agrarian economy; the extension of rather than the intensification of cultivation; rapid population growth; and from the virtual absence of employment opportunities in agriculture. For the vast majority of peasants and workers in Nepal, the crisis which reflects the structural underdevelopment of the economy is persistent and chronic; the reproduction of deprivation and poverty, which is a function of the continuing underdevelopment of Nepal, manifests itself nationally as a crisis, and for the vast majority of the rural and urban population as constant hardship, uncertainty and desperation. Without fulfilling its commitment to meet the basic needs of the people, the democratic government established in 1990 was engulfed by

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the problems of inflation and poor economic condition. Adding to it, with no change in the old bureaucratic structure, it could achieve very little success. With frequent changes in the government and continued insurgency in the past 15 years, Nepal is in a critical situation in all spheres – economic, political and social than before. The multi party government which was formed for the purpose of conducting election of Constituent Assembly suffered from instability and stagnation in terms of development. The election of the Constituent Assembly resulted in the loss of Democratic Party and the victory of Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist). Restoration of a democratic system could not be stable in case of Nepal due to power struggle of the political parties and now the power is being transferred in the hands of communists. The Maoists are struggling to get support of the political parties to form the government and in addition are also facing the ‘Madhesh ek Peadesh’ (one Madesh province) demand of the Tarai Madhesh parties. Although the Maoists claim people’s support for their victory in the election, it has to prove its commitments for the lower classes who supported them in their struggle for change. To quote Blakie et. al (1980) "The classes who played a crucial role in the struggle are not simply passive in the face of the state and other even more powerful foreign influences; they have a crucial part to play in making their own history and that of Nepal, and it may already be possible to identify the directions and forms which their action will take". If so, can Nepal ever be in peace and develop as other nations who went through various struggles in their history if the political situation remained unstable as now? Should we believe in the above mentioned quotation and wait for an enduring struggle in the hope of betterment until we lose our independence? Nepal’s crisis would never end as speculated by the foreign writers without a stable political situation. The present situation would either invite the rule of a dictator or a takeover by the foreign power and our dream of an independent and developed Nepal will remain forever in the history of our struggle for independence. References Allahar, A. L. (1989). Sociology and the periphery: Theories and issues. Toronto, Ontario: Garamond Press. Baran, P.A. (1975). On the political economy of backwardness, in A. N. Agrawala

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SAMIRA LUITEL: Dependency and Under-Development... 219 and S. P. Singh, (eds.): The economics of underdevelopment (New Delhi; Oxford University Press, 1975) and The political economy of growth (Harmondsworth; Penguine, 1973). Bista, D.B. (1992). Fatalism and development: Nepal's struggle for modernization. Calcutta: Orient Longman. Beenhakker, A. (1973). A Kaleidoscopic circumspection of development planning. Netherlands: Rotterdam University Press. Blakie,M.P.; Cameron, J.; Seddon, J.D. (1979). The struggle for basic needs in Nepal. Paris: Development Centre Studies. Blakie, Piers; Cameron, John; Seddon, David. (1980). Nepal in crisis. London: Oxford University Press. Chossudovsky, Michel. (Nov. 1991). "Global poverty and new world economic order". Economic and political weekly, Nov. 2, 1991. Featherstone, M. (1987). Consumer culture, symbolic power and universalism, in Stauth and Zubaida (1987). ??? Frank, A.G. (1973)."Capitalism and underdevelopment in Latin America". New York: Monthly Review Press. Harari, D. and Garcia, J.(1982). Social conflicts and development: basic needs and survival strategies in four national settings. Paris; OCED. HMG/Nepal. (1992). Economic Survey. Kathmandu: Author. HMG/Nepal. (1970). Report of national planning commission Nepal. Kathmandu: Author. Joshi, B.L. and Rose, L.E. (1966). Democratic innovations in Nepal: A case study of political acculturation. Barkeley and Los Angeles: University of California press. Lohani,G.P. (1983). Comments on a seminar paper in foreign aid and development: proceedings of a seminar. Kathmandu; IDS. Pandey, D.R. (1983). Foreign aid in Nepal's development, an overview: in foreign aid and development in Nepal: Kathmandu. Rana and Malla, K.P. (eds.). (1973). Nepal in perspective. Kathmandu: CEDA. Sarkar, Pravirjit.(Oct. 1991)."IMF/World Bank stabilization programmes: A critical assessment". Economic and political weekly.

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Shah, R. (1973). Foreign policy, in Rana and Malla (eds.): Nepal in perspective. Kathmandu: CEDA. ` Sklair, L. (1991). Sociology of the global system. Baltimore, Maryland: John Hopkins University Press. World Bank. (1979). Nepal development performance and prospects: Washington D.C.; USA. World Bank. (1990).Policies and improving growth and alleviating poverty. Washington D.C.; USA. World Bank.(1991). Nepal Poverty and incomes. Washington D.C; USA.

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MACRO DEVELOPMENT AND MICRO SOCIAL PROCESSES: DEVELOPMENT AS DISCOURSE IN NEPAL Sujan Ghimire* Introduction This paper points out that to understand development processes, examining aid impacts at local level is as important as studying the impacts of development at the macro level. Studying development at local levels entails understanding the different societal processes triggered off by aid including the undesired and unplanned consequences. This paper is a part of my ongoing Ph. D. dissertation under the central Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Tribhuvan University in which I try to explore the intended and unintended impacts of Finnish aid in the Nepali forestry sector. At the macro level, conventional development equates impact of aid in forestry sector with issues such as how many hectares of forests have been planted, how many nurseries established, fire-lines made, how many community forestry user groups (CFUG) have been formed, what is the involvement of the women and Dalits in the CFUGs and so forth. These are the intended outcomes or rather the effects of aid. There may be unanticipated consequences of aid at the local levels which may have affected the social activities and relation of the people, but, which, have not been studied. I attempt to link the impacts of aid at macro level with processes at the micro level following a genre of thought, known as post-development. I discuss some literature, global (Escobar 1995, Ferguson 1994) as well * Sujan Ghimire is the doctoral candidate in Sociology at Tribhuvan University.

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as pertaining to Nepal (Pigg 1992, 1995, 1996; Fujikura 1996, 2001; Sharma 2001; Harper 2002; Hindman 2002), which examine the aid discourses and explore the workings of aid and show their impacts on social activities of the people at the local levels. The literature that is discussed here by showing different aspects of development as to how it works and why it does is expected to be useful to students of sociology/ anthropology of development 20. The literature examined in the paper by pointing out the impacts of aid at local levels can also feed into the process of policy-making. I proceed by introducing the main concepts and outline two of the groundbreaking post-development writings after which I examine some of the aid discourses in Nepal. I attempt to understand development through the help of two types of writings. In the first group are the writings that try to figure out the reasons for lack of development in Nepal and in the latter group are those studies, based on post-development thought, that take a distance from development paradigm itself and question its premises and workings. The post-development writings reviewed here vary in focus from health to water supply but the underlying thread is that they concentrate on the ‘apparatus’ of development, explore how aided projects work and show the unintended consequences of the workings of aid. This paper is an attempt to demonstrate how historically grounded analysis of development and deconstruction of aid discourses can provide better understanding of the impacts of aid at local level and of the development processes. Background The post-development writers have largely been influenced by postmodernists who question the Enlightenment narratives and the primacy of scientific knowledge and rationality. The post-modernists argue that as the age of ‘modernity’, which began with the Enlightenment in the 18th century, has ended, the conditions and categories, which we use to make sense of the social world, too should change. Linking knowledge to time, place and social position from which an individual ‘constructs’ that knowledge, the post-modernists contend that there is no single truth

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SUJAN GHIMIRE: Macro Develoment and Micro Social... 223 but a plurality of options and assert the need to ‘deconstruct’ the way we look at the social world. Prominent among the post-modernists are JeanFrancois Lyotard, Jean Baudrillard and Michel Foucault. Michel Foucault’s ideas on power, relation of power and knowledge and how these manifest through discourses in a given historical context have had much influence on post-development writers. Foucault was interested in micro-politics of power and saw power emanating from the arrangements of social order. Having knowledge is also a source of power according to him because having power lets one speak of others in an authoritative way. Thus, he views power and knowledge as inseparable. He writes that "…there is no power relation without the correlative construction of field of knowledge, nor any knowledge that does not presuppose and constitute at the same time, power relations…" (Foucault, 1977, cf. Kiely, R. 1999: 33). And discourse is the articulation of power and knowledge. By discourse, Foucault meant ‘a group of statements which provide a language for talking about and a way of representing the knowledge about- a particular topic at a particular historical moment’. Discourse allows only certain ways of thinking and excludes others. The Foucauldian thought is carried on by the postdevelopment writers who see the idea of development as a particular discourse, a particular way of thinking about the world and a particular form of knowledge, which not only reflects but constructs reality. Development is regarded as the Eurocentric view through which the West continues to exercise power and domination over the subjects of the Third World by excluding alternative forms of thinking. Thus, the post-development writers deconstruct discourses, study social activities and search for options and alternatives to development. The Works of Escobar and Ferguson: Aid Discourses and Knowledge Construction Escobar (1995) and Ferguson (1994) are the pioneering theorists with whom the post development writing is usually associated. They view development as an apparatus and question the conceptual and institutional construction of this apparatus. Escobar in Encountering Development: Making and Unmaking of the Third World (1995) writes that to understand development it should be studied as a historically singular experience +

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along three trajectories: "… the forms of knowledge that refer to it and through which it comes into being and is elaborated into objects, concepts, theories, and the like; the system of power that regulates its practice; and the forms of subjectivity fostered by this discourse…" (Escobar, 1995: 10). He writes that 'development' came into being after the Second World War with President Truman's speech in 1949 when Truman described the differences between the countries of the north and the south and envisaged a program of development. The aid regime initiated a new era in the understanding and managing of world affairs, particularly those concerning the less economically accomplished countries. Capital investment, which the poor countries do not have, was regarded as the most important ingredient in economic growth and development. Poor countries were seen to be trapped in a vicious circle of poverty so the needed capital, it was said, should come from the government and the international organizations. The capital would fuel up industrialization and urbanization, gradually leading to development. This aid discourse has resulted in the formations of new organisations; institutions and the technocratic regime leading to ‘professionalisation’ and ‘institutionalisation’ of development. Escobar deconstructs the language used by the development agencies to show how the discourses have helped in securing the power of US and northern countries over the south. The countries of North America have come to be regarded as the appropriate models for development for the countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America, which are lumped together into the 'Third World’ category in spite of their geographical and socioeconomic variations. The language used by development apparatus is such that the culture of the 'Third World' countries is seen to be backward, and which needs to be replaced by modern education and cultural values. Discourses of development have generated a certain type of knowledge about development that has become hegemonic and it has become nearly impossible to conceptualize reality in other terms. It has "… fostered a way of conceiving of social life as a technical problem, as a matter of rational decision to be entrusted to that group of people-the development professionals-whose specialized knowledge allegedly qualified for the task" (Escobar, 1995, 52). In a vein that echoes Foucault, Escobar writes that development discourse and practices have constructed objects and

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SUJAN GHIMIRE: Macro Develoment and Micro Social... 225 has proceeded by creating abnormalities such as "illiterate", "underdeveloped", "malnourished", "small farmers" which it would later try to treat and reform. Ferguson in ‘The Anti-Politics Machine: Development, Depoliticization, and Bureaucratic Power in Lesotho’ (1994) creates development as an apparatus; a strange machine and explores how it works and why. He takes the case of Lesotho where innumerable aid agencies were present and shows how the discourses represent Lesotho. The process through which the World Bank (WB) represent Lesotho (in WB’s report on Lesotho in the 1970s) is ahistorical and acultural and can be applied to any of the ‘Third World’ countries. The WB Country Report discourses represent Lesotho as a traditional subsistence peasant society which was virtually untouched by modern economic development and portrays the picture that labor migration and the cash economy is something new in Lesotho’s history. But these representations are not the reality because Lesotho entered the 20th century as a producer of cash crop for the South African market and it was a labor reserve economy. Ferguson argues that development institutions generate their own form of discourse, which constructs an object (in this case, Lesotho) and creates a structure of knowledge around the object. As these discourses are constructed exterior to the subject, these do not reflect reality but aid agencies based upon this assumption design organizations, form institutions and implement programs. He writes that there are two different worlds: that of the bureaucrats and the social world of the people. The bureaucrats attempt to "develop" Lesotho fail, as these do not reflect the reality. Though it fails to develop it produces certain unintended consequences such as depoliticizing political issues, expanding bureaucracy and the bureaucratic state power. Hence, Ferguson labels development as a strange machine. Grass-root movements, which are "movements for empowerment" according to Ferguson, operate outside the development paradigm and these should be regarded as alternatives to development. Moving on from post-development literature, I now discuss some common aid discourses on Nepal to show how these have generated a certain type of representation of Nepal and examine how these

