Celebrating International Youth Day 2015

On 14th August, on the occasion of International Youth Day, CHRS and Betarbondhu volunteers organized a picnic and boat trip in the wetlands in Kishoreganj. It was a day long trip where they visited Mithamoin, the birthplace of Honorable President of Bangladesh H.E. Abdul Hamid. They also meet with Rejwan Ahammad Taufiq, MP, Kishoreganj. Participants enjoyed the beauty of riverside, they sing, they dance and they observed the International Youth Day 2015 with joy and fun.

Workshop on Community Radio Program Development

Taking interview of a village older

Taking interview of a shopkeeper for radio program

As a follow up activity of my FK Exchange program, Center for Human Rights Studies (CHRS) has recently organized a “Workshop on Community Radio Program Development” at Halimpur Union, Bajitpur. 28 participants from around 20 villages of Bajitpur and Kuliarchor Upazilla joined the 4 days’ workshop from May 25-28, 2015. After successful completion of the workshop participants developed 4 radio programs focusing on “Community Treatment Facilities”, “Necessity of Sports for Children”, “Community Schooling”, and “Circumstances of Community Market”. During these four days participants learned to work together by working on program development for community radio, the importance of community empowerment when designing CR programs, identifying issues for community radio, steps of program development and finally promoting the value and spirit of human rights/community development through CR program. During the training program participants went to different places of the village to collect interviews and information for their planned programs. CHRS staffs helped them in recording their interviews, voice over and editing the radio programs. All participants agreed to work in program development for the community radio Betarbondhu at Halimpur in near future. On the last day with the presence of Mr. Chitta Ranjan Shil, Head Master of Halimpur High School, participants were appreciated with certificates for their successful completion of the workshop.

FK Exchange Program and I

With the station manager during a visit to community radio in Nepal

Since 1963 people from Norway and developing countries has been taking part in FK Norway’s exchange program and about 400 organizations and institutions are exchanging young people in collaboration with FK Norway. In 2012 Center for Human Rights Studies (CHRS) entered into a partnership with Asian Institute for Human Rights (AIHR) in Bangkok, SAMATA Foundation in Nepal and Kislay in India, to facilitate an exchange program with the objective of strengthening capacity of the partners for promoting good governance and human rights. Under this exchange program in 2004-15 session I had been selected by AIHR from CHRS to be exchanged from Thailand to SAMATA Foundation, Nepal.

After farewell from SAMATA Foundation

 In Nepal, under this exchange program, I was learning about community media activism in Nepal, organizational strategies of the organizations who deal with strategic litigation and developing a training module on Active citizen journalism. I visited more than 20 community radios around Nepal and learned about how the community media is working for the community development in Nepal. With compiling cases on organizations strategies on strategic litigation I had contributed in a book published by Asian Institute for Human Rights (AIHR) named “Law in the Struggle of Justice and Dignity” by D.J. Ravindran. To prepare the training module he has conducted a training program in January at Halimpur Union, Bajitpur and now I am working to finalize the module. Besides these activities I have also participated and joined programs on Human Rights and youth activities. Among those the 24th Annual Human Rights and Diplomacy Training Program organized by DTP and INSEC, Regional Youth Summit organized by YHRI Nepal, Dalit Human Rights Defenders Training by SAMATA Foundation are much mentionable.
After the completion of the fellowship program successfully in April, I participated the Homecoming Seminar and reported about my activity which was organized by FK Norway in Bangkok, Thailand from 6-7 May, 2015.

Receiving certificate of successful completion of fellowship program

A workshop on Community Journalism through Active Citizenship

Community journalism is a form of journalism which is considered as one of the most powerful and effective ways to foster the development process and the advancement of in the free flow of information in the community. Community journalism has the ability to get in touch with and draw out the actual situation and voice of the most disadvantaged, marginalized and vulnerable groups of society which include the poor, women and children.

