In his seminal book Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Paulo Freire redefines oppressors and the oppressed. While redefining the oppressors, he problematises the oppressed for idealising the ‘masculinity’ of the oppressor. Freire warns the oppressed not to turn into oppressors as they strive towards humanisation and social justice. Freire’s work is instrumental in the Nepal context of groups and communities, including Dolpo, who feel that they have been historically dehumanised and continuously neglected by the state. When they try to break their chains, the results are often similar to the recent situation at Do-Tarap. I have explored some of these issues in a previous article (‘An alternative to violence,’ June 14, Page 6). In this piece, I plan to look into the oppression of the Dolpo people and their ongoing efforts in the pursuit of justice through the lens of Freire.

Congradictions within 

A recent delegation of a committee consisting of locals from Do-Tarap to the Home Ministry raised several issues to be addressed. The Ministry’s response, however, was not positive. This even led to multiple contradictions and divisions among members of the community itself. According to the delegation that had gone to the Home Ministry on August 16, the Ministry instead asked them to be more sympathetic to the police in the Dolpo region. The Ministry was equally unhelpful when the team asked about the investigating committee report regarding the death of two locals during the clash between police and locals on June 3. After the meeting, most of the team members were frustrated by Home Minister Bamdev Gautam’s behaviour. Many of them felt that he did not seem to care about the struggle of locals, supported by the fact that the Dolpo committee was only allowed to meet Minister Gautam after two months. According to a source, the Ministry has not even read the list of demands, three weeks after meeting with the minister, which further worsens the situation.

However, there is also another side to this story which is more compelling. According to the same source, some of the people re-edited the language of the list of demands. There is, thus, a big difference between the original list of demands and the language forwarded to the Ministry of Forest and Soil Conservation and the Home Ministry. Some of the main points left out of the list when submitted to the Home Ministry were: (i) Declaring Tsering Phurwa a martyr; (ii) Establishing a Dolpo United Service Centre at Do-Tarap; and (iii) Formation of a central committee including representatives from the Nepal Federation of Indigenous Nationalities (Nefin), the National Human Rights Commission and the locals of Dolpo. Though these demands were first discussed and finalised among local representatives and submitted to the Ministry of Forest and Soil Conservation, they were left out from the later edited 8-point demands without proper consultation. In this case, some of the committee members clearly failed to reflect upon their practice and ethics. This has also broken the level of trust among committee members.

According to Freire, critical reflection upon our own practices and behaviours along with building trust are important in transforming the oppressive reality and in the process of liberation, besides education and solidarity among the people. 

Sey Namkha Dorje, Chairperson of the Dolpo Concern Centre, denies signing the 8-point list of demands forwarded to the Home Ministry. In addition, he also highlighted that the committee should be united on all issues, not only those related to Dolpo, but also those of indigenous peoples, as the Dolpo are among one of the 59 listed indigenous groups under Nefin. Meanwhile, Dorje also informed this scribe that there are certain people within the community who want the whole process to fail. He believes that these people are influenced by elites in the community and have become mere puppets for local oppressors. Moreover, he was also absent in the meeting with the Home Ministry, despite having been  active from the start and was one of three delegates who first visited Do-Tarap after the violence.

Broader picture

It is common knowledge how several movements, including the Maoist insurgency and the Madhes Movement, have now turned into a mere gateway to power due to the behaviour of some ‘bourgeois’ leaders. The discontent of many Maoist cadres regarding the lifestyles of some leaders of the UCPN (Maoist) is not hidden. The repeated positions of power Bijay Kumar Gachhadar has held by forgetting the sacrifices of many Madhesis is also not unknown. Sushil Koirala, the current Prime Minister, keeps reminding all that sticking to his chair is important, despite his inability to take decisions and his failing health. This demonstrates that those oppressed in the past can easily become perpetrators in the present.

Freire asks one to consider both the subjectivity and the transformation of the dominating reality. He writes, “To affirm that men and women are persons and as persons should be free and yet to do nothing tangible to make this affirmation a reality, is a farce… hence the radical requirement—both for the individual who discovers himself or herself to be an oppressor and for the oppressed—that the concrete situation which begets oppression must be transformed.”

The task is radical also in terms of the urgent need to critically reflect upon our behaviour, view of the world and ethics. The state, as one of the prime oppressors, does not seem to change its culture of domination. But in this case, problems for locals emerged when their own elites tried to manipulate and negate their liberation process. Such continuous breaches of trust will only harm their commitment to action. Therefore, the oppressed Dolpo locals need to reflect, inquire and negate their own, and society’s oppressive consciousness, while defeating ‘the boss inside them’ while simultaneously raising their voices against the state’s status quo.

Tewa Dolpo is a Research Assistant at the Nepa School of Social Sciences