Sasmit Pokharel on democracy and rape culture

Sasmit Pokharel was sworn in as Minister of Education, Science and Technology and Minister of Youth and Sport in the Nepal Government on 26 March. When I interviewed him five years ago he was co-leader of a group of young people dedicated to fighting Nepal's "rape culture". 

I never imagined that in a handful of years he would be a senior government leader, which was a lack of imagination on my part, salted I think with a layer of ageism.

I'm re-posting this episode so you can hear future leader Sasmit, and his fellow guest Sagoon Bhetwal, speak passionately and articulately (despite issues of sound quality, back in the early days of the podcast) about rape in Nepal. Sasmit especially also talks at length about the role of youth in developing democracy in the country and points a finger at current leaders (5 years ago) for ignoring their needs.

Listening to this conversation I hear how determined and strategic these two activists are. No doubt those qualities would be very useful in Sasmit's new job. 

Transcript

Previous episode begins

Marty Logan 0:00

Hi everyone. Marty here. I was very surprised to hear that Sasmit Pokharel is a minister in the new government. Really, only because he's so young. I know that because I interviewed him five years ago, so this is not based on his qualifications or experience, about which I know very little. In fact this might be ageism on my part because as recent Nepali governments have shown, age and experience are no guarantee of good performance or integrity. Sasmit is now Minister of Education, Science and Technology and Minister of Youth and Sport in the new RSP government. This is the government that follows the Gen Z uprising so expectations are extremely high for them to perform well, and of course there are lots of challenges in Nepal, so I wish everyone there best of luck! It was December, 2020 when I spoke to Sasmit and his co-guest Sagoon Bhetwal. The two of them had just started a group called Ajhai kati sahane?, which I was told translated to, How much more must we endure? It was in response to a number of high profile cases of the rapes and murders of women in Nepal and the slow reaction, or the non-reaction, of authorities to investigate. There were lots of allegations of corruption and cover ups and a growing chorus of voices both on the street and online, and prominent among the calls was Hang the rapist! So there was this real push to take very strong action against individuals, to punish them severely. And Sagoon and Sasmit were saying, No, that's not the way to go. We need to examine what is it about Nepali society that allows this rape culture to flourish? Sadly, it looks like now history is repeating itself in the case of Inisha BK of Surkhet, who was raped and killed recently. I hope that the new government can act on this, and if they do, they are fair and quick and get a resolution of this case. What's also interesting is Sasmit especially talks in the interview about the evolution of democracy in Nepal and the key role that youth played. And points out how the current politicians have this sense of entitlement and have been ignoring youth. I can't help but wonder now how much of that activist remains in the new minister, Sasmit. Of course, time will tell. I hope that you enjoy this episode and perhaps gain some insight into his thinking, at least five years ago. I will talk to you next time. Welcome to Nepal now. My name is Marty Logan. The rapist is you. On October 10th, a group of about 20 young women dressed in black, took over a street in Kathmandu, pointed straight ahead accusingly, and performed the anti-rape song, A rapist in your path. The flash mob was protesting what feels like an epidemic of rape in the country. In recent months it seems that every week the media is reporting another violent incident, often against adolescent girls, too often ending in murder. Ajhai kati sahane? How much more must we endure? is the movement's name. As we mark the 16 days of activism against gender-based violence, you'll hear in this episode that what got the almost all young women onto the street was the growing chorus of voices screaming via hashtag Hang the rapist. Movement members Sagoon Bhetwal and Sasmit Pokharel told me that their group of activists disagrees with that diagnosis, arguing that Nepalis need to confront a rape culture, not punish individuals to death. Ajhai kati sahane? is not taking credit for the government announcement two weeks ago that it plans to increase prison sentences for rape and punish those who try to settle accusations outside of the justice system. But, it considers the pledge of success and plans to monitor the government to ensure that the changes do really happen. As always, we want you to let us know what you think of this episode. Nepal now is on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook, and you can email me at marty@martylogan.net. Don't forget to follow the show on your podcast player, whether you use Apple or Google Podcasts, Anchor, Spotify, Stitcher, or another, so you don't miss the next episode. And now Sagoon Bhetwal and Sasmit Pokharel. Sagoon Bhetwal and Sasmit Pokharel, welcome to Nepal Now podcast! Thank you for being here.