Participants with certificates in hand after finishing the workshop

As an FK Fellow, I along with my country office Center for Human Rights Studies (CHRS) planned to develop a module on community journalism. After finalizing an outline and materials for the module we planned for a test workshop on the module. As planned during my home visit to Bangladesh in December we circulated and prepared for the workshop in January. Finally, with 27 local youth participants who really have enthusiasm in journalism and volunteerism the workshop on “Community Journalism” held at Halimpur Union Parishad, Kishoregonj, Bangladesh from 6-8 January, 2015.

Participants registering before the starting of the workshop

The objective of the workshop is enhancing the capacity and ability of the participants to different forms of media- print, audio or visual in community level. Along with this one of the main objective was to test the ongoing workshop manual, find out the opportunities for changing or reshaping the manual and finalizing it were also objectives of the workshop.

Chairman of Halipur Union Parishad visited the workshop

During the session of AKM Golap Mustafa

All three days, the workshop started at 9am in the morning and end up at 4.30pm in the evening. On the very first session of the workshop, Mr. Mofaq Kharul Taufiq, staff member of CHRS, welcomed all the participants in the workshop and gave a short introduction on CHRS and Betarbondhu, program co-organizer. Mr. Taufiq arranged some ice breaking and introductory games to make the participants more comfortable and energetic for the workshop.

Group exercise

 Later on the first day, there was discussion and activity on what is news, news and literature, basics of journalism and ethical issues of journalism, basic story elements- 5W, 1H. Mr. A K M Golam Mustafa, contributor and journalist of "The Daily Ittifaq" one of the oldest daily of Bangladesh came on the first day of the session and discussed about journalism and ethics of journalism from his own journalistic experience.

Group exercise

 On the second day of the workshop there was discussion about fact finding, interviewing and report writing. Participants got a very clear knowledge about how to conduct fact fact-finding and identify the sources of information in a prior time of fact finding task. Participants also told to prepare questions for the sources before going for their interview activity. Later on there was a role play session where participants given a situation and to have practical knowledge about fact-finding activity. Participants also wrote reports based on the information from the role play exercise.

Role play session of fact-finding

The last day of the workshop started with basic understandings on Human Rights. Mr. Farhadul Islam, Co-ordinator of CHRS, took the session. Later on participants were discussed about citizen journalism and community journalism in conjunction with their importance for the citizens and the community. On the last half of the day participants were familiar with social media tools like- photography, community radio and others. Participants also informed how we can use social media like facebook, twitter or blog and share our writings, reports and photos with a bunch of people around the country or beyond country.

One of the participant receiving certificate from the guest

The workshop ended with certifying all the participants of the workshop for their successful participation. Muhammad Farhadul Islam, Coordinator of Betarbondhu chaired the closing ceremony of the three days workshop.

[Another workshop for testing and finalizing the workshop will be conducted in Nepal before April 2015.] 

24th Human Rights and People's Diplomacy Training Program

The 24th Human Rights and People's Diplomacy Training Program, Nepal was organized by DiplomacyTraining Program in partnership with INSEC, Nepal. It was a 17 day training program from November 3 to November 19, 2014 with participants from 14 different countries of Asia Pacific. The main objective of the training program was to increase the capacity of civil society advocates to engage effectively with governments and others – locally, nationally and internationally. To equip participants with the knowledge, skills and confidence to engage in dialogue and build their support networks. 

The target groups of the training program was human rights defenders working with NGOs in the Asia-Pacific region committed to developing and sharing their knowledge and skills in human rights advocacy. I had participated the training program as a participant from Bangladesh.

From the training program we, the participants, have learned many things. We have learnt about the UN Human Rights Mechanism- The International Bill of Human Rights, UN Special Procedures, Charter and Treaty Body activity, UPR Process. We have practical sessions on how UN Treaty Body or UPR session is done and what is the role of country representatives, UN Officials and Civil Society activist during these special sessions at United Nations.

