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The Guthi case in Deukheri

Ulf Wolff-Jacobsen
Danish DW, BASE

Dedicated to Halu Ram Chaudhary, a lawyer with commitment beyond the compulsory.

The existent land law with the aim to secure the Tharus their rights is still not being enforced.

In Deukheri, the lowland area belonging to Dang district, the population mostly consists of Deukheri Tharus. One can always recognize them, by looking at the women’s dresses. A loose red top with blue shoulders, and hand-sewn bordering in gold and white colours. In Deukheri a very big estate of 1250 bighaa¹ , is own by a Guthi from Pyuthan district. The Guthi is a mandir²  (temple) owned by a kind of board of ghargurwaa´s³ , which in these modern days are more like major landlords.

The Tharu people of Deukheri have cultivated the land since the time of Buddha, so the Tharus are being named as one of the indigenous peoples of Nepal. The Tharus have experienced marginalization as a result of the construction of the modern state of Nepal, partly as a result of the general increased pressure of the scarce land resources.

The land, that for generations, has been cultivated by the Tharus was at the beginning of this century brought under the control of the central government and subsequently redistributed primarily to landowners of hill origin. In this process the Tharus did not only loose control over the land they had so far been cultivating, but also became increasingly indebted to the new landowners. This process is continuing still today.

For many years the prime response of the Tharus to the detoriation of their living conditions, was migration towards the remaining areas of virgin jungle, along the Nepali-India border.
Land law with exceptions

Back to Deukheri. When King Mahendra in the 60´s realized that the people cultivating his land were leaving, he made a drastic move⁴ . He made a land law, whereby the Tharus could keep their land; almost free of taxation, and more important, it was made more difficult, to be sold to non-Tharus. But it required that they registered the land they cultivated. Many Tharus have done this and so they stayed. But the estate in Deukheri remained under the control of the Guthi in Pyuthan district, because two districts were involved. The Guthi of Deukheri could manipulate the 2 districts (CDO´s), so that registration was almost impossible. The Tharus were totally unaware of this situation. But in April 1999 the Nepali parliament made legislation to force the last Guthi lands to make registration within 4 months time.

The land reform office of Ghorahi and Backward Society Education (BASE) realized this, so they started mobilizing their advocacy abilities. And it helped. Some of their best lawyers worked voluntary to make the CDO´s realize the actually law. But for some it was too late. Gautja Man Chaudhary of Harpur, Daragaun, Dheukheri had for 6 years tried to register his land, but every time he went to the CDO, they ignored him. One time he hired a local lawyer to help his case, but he was told by the CDO, that he did not know the law, so he gave up and lost his land.

Still almost 80 % of the land was secured, because of voluntary efforts by BASE and community people. Though the struggle has just started. The law is there, but the enforcement of law is almost non-existent.

The begaari⁵  of Dang Deukheri needs to be turned around, now it is time for the local authorities to provide labour for the people.

1 About 125.000 acres

2 Nepali temple

3 Hereditary priests

4 He even went to Dang Deukheri to stop the migration, though he arrived somewhat late. But when the migrating Tharus heard he had arrived, many of them returned.

5 Voluntary work provided to the local authorities.

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