British Council Nepal organized achievements and dissemination programme of Ensuring Rights through Skills and Voice project (ERSVP) on July 7 in Kathmandu. Incepted in December, 2014, the project was funded by the European Union and jointly implemented by British Council Nepal and two NGOs namely Association of Dalit Women Advancement of Nepal (ADWAN) and Nepal National Dalit Social Welfare Organization (NNDSWO).
To commemorate the closing of the project, the event highlighted the achievements of the project which was implemented to fight the discrimination of the Dalit population, mainly related with Dalit women in Siraha and Gorkha districts of Nepal and to promote their access to economic, social and political rights.
Project Director of ERSVP and Head of Programmes at British Council Nepal, Rhona Brown welcomed the guests and shed light on the objectives of the project. She shared how the project would not have been successful without the assistance of the European Union and without the coordination of the implementing partners ADWAN and NNDSWO. She further highlighted that the project was executed to provide the skills based training to the Dalit population of Siraha and Gorkha districts and to identity their needs to bring out realistic positive outcomes from the project.
Head of Cooperation and Charge d’Affairs of the European Union, Andreas Roettger also congratulated all the implementing partners for successfully executing the project and for contributing in empowering the Dalit community of the two districts.
Project Manager Badri Prasad Tiwari shared a detailed presentation highlighting all the achievements of the project and the lessons learned.
He highlighted that the initial target of the project was to make a positive difference in the livelihood of 60percent Dalit women in the target area of the districts and the project succeeded in meeting 62.32 percent.
“The Dalit women who never got out of their veil, never walked into the streets beyond domestic works, never had eye-to-eye conversation with men outside their families, have now come out of their closet. After ERSVP’s training they are now skilled, empowered, their voice is stronger and they are competitive in the market irrespective of social odds to do with caste discrimination. As a project manager, I take this as the biggest achievement of this project,” shared Badri Prasad Tiwari.
The highlight of the event was the presence of two project beneficiaries – Gita Pariyar and Binda Bika. Both of them shared how ERSVP’s training changed their lifestyle, empowered them and now they are leading examples in their respective communities. They shared how they feel economically empowered, respected in the family and community and are proudly exercising their fundamental rights of voicing against any social ills based on caste, ethnicity or gender.
Akim Shrestha, executive director of CTEVT also congratulated for successfully disseminating the project and acting country director of British Council Nepal, Jim O’Neill thanked all the partners and each individual involved in the project for the successful implementation.