Sasmit Pokharel 5:25

Thank you so much. Thank you for having us.

Sagoon Bhetwal 5:27

Hi Marty. Thank you for having us.

Proposed changes to Nepal's rape law

Marty Logan 5:31

Last week or early this week, I read in the media anyway that there was some changing or there are some changes coming to the rape laws. And I think generally it boils down to two major things. One is longer jail sentences for people found guilty of rape. And the second one, which seemed very interesting, is a provision to criminalize people who mediate in cases of rape, I think with the goal of keeping them out of the criminal justice system. So how do you feel about these changes?

Sasmit Pokharel 6:07

Marty, the first thing we must understand here is that nothing has been official yet we just heard about this from the media. We heard there is ordinance that's coming out and that's all we know. And according to the media, like you said, there are a few changes that we have heard. The first thing being longer sentence, which is really necessary because under the last law the sentence for somebody who commits rape if the victim was older than 18 years old was only from seven to 10 years. So relatively, that's a very few sentence for crime like rape, right? So we really needed a longer sentence in this. So if this is true, then it is going towards the right direction. One thing we really find good in the changing law i s that the previous definition of rape, under the criminal code the rape was defined as forced sex from male to female. So what that showed was that the rape could only be committed from man to woman. But what we can understand is that there are different kind of rape. It does not only have to be from men to women, right? So little boys are getting raped these days. So rape can be done from woman to men or men to men, or even if we look at a lot of issues in third gender community these days, there are lots of rape cases there as well. We started advocating to change the definition of rape from a man to woman to any adult or any person, to any other person. And according to the media, they have adjusted this as well. We have heard that there are far more other changes as well but again, since it's not official we don't know anything yet. So according to the media, these are the changes that the government is trying to bring.

Marty Logan 7:47

Okay, great, thank you. I understand that your group, and I didn't even mention the, the name of the group, I should have done that earlier. So the group or the movement it's called Ajhai kati sahane?, how would you translate that in English?

Sagoon Bhetwal 8:04

So the English translation to that would be, How much more are we to endure? So how much should we suffer, right?

Marty Logan 8:12

And so I understand that your group did meet earlier with some government officials and presented some demands to them. So did you know that these changes were coming or was it a surprise to you?

Sagoon Bhetwal 8:27

Most of the changes that we know are coming from this ordinance right now are the demands that we had raised as well, starting from longer sentences to having gender neutral laws, you know. We were advocating for these changes and we actually had a seven point demand presented as well. And when we were meeting all these different officials and parliamentarians and Attorney General, we did present our demands to them as well. So I think we are very happy with our movement to see that most of our demands, not all of them but most of them, have been addressed. We were hoping for this to come forward. We're not exactly sure when it was coming, but it did actually come as a surprise. It did come very early on.

Sasmit Pokharel 9:05

We met few people, a few quite officials in past few weeks. We met the Attorney General of Nepal, who is also the legal advisor to the Prime Minister. And we met the Inspector General Police of Nepal Police. We made DAG, AIG, and IGP, the highest three positions of Nepal Police. And we also met the Minister of Law. So it was quite an experience. We met all these people, and we presented them with our demands. We are quite in touch with our attorney general and he he was saying that yeah, we're almost ready to bring the ordinance, but there are few problems here and there and we're not expecting for this ordinance to come this quick. We're expecting it within few months.

Statute of limitations on rape

Marty Logan 9:43

That seems very quick, so that must be encouraging also. Is there anything, from what you've heard, and again, like you said, there's no law yet, but from what you've heard, are there any changes that you wanted to be made that have been left out, that have not been included in the ordinance?

Sasmit Pokharel 10:02

One of the major changes we're trying to bring was about the statute of limitation. So what happens is that under Nepali law a statue of limitation for rape cases was one year. Meaning after one year you wouldn't be able to file an FIR saying that you got raped. That would not stand in the court if it was after one year. So we are really trying to change that because a lot of people, they need confidence, they need encouragement to come out and tell the world that they were raped because in a society like Nepal a lot of people, society usually blames women for getting raped. So they need a lot of encouragement to come out. So for that, it might take more than a year. It might take five years, it might take 10 years to come out and claim that a person was raped. So we're really hoping that the government would wipe out the provision for the statute of limitation in rape. But what the Attorney General told us, again, it's not official, but he told us that what we have considered is that if the person is under 18 and they got raped, after they turn 18, no matter how old they were when the incident took place, once they're 18, they will still have one year of time to file an FIR if they want to. So that's a small victory, but what we're looking was to wipe out the provision for statute of limitation completely. But again, this is a long race and we have started the race, but it's a long way to go.