During the training we have also learned about the National Human Rights Institutions (NHRIs) and Paris Principles. We have visited the head office of National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), Nepal and learned how they are working to protect human rights violation in Nepal. We have learnt about the structure of NHRC Nepal and the activities of different groups. I and some of the training participants have also visited the district office of INSEC at Pokhara and learned about their activities that how the defenders are working on investigating and collecting information about rights violations and their approaches to deal with their activities. We have learned that most the defenders are also involved in different local news agencies and they actually maintain very good relation with the local legal officers and political leaders or they (defenders) have known persons who have connections with them. The other group went to the NHRC Nepal district office in Pokhara.

From the training we have gained idea more about how to develop advocacy and campaign strategies for the NGOs or for the local community to deal with human rights violation issues. We had also practice session on this.

We have learned that how we can relate the Normative Content of General Comments from United Nations with problems of our community and what kind of actions should be taken to minimize the problems with using Human Rights Based Approach by the responsible authority. We have learned about the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and how to craft common SDGs for all countries as well as thinking over the measures to undertake to reach the goals. We have also learned about Right to Development Declaration by UN and we had practice session on this. We have worked in groups and performed as local NGO where other groups remain as governments and the NGO have to present about a village problem and ask the local government to take necessary steps to fix the problems.

 We have also gained knowledge about how we can use social media for our campaign and advocacy activity. Beside this we have also learned using media and dealing with the reporters of media during interview or live programs.

During the training program we had participants cooking session where participants from different countries cooked their own and traditional foods. All the foods were so delicious and that they we found ourselves how good cook we are but wasting our talent in vain. On the cultural night every participant wore their traditional dress and we found the cultural diversity of our region.

We have session on lobbying where participants share their success and failure during their lobbying in their country. From that session we have gather practical knowledge about lobbying and for the practical exercise I went to the Royal Norwegian Embassy Nepal. There we met Mr. Håkon Arald Gulbrandsen, Minister Counselor/Deputy Head of Mission and we had chat on the Human Rights and lobby activities. I also shared about my works as an FK Fellow at Nepal with him.

We have learned about the UN Declaration on Human Rights Defenders and Responsibility of Governments. We have also learnt how to minimize the risk of a human rights defender.

From the training program we have get knowledge about 14 different countries, from Asia Pacific, human rights situations and how the governments are responding to these problems. In the meeting with Mr. Jose Ramos Horta we have learnt how he had lobbied, negotiated and dealt with the diplomats of other countries to free Timor Leste from the Indonesian Army Occupation which gave a the idea of real UN diplomatic postures.

 We are really very lucky to have John Pace, Virginia Danda, Patrick Earle, Philip Chung, Joshua Cooper and other very talented and experienced trainers who gave a lot to the participants to work in future. INSEC Nepal had done an incredible job in organizing along with DTP Team. It would be suggestion to all the human rights advocates around the Asia-Pacific region to apply for this training program in future and enhance their capacity to work ahead.

Training for the HR WATCHDOGS

SAMATA Foundation, Nepal has organized a 3 days training program on Capacity Enhancement of Dalit Human Rights Defenders on Dalit Human Rights Monitoring. This training held from September 15 to September 17 at Hotel Hardik, Bagbazar, Nepal. This program is a continuation of SAMATA Foundation's European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR) Project. This is the second phase of Dalit Human Rights Defenders (DHRDs) Training program. The first phase of this training program was held in 2013. This three days program was inaugural by the welcome speech of Mr Padam Sundas, Chairperson, SAMATA Foundation in the morning of September 15. The training ended with the presentation of DHRDs next activity planning and Participants were awarded with certificated on the evening of 18th September with a Valedictory Ceremony Program.
This training program aims to enhance capacity on monitoring Dalit Human Rights through- sharing learning's and challenges faced by the defenders during Cast Based Discrimination (CBD) and Human Rights Violation, providing inputs to reinforce the learning on CBD mechanisms and new progress in the country, providing practical knowledge on following up cases and their interventions and ensuring practical planning on Dalit Human Rights activities and involvement of DHRDs.
After getting the training the defenders returned to their areas and start working as the Human Rights watchdogs to identify any kind of violation in the society or in their community. These defenders will also help people to reach local police station, filing cases or FIR and contact with the networks for further activities. I feel lucky to be a participant of this program.

