While the great ethnic and cultural diversity in Nepal makes up the country’s unique identity, it also gives rise to various complexities occasionally resulting in conflicts. This diversity is manifested in the country’s population composition. Nepal’s population can be basically divided into two groups— the Hindu caste groups and Tibeto-Burman ethnic groups. The government has officially recognised the existence of 61 ethnic groups, which constitute 39 per cent of the country’s population. The rest belong to Hindu caste groups.

The Dum community in Mugu, a very remote district of Nepal is one of the main constituents of the different Hindu caste groups. The Dums, traditionally considered “serving caste”, earn a living by providing the so-called high-caste people their caste-specific services and unskilled labour based on the age-old patron-client relationship. They own very little asset of their own and have extremely limited access to local resources. Placed as they are in the lowest rung of the social order according to the traditional Hindu caste system, the Dums are economically marginalized and socially oppressed.

Likewise, majority of the Dum population in the district do not have land. What they have is a small patch for kitchen garden and their small houses. They work as agricultural labourers and make small agricultural tools to make their ends meet. Although land for tillage is a rare commodity in this district due to the rugged mountainous terrain, the little land available for agriculture is chiefly owned by the higher-caste people. So, survival for the Dums is a difficult proposition in such harsh conditions. They have no other source of income and their “untouchability” status has further worsened their situation.

Dalsingh Kami is a schoolboy of 16 from the Dum community. He is well aware of his place in society and gets annoyed when he is called by his nickname “Dale”. He is the youngest member of the family of eight. His grandfather Dhanamal is 70 and can hardly work as a wage labourer. His father, Parimal Lohar is 54 and is the main bread-earner of the family. Dalsingh’s mother, his brother and he himself work hard and yet life has never been easy for him or his family. Dalsingh is already married and his wife wants to live separately in the hope of having easier life. Dalsingh’s sister Kali, 29, has been living at her parent’s house for the last three years. After one month of marriage, Kali’s husband went to India to find a job and no one knows what he is doing there for the last four years. Dalsingh’s cousin is now five years old and has recently joined school.

Dalsingh’s family is a typical Kami or a blacksmith family that lives by working as agriculture labourer and by making and selling small agricultural tools. Being a Kami, Dalsingh’s grandfather and father want him to follow their profession. However, Dalsingh is reluctant to adopt their traditional profession because he wants to educate himself and work in an office. But convincing the grandfather and his father has never been easy for Dalsingh. Citing his not so good performance in studies as the reason, they want Dalsingh to take up their traditional occupation, all against his interest, which is a clear indication of a conflict between the young blood and the old guards in the Dum community. The conflict is not only limited to questions regarding whether the young generation should or should not continue with their traditional professions. On careful observation of the Dum community, the generation conflict is clearly evident in many aspects of social and domestic life of the Dums.

In the case of the Dalsingh a local schoolteacher convinced Dale’s father and grandfather on the merits of the education and finally he was allowed to continue with his studies.

In Kharka, another village in Mugu live Tamatas, who also belong to the Dum community. Two years ago a local women’s committee was formed in the village at the initiative of a girl from the same community, a high school dropout. The Women’s Awareness Group wanted to start a micro credit and saving programme for income generation. The group also ran non-formal education classes and strived hard to fight all pervasive male domination.

The males while away most of their time and the women bear the entire workload. With babies on their backs, the women do all the hard jobs from dawn to dusk. On their return home, they are greeted by hungry little siblings, cattle in need of fodder or water, and empty pitchers. But their husbands flocked by many other men of their kind remain busy at the local shop playing cards. Although always short of money to buy a notebook or a pen or a pencil for their school going children, they somehow manage to earn or borrow money to buy local liquor “jaand.” The liquor was easily available in the village. Thanks to the Maoists, it is completely banned in the village now.

Although “jaand” and cards are the two ubiquitous pastimes for the Tamata men, the problem holds equally true for the people of the other communities. Enough is enough, said the local Women’s Awareness Group and waged a moral battle against the males of their community. They stopped the men from drinking liquor and playing cards. The men of the community could not tolerate this ‘extreme’ step of their female counterparts. They boycotted the meetings called by the Group and even branded the women leaders with all baser names. However, the efforts of the women’s group finally paid and this conflict did not last long. A compromise was worked out and enmity was buried through understanding when the Women Awareness Group leader was successful in convincing the men to refrain from their bad habits for the happiness of their families and for their own sake.

In fact, there was once the practice of social segregation of one sub-caste by the other. There was a separate water tap for the Bhiyals, the Kamis and others. One was not allowed to use the tap belonging to the other sub-group, even though their ancestral god— the Badpal Masto—was the same. It was once reported that a little girl from a Bhiyal family and another from a Lohar (blacksmith) family were playing hide-and-seek in Thara village. The Bhiyal girl happened to enter the house of her Lohar friend to find her friend. The innocent little Bhiyal girl began to look around for her friend who had been hiding behind the family hearth and in the process passed by the stove where the meal was being prepared.

It is but natural that any community or society cannot be conflict free and conflict is somehow a part of life. But what seems important is the way conflicts are handled either by the conflicting sides themselves or by a third person. And it may be very important to imbibe what once Mother Teresa said— “ if we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.”

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