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representations impact on the Nepali’s mind space. Then I move on to discuss some works on aid in Nepal. Aid Discourses in Nepal Foreign aid has been the link tying Nepal with development and this link was created in the early decade of the 1950s. Along with aid, development worldviews also entered the Nepali mindscapes. It was at this point of history that the leaders of the new Nepal articulated the demands for schools, roads, electricity etc. which they had seen in neighboring, India but which were present only in name in Rana Nepal. Most of this group of Nepali leaders were educated in India and had carried out their underground activities. Nepal under the Ranas did not have those amenities and the beginning of the international aid era made it possible for that generation of Nepali leaders educated in India, to realize these dreams. Similar to Ferguson’s study on Lesotho, the aid discourses of the donors in the early years in Nepal construct Nepal as a lab where no development had taken place and where the people were eager for changes. The language of the initial development experts as " ‘…unexposed to the modern world’, ‘blank state’, ‘no education facilities’," (cited from Fujikura, 1996:271) shows how Nepal is represented ignoring Nepal’s culture and history not least the status of Nepal as a semi-colony of the British during the Rana times. Nepal is portrayed as a poor and traditional country where there was no education, no development but that the people were eager to have these changes. The formal education system in Nepal has also reinforced this idea. This representation has had profound impact on the thoughts and behaviour of the people. But this ideological impact though very pervasive, was ironically not discernable. It has been the work of the post-development writers searching for the unintended consequences of development and its alternatives that have unearthed the processes through which aid has moulded Nepali's own reading of history. Research on Aid The topic of aid has been studied by both foreign and Nepali scholars

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SUJAN GHIMIRE: Macro Develoment and Micro Social... 227 since the 1960s and these works have from the very beginning questioned the role of aid in Nepal’s development. One of the earliest books to study the politics of foreign aid is by Mihaly E. in" Foreign Aid and Politics in Nepal" (1965 reprinted in 2002) where the author tries to find out whether or not the US aid has been an effective tool for political change. He writes that aid has not brought about political changes in Nepal because American aid was based on the flawed assumptions that capital and technology would result in the desired socio-economic changes and that Nepali people were eager for the changes. He further writes that aid policies have overlooked the Nepali social structure and subsequently aid has largely been ineffective in achieving its aim of transforming society. Another work to discuss aid and its workings during the50s, 60s and 70s is by Yadav and Stiller in Planning For People (1979). The authors, similar to Mihaly, argue that aid has not been effective in changing society. The fault, according to them, lies both within the Nepali social structure and with the aid polices of the donors. They write that the Nepali social structure was unable to understand, evaluate and utilize the aid that was being received. Consequently, the burden of development fell on the 'experts' within the development agencies and these 'experts' failed to relate their policies to Nepal's political, social and administrative structure and Nepal slowly started to become dependent on decisions made at Delhi and Washington. The authors write that foreign aid has been a good business for the foreigners involved in aid as well as for the Nepalis who profit from the economy generated by foreign aid. This thought, that aid has been beneficial only for a certain section of the population is the theme in the papers compiled in the Foreign Aid and Development in Nepal (1984). One of the seminal papers in the book is "Foreign Aid and Social Structure: Notes on Intra- State Relationships" by Mishra and Sharma. In this paper, the authors analyse the relationship between foreign aid and social structure and argue that foreign aided development has had no significant effect either on agriculture or on the mode of production in the country. The authors explore the effects of aid in different sectors and show that aid has not helped in bringing about significant effect on the 'mode of production' +

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but only in the 'distribution' system. According to Mishra and Sharma, foreign aid in the country have led to the strengthening of the power of the upper class through which they legitimatise their power and their political rule. Foreign aid has increased the dependence of the lower classes, has increased the incidence of poverty, has led to centralisation and to the growth of westernization of ideology. Another work that examines the links between foreign policy and aid policy to understand aid is by a Nepali scholar Khadka N. in the "Foreign Aid and Foreign Policy, Major Powers and Nepal" (1997). His main argument is that the aid policies of the donors are based on their foreign policies and reflect their strategic, political and economical gains. Consequently, the goal of aid is buying international support for the policy of donor countries rather than humanitarian support to the poor countries. The US aid policy in Nepal reflects the US foreign policy of the cold war considerations and the modernization theory of development. Nepal's adjacent position to China prompted the US to provide funds for some socio-economic sectors in order to make direct impacts on the living standards of the poor and thereby discourage their attraction to communism. Similarly, Indian aid and Chinese aid to Nepal have expanded and contracted according to their relations with each other. The studies cited above do not include all the works on foreign aid in Nepal but these are only a few sampled ones to show the general trend of the studies on foreign aid. The studies show that the flow of aid into the country has not resulted in the desired changes; consequently, the effectiveness of aid has been questioned from the beginning. These also show that strategic interests of the donors overshadow their humanitarian concerns while giving aid. If one recollects the distinction between aid impacts and aid effects, what these studies have done is to focus on effects. These have also examined aid at the macro levels such as agriculture, education, communication, etc. Despite many published works on aid, those that explore the impacts at local levels is still lacking. Another point is that most of the authors have studied the aid programs of bigger donors such as US, India, China and the Soviet Russia. These have overlooked the assistance of the smaller European donors who since 1990s are slowly emerging as 'partners' of aid in Nepal. +

SUJAN GHIMIRE: Macro Develoment and Micro Social... 229 Role of Foreign Aid in Nepal What has been the macro impact of aid? The standard, as mentioned earlier, is to see the direct impacts in quantifiable indicators and more so at the national level. The variables of development show these accomplishments: from one airport in 1951 to four dozen by 2002; 276 km of roads increased to 328,000 km, 1.1 megawatt of electricity to 527 megawatt; etc21. In spite of these accomplishments, it is common knowledge that a vast number of Nepalis eke out a precarious existence. Standard economic and social indicators give a low scoring for Nepal. Despite the continuous flow of aid, why has there not been the desired socio-economic transformation is the question in the minds of aid writers in Nepal. No less insidious, I argue, is the manner in which development ideology has become hegemonic. The ideology of development itself structures the self-images of Nepalis and perpetuates the idea of self as 'backward'. The post development writings, therefore, question the concept of ‘development’ itself and show how it works (among others on forming categories of self and others) and analyses the impacts at the local levels. Based upon various studies I will try to explore the impact of development. In the beginning, I will draw from those works that are based on modernization and dependency theory. These works question why there has been no development in Nepal. Then I will review those studies that take a distance from development ideology itself and endeavor to examine how ‘development industry’ works and what have been the outcomes of its workings on the minds and lives of people. In 1940s and 50s, development was seen as a modernization process that would bring about structural changes in society. Modernization was a historical product of three events: rise of the US as the superpower, spread of a united world communist movement and disintegration of European colonial empires in Eastern Europe and Asia (Alvin So, 1990:17). ‘Extensive division of labour and specialization, self-sustaining economic growth, a well functioning and active state apparatus, a democratic form of government and equality before law’ were the main postulates of the modernization theory (Alvin So 1990: 38). The prime argument of the modernization school is that development includes social

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and economic transformation and that the industrialized countries are the mentors for the less developed countries. The modernization advocates see development as important and sublime and show a proclivity for understanding the underlying causes for retarding development. One important sociological/ anthropological work on modernization in the Nepali context, though one that appeared some two decades after the hegemony of modernization theory had ended, is Fatalism and Development: Nepal's Struggle for Modernisation by Dor B. Bista. In Fatalism and Development: Nepal's Struggle for Modernisation (1991), Bista attempts to attribute specific cultural values, for the lack of development in Nepal. The author delves into the Nepali social structure and asserts that the culture of fatalism has been the main impediment in Nepal's development. It is because the people have inculcated the culture of fatalism, they believe that they have no personal control over their lives and this, in turn, has far-reaching effects on the work ethic and achievement motivation. Fatalism is connected to different forms of dependency through social institutions such as afno manche and chakari. And according to Bista, dependency and fatalism combined together impede development. Thus, he claims, in spite the flow of capital and import of technology from donors, Nepal is not developed. Another such book is Devendra Raj Pandey's Nepal’s Failed Development: Reflections on the Missions and Maladies (1999). Pandey’s work (1999) is similar to Bista's work in that it identifies the Nepali social structure as an obstacle to development. He argues that development is a must but it can be achieved only through proper self-interest of the Nepalese. Corruption, according to him, is the main factor for the lack of development in Nepal. The modernizers assume that there is something wrong inside the 'Third World' things such as traditional culture, overpopulation, low investment, lack of achievement motivation, etc. In this way, the modernizers account internal factors for lack of development whereas their critics, the neo-Marxists, attribute external factors for lack of development. In the 1960s and 70s, neo-Marxist theory of development gained

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SUJAN GHIMIRE: Macro Develoment and Micro Social... 231 ground. The Neo-Marxist believed that development implied the gaining of real national independence and self-centered economic progress. The dependency theory held the view that the colonial powers and imperialism had actively underdeveloped the Third World. According to these, development should be understood from the historical and structural perspective. Neo-Marxist dependency theorists treat capitalism as inherently exploitative and development as an essentially unequal process. And for genuine development to take place, there was a need to disassociate and de-link from the core rich countries of the first world. One of the earlier works to study Nepal's development through the neo-Marxists/dependency approach is the Nepal in Crises Growth and Stagnation at the Periphery, by Blakie, P et al. (1983, reprinted 2005). The authors contend that development in Nepal has to be examined historically with its dependency with India. The authors take up the case of metalled roads financed by foreign aid in Nepal and depict how these have resulted in changes in the mode of production by contributing to social, economic and spatial inequalities. Writing under the theoretical framework of the dependency theory, the authors show how Kathmandu is the periphery of the centre, Delhi, and that the west central region of Nepal is a periphery of the periphery (Kathmandu). The relationship between the center and periphery is based on the center appropriating surplus from the periphery largely for its own advantage and maintenance of the structures of domination and dependency with the periphery. They illustrate that the growth in the size of bureaucracy, towns, expansion of commerce, motor transport in the west central region of Nepal are not the product of national economy but of the underdevelopment and enforced stagnation. The authors emphasize the political and economic determinants of stagnation and write that the stagnation is the result of Nepal’s partial incorporation into the British India in the past and lately into the political economy of the Indian Republic. The authors in this way try to combine local level analysis with the analysis of change in the wider Nepali economy and society. Chaitanya Mishra in the Development and Underdevelopment: A Preliminary Sociological Perspective (1987) writes that underdevelopment

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is a cycle, which is affected by diverse issues as integration to the capitalist and regional system; internal class relationships and form of utilization of political-economic resources. He states that underdevelopment in Nepal has a long history whose roots lie in the continuous and uneven process of peripheralisation. To understand Nepal's present underdevelopment it should be seen historically and with its relation with the capitalist system. Though not neo-Marxist per se, but a work that depicts the material, spiritual and psychological deteriorations the country is going through is N. R. Shrestha's In the Name of Development: A Reflection on Nepal (1998). Shrestha argues that development institutions have been instrumental for the underdevelopment of Nepal. He argues that development in Nepal has cloaked under it the exploitative capitalism that has colonized the minds and bodies of the Nepalese people. The above-mentioned texts based either on modernization and dependency center on how development should work and seek to identify the reasons why it has not functioned properly. Identifying where it has gone wrong, these positions also try to facilitate development process. The post-development studies, a genre of work that questions the development paradigm itself, make an effort to understand how development works and why it works the way it does. Some postdevelopment writings on Nepal are reviewed in the subsequent section. Development and Narrowing of ‘Choices’ In "Unintended Consequences: The Ideological Impact of Development in Nepal"(1993), Pigg reveals how the ‘culture of development works within and through local cultures’. She expounds a historically grounded analysis of development and demonstrates how the impact of development is profound at local levels. She counters the argument of Ferguson who had said that there are different worlds: of the development planners/ implementers and the social reality of the people for whom the development interventions are targeted. Pigg declares that there can be no such fixed worlds because development interventions take place in the social sphere where they fuse with the existing social-cultural practices and behaviors. She writes that though in the discourse of international

