Shiva Shankar Das, 20, had a love affair with a 20-year-old woman belonging to a so-called “upper-caste” community. Both Das and the girl reside in Pansera VDC of Siraha District. The relationship was known to the whole village. The girl’s family sternly opposed the relationship, which challenged the strict social barriers of caste.
On January 29, the girl’s brothers threatened Das, demanding that he bring the relationship to an end or to “prepare everything for his funeral”. According to Shiva’s family, on January 30, Shiva was beaten up by seven of the girl’s relatives. Shiva sustained numerous scars and bruises from the attack. Later that day, Shiva went to meet with the girl to get his phone, which had been taken by the girl’s relatives. He was healthy at the time. He came back home around 8.30 pm crawling on his hands and knees, and told his family that he had been poisoned by the Chaudhari family. He vomited twice while narrating the event. He was taken to the Nursing Home at Lahan for treatment. The Nursing Home referred him to BP Koirala Institute of Health Science Dharan where doctors announced his death the next day. The initial local police officers reaction to the case has been highly problematic and suggests that they have been attempting to cover up the case, protecting the perpetrators. Collusion between the police and the perpetrators typically happens in cases of caste-motivated violence and prevents the victims from benefiting from the protection of the law.
A death certificate specifying the victim’s cause of death was provided to the police instead of the victim’s family. The police did not give the death certificate to the victim’s family at any time. In addition, the doctors prepared a postmortem report, but the victim’s family did not see its content. Requests by human rights organizations to see the postmortem report have yielded no result.
The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), the National Dalit Commission (NDC), and also the members of the Subcommittee to study and find solutions to the caste based discrimination and untouchability experienced by Dalit communities within the Legislative Parliament related to the Women, Children and Social Welfare Committee conducted separate fact-finding missions and released their reports. These reports reiterated that Shiva Shankar was poisoned to death. These teams met the police, his family members, friends and the villagers. The NHRC, the NDC and the subcommittee recommended that the police speed up their investigation and bring the alleged perpetrators to justice.
Immediately after Shiva’s death, his parents contacted the police about the case, but the police failed to return their call until almost 8 hours later. Inspector Pradhumn Adhikari from the area police office, Kalyanpur VDC, Saptari District refused to file the family’s complaint and without conducting a thorough investigation into the case, alleged that the victim had committed suicide instead. As per the State Cases Act, the police have an obligation to register and investigate every First Information Report brought before them.
The police then allegedly prepared a report but did not allow the family to see its content. Instead, the police forced Das’ father to mark his fingerprints on the police report without being able to see its content and without it being read to him. They threatened to thrown him into jail if he did not comply with their demands. After the initial rejection of the case, the victim’s family sent their First Information Report to the Chief District Officer and the District Police Office, Saptari.
Dalit civil society led a campaign protesting the police’s rejection of the case, and eventually the case was registered on 26 February 2012 in the Kalyanpur area police office in the name of the seven Chaudhari family members quoted above. In spite of that step being taken, however, no investigation has been launched.
The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), the National Dalit Commission (NDC), and also the members of the Subcommittee to study and find solutions to the caste based discrimination and untouchability experienced by Dalit communities within the Legislative Parliament related to the Women, Children and Social Welfare Committee conducted separate fact-finding missions and released their reports. These reports reiterated that Shiva Shankar was poisoned to death. These teams met the police, his family members, friends and the villagers. The NHRC, the NDC and the subcommittee recommended that the police speed up their investigation and bring the alleged perpetrators to justice.
The then Prime Minister, Dr. Baburam Bhattarai promised that the alleged perpetrators will be booked as per law and the victim’s family would receive interim relief from the government. His father had travelled to Kathmandu to seek justice and remained there for a month. On his next visit he stayed in Kathmandu for 2 weeks. He met different Dalit NGOs, government bodies, even the Prime Minister, Babural Bhattarai and the home minister, Bijay Kumar Gachhadhar. However, he had not received any help, and there was no sign of justice being done.
In similar incidents, victims of caste-based discrimination received compensation from the government where the amount was NPR 1 million/=. The families of Sete Damai who was killed due to an inter caste marriage feud and Manbir Sunar were provided the same amount. But the government still have not provided any compensation or delivered justice to the Das family. This raises a serious question of whether there is a different law and government in Nepal. The aged parents of Shiva Shankar Das are still awaiting justice. They want a secure environment in which to live in their village. The parents are not asking for anything more than that which they entitled to: a speedy investigation and the delivery of justice.
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