Marty Logan 11:26

Definitely. Compared to other social movements or other campaigns where often nothing seems to happen, I mean, one was the well-known rape case of Nirmala How much campaigning went on afterwards for change. And yet it appears that it didn't have a huge impact. So for yours to have that impact and to already be seeing these or to be hearing about these changes is fantastic. Let's go back a bit to the beginning and the beginning actually, for this movement, wasn't that long ago. I remember the day I saw your flash mob on social media, and I think you were at Maitighar Mandala. You were in the street, you were all dressed in black. It was, it was very dramatic looking and I know all the media covered it and it looked very well organized. But what went on behind the scenes? What led up to that point? Who decided to start this? What work went into it? How hard was it to get all the, the women involved? Can you give me a little bit of the, the organizational work that went into that appearance?

Capital punishment not the answer

Sagoon Bhetwal 12:37

We had a first flash mob on October 10th, so, it was before that week that we had seen a lot of rape cases in the media that were being highlighted. And you know, public had this kind of outreach and what was very surprising and shocking to us was young people like us, and even younger generation, they were advocating for death penalty, right? So it was very instinctive. There was this hashtag called Hang the rapist that was being very viral. Not only that influencers and actors who so many people look up to Nepal, they were too advocating for it. They were saying that definitely is what we need to demand for. That is what we are fighting for. So we're seeing this wave coming up that was promoting and demanding for capital punishment in the country. I think that is where we started, right. Until that time we did not know each other. We hadn't formed a team yet, but as individuals and as liberal peoples, all, all of us in the team, so it's six of us in the core team, and all of us individually had this understanding that capital punishment can never be a solution. It can never be different to ous crimes like like rape. So that is what led for us to form a team and come down to the streets to actually advocate against that penalty. So that is how we started. We actually met on either Monday or Tuesday, that is when we had a first meeting. And we're brainstorming, we are thinking, what can we do? We always wanted to have a long vision and go have a long ride and a long journey. But, we also wanted to do something very quick, something that could be done and grab attention and let people know that death penalty is not the solution. We had to come from the opposite side, right. So, it, it was in that meeting when we decided to do a flash mob in the streets. We actually take inspiration from Chile the feminist anthem called A rapist in your path started in Chile and it had been performed in different countries and they were all against this entire rape culture that is so prevalent in so many country like ours. We took that inspiration from them and we wanted to make it contextual, so we translated the lyrics. Then we also wanted to make it more of our own movement, so that is how we came up with this idea of a flash mob and we brainstormed and we started planning for it. We only had around two or three days to do the entire translation, finding people, coordinating everyone. And one of the major part of our movement is we always think about how can we be more creative and, cooperation and be, you know, as an collective, how can we move forward? So, in all of this, what people do not see is behind the scenes we take so much of time into making this more coordinated and planned, even during times like these when the risk of pandemic is so high, right. That was one of our major concerns, and that is where we put a lot of our focus in as well, to make this as coordinated and as safe and as planned as possible. A large part of the comments were saying that it was just a flash mob, or it was just a dance. But people were not understanding what the essence of our movement was. So it was not just the dancing or the flash mob that we did we had an entire list of demands prepared. We had this planning going on for two, three days, but we always had this large goal in our mind.

Sasmit Pokharel 15:42

One thing that I would like to add is that the kind of media attention it got, it really encouraged us to move forward. And not just that, some people from outside, the outside Kathmandu, they started contacting us as well. They were like, we are to do the same thing, can you provide us the lyrics? And we got the response in such a huge amount that we are really encouraged to move forward. It slowly started spreading outside Kathmandu and, I think until this day it has been done in over 40 districts. So, I think people were really fed up. People were, they wanted to do something and people saw this movement as very creative. And since we're meeting a lot of government officials and a lot of laws were being proposed, people thought that this is somewhere that we could bring an actual change. I think that's why we got this momentum and till this day a lot of people are still contacting us and they're still doing flash mobs in different parts of Nepal.