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SUJAN GHIMIRE: Macro Develoment and Micro Social... 233 development planning, development exists as an abstract concept it acquires a distinct meaning through a very specific history. Therefore, development interventions have to be seen in their historical context. For Nepali people, the meaning of bikas (development) is firmly rooted in social experience, in what bikas has been and has done in Nepali society. This is the reason "… bikas for the most part means things: especially commodities that come from elsewhere" (Pigg, 1993, 48). She elucidates how it is the non-local things such as electricity, pipes, trucks, fertilizers, cement, etc; that are termed as bikas in every day parlance in Nepal. Echoing Escobar, she states that development has constructed the space, which has regularized human behaviour. Nepali people place themselves and others into different slots either of modern, represented as bikas or traditional represented as underdeveloped and this becomes the guiding principles of social interactions and activities. More detailed exploration is done by Pigg in Inventing Social Categories Through Place: Social Representation and Development in Nepal (1992) where she explains how the development discourse has regularized peoples’ behaviour and beliefs. She takes the example of a category 'village' to understand how the language used by development institutions has constructed specific images about a Nepali village. She shows that the discourse has changed the meaning of village in Nepali social imagination because it is understood not as a place (as different from a city) but in relation to bikas or development. And village "…becomes a space of backwardness-a physical space that imprisons people in what is considered inferior and outmoded way of life…"(Pigg, 1992: 507). Pigg also shows that the education system in Nepal has also reinforced this type of construction of village and villagers through language and symbols. By placing villages in relation to the kinds of places they are not, schoolbooks have helped to widen the dichotomy between the village and bikas. Yet another work is "Found in Most Traditional Societies ", Traditional Medical Practitioners between Culture and Development (1997) in which Pigg looks at how aid policies in the health sector have contributed to shaping a particular kind of social order. A certain health

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program's objective was to include the 'Traditional Birth Attendants' (TBA) and 'Traditional Medical Practitioners' (TMP) in their programs but the language of development program defined these terms as obstacles rather than resource. In this way, Pigg argues, development activities marginalize local practices and augment the belief that existing practices must be replaced. Deconstruction: Opening up of Hidden Avenues Fujikura in the paper, ‘ Technologies of Improvement, Locations of Culture: American Discourses of Democracy and Community Development in Nepal’ (1996) takes the example of the US- assisted Village Development Project and tries to find out why this project was not successful by examining the prevalent discourses. As the Village Development Project was based on the concept of community development, Fujikura goes through different documents to understand how community development is represented by the ‘experts’. Fujikura argues that the concept of community development is constructed by the experts based on different texts and bureaucratic experience without their prior interaction with the Nepali rural people and locale, so the representations are not a reflection of the reality but constitutive of it. The bureaucratic and the textual mechanism structures, the relation between the ‘client’ (target) and the ‘agent’ (expert) so that the results of interaction are presented as fact or as true discourses. While the experts construct the motif of community development, there is a lack of importance given to the historical experience of the country and the cultural location, which narrows down the meaning of development. Fujikura makes explicit how development experts construct certain methods, motifs and processes about community development to be pursued in Nepal and how this type of construction restricts the activities to be undertaken under community development. Tatsuro Fujikura writes that even after forty years the discourses of development has not changed and at present they based upon the knowledge generated by international agencies as the International Monetary Fund and Structural Adjustment Programs. He says that it is only the rhetorics of aid that has changed from infrastructure and agriculture to institutional strengthening and human resource development, but development

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SUJAN GHIMIRE: Macro Develoment and Micro Social... 235 continues to operate in the space created by the discourses of the 1950s. Thus, Fujikura shows how the discourses of development have created a space in which only certain things are said and imagined. Continuing this line of thought further, Fujikura in ‘Discourses of Awareness, Notes for a Criticism of Development in Nepal’ (2001) reconstructs the discourses of ‘awareness’, explicates how development normalizes human acts and behaviour through controlled knowledge. Interestingly, Fujikura ends by stating that there may be social and economic opportunities even within the space allotted by the development discourse. Taking the case of the education system in Nepal, he deconstructs the discourses of education and shows how these have constructed the people' worldview. These discourses not only influence what we think and imagine as the realities but have also helped in forming ourselves. The formal education in Nepal has the nation as its referent and propagates the idea that the students should make sacrifices for their nation. On the other hand, the non-informal education, prompted by the NGOs, has as their referents the individual themselves and efforts are made to enable the "target" people to become "aware" so they can help themselves. And awareness is ‘…seen as implying very specific attitudes and conduct, such as financial frugality, use of contraceptives, use of pit latrine, growing cash crops, the ability to sign one’s name in paper etc…’ and is more about changes in behavior and practices of the people rather than awareness per se. Though the agency and modality of development has changed in the last half a century, development as pursued today, still operates within the space provided by the discourses of community development, argues Fujikura. The NGO activities show how social life is still conceived as a technical problem and how the target people learn to master some technical skills. And development discourse by emphasizing changes in behavior and practices has depoliticed political and social issues. In this paper, Fujikura's explanations are analogous to Ferguson's and Pigg's studies’ on how discourses construct our knowledge about others and even of ourselves. Pigg and Ferguson believe that the development paradigm should be discarded because this leads to the

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narrowing of choices. Fujikura, however, argues that even within the conventional development paradigm, there may be spaces, which can result in the broadening of the economic and political opportunities for the people. He provides the example of the social movement for the liberation of the agricultural bonded laborers (Kamaiyas) in Nepal, which originated within the present conventional discourses of development and not as an alternative to development. The movement was supported by different NGOs but it was neither restricted to the project mentality nor to the rhetoric of development and became a social movement. This non-violent movement for the Kamaiyas ultimately became the grassroot movement and provided the political and economic venues and possibilities for socio-economic engagements. Ferguson and Pigg believed that the alternatives to development should be sought from social movements that operate outside the development paradigm but Fujikura asserts that even the social movements are an ‘addition to those institutions, creating new venues and possibilities for socio-political engagements’, within the development paradigm itself. While the aforementioned works on development discourse do not have as their point of reference a specific program or project, Sharma's ‘Procuring Water: Foreign Aid and Rural Water Supply in Nepal’ (2001) embarks upon a social analysis of development by taking the case of a Finnish aided rural water supply project in Nepal. Dismantling an Aided Project to See the Actors Procuring Water: Foreign Aid and Rural Water Supply in Nepal (2001) elucidates how development provides a social space in which different relations are sustained and how different actors manoeuvre within the set of possibilities. This process of contestations, negotiations between different actors and their relation all indicate development as a social form; a resource where different stakeholders have different levels of access to it. Thus Sharma scrutinizes power relations in development to find out what actors do and how aid works. Sharma begins by examining the international and the national (both official and unofficial) discourses of water supply; how the discourses construct the rural water supply sector as being problematic and proceed

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SUJAN GHIMIRE: Macro Develoment and Micro Social... 237 by creating institutional structures for development. He shows how global agendas and donors priorities largely maneuver development activities and role of the state. During the 1970s decade, the Nepali state instituted Department of Water Supply and Sanitation (DWSS) for carrying out the task of expanding the coverage area of piped water. Under the DWSS, the task of providing piped water increasingly became a hydrological and technical enterprise. As more aid flowed into water sector, other issues as health and hygiene were sidelined and only issues relating to piped water coverage became prominent. The emphasis on the technical aspect was beneficial to the DWSS and its role in the water sector became more limited to procuring pipes because the commission from this procurement activity was beneficial to the overstaffed but under paid Nepali bureaucracy. Sharma writes that the knowledge and use of water at local levels has resulted from the amalgamation of local customs and the practices of modernity. At local levels, the global discourses of water lead to a specific configuration of ideas and associated practices, thus highlighting some (practices) and negating others. This is clearly seen in the impacts of the project. The intended impact of the provision of water by the state is improving the conditions of life of the people. Sharma illustrates that in the hills where there was scarcity, installation of drinking water taps led to one group of people consolidating their entitlement to water at the cost of others. In the Tarai where there was no acute shortage of water and where the water supply was delivered through installations of community tube-wells, water supply meant contestations over the ownership of the community tube-wells. Here the people saw the Finnish project opening up social space, which provided opportunities to people to move into leadership through the Water Users Committee formed for drinking water purposes. Sharma’s study similar to Pigg shows how development shapes social activities of the people. Sharma deconstructs the discourses of ‘empowerment’, ‘decentralisation’ and ‘private sector mobilisation’ and shows how these discourses are deployed by donors and the local agents of development. Though these discourses are interpreted as including the lowest tier of government, the way certain partners were selected (eg. instead of VDC, selecting the Water Users Association and Support Organisations as +

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partners) shows that in practice there was no real devolution of power at local levels. The activities as contestations, negotiations between the donors and the working line agencies all reveal that aid is more than development; it is also a resource and stakeholders have different levels of access to it. Sharma shows how process that entail changing of partners from one ministry to another facilitated the Finnish personnel in having more control of the implementation process and the overall project. Thus, Sharma's study of discourses and practices concerning water supply in Nepal shows the global level discourses leading to a 'professionalisation of knowledge' and 'institutionalization of practices' and 'enshoring' of power at local levels. Another work that examines a specific project is Ian Harper's Capsular Promise as Public Health: a Critique of the Nepal National Vitamin A Programme (2002). Ethnography of an Aided Project Harper in ‘Capsular Promise as Public Health: a Critique of the Nepal National Vitamin A Programme’ (2002) shows how the discourse in the health sector includes certain types of knowledge and excludes others. He provides an ethnography of the vitamin 'A' program showing how global health discourses have been influential in determining the types of health programs been implemented in Nepal. Harper illustrates how experts, based on certain knowledge construct these programs and also examines the process through which they are operationlized in society. Harper also shows the relationships between fundable research and development industries, which are influencing the discourses of health policies, and practices. As a consequence of this relation, only those researches that are built upon the discourses of the donors are highlighted as appropriate forms of knowledge about the health sector in Nepal. The donors' knowledge suppresses and marginalizes other forms of sociopolitical knowledge and what are basically political problems of the state such as poverty and malnutrition and which in turn cause most of health problems, are overlooked. This process contributes to maintaining certain relations of domination between the donors and the recipient countries. Harper shows how certain "institutional partnerships, liaisons and linkages

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SUJAN GHIMIRE: Macro Develoment and Micro Social... 239 work together, provide potential profits and capital and determine the types of researches in specific area". The above mentioned texts have looked into aided projects, programs and the social activities of the people to understand the impact of development whereas a work that examines the domestic lives of the development workers and shows how the development discourses constructs the lives and behaviour of the expatriates is by Heather Hindman in ‘The Everyday Life Of American Development in Nepal’ (2002). Development Ideology and Lifestyles of Expatriates Hindman in ‘The Everyday Life Of American Development in Nepal’ (2002) shows how along with US aid the American discourses of family and work have entered Nepal. She shows how the development workers live their daily lives in Nepal with their families by distancing themselves from the local people and relying on imported goods for domestic use. Fujikura has shown how development discourses normalize human thoughts and behaviour of the people where the project of development is implemented and Hindman shows how development discourses have also normalized the personal and the professional lives of the experts. Hindman illustrates how President Truman's Point Four Program generated knowledge about the development that emphasized technology; linked technology with modernity and modernity with progress and success. Technology is seen as the solution to all kinds of problems that are to be solved by experts. Experts are those people of the first world who have diverse technical skills and can efficiently ‘solve long term problems in a short time’. In Nepal, Hindman shows that aid regime has entrusted development in the hands of experts and these are guided not by local logics but by efficient implementation. And the job of development has been reduced to technical problems and strategies, which in turn are reduced to the lowest bidding multinational corporations. Conclusions The above-mentioned post-development writings have shown how different social processes are set off by development at local levels. +

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Escobar’s study shows how development results in a particular types of professionalisation and institutionalisation, Ferguson illuminates how development results in depoliticising political issues, expands bureaucracy and bureaucratic state power. He writes that the social movements, which resist development, should be seen as the alternative to development. Focusing on Nepal, Pigg examines the ideological impact of development, and shows how development normalises thoughts and behavior and marginalises local culture. Fujikura shows how discourses of development have limited the space for undertaking activities under ‘development ‘. Carrying further the argument of Ferguson and Pigg who see social movements as alternatives to development, Fujikura says that social movements are more about getting access to development rather than resisting development. Sharma, taking the case of a particular aided project, identifies different actors within the space provided by development and shows the workings and consequences of development on the state’s structure, aid agency and on different people for whom the aided project is implemented. Harper taking the case of an aided health project shows how at the local levels the rituals of development are practiced. Hindman’s study shows how the personal and professional lives of development experts are affected by the knowledge generated by the development discourses. The post-development studies through an‘ethnography of aid’ have shown the workings of aid at different levels. These studies try to understand development as a historical process of social change and reveal how impact is produced by the interplay of the intervention and the context. I am grateful to my academic advisor Dr. Krishna Bahadur Bhattachan and technical advisors Mr. Dipak Gyawali and Dr. Sudhindra Sharma for their inputs on the earlier versions of the paper. I also like to thank Prof. Juhani Koponen, Institute of Development Studies (IDS) Helsinki, coordinator of the overall research project on impacts of Finnish aid, for his suggestions. I am grateful to IDA Kathmandu and IDS Helsinki for providing me the financial support for preparing this paper. References Acharya, Laxman. 2004. A Review of Foreign Aid in Nepal. CPFW and Action Aid Nepal.

