Atrocities in Madhes continue — Nepalpostdaily English Edition
Shailee Chaudhary/Birgunj:
While we are fighting the pandemic and looking for ways to overcome the repercussions, the atrocities in Madhesh never seem to end. We are for the second time confined in our homes as the COVID- 19 hits the second wave. It has already been almost 5 years of the promulgation of The Constitution of Nepal. Although the Constitution assures the equal rights and treatment of the citizens irrespective of their caste, ethnicity, race, age, geographical region, the unprivileged and minorities have to face the atrocities in their day to day life along with the struggles in their life. The atrocity took a new face today when the people called to collect the relief packages during the injunction were beaten up.
The District Police Office after receiving relief materials from the local government informed the Wada Offices of Birgunj Metropolitan City to send the affected families for the relief packages. The Wada Officials informed the families accordingly. On 2nd September 2020, families from different Wadas reached DPO for the relief materials. They were stopped at the gate and asked to contact a Photocopy Shop 50 meters away from DPO and get an application filled. The families contacted the shop. The shopkeeper charged from Rs. 25 to Rs. 100 as per the shop owner’s wish for each application. The shop owner is not giving any receipt of the charges they are charging for the service. Few families received the relief packages on the same day while others were asked to come the next day.
Today, on 3rd September 2020, approximately 1000–1500 public reached the same place and the photocopy shop charged the same way. The families were waiting for the distribution to start. Even after the long wait, when the distribution didn’t start, they started getting restless. They started asking questions and the cops had nothing to answer. While they were voicing for the relief packages, the SP arrives in her vehicle and talks to the families.
“Please stand in a line, we will soon be distributing the packages,” said the SP as stated by one of the families.
The SP left for DPO immediately and after a few minutes, few cops came from the DPO near the families and said to go and talk to Chief District Officer, Parsa. After hearing this statement from the cops, the families started to cross-question. While the families demanded an answer for all these unnecessary struggles and hopes and denied going back without an answer, one of the cops started beating one of the females. The lathi-charge from the cops worsened the situation. The chaos was created at the main road and cops directed the families towards the Ghantaghar. While approaching members of the families, they complained about the atrocity and false hopes given by the District Police Officials and the SP of Birgunj. They further cried out their pain and informed that they might not die of COVID-19 but they will surely die of starvation and the atrocities from the administration.
The incidents of atrocities are vividly available and can be observed in different places and different time periods. The pandemic and unmanaged lockdown and prohibitory order have been havoc on the public. At the same time, the incident from today shows the unethical and inhumane behavior and attitude of the administration towards the public. The families were humiliated, beaten and the chaos emerged. The public appealed through different platforms that if the atrocity doesn’t stop, we will come on the roads as it is better we die than to be humiliated to ask for our basic rights.
It is the time when the administration needs to be held accountable for their actions. The atrocities at the harsh times of crisis touch new levels of human rights violations. The lack of necessary actions on these atrocities might push the nation to a new kind of havoc which would eventually result in the distress among the public and the nation.
Police Atrocity on Daily Wager Poor Locals
Video Credit: Aayush Raj Barnwal
Originally published at https://nepalpostdaily.com on September 3, 2020.
