The clandestine mobility pattern of population in Nepal makes it difficult to provide any accurate estimates on the total number of people displaced by the conflict. The endeavor for empirical data collection of internally displaced persons (IDPs) has become a distant reality.
The covert nature of internal displacement and unregulated cross-border migration flows and urban centers are difficult to monitor, and all facts and figures provided are speculative, rough estimates, and impossible to verify. [break]The pertinent question remains unanswered to accurately estimate how many fled as a consequence of the conflict and how many are “regular” urban or economic migrants.
The government has largely unfulfilled its obligations to protect the IDPs in accordance with the 1998 UN Guiding Principles. Many international actors have been in Nepal for years providing development-oriented assistance, but almost none geared their humanitarian relief or target their assistance to IDPs prior to the inception of UNOCHA Consolidated Appeal Process (CAP). Of those who did, insecurity and lack of access put most projects on hold. With two antagonistic political visions and in the absence of peace corridor for humanitarian intervention, the IDPs crisis remained in limbo for years though a segment of IDPs have managed to return home.
Neither of the former warring parties willing to compromise, it has become difficult to envisage an effective rescue, relief, return nor recovery process of those sufferers during the height of the conflict.
A large number of those fleeing the fighting have been from relatively well-off strata of the population: landlords, party workers, and security personnel, teachers, and Lahurey retirees from Indian and British Army, and VDC chairmen. Insecurity such as death threats, food insecurity, absence of security organs along with dehumanized ways of killing, maiming, physical beatings, torture and intimidations have been some of the key factors of peoples’ displacement. People also tend to flee the place of origin due to alleged charges of being informers. Hindrance in children’s education and disturbances in schools have also been other significant primary push factors.
Additionally, extortion by the Maoists and the activities of the security forces/Maoists in disguise, and now also by splinter armed groups has also resulted in forced displacement. Confiscation of land and houses, and killing of livestock, harassments such as demand for food and shelter, regular searches, aggravation to the family members of either sides caused constant trouble in the villages. Similarly, lack of health services, loss of existing jobs and unavailability of other employment opportunities along with forced conscription have contributed to abrupt displacement of civilian population.
During the decade-long conflict, the counter-insurgency operation spearheaded by the security forces further caused tension, insecurity and threat to the civilian life, provoking dislodgement and fleeing the place of origin. Although certainly underreported, many villagers were displaced by food blockades, torture and killings by security forces. Civilians were killed on suspicion of providing food, shelter or financial assistance to the Maoists, and often tortured by the army and police.
Displacement caused by security forces was partly hidden by the government-imposed state of emergency from November 2001 to August 2002, and again the post-February 1 scenario which hindered independent reporting and intervention on displacement caused by the security forces. Though small in scale, displacement is a common phenomenon even in the post-conflict scenario.
Highway to glittering towns
The IDPs generally believe that the cities and towns are perceived as safer destinations platforms for better education and employment opportunities and better access to the health services. Some IDPs have connections in the cities (especially for politically affiliated people) and/or have children, friends, acquaintances and other relatives. Easier to access and approach government agencies and human rights, humanitarian and relief organizations have also resulted in alluring them to the urban centers.
The population of 12 municipalities grew by 5.2% over the last two preceding years, compared to 3.6% between 1991 and 2001, according to an UNDP-RUPP survey (GTZ, INF, SNV, UNDP/RUPP, NHRC & the Global IDP Project, March 2003). This represents an increase of more than 80,000 rural-urban migrants, coinciding with the intensified conflict, although not necessarily all as a direct result of the conflict itself. Although many people have fled rural areas, some of the worst affected people could be the ones who stayed behind. Many families, the elderly, women, children and poor villagers have been less able to flee, staying behind to face worsening poverty, food shortages. They have remained back as eternally discarded people.
Many IDPs suffer from feelings of helplessness, depression, irritability, sleep disorders, addiction, gambling and post-traumatic disorders. Many problems stem from long-term stays as destitute. They include the creation of attitudes of dependence, loss of self-esteem, fostering of social problems, including breakdown of the family, alcoholism, drug abuse, suicide and crime. From being respected as landlords, merchants and traders in their respective districts, they have now become anonymous. Though many of them have lost their property, family members, relatives and neighbors, they still retain a sense of belongings to their own place of origin. Many hope they can return, and in fact, some of them have, as they belong nowhere else. However, those who have lost their close relatives and are under direct threat due to political dissidence and are more likely to be resigned to return.
Women and children are hit the hardest by the conflict and displacement. They don’t have access even to the basic health facilities. They encounter problems during childbirth, post-natal care, and lack of adequate/nutritious food for the growing children and immunization of young children, psychological problems – depression, frustration, irritation, homesickness and solitary stress. Many displaced children are deprived of education. Parents are unable to afford public school expenses, let alone private schooling. Displaced children are unable to produce identity details. Parents may have a growing preference towards getting their children employed, thereby indicting young population to the exploitative labor market. Children are compelled to be laborers in stone quarries, sand mines, apparel factories and brick kilns, or as local porters, street vendors, drivers, conductors, domestic labors, construction workers etc. They are usually underpaid and their income is not adequate to sustain themselves. They have become easy targets of traffickers and are easily allured to sex work and uninformed overseas employment.