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SUJAN GHIMIRE: Macro Develoment and Micro Social... 241 Himal Books Aid Under Stress Water: Forests and Finnish Support in Nepal. Himal Books, Nepal. Bista, Dor. Bahadur. 1991. Fatalism and Development: Nepal’s Struggle for Modernization. Orient Longman, Calcutta. Blakie P., Cameron J. and Seddon D. 1980. Nepal in Crises Growth and Stagnation at the Periphery. Oxford University Press. Chene, Des, Mary. 1996 In the Name of Bikas. Studies in Nepali History and Society, 1(2). Dixit, Kanak, Mani.1997. Foreign Aid in Nepal: No Bang for the Buck. Studies in Nepali History and Society, 2(1). Escobar, Arturo. 1995 Encountering Development: The Making and the Unmaking of the Third World. Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey. Ferguson, James. 1994. The Anti Politics Machine:"Development", Depoliticalisation and Bureaucratic Power in Lesotho. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis. Folke Steen and Nielsen Henrik. 2006. Aid Impact and Poverty Reduction in Aid Impact and Poverty Reduction. Eds. Folke Steen and Nielsen Henrik. Palgrave Macmillan. Fujikura, Tatsuro. 1996. Technologies of Improvement, Locations of Culture: American Discourses of Democracy and community Development in Nepal. Studies in Nepali History and Society, ( 2). Fujikura, Tatsuro. 2001. Discourses of Awareness, Notes for a Criticism of Development in Nepal. Studies in Nepali History and Society, 6(2). Harper, Ian. 2002. Capsular Promise as Public Health: a Critique of the Nepal National Vitamin A Programme. Studies in Nepali History and Society. 7(1). Hindman, Heather. 2002. The Everyday Life Of American Development in Nepal. Studies in Nepali History and Society. 7 (1). Integrated Development Systems.1984. Foreign Aid and Development in Nepal: Proceedings of a Seminar. Integrated Development Systems, Kathmandu. Justice, Judith. 1986.Policies, Plans, and People: Foreign aid and Health Development. University of California Press, Berkeley/Los Angeles/London, Mandala Publications, Nepal.

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Khadka, Narayan. 1997. Foreign Aid and Foreign Policy: Major Powers and Nepal, Vikas Publishing House, New Delhi. Khadka, Narayan.1991. Foreign Aid, Poverty and Stagnation in Nepal, Vikas Publishing House, New Delhi. Kiely, Ray. 1999. The last Refuge of the Noble Savage? A Critical Assessment of Post-Development Theory. European Journal of Development Research. II ( 2). Martinussen, John. 1997. Society State and Market: A Guide to Competing Theories of Development. Zed Books Limited, London. McHoul, Alec and Grace Wendy. 1993. A Foucault Primer: Discourse, Power and the Subject. UCL Press. Mihaly, Eugene. B. 2002. Foreign Aid and Politics in Nepal, A Case Study. Himal Books, Patan Dhoka, Nepal. Mishra, Chaitanya.1997. Development Practices in Nepal: an Overview in Development Practice in Nepal. Eds. Krishna Bahadur Bhattachan and Chaitanya Mishra. Central Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Tribhuvan University, Kathmandu. Pandey, Devendra. Raj.1999. Nepal’s Failed Developmeny: Reflections on the Missions and Maladies. Nepal South Asia Centre, Kathmandu. Pigg, Stacy. Leigh. 1993. Unintended Consequences: The Ideological Impact of Development in Nepal. South Asia Bulletin, xiii 1(2). Pigg, Stacy. Leigh.1995. Acronyms and Effacement: Traditional Medical Practitioners (TMP) in International Health Development. Social Science and Medicine. 41(1). Pigg, Stacy. Leigh.1996. The Credible and the Credulous: The Question of "Villagers Beliefs" in Nepal. Cultural Anthropology, 11 (2). Pigg, Stacy.Leigh. 1992. Inventing Social Categories Through Place: Social Representations and Development in Nepal. Comparative Study of Society and History, 34(3). Preston, W, P 2001. Development Theory An Introduction. Blackwell Publishers. Said, W. Edward. 2001. Orientalism: Western Conceptions of the Orient. Penguin Books, India. Sardar, Ziauddin.2005. Postmodernism in The Future of Knowledge and Culture

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SUJAN GHIMIRE: Macro Develoment and Micro Social... 243 A Dictionary for the 21st Century. ed. Vinay Lal and Ashis Nandy. Penguin Viking. Sharma, Sudhindra. 2001. Procuring Water, Foreign Aid and Rural Water Supply in Nepal, Nepal Water Conservation Foundation, Kathmandu, Nepal. Sharma, Sudhindra.,Koponen, Juhani, Gyawali, Dipak., Dixit, Ajaya. Ed. 2004. Shrestha, N. R. 1998. In the Name of Development: A Reflection on Nepal. Educational Enterprises Kathmandu. Skery, Christa. Kerry, Moran and Calavan, M. Kay. 1992. Four Decades of Development: The History of U.S Assistance to Nepal 1951-1991. Kathmandu, USAID. Stiller, F. Ludwig and Yadav, Prakash Ram. 1979. Planning For People. Human Resources Development Research Center. Thapa, Manjushree. 2004. Uttaradhunikata. Nepalko Sandharvama Samajshastriya Chintaan (558-574). Eds. Mary Des Chene and Pratush Onta. Social Sciences BAHA, Nepal.

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PERCEPTIONS AND PRACTICES OF SOCIETY TOWARDS SINGLE WOMEN IN THE CONTEXT OF NEPAL Mina Uprety * Sikshya Adhikary * The purpose of this paper is to highlight on the perceptions and practices of society towards single women, specifically the widows, in the context of Nepal. The focus is on issues of gender relations and the status of widow women. The arguments are based on the review of literature and the author’s own observation of social practices towards women and widow women. The discussion starts by defining the concept of women and single women and proceeds through the discussion of their status in relation to men as they are prescribed by codes of conduct of society. Concept of Women and Single Women The binary opposition between men and women construct two antithetical sets of characters that position men as superior and women as inferior. This scheme includes dichotomies between rational/emotional, assertive/ passive, strong/weak, or public/private. These are strategic oppositions, which place men in the superior position of a hierarchy and women in the inferior position, as the second sex (Best and Kellner, 1991). Wherever women are subordinate, and they have been subordinated almost always and everywhere, they seem to have recognized and protested that situation in some form (Lerner, 1993). There is very little consent to be found, for example, in the fact that Flaubert’s encounter with an Egyptain courtesan produced a widely influential model of the oriental women: she never spoke of herself, she never represented her emotions, presence, * Ms. Meena Uprety teaches Sociology at Trichandra Multiple Campus, Tribhuvn University. Ms. Sikshya Adhikary is a freelance consultant.

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MINA/SIKSHYA: Perceptions and Practices of Society... 245 or history (Said, 2001). Various societies (including Nepalese society) in recent days have, however, initiated to show appropriate concern and respect for women, allowing them sizeable freedom and dignity in various dealings and existence. Until now, masculine sentiments have not entirely developed a tolerable culture. They still have a construct or a deep feeling to consider and understand women as the subject to be treated with extreme kindness and deliberation (Women are not considered more than the source of continuing men’s lineage). It is still persistent in many places, both in policies and practices, that women as such cannot fully exercise human as well as constitutional rights. They are (were) naturally low-grade to men and as a result have to be for all times subordinated and oppressed. Single women can be referred to those women who abandoned their husbands, who are divorced with their spouses, whose husbands are dead and those who are unmarried till the age of 35. Understanding for single women differs from differences of nature and forms of single women. Unmarried, divorced, separate and widow are the various forms of single women and all these forms are defined in different ways. Literally, unmarried single women are defined as those who are not married or have an unmarried status. Divorcee single women are those who have legal ending of a marriage. Similarly, separate single women are those who stop living together as a couple. Besides this, widow (a category which is of more focus in this paper) is simply defined as a woman whose husband has died and who has not married again. Widow is a harsh and hurtful word. It is derived from the Sanskrit and it means "empty." Women for Human Rights (WHR) thus passed a national declaration to use the word "Single Women" replacing the terminology "Widows" to rephrase this "state of being single" as a natural phenomenon. The change in terminology has made many effects, particularly, to the rights of widows. However, over the time, the definition of single women has undergone change to include divorcees, unmarried women over 35 and other single women. In spite of the several social reforms and legal enactments, the widows (especially youth widows other than elderly widows) continue to suffer the physical, mental, cultural and other social discriminations and many other social malaises.

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Whatever may be the reason for remaining single, it is a fact that human society since very long has remained prejudiced and narrowminded towards them. It is very easy for people to blame the women for remaining single, whatever may be its reasons and realities. If we look into the lives of these women, it is not easy for them to stay single in a strict and rigid patriarchal society like Nepal. They have to bear horrific suffering in every moment of living a single life. The rising number of single women in recent time has contributed to misrepresent the existing order of patriarchal arrangements. The number of unmarried single women has been increasing day by day. It has been so because they are interested to complete their creative and productive education, to grab opportunities of better life provided by that education and want to have an independent and career-oriented existence. Similarly, divorce rate has become high as a result of pressure or mental strain inflected by marriage, love and artificial love marriage, lack of common understanding among the spouses, vindictive dowry system and various conservative and profitable or commercial marriage practices. Increasing ratio of widows is considerably high and outstanding as a result of child marriage practices, restriction of remarriage, death of husband in accidents, insurgencies or other unnatural contexts and situations. Living life as a daughter, a wife, a mother and as a single woman leads to innumerable challenges, confrontations and disturbances. Though the global scenario of women seems to be improving, the societal manifestation of male predominance is so deep-rooted and deep-seated that the impoverishing circumstances of a woman, especially widow needs to be underlined. Marriage, Husband and Widow Marriage is a remarkably imperative occasion in the existence of women. A compromise marriage (related person) is a greeting and salutation of security for women. A marriage by pressure (such as traditional and religiously-oriented) is not good for women. Marriage, in course of time, is followed by motherhood, and its reappearance makes the women occasionally powerless, incapable and completely dependent on her

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MINA/SIKSHYA: Perceptions and Practices of Society... 247 husband. The husband becomes the leading power and the wife’s circumstance is one of ethical subordination (Uprety, 2008). In the Vedic society, we find that the wife was treated with utmost courtesy and regards. It was well recognized that the wife was the ornament of the house (Altekar, 1959). The average Hindu wife who is ideally compared with Savitri is not imagined to be separated from her husband because of the deep-rooted belief that she would neither have desire, pleasure, prosperity nor heaven once separated (ibid). The majority of Nepali women (both educated and non-educated) are strongly attached as the housewife and helper of the husband rather than his equal partner. The wife on her part performs traditionally identical duties, compulsions and responsibilities. She is obliged to be appropriated and well mannered to her husband in her wedding promise and move ahead with her life of a just right pativarata. As a practice in Nepal, marriage is regarded in the form of a spiritual and social obligation and commitment between both men and women relation. It is also a common understanding of people in our society that neither men nor women can have a happy and successful life in this world and also in heaven if they have not enterned into marital life. Our social values have provided an orientation that women have to feel privileged to be with husbands in the family, and be content with happiness gained through this relation by their spouse. The theories of family and marriage institution have established an ideology that a woman is the equal partner of the male for the maintenance of the family and other dealings. However, what is in practice is that she holds an inferior status within these social units. Death is inevitable. But, the bereavement due to loss of husband creates a severe problem in the role adjustment for a woman. The oppressive social structures founded on patriarchal construction make widowhood personally problematic for individual widows. Social researchers, social workers, social reformers and planners have ignored the problem of widowhood. In a male-dominated society, women are most unfortunately viewed as household workers and child bearers. It is only natural that in such an atmosphere, women are neither properly educated nor informed of their rights and legal procedures. This takes a worst turn after a woman is widowed. +

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The sudden and abrupt loss of marital status happens due to death of the husband. The loss of the husband is not the only suffering that a widow, has to encounter. When a woman becomes a widow she is further required to obey very stern and rigid rules and regulations to curb many areas of her freedom. These types of normative requirements prescribed for widows differ as per different types of castes, ethnic and religious communities. However, economic dependence is the major problem that outweighs other types of restrictions to keep them in marginal social position. Among Hindu, widows are not allowed even to wear the red color, a color regarded as a symbol of luck to use in religious ceremonies. As widows are considered inauspicious, they are not supposed to participate in religious and other cultural ceremonies like worship of gods and goddesses, marriage of their own children, etc. Most widows are ignorant of any legal rights they may have about compensation or inheritance. It is pity that widows lack self-confidence and are depressed, discriminated, afraid and immobilized in all their lives only because they are women. Those are facts for all the women, even those who are educated (WHR, 2006). After the death of the husband, the change that takes places in a women’s life confers them a different type of status from wifehood to widowhood. The life of widows is one of darkness. Social norms restrict their mobility, remarriage, employment, interest, happiness, ownership and other kinds of social and cultural relationships. In case a widow heads a household, her position sometimes becomes much worse both socially and economically. Various less-developed societies are unsuccessful to ensure proper rights of the women, so are suffered the widow. Widowhood and Gender Relation In Nepal, similar to many other countries, social issues concerning women, gender relations and gender associations have received little level of attention from the scholars. However, it has gradually been realized that there are inequalities, discriminations, subordinations and inhuman treatments in gender relations leading to many types of suffering for women.