TEEJ: The fest for Women

I have passed more than a week in my host organization here in Nepal. I have got a calendar from the office where the holidays are mentioned. I found that August 28th was a holiday and planning to visit some place in Kathmandu Valley. But it shocked me when I heard that this is special holiday only for the women staffs of my office. Then I asked my colleagues about the day. From them I have learnt that this "Teej" festival is the fasting festival for the women. That's why they got special holiday. Married women used to visit their parents house to meet them. On this festivals women dance in joy, pray for their husband, children and family.
To celebrate the day all the male staffs including the FK Fellows of SAMATA Foundation, we organize the lunch for our female staffs. All the male staffs gave some money and from that we money cooking staffs were bought. The day was on 26 August, Tuesday. Me and Sonu Kumar Yadav (FK Fellow from India), both of us, were very much excited about this program. We along with Surya (intern at SAMATA Foundation) assisted our Maya Didi, Chief of the Kitchen, in cooking that day's lunch. She cooked some special dishes like-Polau, Chicken Curry, Rajam and also brought Dai for us. Being a vegetarian Sonu prepared a veg-dish with Panir for the vegetarians including him. At lunch time all the female staffs were given priority to take the food first and we all had lunch together at ground floor of the office. It was really a nice day and good way to respect women. This event was a great experience for me to learn and respect my mother, sisters, relatives, female friends and other women in a very different way. And yes I agreed, this day women should be given special holiday.

Here I am sharing the story on "Teej" to understand the festival. It's collected from internet-
Teej" is the fasting festival for women. It takes place in August or early September in every year. The festival is a three-day long celebration that combines sumptuous feasts as well as rigid fasting. Through this religious fasting, hindu women pray for marital bliss, well being of their spouse and children and purification of their own body and soul.
Traditionally, the ritual of Teej is obligatory for all Hindu married women and girls who have reached puberty. Exception is made for the ones who are ill or physically unfit. In such circumstances a priest performs the rites. According to the holy books, the Goddess Parbati fasted and prayed fervently for the great Lord Shiva to become her spouse. Touched by her devotion, he took her for his wife. Goddess Parbati, in gratitude sent her emissary to preach and disseminate this religious fasting among mortal women, promising prosperity and longevity with their family. Thus was born the festival of Teej.
The first day of Teej is called the "Dar Khane Din". On this day the women, both married and unmarried, assemble at one place, in there finest attires and start dancing and singing devotional songs. Admist all this, the grand feast takes place. The jollity often goes on till midnight, after which the 24 – hour fast commences. Some women without a morsel of food or drops of water while others take liquid and fruit
Gaily dressed women can be seen dancing and singing on the street leading to Shiva temples. But the main activities take place around the Pashupatinath temple where women circumambulate the Lingam, the phallic symbol of the lord, offering flowers, sweets and coins. The main puja (religious ceremony) takes place with offerings of flowers, fruits etc made to Shiva and Parbati, beseeching their blessing upon the husband and family. The important part of the puja is the oil lamp which should be alight throughout the night for it is bad omen if it dies away.
The third day of the festival is Rishi Panchami. After the completion of the previous day's puja, women pay homage to various deities and bathe with red mud found on the roots of the sacred Datiwan bush, along with its leaves. This act of purification is the final ritual of Teej, after which women are considered absolved from all sins. The recent years have witnessed alteration in the rituals, especially concerning the severity, but its essence remains. No matter how agonizing the fast may be Nepalese women have and will always continue to have faith in the austerities of Teej.