Habitat and commodities have remained burgeoning constraints for IDPs. In the absence of organized and safe camps and shelters, the housing rights of IDPs is nowhere in the national agenda. House rent in the urban centers have dramatically increased. Due to skyrocketing price of real estate, it is beyond the reach of IDPs to have a new place to stay. There is also very little external support. In the urban areas, most of them are scattered, live in single and cramped rooms with pending rent for months. With no relief and development agencies, daily food and other ration for IDPs is uncertain and mostly inadequate. Equally worse, the IDPs themselves have exhausted their own personal funds by now.
Urbanization of poverty
Living conditions are extremely difficult for many IDPs in urban areas. The unprecedented population flood into cities, combined with the growing migration trends to urban areas in the last decade, has led to a surge in the number of urban poor and placed a strain on the municipalities’ capacity to deliver basic services, such as water supply, sanitation and waste management, transportation, health and education. The increasing concentration of IDPs in urban settlements has begun producing a huge segment of urban poor.
Many IDPs are peasants and are unprepared to make a living in urban areas. When they find employment, these are generally poorly paid. This is partly because their own arrival has driven down wages in jobs that require low or minimal capital investment. These jobs are physically demanding and insecure. Along with poor economic migrants, displaced people who work in the labor market generate low returns.
Village influx threatens cities
According to studies by NGOs, there are around 200,000 IDPs in urban areas – some 100,000 of them in the Kathmandu Valley alone. During the high-intensity conflict, more people in villages packed their belongings, fearing the worst. Though the Valley is somehow able to accommodate new arrivals, the Kathmandu Metropolitan City (KMC), the largest municipality of the nation, is facing problems, such as encroachment and congestion. Peace and safety – post-conflict organized crime has affected the city in recent years – combined with the availability of employment opportunities has made the capital, Kathmandu, the obvious sanctuary for displaced people. Consequently, urban sprawls are now a major problem, with IDPs occupying pavements with vegetable kiosks, grocery shops and tea stalls. There is a surge in such encroachments, as evidenced by the KMC detailing 100 extra men from its police force just to clear the road congestion.
Take Krishna Bahadur Thapa, from Surkhet. Having fled his village after Maoist rebels threatened him and his family,he now sells roasted corn in his pavement shop in the heart of the city. Thapa barely makes ends meet. He has to fork out US$12 a month as rent for his one-room tenement.
“My wife sells cigarettes, candies and roasted beans at street corners. Together, we make around US$2 a day,” he says.
Unable to cope with the population explosion, the government has resorted to rationing water. There are places in the city where water is supplied only once a week, and that, too, for just a few hours.
The existing infrastructure is heading for collapse. In the past couple of years, the government has not constructed a single hospital or school to cater to the lower social strata. So the mega influx has stretched existing hospitals and schools to their limit. Government hospitals are under severe pressure from the hordes of patients, whose numbers have soared in the past decade. Other hospitals and nursing homes aren’t any better placed. The pressures on schools are not apparent, though. Since most of the displaced are poverty-stricken, finding it hard to make ends meet, education is a luxury. “How can I send my children to school with such meager earnings?” asks one IDP. With such huge numbers of people seeking accommodation and squatting rights, urban real estate prices have escalated.
Real estate agents say much of the boom can be attributed to affluent rural folks buying land in the capital. On an average, in 2004-2005, the Kathmandu District Land Registration Office received 400 cases of land transactions everyday – a considerable increase compared to the previous years. Land prices have spiraled by as much as 100% in the height of the conflict. Many private housing complexes have come up and rent has gone up considerably.
For those who can’t afford to buy, there is always the option of encroaching upon public land. The areas around the riverbanks in Kathmandu are their favorite targets. Several shanties have mushroomed on the banks of rivers like the Bagmati and the Bishnumati. Town planners say these developments could cause immense damage to the environment.
Conclusion
The Government has a responsibility to assist and protect all people living within its borders, but its actions make clear that the IDP problem did not become a top priority in the peace process and transitional justice. The state has its obligation to render basic service delivery such as housing, land, water supply and so on, without broadening the concept to include other services that may be viewed as basic to the needs of urban dwellers, such as food, energy and other services. Efforts to improve access by the IDPs to basic infrastructure services have to be made at city (or town) levels. Attempts should be made to delineate the dimensions and character of urban poor, including IDPs, while doing the survey of the current state of basic infrastructure services in the country. Similarly, for those willing to return their homesteads, their dignified return must be ensured by restituting their land and property. The plights and rights of IDPs must be considered as one of the core components of the transitional justice process.
The writer, an Honorary Kingian Non-violence Advocate for Promoting Global Peace, is the president of INHURED International, the first Nepali organization to enjoy Special Consultative Status with the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations. The primary focus of the organization is to advocate on behalf of vulnerable population such as women, children, indigenous people, Dalits and other marginalized sections of the society. Protection of refugees and IDPs is one of their key areas of concern.
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