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MINA/SIKSHYA: Perceptions and Practices of Society... 249 The traditional patriarchal thought requires a wife to be propitious for her husband. The long-established religious principles (Dharma Shastras) prescribed in Manu-Smriti has mentioned that among Hindus the women are accountable for ensuring the social, physical and spiritual happiness of males, especially in their role as wives. They can satisfy this duty through dedicating themselves to the life of their husbands. Her devotion and fidelity to her husband is thought important to prolong his life too. At the same time, she is also regarded as a cause to bring him death and misfortunes. His death further afflicts many other types of problems in her life including change of her socio-cultural identity and loss of freedom in many issues. In other words, a husband’s death results in a number of social and cultural problems in the life of his widow. She retains only a limited or restricted level of freedom to remarry, own property, and take advantage of social and economic opportunities provided for male by society. In Nepal, the consequences of socio-political conflicts of the last fifteen years (those related to Maoist insurgency and various social movements) left tens of thousands of women to become widow without their own involvement in these events. However, the conventional belief of society takes this type of their suffering also as a product of their sins committed in the past probably in previous life. How far this belief matches with the hard fact of society is a question which requires answers through empirical studies and investigations (Uprety, 2008). The condition of widows vastly differs in different groups of people distributed in different areas. Despite these variations, they all have one feature in common that as widow they have to bear a number of sufferings. Widowhood and related burden of restrictive rules and regulations separate and marginalize them from their community, family and the circle of relatives. Being a widow is a dishonor. It gives the impression that she has made many mistakes in life by being a woman and a wife. People tend to evaluate them unsympathetically to tag bad symbols. This makes the widows very embarrassed to open their identity as a widow in the public. The widow has to lead a life of self-mortification. Sometimes her head is shaved. Married women whose husbands are alive avoid any

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cultural links with the widows. They are regarded as the symbol of evil (Alakkshini). Widowhood is a curse on women. The widowhood and evils associated with it has roots to pre-Vedic era. According to an article, "Victim of Discrimination" written by Dr. Ginny Srivastav, Professor of Delhi University, the traditional word for widow is a symbolic identity for a woman, whose husband is dead. The term "Vidawa" or "widow" is very old and can be traced to Vedic scriptures or even beyond to Indo-European origin. Despite the social transformations caused by scientific advancement over the past 200 years leading to change in human outlook, there has hardly been any change in people’s attitude towards widows. It is true that there is always role differentiation and a division of labor at least according to age and sex. Adults and children, males and females are always assigned with different tasks. However, some studies (e.g., Duberman and Azumi 1975) have mentioned that in this division of labor Nepali women are among the most deprived groups on earth. Parents are legally obliged to support sons, not daughters. Only sons can inherit. The only compensating factor is that a wife is entitled to 50 percent of her husband’s property. After a wife is widowed or deserted, her in-laws steal her share. One study has reported that more than 1.6 percent of the female populations in Nepal become already widowed by the age of 29 (Acharya, 1994). The risk of widowhood and related types of problems for the women tends to increase with increase in their age. The patriarchal social values always make critiques and pose unseen restrictions to the young widows. All their activities are seriously watched with negative eyes. They are not supposed even to talk to other males in society. Together with the burdens, they have to bear the responsibility for the maintenance of their children which deprives of their freedom and orients them to think that they cannot have a better life even when they dare to remarry. Hindu social structure is such that it makes majority of women dependent on male members of the family. As a result, when a woman becomes a widow, she becomes vulnerable. Lack of adequate expertise does not permit her to run any type of earning activity independently.

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MINA/SIKSHYA: Perceptions and Practices of Society... 251 Such a situation leads them to rely on others even for the fulfillment of basic needs like food, shelter, health and others required for herself and her dependents. Alternatively, having no earning partner to support her in the domestic unit she has to bear a double burden of an earner and manager of the household unit. As a married daughter, she has no right to seek the help from her natal family. It seems relevant in this context to have a look on the code of conduct prescribed for women and widow women on the basis of which they have to bear these sufferings. The Hindu philosophy regards widowhood as a social misfortune and imposes for the widows many conducts related to dress, color, behavior and others. Let us have a look at these social codes separately. Dress and Color Code Various set of laws or codes over the years have managed to achieve religious sanctions. The life of a woman undergoes total metamorphosis after she becomes a widow. Every aspect of her life undergoes changes. In Nepal or in any part of the world, there is no dress code for married men whose wives are alive or who are widowers. But at the same time, this is not very true for women. Dress and color code (rules, symbols, beliefs and other various social implications) changes for women with changes of her status from unmarried to married and from married to widowhood. The dress code and color code are different in different regions or groups in society. All secret and cloak-and-dagger codes and symbols of married-hood are to be shunned by the widow, proclaiming her status in the society. The dress code that the widows are enforced to accept aims to "de-sex" the widow and at times, they are even further humiliated by requiring to tonsure their heads. The dress code at widowhood is also introduced in a shocking manner by flouting the bangles with a pebble and wiping out the vermillion. Red color is the only disallowed thing, which makes them suffer as a widow all the time. Otherwise, they do not feel much differents in their lives. Behavior Code According to the conservative philosophy, a widow is considered ill-

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fated. She is habitually addressed in very insulting way or manner. Over and over again, she remains marginalized from actions and reflections of people on her so-called ill-treated status. A widow is supposed to have no relations with men outside her family. However, her position even within her family also remains subjugated regularly. She is prohibited from being present in any type of religious or social ceremonies. Her presence in such ceremonies are considered inauspicious. So, many widow women themselves do not desire to be involved in these social functions due to the apprehensions of being criticized by society. Widows and Diverse Circumstances Although widows look like powerless in the eyes of public, they are found to be involved in special works and services in order to manage and fulfill their every day expenses. Because of low level of their qualification and social linkages, these women are enforced to perform what they obtain at the first hand, and there is forever a terror in them of loosing the jobs for subsistence generation. Nearly all widows care for the work they perform. The fear of any kind of sexual harassment that they may face in new social setting motivates them to stick in activities which they are performing rather then looking for alternative opportunities of emerging social environment. However, there are hopes for the improvement of such a social situation. If the widows are educated, and become qualified for profitable earning, they will have to face less economic problems. Once their economic problems are narrowed, it may help to increase their courage and confidence. The improvement of economic and education status also provides them strength to develop a feeling that it’s not their sin or luck to be widow. Conclusions The death of husband makes a transition in the life of a woman from a wife to a widow. Whatever the cause of the husband’s death is, in most cases, the wife has always been blamed for it. She is supposed to bring the ill-fortunes in the family. Her hard works, skills, dedication to the family is counted only as long as her husband is alive. The neglected and hated status of the widow is not the recent one. It is deep-rooted in the patriarchal Hindu structure. Though the widower can remarry, the +

MINA/SIKSHYA: Perceptions and Practices of Society... 253 remarriage of a widow is considered very rare and uncommon. The society is very biased towards the widow’s freedom and their life. Thus, it makes a widow feel inferior in all fields of society. We feel that unawareness (not only of women, but of all circles) and illiteracy are the foremost fundamental issues of concern of single women, particularly widow. Though they are being victims of sociocultural evils and customary practices, they are not aware of their rights and inferior status. Affected by the unfair type of patriarchal social philosophy and structure, they feel it as their fate and not the social prejudice. In contrast, the literate widows who are aware of their legal rights also think that these social evils cannot be neglected. The widows are shocked and shackled by socio-cultural and customary ideologies, relationships and practices. Unless they become literate and aware of their rights, it is difficult to change their suppressed status. It is found that the widows in groups can appear much more confident to defy the evils and conservative practices of society. They can feel much secured in spaces, which are represented by themselves. In these spaces, they can share their inner feelings and find opportunities to understand each other. Absolutely, the women who are not organized are still mystified and baffled about their status. These women are much more vulnerable than the widows who are organized. To date, all these ideologies and practices, separately and jointly, barricade women’s common happiness and existence. Definitely, all sectors, aspects and levels the Nepalese society are dominated by the males. However, the circumstance is slowly but unquestionably changing with new options, opportunities and hope for women to emancipate themselves from patriarchical domination. Bibliography Achrya, Meena. (1994). The Statistical Profile of Nepalese Women: an Update in the Polity Context. Kathmandu: IIDS. Agarwal, Beena. (1998). Widows versus Daughters or Widows as Daughters? Property,Land and Economic Security in Rural India. Delhi:Institute of Economic Growth. Altekar, A. S. (1959). The Position of Women in Hindu Civilization. Delhi: +

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Motilal Banarsidas Publishers, Pvt. Ltd. Best, S. and Kellner, D. (1991). Postmodern Theory: Critical Interrogations. New York: Guilford Press. Chakaravarti, Uma .(1993). Gender, Caste and Labour: Indological and Material Structure of Widowhood, EPW. Vol.30 No.36. Duberman, Lucile and Azumi, Koya. (1975). Sexim in Nepal; Jornal of Marriage and the Family Vol. 37, no.4. Lerner, Gerda. (1993). The Creation of Feminist Consciousness. New York: Oxford. Rosaldo, Michelle. (1974). Women, Culture and Society: A Theoretical Overview. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Said, Edward W. (2001). Orientalism: Western Conception of the Orient. Delhi: Penguin Books. WHR, Action Aid Nepal. (2006). Problems and Challenges of Single Women (Widows) in Nepal. Kathmandu: Action Aid and Women for Human Rights, Single Women Group. Uprety, Mina. (2008). "Women’s Subordination : A Conceptual Analysis in Nepal". In Pyakuryal et al (eds.) Social Sciences in a Multicultural World: Proceedings of the International Conference, Held on 11-13 December 2006, Kathmandu: SASON.

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THE ANTHROPOLOGY OF TACIT KNOWLEDGE IN THE DOMESTIC MANDALA: A CASE STUDY OF CHHETRIS IN THE KATHMANDU VALLEY John Gray * ‘For our house is our corner of the world ... it is our first universe, a real cosmos in every sense of the word.' Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of Space ‘We know more than we can tell.' Michael Polanyi, The Tacit Dimension The epigraphs encapsulate the two major themes of this paper. As Bachelard's quotation suggests, Chhetri houses are not simply functional places for everyday living. Instead, the house and its surrounding compound are also an encompassing cosmos in which Chhetris of the Kathmandu Valley dwell and come to understand its fundamental principles.1 In their everyday activities of preparing, cooking and eating rice, Chhetri Householders spatially configure their domestic compounds into mandalas-sacred diagrams that are simultaneously maps of the cosmos and machines for revealing the truth of cosmos as a fundamental unity. At the same time, such everyday dwelling in a domestic mandalas is productive of knowledge of the cosmos they represent. Polanyi's point ‘we know more than we can tell' (1966:4) is a vital dimension for anthropology in explaining social and cultural life. Refocusing on what he calls ‘the tacit dimension' redresses the tendency of * Jhon Gray is an Australian Antropologist. 1 Se also Blier 1987, Kent 1990, Rapport 1969, Rudofsky 1964, Waterson 1991.

