Inhuman Right Organizations in Nepal

What we have in Nepal in the name of human right is inhuman right. To the common people, most of the Human Right Organizations have been overly political and outrageously biased towards social and political issues. Their focus and roles have been narrowly defined in addressing only political issues. They have ignored all the other vital social and economic area of human rights where they could make a real fruitful difference in the society.

The Human Right organizations seem to have failed to understand that, apart from big political issues, human rights are being violated in several other core areas such as gender, economic growth, social and cultural practices, governance, to name a few. They have least or no intervention in promoting the basic human dignity and culture in the society, which need more genuine focus.

Just having a mere format of political democracy, does not guarantee actual human right in a correct sense. The understanding, principle and practice of Human Right need more sophisticated thinking than we have now. In the Nepalese context, we lack even the basic human right to eat, drink water, required to live with dignity. Where is the human right of a woman when her existence is questioned by asking her husband’s name when issuing citizen certificate or passport for their children? And where is the human right of people of Nepal when a majority of genuine citizens are denied their citizen certificate on the pretext of some mere technicalities. As if it is not already shameful, the same voters without citizen certificates are made to vote but denied from very basic citizen rights. However the Human Right Organizations see no roles in such area of human right. They are stereotype focusing only on political issues.

In the first place- the term “Human Right” itself is a very vague and ambiguous term, with no clear-cut definition. Due to the vagueness and ambiguity, the term has, time and again, been misinterpreted in the ways that benefit organized crimes and political parties. The biasness of some Human Right Organizations, at times, even propagated the violence in the country. Example of such biasness, as any common people would agree are- always-taking side and sympathizing insurgents against the government. They keep silence when security people and general public are killed mercilessly and make a clamor of violation of human rights when a Maoist rebel is killed. In an ideal situation, their sympathy should have gone to both parties, and their effort should have been towards bringing both parties to negotiation table. Apparently they have no such interest.

Its time to redefine the term “Human Rights” itself by changing it to Human Rights and Responsibilities which would correctly connote the true role and spirit of human right. Every Human Right Organizations should start operating as Human Right and Responsibility organization in name and spirit also. It would fairly minimize the malpractice of using the Human Right forums to cover some biased political issues. Logically also, human rights should always come accompanied by human responsibility (actually the human rights be earned by fulfilling the human responsibilities) to prevent anarchy against each other. For example- political parties may have human right to rebel against a system for larger public interest such as now. But they should earn their right, first by fulfilling their fundamental duties. How can Human right Organizations stay aloof or even support political party’s unilateral decision to declare Nepal Bandh or to organize violent demonstration? If this is the definition and scope of work of the Human Rights Organizations includes supporting and even actively propagating violence, the relevance, need and scope of these organizations must be revisited in the larger social and national context.

The scope and the practice of Human Rights need redefinition to suit the national context and interest. The scope of Human Right should also be redefined so that the human rights of a person or organization do not cross same of other individual or organizations, a clear trend seen in Nepal. If it is the human right of political parties to organize demonstration, and to paralyze country to get their demand, it is also the human right of business organizations to be able to work peacefully and for people to earn their bread unhindered. It is as painful for any Nepali to see a security person die, as it is to see any Maoist die. But unfortunately the Human Right Organizations do not seem to view human right situation from this angle. They choose to take side.

The Human Right organizations must at least remain neutral if they cannot play any active positive roles. It is yet to understand whether it is due to lack of sufficient competence in the relevant technical areas in playing correct role or it is due to the vested interest that such human right organization failed to fulfill their correct roles.