Marty Logan 16:40

Yeah, like I said, I mean, it was very, it was very dramatic and it looked very good. I could see why it would be impactful, as they say. As part of your campaign now, are you going out and saying, These, these things that were in our seven point demand are apparently in this ordinance that's coming out, this is a victory for the campaign'. Is that part of what you're doing or are you not, are you not taking credit for that?

Sasmit Pokharel 17:05

No Marty, uh we want change, that's the only thing we want. The credit doesn't really matter. We're not looking for credit. We're looking for a, for actual change. And in some way I think we're moving towards the change: that's victory for us. So what we're focusing on right now is that passing the ordinance as soon as possible. What we have heard so far is that the ordinance has gone to the President and we're trying to figure out what's taking the President so long to sign the ordinance. Because looking at the duty of president, it's only to sign what has been actually been forwarded by the Council of Ministers. And that has been done. The ordinance is sitting in the table of the President and all she needs to do is sign the ordinance. For now, we are just looking to pressurizing the President to sign the ordinance.

Sagoon Bhetwal 17:51

To add a little on that, we definitely did not do all of this for credit we wanted to see change and that is actually happening, right. So we will take this as a victory, we will take this as an achievement for our movement, because there are so many young people who joined us from all around the country in this movement. So many people have been a part of this starting from districts in the eastern side of Jhapa to upper side of the country, to Humla and Jumla, right. So many young people joined us and it's really encouraging for all of us to actually see that as young people we actually are capable of doing something. So we'll say that we worked as a catalyst, we were able to push this further, but we'll also say that a lot of people and a lot of movement did also advocate for this and were demanding for this starting from the LGBTQI community itself who has been been advocating for this since years and years, right. So, we just added on to that effort. We do not take the sole credit, but we we'll always be proud of what we have been able to do as a movement and as a collective of young people, and especially as a majorly women led movement.

Sasmit Pokharel 18:52

The reason why we got so much attention from the officials was because the other group who were advocating for law changes were also advocating for death penalty. But we're not advocating for death penalty, we're against death penalty primarily because our Constitution guarantees right to live. And if you look at Article 16 of the Constitution, it clearly says that death penalty shall not be introduced as any law in Nepal. So, respecting the Constitution, but also respecting the international treaty, we have signed we have ratified the second optional protocol of I-C-C-P-R, which also says that Nepal will not introduce death penalty into its law. So we looked into, into the international treaty I-C-C-P-R. We also looked into our Constitution and respecting the laws we have and what are the international treaty we have signed, we were clear that we're not going to include death penalty, not just because of legal reason, but also of social division because we also did very deep research on this, you know, so we have to understand that. We have fought really hard to remove death penalty from Nepal Law, and that's a critical human rights issue. So, I would like to request people that let's not move backward we have to focus on moving forward. Yes, we have to focus on removing the rape culture in Nepal. Our primary focus should not be to kill one rapist, but to end the rape culture. So, let's think about that. Why is there such high cases of rape that's happening currently? And let's get to the core issue and let's try to solve the problem and not introduce death penalty. The attorney general looked at our demand and he found out that we are not advocating for death penalty, the demands we're advocating for was very reasonable, so he called us and we went to meet him, and he also called other lawmakers as well at, at our first meeting and we discussed all the laws. He was really interested in our demands, and he promised us that he will send our demand to the Prime Minister as well. He worked really close with us, so we'd like to believe that our movement had a huge part in bringing this ordinance.

Marty Logan 20:57

Hopefully you're right and this is a victory, the ordinance will be signed and the provisions will be as reported in the media, but this is the legal side of things. As you know, there are many, many laws in Nepal, but not all of them are implemented the way that people would want them to be implemented. So once these legal changes are made, then what will your approach be? Are you looking at rape as a social phenomenon, as a cultural phenomenon? Are you planning on looking into education, for example, or taking other approaches to, to deal with the topic, or will you focus mostly on, you know, making sure these legal changes are implemented?

