Week 8: Trip to Dhangadhi
In my very first blog post, I wrote about expecting this job to challenge the way I think about helping trafficking survivors. It is easy for me to say I agree with utilizing a survivor-centered approach, but I am quickly learning this strategy is a lot more controversial in practice.
This week, I traded in the fast-paced city life of Kathmandu for the much quieter Dhanghadi, tucked away in the flat lands of far western Nepal. Outside of Kathmandu, the Hamro Samman project also works in the Sudurpashchim Pradesh province, targeting a couple of districts that border India. For the last few days, one of the project’s partner organizations hosted a three day forum on what local governments can be doing to counter human trafficking, working with local officials and convening a small parliamentarian session. Most of these sessions were in Nepali, but it was really encouraging to see so many critical leaders in this province show their commitment to the cause.
As I stepped off the plane in Dhangadhi, I was taken back by how different the city is from Kathmandu. The sun is far more intense in Dhangadhi, and dressing to accommodate for extreme heat is challenging with my very limited wardrobe here and my efforts to respect Nepal’s conservative culture. Instead of tightly packed, multistoried buildings, the main road running through Dhangadhi is speckled with small stores and street food stands. The town’s center is surrounded by miles of rice fields, with numerous cows and goats roaming freely.
Although the main objective of this trip was to support our partner organization in hosting the forum, we stepped away from policy work for a bit and focused on counter trafficking efforts done on the beneficiary level. The first initial visits were heartwarming; we started with a trip to USAID’s Stop Girl Trafficking office, where the coordinators explained the program’s objectives. Stop Girl Trafficking ensures education for girls at-risk of being trafficked and provides microfinancing for women to start businesses. After learning more about the project, we visited a young woman supported by the program, both through a scholarship to attend school and a small loan to start a business. She gave us a tour of the small computer repair and typing shop she owns, explaining the program enabled her to be the first in her family to receive an education.
Later on, we visited an organization that the Hamro Samman project directly supports throughout Nepal. In Dhangadhi, this organization operates a shelter, hosting up to 20 individuals; most of the people that come through the shelter are intercepted at the India-Nepal border, identified as trafficking survivors or at-risk of being trafficked.
After walking through the shelter, the manager took us to the border of India. In addition to operating a shelter, this organization sets up an office directly next to the customs office, stopping people as they cross the border to check for signs of trafficking. I stood on the edge of Nepal, looking into Uttar Pradesh, India and watched as two female employees interviewed a young woman they suspected of being trafficked.
This kind of work at the border is critical. India and Nepal share an open border. Although the Government of Nepal has tried to oppose tougher regulations on recruitment companies and destination countries that often host Nepalese migrant workers, many of these requirements are circumvented through crossing into India. For example, female domestic workers from Nepal are banned from working in many of the Gulf countries. To overcome this barrier, many women take riskier routes through India, choosing employment in those prohibited countries as an undocumented worker.
Despite the need for better monitoring at the India-Nepal border, this kind of interception work hosts a variety of legal issues. First, it is questionable these organizations have the legal authority to stop people from crossing the border. In practice, the Government of Nepal heavily supports these organizations, often leaving it to NGOs to do interception screenings instead of the border police. However, at the end of the day, these are civilians preventing other civilians from doing what they are legally allowed to do—cross the border. Even with the police and Government of Nepal’s support, there are lingering questions of legality.
Secondly, it is unclear how voluntary these interviews are. One of the cornerstones of a survivor-centered approach is advocating for survivors and at-risk individuals’ choices. As difficult as it can be, that sometimes means letting people make bad decisions. When an individual is stopped and warned that they may be entering a risky situation, but there has yet to be a crime committed, that person has a right to take that risk. In Dhangadhi, it is not always clear these interviews are voluntary; when NGO employees suspect someone is being trafficked, they often immediately send them back to their homes, prohibiting them from crossing into India.
Trafficking happens in a variety of ways. There are plenty of instances where an individual is being trafficked and has no idea; oftentimes, it is not until complaints of a broken contract or unpaid wages surface that individuals are correctly identified as trafficking victims. This reality scares advocates into pushing for stronger protective measures, but it also tends to erode other rights. Sometimes people knowingly choose potentially exploitative environments because they feel safer than their previous circumstances, or they are just hopeful things will change.
At the end of the day, utilizing a survivor-centered approach means weighing the objectives: We want people to be safe, and we want people to have a secured sense of dignity. I now realize how difficult balancing these two goals can be. All of our best efforts to protect people are quickly diluted if we do it at the risk of losing other rights. We fail to treat people with dignity when we deny them the opportunity to make the same choices afforded to every other adult, just because we assume we know the risks better than them.
After eight weeks in Nepal, I thought I would have better answers to what being survivor-centered really means. At this stage, with only a couple of weeks left here, I expect to leave with more questions than when I arrived.