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anthropologists to rely on what people can and do say about their lifeworlds as evidence for the analyses and interpretations they construct. Yet, much of the knowledge by which we live our everyday lives is tacit. In this paper, I highlight four aspects of the tacit dimension. First, it is not easily verbalised and activities can be meaningful even if the meaning is not able to be explained in words, explicit concepts or subject to reflection (Jackson 1966:34). ‘This sort of [tacit] knowledge can be represented, made present-only through action, enactment, or performance (Fabian 1990:6, brackets added).Second, it is not just the case that tacit knowledge is not formulated linguistically and not available for reflection, rather its effectiveness in enabling everyday life is founded on it not being explicit and linguistic, (Bloch 1998:11), or use Polanyi's concept, it remains in our ‘subsidiary awareness' (1958:55ff). Language is a good example. I am able to write in English for this paper without being reflexively conscious of or able to verbalise explicitly the knowledge of English grammar the rules about the use of nouns, verbs, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, clauses, and stylistics-that linguists tell me I have in that enables me to do so. This is not to say that I don't have some rudimentary explicit and sayable knowledge about English grammar that I can bring into my focal awareness when I am analysing the grammar of what I am writing. But even though I do, such knowledge interferes with my explicit intention and ability to express my thoughts. If I try to bring my tacit knowledge of grammar into reflexive consciousness or focal awareness simultaneously with the intentional act of writing when my focal awareness is on what I am trying to express, it distracts me and inhibits me from my primary, pragmatic and explicit task of writing something about the anthropology of domestic architecture among the Chhetris. In taking this stance, Polanyi joins a number of other anthropologists and philosophers who argue that our humananity emerges primarily through our everyday, practical engagement with the world rather than through a contemplative reflection upon the world (Arendt 1958, Heidegger 1962, Jackson 1996). Accordingly, there is a difference between the lived, often pre-reflective, immediacy of being-in-the-world and the distanced and reflexive accounts about being-in-the-world, between a pre-theoretical and praxical relation to the world-embodied actions of using and doing things in everyday life-and a contemplative +

JOHN GRAY: The Anthropology of Tacit Knowledge in The Domestic... 257 and reflexive relation to the world. ‘The knowledge whereby one lives is not necessarily identical with the knowledge whereby one explains life' (Jackson 1996:2). Such being-in-the-world and the practical knowledge for doing so, `the knowledge whereby one lives', is to an important extent tacit and consequently embodied. This is the third aspect of the tacit. ‘My body has its world, or understands its world, without having to make use of my "symbolic" or "objectifying" function' (Merleau-Ponty 1962:162). We are conscious with and through our bodies and we live in and constitute the world as embodied subjects. Fourth, this being-in and constituting the world as lived bodies is primordially spatial. Humans inhabit spaces through their body. We see, hear, feel and move in relation to things with our bodies and these things have a spatial relation to our bodies so that our inhabited space is constituted as bodily space. Through the lived body's consciousness and actions, we project ourselves into the world, embrace it, encompass it, and to use Heidegger's (1975:145) encompassing concept for this multifaceted praxis, to `dwell' in it. We do not exist as conscious subjects without it; it doesn't exist for us without our consciousness. In this sense, body and the surrounding spatial environment are mutually constitutive; there is nobody outside its sensuous relations to the world. Accordingly, a pervading ethnographic theme of this paper is the way Chhetri villagers come to understand their paradoxical world of prosperity and its renunciation through embodied spatial movement in their houses. As they move about their domestic compounds, they not only carry out everyday activities tasks such as entertaining guests, processing grain, preparing food, eating a meal that are in their focal awareness-but also tacitly build their houses into concentric mandalas, produce an embodied and revelatory knowledge of the enigma of being Householders and turn it into a`bodily hexis', that is, a permanent and corporeal disposition of thinking and feeling (Bourdieu 1977:93-94). Underlying their seeming ordinariness, Chhetri houses are also extraordinary; they are sacred spaces that re-iterate the Hindu cosmos-that's why I have called them Domestic Mandalas. Ordinary everyday household chores and activities in Chhetris focal awareness are simultaneously extraordinary cosmogenic acts of building Chhetri houses into the cosmos and revelatory acts of tacit and embodied knowing its fundamental principles. +

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Chhetris The ethnographic focus of this paper are members of a clan of Chhetris living in a hamlet located in southern reaches of the Kathmandu Valley. The hamlet consists of approximately 100 household groups (pariwar), of which two-thirds are members of a single agnatic lineage. Household groups range in size from single person households (2), to nuclear households (39) and complex joint households (24). In most cases, each household group occupies a single ‘house' (ghar) consisting of the house building and the compound that surrounds and encloses it.2 Chhetris explicitly understand their earthly existence in terms of the enigmatic nature of their lifeworld and the Hindu notion of the four states of life (ashrama). Many were able to articulate to me the idea that the human world consists of, on the one hand, a diversity of human individuals, social groups, material things and natural forces of the everyday life and, on the other hand, a transcendent and absolute unity that is a spaceless, timeless, causeless void. They understood the origin of this worldly diversity through the self-sacrifice of the primeval cosmic being, Purusha, who embodies the fundamental unity of the cosmos.3 As a result of Purusha's sacrifice, all perceptible time and space, every different corporeal being and thing, and all the variety of natural energies and forces in the everyday world are both distinct phenomena and an expression of the whole unified cosmos. To focus on the former as fundamentl is to experience reality as constituted only by the diversity of sensible worldly phenomena and to become attached to people and things through social and material relations (see Gray 1995). To pursue such attachments as the goal of life is to be shrouded in ignorance and to be caught in the continual cycle of death and rebirth. To focus on the latter as the fundamental reality is to experience the everyday world of diversity 2 There are some cases in which a joint family has split into two or more household groups and continue to occupy a single house structure until land and money is found to build two separate houses. In such cases, internal renovations are carried out so that each household group has at least a separate kitchen. 3 Rig Veda ‘Hymn to Purusha' (I O:XC). Purusha embodies the fundamental unity of the cosmos. All that can and will exist in the world is immanent in his body. His self-sacrifice is a creative act unleashing the diversity inherent and potential in his body and establishing the microcosmic-macrocosmic system of correlations between planes of existence.

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JOHN GRAY: The Anthropology of Tacit Knowledge in The Domestic... 259 as ultimately an illusion (maya) that hides the unity of the cosmos; such enlightened knowledge of the absolute leads humans to eschew the illusion of attachments and gain liberation or release (moksha) from the round of death and rebirth, that is, consigned to continual life-in-the-world of illusion. It is in this context that Chhetris situate the four stages of life-inthe-world. The first stage is the Brahmacharya, the Life of the Celibate Student. This is the stage during adolescence when a young boy studies the religious texts under the guidance of a guru as a prelude to and a precondition for marriage and entering the Householder stage of life. During this phase, the boy adopts asceticism as a mode of life through celibacy and begging for food. Most Chhetri boys go through the Brahmacharya stage only as part of the rite of passage (Bartaman) in which they become adults.4 The second stage is the Grihastha, the Life of the Householder. This is the stage in which Chhetri men and women spend their adult lives; it is the stage for life-in-the-world, fully and actively engaging with the diversity of people and things motivated by practical, everyday concerns. It includes marriage, raising children, living in a household and producing the material needs for its members. The third stage is the Vanaprasta, the Forest Dweller. This is the stage when, having discharged the duties of the Householder and passed the age of copulation, a man and his wife retire to the forest where they devote themselves to meditation and the practice of austerities including chastity. All of the previous stages are a preparation for the final and most radical renunciation demanded of the final stage of life, the Sanyasin, or Wandering Ascetic. During this stage of life, a person renounces all worldly desires, together with the social relations and attachments entailed by them. Chhetri villagers consider themselves to be in the Householder stageof-life. They told me that every Chhetri boy had gone through Bartaman and they could not remember anyone from their hamlet who had become a Forest Dweller or a Wandering Ascetic. In effect, the four stages-oflife are reduced to a juxtaposition of two possible modes of being-in-theworld. One is the Householder, the ordinary person-in-the-world whose 4 For women, the rite of passage to adulthood and to the Householder stage of life is marriage.

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life is defined by Grihasta dharma5 that motivates actions (kaman) and the aim of such action is to produce ‘practical' and beneficial results (‘fruits') in this world. It is this action in and for the world that both produces and engages the diversity of people and material things which are the objects of one's attachments, desires and passions. But as a result of such worldly-oriented action and attachments, the Householder is caught in the continual round of birth-death-rebirth into the world. The other mode of being-in-the-world is the Renouncer, personified by the asceticism and detachment of the Brahmacharya, Vanaprasta and Sanyasin. The goal of such detachment is to achieve liberation from the round of birth-death-rebirth and to realize the fundamental unity of one's self with all other selves and things. Chhetris' lifeworld is both practical and cosmological: as they engage in everyday domestic activities, they are fulfilling their sacred duties. As Householders, their aim is to prosper not just in the narrow sense of material wealth but also in the wider sense, captured by the Nepali word Samyddhi, of an abundance of those things that characterize the `good life': children, health, well-being and peaceful relations with oneself, other human beings and the deities. At the same time, they are also enjoined to remain detached from these manifold worldly attachments, to resist enslavement by them (Madan 1987:3) in order to achieve liberation by seeing through the veil of illusion that conceals the fundamental unity of the cosmos. Their goal is to live a life characterised by detached attachment or passionless passion. Chhetri Houses The house is the primary locus and focus of the Householder's life-inthe-world. In the hamlet where I worked, there are two types of houses 5 Grihasta dharma includes three main duties: begetting children, feeding the ascetics, and performing sacrifice. Each of these motivates Householders to a life characterized by passion, prosperity and attachment (see Gray 1995): the duty to beget children motivates an attachment to a diversity of people (epitomized by marriage and the love of children); the duty to feed the ascetics motivates attachment to a diversity of things in the world (epitomized by ownership of land to produce food for subsistence and to feed the ascetics); and the duty to perform sacrifice motivates attachment to a diversity of deities (epitomized by doing numerous pujds towards gods and goddesses).

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JOHN GRAY: The Anthropology of Tacit Knowledge in The Domestic... 261 usually consisting of two storeys.6 One type I will call ‘traditional' (see Figures la and lb) built with sun-,dried mud bricks, carved wooden window frames and doors, mud floors, and tile or thatched roofs. They generally have an open plan ground floor with four visible pillars forming a rectangle around a central pillar, a kitchen in far corner often behind a low all to obstruct visibility from doorway, and a worship room generally located on the second floor. The other type of house I call `contemporary' (see Figures 2a and 2b), indicating its more recent construction using concrete for wall construction with wooden windows frames and doors. The main difference is that these newer houses have separate rooms rather than open plan with kitchen located in the room furthest from the main entrance or on an upper floor. Although they are distinguished by the building materials and interior room layout, there are four common architectural features. First, houses are built on rectangular sites surrounded by a low wall that defines the boundary of the domestic compound. They are located towards one edge of the site away from approaching public roads or paths, leaving space for a courtyard. This results in a configuration of nested domestic spaces boundary, courtyard, verandah, main entrance and interior of house (see Figures 1 and 2). Second, the houses are oriented with the main entrance opening out onto the courtyard allowing household members a clear view of it and anyone who may be approaching the house from the public path or roadway. Courtyards are distinct spaces and one of their important architectural functions is mediating between the house and public thoroughfares outside the boundary of house compound that are potentially dangerous places where impure people of lower castes (jat), malign witches (boksi) and malevolent ghosts and other spirits (bhut, pret, pichds) linger. Third, a covered and raised verandah spans the front of the traditional houses and some portion of the front of contemporary houses; its location makes it another mediating space, now between the courtyard that is visible and the interior of the house that is not visible to those outside the compound. Finally and most 6 When I began fieldwork in 1973, all the houses were of the traditional type. By 2001, traditional houses were in the minority (31 of 69), as over the intervening years a significant number of Chhetris had built contemporary ones. Most of these new houses were built by young men after their marriages as part of the process of separating from their joint families and establishing separate household groups.

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importantly, both types of houses are in the spatial configuration of a mandala.

Figure 1a: Traditional House

Figure 2a: Contemporary House

Figure 1b: Sketch Plan of Traditional House (ground floor)

Figure 2b: Sketch Plan of Contemporary House (ground floor)

The Mandala Form A mandala is a mystic diagram that represents the nature and order of the universe (see Figure 3)-‘map of the cosmos.. .the whole universe in its essential plan' (Tucci 200L23).7 Tucci's description highlights three important attributes of the mandalas. First, their primary referent is the 7

In Nepal 'mandala' tends to refer to mystic diagrams associated with the Buddhism of Newars and Tibetan groups and 'yantra' with the Hinduism of Brahmin-Chhetris. See Figure 3. At the same time, it should not be concluded that 'mandalas are rarely part of the Hindu tradition and than yantras are not found in the Buddhist tradition' (Buhnemann 2003:16). See Gellner's description of the importance of mandalas among both Buddhist and Hindu Newars of Patan (1992:45-8,190-1). Buhnemann (2003) and Brunner (2003) provide discussions of the differences between mandalas and yantras based upon analysis of Hindu textual sources. BUhnemann concludes: ‘The use and functions of these terms [mandala, yantra and cakra] are complex and it will be impossible to arrive at a universally valid definition' (2003:18).

