Roshana Pradhan of Nepal, a Harpswell ASEAN Program in Women’s Leadership alumna who participated in the 2019 program, describes herself as a feminist advocating for equal rights. She is a lawyer and currently works as a Program Coordinator at Forum for Women, Law and Development (FWLD), a non-governmental organization that protects and advocates for women’s rights issues along with other human rights issues in Nepal. Roshana has a Bachelor in Arts and Bachelor in Laws (B.A.LL.B) with a focus on Gender Justice. She is currently pursuing an LL.M in Human Rights and Gender Justice.

How did you become interested in working to advance gender equality and women’s rights?

I have always been skeptical about the patriarchal norms and values and been vocal and rebellious since my childhood. When I began to understand about the discrimination and inequality, especially during secondary school, I decided to study law with a focus on gender justice. I started learning about the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) and also started getting flashbacks to the discrimination that I and other women faced and people protecting the deep-rooted stereotypes in our society. Hence, I decided to pursue my career in advancing women's rights and wanted to create a better world for women.

What successes have you seen in advancing gender equality and women’s rights?

In Nepal, there has been a lot of progressive steps taken by the government. Most of the discriminatory laws have been scrapped and amended. The right to equality has been ensured by the Constitution of Nepal and the right of women has been enshrined as a fundamental right of women in the constitution. Similarly, diversity within women has also been recognized and provisions for positive discrimination to maintain gender equality have been introduced. The courts have played a great role in Nepal to support gender equality through progressive decisions. A lot of discriminatory laws in Nepal have been either repealed or amended through legal petitions.

What challenges and opportunities remain in addressing gender equality and women’s rights in Nepal?

Although the new law and legal decisions are commendable, the implementation of those laws and decisions has been meager. Also, the deep-rooted mindset and stereotypes still prevail, which makes the implementation of laws difficult. There is no change in the traditional roles of women in society. On the one hand, women have become empowered and are entering the labor market whereas, on the other hand, they are still responsible for homemaking which has created a double burden. This has worsened due to the COVID-19 pandemic.Also, there are issues of LGBTI rights that still have not gotten recognition due to lack of awareness. We have an opportunity to work for the effective implementation for the practical realization of the rights and to bring change in the attitude and belief of people.

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a detrimental impact on women across the globe. What has the impact been in Nepal?

There has been an increase in the number of cases of violence against women, especially rape and domestic violence cases. Per the data released by the Nepal Ministry of Women, Children and Senior Citizen, there were 900 cases of violence against women, children and senior citizens during the period of lockdown from March 24, 2020 to May 16, 2020. These include cases of rape, attempt to rape, polygamy, child marriage, witchcraft allegation, domestic violence including others.During the period of lockdown until now, my organization has been providing free legal helpline service and among the cases that we have received, the majority are related to violence against women. Since women lost their jobs and were forced to remain at home, they became the victim of violence and they could not ask for legal redress due to the lockdown. However, since the courts have opened, we have been able to meet victims and provide counseling and necessary legal services.

What advice would you give to young women who are interested in pursuing the same path as you?

First of all, I would like to encourage them to be persistent in working to change the current situation as it is difficult to change the deep-rooted patriarchal mindset. It might be slow but if we keep on going and continue to advocate, we’ll start seeing the results. The satisfaction that we receive from the changes is beyond words.Also, I would suggest that they pursue the path only if they have the passion to create a better world for women - there are times when we feel sad and frustrated during our work, as we are trying to change things that have been shaped by actions of people from time immemorial. For that, we need a strong desire and we need to learn to be resilient.