Next steps after the law is passed

Sagoon Bhetwal 21:43

We are looking at this from all different aspects, not just legal one, but we are constantly looking at how or what are the social implications, what are the cultural influences that leads to all this incidents and these crimes to happen. So, even met with the Nepal Police and what we talked with them was about the differentiators that they could take because Nepal Police is in every district of the country, they're in every communities. And they're the ones who have the closest reach to these people, to people all around the country. We are also looking at the bottom up approaches that can be taken. So, like you mentioned, yes, definitely we'll be looking into the implementation side of it, we'll be looking into holding officials accountable even after this ordinance is signed. When we are talking to Nepal Police, for example, we highlighted the fact that they have this community police partnership going on. So that is where police should work to build a stronger connection, stronger trust with citizens of the country. So, it's not just the legal side, but as well as how can we increase community awareness? How can we make sure that people actually know that ordinance like this and these kind of laws have been passed in the country? How this has been defined as criminal offense? So starting from marital rape to starting to having these many years as your jail term so people aren't aware about all these things, right? So that is another side where we want our country, our authorities to focus on as well. And we'll keep advocating and talking about these other aspects sides from(the) legal part as well.

Sasmit Pokharel 23:08

To add to that, we're looking forward from two more sides after the ordinance is passed. The first thing we, we need to understand is that not everything that we asked for has been addressed in the ordinance. So we'll continue this movement until most of our demands are, all of our demands have been made. But some of the team will, fight for is that first of all, like you said, implementation is a, huge challenge, so we'll have to fight for implementation. Like Sagoon said. When we had meeting with Nepal Police, with IGP, he agreed that there has been a lot of weaknesses in the investigation part. And they were looking to adjust and change how Nepal police conducts investigation as well. So one of the ideas we brought up there, and he was really interested in, was that introducing a whole bureau just for investigation of rape. So that would be an entire bureau, which would consist of a lot of women and all the trainings and all, the seminars that that bureau would attend would solely be on investigation in rape cases. And their whole tenure of 30 years, which is the tenure of Nepal Police, would be all focused on that bureau so that they would have better investigation, they would have better knowledge, better education on how to investigate rape cases. He said that Nepal Police had been trying to introduce bureau like that for quite some time, but there has been some administrative process that's keeping them away from doing that. So that's on implementation part. We're also advocating for a change in education policy because sex education in Nepal is not really given well. But what we're trying to do is that take sex education in every corner of Nepal, starting from maybe grade five or six. People need to learn about what consent is, people need to know about what sex is, about good touch and bad touch. So if they know what consent is, what sex is and what rape is, I think a lot of unreported case that goes around Nepal will start getting re reported. And if people are aware, if people are empowered, if they constantly ask for an update, if they constantly fight for justice, I think investigation will be much smoother. So that's from cultural side. And we're also looking for some victim-centric law. Most of the movements they only advocate for longer sentences for the criminals, but what we do not realize is that what a victim must be going through right now. What we'll also advocate for, is that how the state is going to take care of the rape survivors? Are they going to ensure them jobs? Are they going to ensure them some psychological counsellor if they need one? So that's another side we'll be fighting for. One of the things that we raised in our demand that was not addressed by this ordinance was that after the FIR has been filed for rape cases, there would be one representative each from Human Rights Commission and Women Commission, who would be alongside with the research, the investigative authority, until the legal process has begun. That would make the whole investigation more open to the Human Rights Commission and Women Commission. And what that would do is that Nepal Police have, they have to follow direct order from the home ministry or from the district officer, from each district. So if we get the commission involved, process would be more transparent and there would not be any illegal orders because there are member of commission who would be watching the whole process. So I think that would also make the investigation more fair than what we have right now. These are the issues we'll be fighting for even in the days to come.

Marty Logan 26:39

This sounds like a lot of work, but again, I mean, I think the results so far, as you said, are encouraging. I am surprised actually at this success and the way you're talking about being in conversation with the Attorney General and the officials from Nepal Police. It sounds like you've managed to engage, obviously, at a very high level very quickly, very effectively for a new movement. And I don't mean this in a negative way, but you are very young people in a country that values age. How would you explain how far you've got to this point and, you know, what advice might you have for other people, especially young people, who are trying to bring about change?