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JOHN GRAY: The Anthropology of Tacit Knowledge in The Domestic... 263

Nairatma Mandala8

Nepal, c. 18th century9

Figure 3 Two forms of the mandala

cosmos that may be represented in different graphic modes: pictographs composed of pictures and icons that depict religious concepts and deities who in turn personify the primary bodies and natural forces of the universe as well as the qualities of humans; geographs composed of purely geometric designs-squares, circles, triangles and the point whose shapes likewise stand for religious concepts, deities and the natural forces and human qualities they personify. Second, they are maps of the cosmos and, as such, the spatial arrangement of the pictures and geometric elements in the composition depict important characteristics of the cosmos. Third, more than just an allegorical map of the cosmos, mandalas are microcosms of it. Whether composed of pictographic or geometric elements, they are revelatory of the fundamental unity of the cosmos as well as the normally hidden system of correlations between planes of existence immanent in that unity: the cosmos, the deities, the human world, and the body and psyche of the individual (Hopkins 1971:25, Tucci 2001:45); ‘knowledge of such mystical connections leads to power...' (Gourdriaan 1979:57-58) and is a basis for ritual action and its efficacy (see Daryn 2002: 164ff). 8 From ‘Early Tibetan Mandalas: The Rossi Collection'.With the kind permission of Rossi & Rossi Ltd., London. 9 Ajit Mookerjee Collection. From Yantra: The Tantric Symbol of Cosmic Unity, by Madhu Khanna, Thames and Hudson, London.

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Again, despite their differences in representational form, mandalas share fundamental compositional design elements for expressing this cosmology and providing a 'machine' (Zimmer 1972:141) for revelatory knowledge: as a whole they are oriented to the cardinal directions each of which is associated with a deity; they have a centre point (bindhu) surrounded by a concentric girdle either circular or polygonic of line/s and space/s that provide the dynamic quality of movement; and they have outer boundary line enclosing a sacred space. This spatial configuration is constructed from three primary geometric elements: the square, the point and the circle, each with representing a fundamental dimension of the cosmos. The square is the perfect four-cornered polygon with sides of equivalent length intersecting at right angles. In Hindu iconography, it is the geometric image of the space for terrestrial dwelling; it creates the spatial abode in-the-world for deities and humans. Its orienting references are the cardinal directions. The four sides and the cardinal directionseast, south, west and north are mutually constitutive. In the process of creation, the cardinal directions and terrestrial space are the source of each other's existence. The four corners formed by the intersecting sides produce the intermediate directions south-east, south-west, north-west and north-east. The eight directions are, in turn, associated with deities representing and reigning over particular aspects of the cosmos they personify the cosmos manifest in the planets, natural forces, and human qualities.10 By focusing on these elements, we can abstract from the complex mandala a basic design configuration consisting of a four-sided, four-corned polygon aligned with the cardinal directions surrounding a centre. In this configuration, the emphasis is on the terrestrial world as a space of human habitation created and defined by the sacred geography of the cardinal directions and their reigning deities. In this configuration (see Figure 4), the mandala is a cosmological space for auspicious action in-the-world. The directions and their reigning deities have distinct qualities and meanings that organize terrestrial space into a template for orientating human action. Chhetris try to align their action in particular 10 These essential features of the square-a four-sided polygon implicating and oriented by the four cardinal and four intermediate directions-are retained in the rectangle which we will see is the basic geometric configuration of a house.

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JOHN GRAY: The Anthropology of Tacit Knowledge in The Domestic... 265 directions-either by physically performing it in a particular part of a structure or diagram or bodily facing a particular direction during actionso that the nature of the action is compatible with the quality or characteristic of the direction toward which it is aligned. Such harmonious and auspicious alignment portends beneficent outcomes for the actions through which Chhetri Householders engage with and form attachments to the diversity of people, things and deities of the world in order to achieved a prosperous life in-the-world. The point (bindhu) and its central location in the diagram together are a spatial rendering of the fundamental unity and truth of the cosmos in its un-manifested form before and after space, time and the diversity of beings and things of the world. Like Purusha, all is immanent in it; it is the point from which the world in all its diversity is created and it is the point into which all creation dissolves. Movement outward from the bindhu that forms a surrounding space is the force of creation and evolution of worldly diversity and the entrapment of attachment to it; movement inward toward the bindhu is the force of dissolution and devolution of worldly diversity and liberation from its illusory power through knowledge of the fundamental unity. The circle defines another type of space, a concentric zone around the all-embracing centre point without reference to the cardinal directions. The concentric zones do not immediately suggest the expanse of terrestrial space of human living but the space created by and for the diversity of people and things. Its orienting reference, then, is the centre point `as the universe in its un-manifested form' (Mookerjee and Khanna 1977:96), `as the principle from which all form and creation radiates' (Buhnemann 2003:41). The zone/s marked out by concentric spaces around the bindhu depict the dynamism of the cosmos-simultaneously the outward, expanding, centrifugal act of creating from the centre point the diversity of things and beings, as well as the space for them, and the inward, contracting, centripetal act of their dissolution into the centre point. By focusing on the point and surrounding concentric zones elements, we can abstract another basic design configuration consisting of concentric zones around a point (see Figure 4). In this revelatory configuration, the mandala is a guide for understanding the cosmos, whether achieved by meditation or action upon its form. In sensual and embodied +

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Revelatory Configuration: concentric zones around a powerful centre

Auspicious Configuration: oriented by cardinal directions

Figure 4: Two Configurations of domestic space

contemplation, as the eye fixes on the centre point and is drawn to move outward by the surrounding lines, the beholder experiences the unmanifested source, visualizes the creation of the diversity of people and things and feels the attachment to the world that traps humans in the round of death and rebirth. As the eye is pulled inward by the power of the bindhu at the centre, the beholder experiences the obliteration of diversity, discovers the illusion of attachment to it and comes to understand the true nature of the universe as fundamentally a timeless and spaceless unity in which all forms of individual consciousness merge in the centre. Chhetri Houses as Auspicious As can be seen from the photos and sketch diagrams, Chhetri houses have the three characteristics of the auspicious configuration of the mandala: a four-sided polygon oriented to the cardinal directions with a materially or ritually established central pillar. Chhetris intentionally build this configuration into their houses through three interweaving

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JOHN GRAY: The Anthropology of Tacit Knowledge in The Domestic... 267 processes of construction.11 The first is the material construction of the house which has a number of stages: selecting the site, preparing the site, positioning the house on the site, laying the foundation and building the external structure, and finally inhabiting the house. The second is linking these stages of material construction to the flow of cosmic time so that they take place at auspicious times calculated by the household priest to be compatible with the horoscope of the owner. The third process is making the house an auspicious place for domestic activities, portending well-being and prosperity for the owner and his household group. This involves creating an harmonious spatial conjunction between the house and the space in which it is built, a space that is created in the act of building. Spatial auspiciousness entails ensuring compatibility and harmony between the physical structure and the spatial milieu in which the house is erected: during the process of selection of the site, worship is performed to the Deity of the Earth (Bhumi Puja); before the laying of the rectangular foundation, a`Foundation Ritual' (Jug Puja) is performed. In this rite, idols of deities associated with the cardinal directions are buried in the four corners and another in the centre of the rectangle. When the foundation is laid, these deities become part of the house structure itself and orient it auspiciously to the cardinal directions. In addition, rites are performed to neutralise evil or harmful presences from the land and the house itself. This theme of auspiciousness is carried through into the spatial layout as well. Using what they call 'bastu rules’12, Chhetris situate particular types of spaces auspiciously in relation to the cardinal directions. The three most important are the main entrance, the worship room and the kitchen. The main entrance is in most cases oriented to the south for two reasons, at once practical and cosmological. First, it situates the courtyard so that it receives the warming sun during the cold winter months. Second, while the south is the inauspicious direction of the Yama, the deity associated with death, when entering the house, people are facing north, the auspicious direction of the deities so that movement into the house 11 See Levy for a description of the Newar house as also an interweaving of the material and the symbolic (1990:186-192) 12 This is the only reference they made to the Vastu Shastras in explaining the orientation and layout of their houses.

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towards the north portends the beneficence of the deities. The worship room should be in the north-east, the direction of the deity Isan, god of purity, knowledge and wisdom the state, outcome and benefit of performing puja. In the majority of houses (66%) for which I have detailed room layout plans, the worship room is located in the north-east; in those houses in which the worship room is located in another quadrant of the house, the worship alter and idols are located in the north-east corner of the room itself. The kitchen with its cooking fire should be in the south-east, the direction of the deity -Agni, the god of fire. However, in most Chhetri houses (72%), the kitchen is in the northern quadrant. This pattern makes sense in relation to the location of the main entrance in the southern quadrant: placing the kitchen in the northern quadrant of the ground floor means that it is the space or room farthest from the main entrance. When looked at according to the location relative to the main entrance, rather than aligned with a cardinal direction, almost all kitchens in traditional and contemporary houses are located far away from the main door either by being placed in the farthest corner or room of the ground floor or on an upper floor. The presented me with a different way of understanding the location of the kitchen-as the centre of the revelatory configuration of the domestic mandala. Chhetri House as Revelatory Bourdieu developed the concept of ‘bodily hexis’ (1977:93) to describe the way in which the knowledge and dispositions through which we conduct our everyday lives have not just a reflexive form in ideas and concepts that we may be able to verbalize but also a tacit form (see Polanyi 1958, 1966) in the gestures and movements of the body. This duality of the verbal/reflexive and tacit/corporeal characterizes the forms in which Chhetris experience cosmological ideas, build them into their houses, and their houses into mandalas. To paraphrase Bourdieu: `Bodily hexis is [cosmology] realized, em-bodied, turned into a permanent disposition, a durable manner of standing, speaking, and thereby of feeling and thinking' (1977:93-4, bracket added). Bodily hexis entails moving in space and such motility creates culturally significant spaces. In the remainder of the paper, I describe how Chhetris create concentric spaces of inclusion and exclusion through the durable patterns of

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JOHN GRAY: The Anthropology of Tacit Knowledge in The Domestic... 269 household activities and movement in their compounds (see Munn 2003). This creation is mediated by their everyday concerns with maintaining purity and avoiding the dangers of impurity. These concerns about purity and impurity transfigure the abstract cosmological concepts of diversity and unity, attachment and detachment, illusion and revelation into everyday bodily practices of purity and impurity and one of the most important of these are activities of cooking and eating in the kitchen. Purity and Impurity For Chhetris, being Householders means that there are no more important media for living in the world than their bodies and the food they eat to sustain them. Like Hindus throughout South Asia, they identify substances produced by the body-saliva, perspiration, urine, excrement, blood, semen and mucus as the primary sources of impurity (jutho) as well as the product and signs of embodied life-in-the-Householder'sworld. Eating is paradigmatic of actions that cause impurity. When people eat, the food they touch as well as the hand which conveys the food to their mouths become polluted with their own saliva. These sources of impurity are all substances that flow from the inside to the outside of the body and the impurity they produce is the result of transgressing its boundary. This means that the vital, life-maintaining organic processes inherently `produce' impurity. Chhetris cannot avoid them as part of their physical being-in-the-world just as they cannot avoid the passions and attachments of their moral being-in-the-world as Householders. This parallel necessity of, on the one hand, corporeal life and the impurity it entails and, on the other hand, the dharma of the Householder and the attachments it entails suggests that impurity is the everyday bodily transfiguration of attachment and by implication that purity is the everyday bodily transfiguration of detachment. Purity as Detachment Purity is a state of perfection characterized by a completeness, wholeness and integrity that has not been corrupted by human action (see Madan 1987:58ff) or by breaching the boundary between inside and outside. Maintaining or restoring purity entails bodily deeds of detachment and asceticism. Bodily-produced impurity is personal and temporary. It is personal in the sense that only the individual whose

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body produces the impure substance necessarily becomes impure. It is temporary in the sense that a state of purity is easily restored by two kinds of activities-cleansing and abstinence. In cleansing, impurity is removed and the integrity of the body's boundary restored with running water that courses over the body and flows away. This is effective because water has the property of absorbing the quality of the object with which in comes into contact. For this reason, cleansing always involves water flowing over the impure part of the body, taking the impurity it has absorbed away from the body, thereby re-establishing its wholeness by creating a separation from the organic substances which breached its boundary. The physical separation from polluting organic substances effected by bathing is a sensual practice of detachment from the corporeal life of the Householder and the worldly attachments it necessarily entails and from which it is impossible-like organic life itself-to abstain. By cleansing after coming into contact with impurity inevitably produced by the processes of the body, Chhetris perform and experience their detachment from these processes. The other method of purification is ascetic practice, usually consisting of abstinence from eating and copulation, activities which produce impurity. Such abstinences involve avoidance or non-involvement with things of worldly enjoyment-good-tasting food and the physical pleasure of sexual intercourse. They are metonymic of a Householder's lifeworld and the necessary attachment to and/or passion for people and thingsfood, kinship relations and sexual relations.The purity achieved by abstinence from such passions and pleasures is another corporeal experience of detachment in the midst of the attachments of everyday life. Impurity as Attachment Impurity also has a permanent and collective form associated with castes whose members are affiliated through current or presumed historical practice with occupations that require contact with the impure substances or actions of others' bodies: Washermen with other people's sweat in the clothes they wash, Tailors with the skin of dead animals used in the drum they play at weddings, and Leatherworkers with the skin of dead animals in making shoes. In these castes, the occupation involves not just physical contact with pollution but also a permanent and excessive

