"I exist" is the photo story done for the Launch of the Human Rights and Justice Centre Nepal, who are here to provide access for victims of human rights violations in Nepal such as genocide, torture, enforced disappearances, extrajudicial executions and sexual violence.
These four stories are about the enforced disappearance cases that happened before and during the armed conflict in Nepal from the year 1996-2006.
17 years have passed and her eyes still search for her husband.
Bimala Dhakal was happily married. Her husband, Rajendra Dhakal, was a lawyer and the Chairman of the Gorkha district branch of the Forum for the Protection of Human Rights (FOPHUR).
On 8 January 1999, during a work trip to Lamjung, Rajendra was approached by a patrolling police team and arrested. He was separated from the two friends he was traveling with and was put in solitary confinement. This was the last time he was seen. Bimala had fought ever since to find out the truth about her husband’s disappearance.
“I looked for my husband in every possible way. I filed for complaints, all the way to the Supreme Court. I visited army camps, where I was arrested and tortured by the army. But I didn’t stop.”
On 17 March 2017, the UN Human Rights Committee issued a decision on the case, finding Nepal responsible for the violation of several provisions of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights in the case of Rajendra Dhakal. In spite of these decisions, Bimala’s questions still remain unanswered.
Gyanendra Tripathi, the husband of Sharmila Tripathi, was a Central Committee member of the All Nepal National Independent Student Union-(Revolutionary) (ANNISU-R), the student wing of the Communist Party of Nepal-Maoist. Following the breakdown of the second ceasefire in 2003, the Royal Nepalese Army began to systematically arrest and detain known ANNISU-R sympathizers in the Kathmandu Valley.
He was arrested first time for 34 days, 7 of which he spent incommunicado, blindfolded and beaten severely. Following his release, fearing for his own safety and that of his family, Gyanendra went underground. But on 26 September 2003 at 11:00 a.m., he left his residence for work and never returned.
From that day Sharmila Tripathi has searched for him tirelessly. She pleaded in every police stations, filed for complaints, wrote letters to the ministry, human rights association and many more. She even participated in hunger strikes to bring this issue in the spotlight.
Her case went all the way up to the United Nations Human Rights Committee, which on 28 October 2014 found Nepal had violated Gyanendra’s right to life, to personal liberty, to recognition before the law and the prohibition of torture.
Sharmila says, “I still have no idea of my husband’s whereabouts, but I still have hope. I will continue the search for as long as I live.”
Shanta Neupane’s husband Danda Pani was an influential member of the Communist Party of Nepal-Maoist at the height of the insurgency. She says, “He had been arrested multiple times so I always knew how risky his involvement was. I feared for his well-being constantly.”
On 21 May 1999, Danda Pani was arrested, put into a van and driven away to an unknown destination. And to date, his whereabouts is a mystery.
“In the days following his arrest, I visited the three main jails in Kathmandu. But I was told everywhere that my husband had never been arrested or detained”, explains Shanta.
The Supreme Court quashed her habeas corpus writ on the same grounds that Danda Pani’s detention was recorded nowhere.
Shanta then opted for non-legal ways to seek the truth, organizing a press conference and writing an appeal to the Parliament - to no avail. “My hair has turned grey searching for him. I regret that my kids have grown up without the presence of their father.”
On the thirteenth anniversary of his disappearance, Danda Pani’s case was submitted to the United Nations Human Rights Committee. A positive decision was issued in 2017, but has not, to this day, translated into concrete change for Shanta and her children.
Anil Tharu was just 15-years-old when he died on 15 March 2004. A diligent student living with his aunt at the time, he was cycling with a friend when he was stopped for what seemed like a normal security check. The guard’s started to question him about Anil’s Maoist allegiance. The boy was apolitical but was still forced to give information on his whereabouts and his family. The interrogation escalated into torture, and Anil was insulted and kicked with boots and gun butts. Eventually, the guards killed Anil by 3 bullets shot in his head.
His father Purinam will always remember the crime scene: “My son’s hands were tied with shoelaces, his trousers were torn. We could not his take body home for fear of security personnel. We had just a few hours to conduct funeral proceedings, that was not enough time to grief.”
Over 10 years after the facts, no culprit has ever been found. Investigations were not even initiated, due to the authorities’ refusal to even register the case.
“I am longing for my son. I cannot stop thinking about it since that day, not only because of grief but because we haven’t received any kind of closure or justice”, says Anil’s mother Niramaya.