Sagoon Bhetwal 27:27

I think many people from the very beginning doubted us because we are young people firstly, and second because we were a movement led majorly by young women. So, it was upon us as well to prove them wrong, you know, to make them realize that we're actually capable of doing something. People fail to acknowledge how young people, and women especially, can do so much and can contribute so much and can take the initiative, but with our movement we will definitely say that we have set an example to other people, to young people especially, that if you have a collective voice, if you are well determined and if you're well planned, that it can actually happen. I think even while we were receiving all these kind of demeaning or discouraging comments we'll al also say that those were comparatively very less we chose to look at the brighter side of it, to look at the support that we were gaining as well. Largely we will have to give it to all the young people who joined that movement, who trusted this movement and trusted themselves as well into doing something you know. Even during these times when things are so uncertain, people were so encouraged and had this trust in themselves first and in the movement as well that if we work as a collective, if we do this together, if we know that our demands are very reasonable and something that needs to be happening, that we can actually make the change happen, we can actually bring some sort of positive result that we actually want to see. For many young people and many young women around the country we definitely have. been able to put ourselves as an example and to show that if we work as a collective, we can make this happen.

Young people have historically led change in Nepal

Sasmit Pokharel 29:03

Since we were very young, a lot of people doubted us, like Sagoon said, but if you look at the history of Nepal, young people have always been pillar for change in Nepal, since very beginning. If you look at the political history of Nepal since 2007 bs, that's when the Rana regime ended. Since that youths had a huge movement a huge role to end Rana regime and to end Panchayat system, to establish democracy in Nepal. The whole thing was done by youth. The current Prime Minister, all the politicians currently, when they were young, they were the one who were advocating for change, and they did bring a level of change. But right now they see themselves as like entitlement like they deserve the position and they're kind of like, pushing youth away from the whole political system. But what they have to understand is that it was youth who initiated democracy, it was youth who initiated to end all the autocratic system. So if you look at right now, all youths have started to rise again. If you look at the Enough is enough movement, it was led by youth and they also brought some changes to the system. While running this movement I think it's really important to bring demands that's actually reasonable, that's actually possible to change, you know. If, if you do that, I, I think the government side will also take you more seriously. So that's one, one of the key things to keep in mind while raising their demands. And also our movement was very unique. So since it was unique, it spread around Nepal like, very quickly. So I, I think if a lot of people are asking for it, even though politicians they might not really care about what people are advocating for, what they care about is vote for the people, vote of the people, right, because election is also coming up. That was one of the reasons why the Prime Minister and the government they're trying to introduce the ordinance and that might be one of the reasons why they're delaying the ordinance as well. So since the election is approaching, what they might be thinking is that if they passed the ordinance before the election date, they might get more vote. I don't know.

Marty Logan 30:59

As you acknowledge yourself, the movement is very unique and I think for a lot of us it was the fact that it was all women, on the street, demanding these changes. Is there a chance that you'll be back on the street? Do you still see these kind of public demonstrations as being part of the movement, or is that no longer necessary now that you've got the attention of the officials?

Sagoon Bhetwal 31:25

Coming down to the streets and bringing something that is unique and doing something untraditional will always be one of the core parts of this movement because that is what we started with. And even when we did a nationwide protest, you know, we brought more aspects into it, from bringing a monologue to, people doing dramas and poetry, whatever they could do. So I think being unique will always be the trademark and a core element of our movement no matter where we reach and no matter what we tend to achieve. That is something that will always keep to us and something we'll always try to do whenever needed. We wanna request every young people out there, our friends and colleagues and everyone who's listening, and also those who look up to this movement to make sure that they're giving some sort of input. It might not be feasible for everyone to come down on the street, but please do make sure that doing something, contributing something against rape culture and realizing that this is such a huge social problem and then how it goes on to affecting every single individual. We speak from a place of privilege when we say that we have this access to the street, we are able to coordinate, we're able to come together and take this movement forward. We need young people and young voices and all of us to do something, put some sort of effort in any way possible, and like this is the urgency of the time right now.

Marty Logan 32:38

Sagoon Bhetwal and Sasmit Pokharel, thank you very much for coming on Nepal Now and talking about the movement and your success so far. It's very encouraging. It's great that you took the initiative but even better, I think, to see that you're having some success and I'm sure that it's going to inspire other people as well. So thanks very much for coming and talking to us about it.

Sasmit Pokharel 33:02

Thank you so much for having us, Marty.

Sagoon Bhetwal 33:05

Thank you Marty. Thanks for giving us the space to us and to our movement as well.