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JOHN GRAY: The Anthropology of Tacit Knowledge in The Domestic... 271 attachment to it in the sense that the activity is understood to have traditionally provided the means of subsistence. People engaging in these occupations embody such impurity and pass it on genealogically so that collectively the pollution defining them as a distinct caste group is part of their corporeal substance. Even if a particular person in one of these castes does not engage in the traditional occupation, Chhetris still insisted that he or she still embodies the collective impurity of the caste through genealogical transmission. If the body is the source and locus of impurity as the everyday transfiguration of attachment, food and water are its main conductors. Caste groups in Banaspati are characterized and ranked as ‘caste groups from whom drinking water is accepted for consumption' (pani chalne jat) and ‘caste groups from whom drinking water is not accepted for consumption' (pani nachalne jat). Within the former category there is a further hierarchised division between ‘castes from whom boiled rice is accepted for consumption' (bhat chalne jat) and ‘castes from whom boiled rice is not accepted for consumption' (bhat nachalne jat). Such an extended and elaborate ensemble of concepts and practices about the dangers of impurity transmitted through food and physical contact renders the preparations and consumption of food not just explicitly nutritionally essential and socially sensitive but also tacitly significant cosmologically. It is through the patterns of intentionally including and excluding impure people from the increasingly interior concentric zones of the domestic compound-courtyard, verandah, and kitchen-where rice is prepared and eaten that Chhetris have in the focal awareness the protection of themselves and their food from the impurity of low caste people, and, at the same time, they tacitly map the cosmos onto their domestic compounds, building them into a mandala of concentric zones around the kitchen as the centre (see Figure 5). Courtyard The courtyard is the space most visible from outside the low boundary wall and most vulnerable to the impurity and dangers of impure people from outside the compound. It is the place where raw grains are dried or processed. When rice is harvested in autumn, it is threshed in the fields

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and brought to the house as paddy (dhan) to be dried in the sun before milling. Once milled to remove the chaff, rice (chamal) is in the next stage of its transformation into food. After milling, the courtyard is the place where rice is winnowed to remove the remaining chaff. It is still considered raw because it is uncooked and it has not been subjected to human action corrupting the wholeness of the grains. It is in the process of cooking that the grains become vulnerable to the impurity of lower castes. Because raw grain is immune from impurity, there are few, if any, protective spatial exclusions. The courtyard is the place where anyone is allowed to enter relatively freely. In this respect, the courtyard is the only place where members of untouchable castes can enter, as the case of the Tailor making clothes illustrates. The reverse is also the case: Chhetris do not fear becoming impure by entering the courtyard of low caste people. Verandah The verandah mediates the visible courtyard and the invisible interior of the house. Since it runs across the front of the house which faces into the courtyard, it is, like the courtyard, visible from outside the boundary. But like the house interior, the verandah is also a raised area above the courtyard on the same level as the house's ground floor and it is covered by a roof. Its architecturally mediating character is matched by its use as a socially mediating space between the public courtyard and the more secluded house interior. In traditional houses, there is often a raised wooden platform at one end of the verandah that people use for sitting in the sun and entertaining guests accompanied by snacks; in contemporary houses, either chairs or a grass mat are brought out for host and guest. In terms of spatial inclusions and exclusions, the visitors and guests entertained by Chhetris on their verandahs are most often people of equivalent purity. They sometimes sit and talk with people of lower castes from whom they will accept water but snacks are not offered. People of untouchable castes (from whom they will not accept water) are usually not allowed on the verandah, particularly when snacks are being served.

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JOHN GRAY: The Anthropology of Tacit Knowledge in The Domestic... 273 These spatial inclusions and exclusions are imposed because the method of preparing the snacks makes them more susceptible than raw paddy and uncooked rice to impurity and danger. Snacks are prepared inside the house where, in the process of converting raw grain into an edible state, the food, the preparer and the cooking process are out of sight and touch of people in courtyard and on the verandah. The most common snack is tea served with a small metal bowl of rice flakes, raw milled rice that has been boiled, then roasted and finally pounded into rice flakes. Alternately, dry-popped maize, dry-roasted soybean or commercially made biscuits may be served with tea. Because of their method of preparation, rice flakes and other snacks are susceptible to impurity, but less so than other forms of cooked food. When rice or other grains are cooked, they are placed in a mediumeither water, oil or air (dry)-and heated over a fire rendering them porous, that is, the boundary of the grain becomes permeable and open to absorbing the qualities of the medium in which it is being cooked. The medium absorbs and conducts to the food the impurities of anyone who touches or sees the grain with evil intent during its transformation from raw to cooked. Different cooking media have different potentials for absorbing and conducting: water is the most, air the least and oil in

Figure 5: Concentric Configuration of Domestic Mandala

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between. The snacks served on the verandah are doubly shielded. First, they are cooked inside the house out of touch of low caste people who might be in the courtyard. Second, they are cooked and served dry (sukha) to guests without further cooking or preparation. Compared to the courtyard, the verandah is more `interior'. By this, I am referring to the increasing need to protect the purity of food with spatial exclusions upon people from outside the household group because the snack served is cooked and more vulnerable to impurity and danger than the raw grains dried and winnowed in the courtyard. Kitchen Chhetris eat two main meals each day, usually consisting of lentil broth, a curry of vegetables and/or meat and rice cooked in water (bhat). Water is the most transitive medium because it readily absorbs the character of any object with which it comes into contact. As a result, it can purify as well as pollute. In purificatory bathing, water flows over the object or person, absorbs the pollution and takes it away into the ground. Conversely, while it is boiling, rice sits in water which conducts the state of the cook to the permeable rice. Because of food's openness to absorption, cooking and eating in the kitchen are dominated as much by an explicit concern with protecting the purity of the food, the people who eat it and the place where it is cooked and eaten as by the practical tasks of preparing food and consuming it (see Daryn 2002: 30-1). The kitchen in traditional houses consists of an earthen stove in the corner of a raised earthen platform (see Figure 6). Women told me that mud is a very absorptive surface that is particularly prone to pollution from eating bits of food made impure by saliva may fall on the ground so they must sweep and seal the floor with a purifying mixture of cow-dung and water after every meal. In some contemporary houses, where the kitchen is a separate room with floors of less or non-absorptive concrete, marble or other hard surfaces, the floor need only be washed with water after each meal to remove impurity. The kitchen has the most exclusive spatial prohibitions. Only Brahmins and other Chhetris, the castes from whom they will accept cooked rice, were allowed to enter Chhetri kitchens when meals were

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JOHN GRAY: The Anthropology of Tacit Knowledge in The Domestic... 275 being prepared and eaten. People of the water-acceptable castes were allowed to enter the verandah during a meal; they were occasionally allowed to come just inside the main entrance to ask a question but they could not enter the kitchen. When food was not being prepared or eaten people of water-acceptable castes could enter the kitchen, but I never saw this happen. Untouchables (water-unacceptable castes) could not even enter the house of a Chhetri without causing defilement of all the living spaces, public and private. Thus whenever an Untouchable wanted to interact with a Chhetri, he or she had to remain in the courtyard and call out to the householder. Compared with the courtyard and verandah, the kitchen is the most interior of domestic spaces. For Chhetris, it is the room where their food and their bodies are most vulnerable impurity and danger so they do their utmost to ensure it is pure by locating it in the most inaccessible place, purifying it before and after eating and imposing the most exclusive spatial prohibitions on people entering it. Taken together, courtyard, verandah and kitchen form a concentric series of increasingly exclusive interior spaces where rice and the people eating it are increasingly vulnerable to impurity and danger, and where maintaining and protecting purity is increasingly important. Everyday Practice, Cognitive Knowledge and Embodied Revelation What I have tried to illustrate is that among Chhetris, their knowledge about equivalences between various planes of existence means that the activities of everyday domestic life and the places where they take place are multifaceted-corporeal, social and cosmological. In their focal awareness, eating nourishes the organic body, pollutes the social person, and is also an embodied experience of a Chhetri Householder's tacit understanding of the consequences of attachment, illusion and the entrapments of life-in-the-world. Similarly, their washing after eating to explicitly clean the body, cleanses the social persona of impurity and is the embodied experience and tacit understanding of detachment and renunciation so central to balancing the attachments of the Householder's life-in-the-world. Concomitantly, in carrying out these activities, Chhetris create multifaceted concentric spaces in their house-at once explicitly functional and social and tacitly cosmological-that form a mandala. Their +

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houses likewise are multifaceted: they are places to live their daily lives, they are maps of the cosmos, and they are machines for revelatory knowledge. I end by paraphrasing a passage from Clifford Geertz's who also sought to reveal the extra-ordinary in ordinary Balinese Cockfights (1975:450-451): Enacted and re-enacted, so far without end, the house as mandala enables the people to see a dimension of their own subjectivity. As they live in their houses day after day, with the active living of a Householder producing prosperity and maintaining purity, they grow familiar with it. Yet, because ... that subjectivity does not properly exist until it is thus organized, the house as mandala generates and regenerates the very subjectivity it pretends only to display. Quartets, still lives and houses are not merely reflections of a pre-existing sensibility allegorically represented; they are positive agents in the creation and maintenance of such a sensibility. References Arendt, H. 1958. The human condition: a study of the central dilemmas facing modem man. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Blier, S. P. 1987. The anatomy of architecture: ontology and metaphor in Batammaliba architectural epxression. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Bloch, M. 1998. How we think they think: anthropological approaches to cognition, memory and literacy. Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press. Bourdieu, P. 1977. Outline of a theory of practice. Cambridge: Cambridge University. Buhnemann, G. 2003. MaSdala, yantra and cakra: some observations. In G. Buhnemann (ed) MaSdalas and yantras in the Hindu traditions. Leiden: Brill. Daryn, Gil. 2002. Himalayan encompassment: man, cosmos and rice in a brahmin community in central Nepal. Ph.D. Thesis, Cambridge University. Fabian, J. 1990. Power and performance: ethnographic explorations through

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JOHN GRAY: The Anthropology of Tacit Knowledge in The Domestic... 277 proverbial wisdom and theatre in Shaba, Zaire. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press. Gourdriaan, T. 1979. Introduction, history and philosophy. In S. Gupta, D. J. Hoens, and T. Gourdriaan, Hindu Trantrism. Leiden: E.J. Brill. Geertz, C. 1975. Deep play: notes on the Balinese cockfight. In C. Geertz, The interpretation of cultures. London: Hutchinson. Gray, J. N. 1995. The Householder's world: purity, power and dominance in a Nepali village. Delhi: Oxford University Press. Heidegger, M. 1962. Being and Time. New York: Harper and Row. Heidegger, M. 1975. Building, dwelling, thinking. In Poetry, language, thought. New York: Harper and Row, Publishers. Hopkins, T. J. 1971. The Hindu religious tradition. Belmont, California: Wadsworth Publishing Company. Jackson, M. 1996. Introduction: phenomenology, radial empiricism, and anthropological critique. In M. Jackson (ed) Things as they are: new directions in phenomenological anthropology. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Kent, S. 1990. Activity areas and architecture: an interdisciplinary view of the relationship between use of space and domestic built envrionments. In S Kent (ed) Domestic architecture and the use of space: an interdisciplinary cross-cultural study. Cambridge: Cambridge Univesity Press. Levy, R. L 1990. Mesocosm: Hinduism and the organisation of a traditional Newar city in Nepal. Berkeley: University of California Press. Madan T.N. 1987. Non-renunciation: themes and interpretations of Hindu culture. Delhi: Oxford University Press. Merleau-Ponty. M. 1962. Phenomenology of perception. London: Routledge. Mookerjee, A. and M. Khanna. 1977. The tantric way: art, science, ritual. London: Thames and Hudson. Munn, N. 2003. Excluded spaces: the figure in the Australian Aboriginal landscape. In S. Low and D. Lawrence-Zuniga (eds) The anthropology of space and place: locating culture. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing. Polanyi, M. 1958. Personal knowledge: towards a post-critical philosophy. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

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Polanyi, M. 1966. The tacit dimension. Gloucester, Mass.: Peter Smith. Rapoport, A. 1969. House form and culture. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall. Rudofsky, B. 1964. Architecture without architects. London: Academy Editions. Tucci, G. 2001 [1961]. The theory practice of the mandala: with special reference to the modem psychology of the unconscious. Mineola, NY: Dover Publications. Waterson, R. 1991. The living house: an anthropology of architecture in SouthEast Asia. Singapore: Oxford University Press. Zimmer, H. 1972. Myths and symbols in Indian art and civilization. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, Bollingen Series VI.

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