Passing on the Gift empowering Tharu communities

Women's groups in Nepal and other countries are a powerful tool to overcome sometimes oppressive societal forces. And, through Passing on the Gift, women's groups are able to not only improve the lives of themselves but their communities as well.

Panauti Village, Nepal – The deep waters of the Narayani River cut a long line through the Nepalese landscape. Along the banks of this impressive river, local Tharu women struggle against a current of long-standing social traditions.
Girls are excluded from school and expected to stay at home to help with chores. They’re given little access to health care or education. Many women like Bhoj Kumari Mahoto often enter into young marriages, some as young as eleven years old. These challenges fate the women to arduous lives as unyielding as the river's course. By the time Bhoj was just fifteen years old, she had worked as a bonded worker for nine years and had been married twice. After her father died when she was six years old, Bhoj’s mother was forced to send her and her sisters away to perform domestic chores in wealthy homes. Bhoj endured great distress for eight years until she ran away.
When she returned home she was forced to marry twice and pressured to give birth to a son. Her life seemed scripted to a predictable fate. That is until she found the Buhari Mahila Bachat Samuha Women’s Group of Narayani.
Established in 2001 through a collaborative partnership of the Women Feeling Unity Forum (WFUF) and Heifer International, the group focuses on empowering women through education in agriculture, livestock and gender equity. The first group began with 20 members who were given the gift of sheep to generate income and invaluable gender equity education.
“I joined the Heifer/WFUF women’s group when I was expecting my fourth child and received gender training,” Bhoj says. “I convinced my husband that if we could educate our daughters, they could become doctors and engineers and be just as successful as a son. Almost every girl in the village wants to go to school and wants to be educated.”
The group began their project with training and the gifts of two sheep and two breeding bucks. By Passing on the Gift, the women have formed a second group of 20, and each member has passed on not only sheep, but also the immeasurable gifts of education and awareness.
“We used to be known in the village only by our husband’s first name but after our gender equality training, we recognized our own names and understood that we should use them,” says group member Meena Mahoto. “There should also be equal responsibilities for both the husband and wife. Our main group objectives have become self-independence and empowerment.”
Within this entrenched culture, the powerful acts of giving and getting – of Passing on the Gift – have redirected the ebb and flow of seemingly unchangeable waters. As Bhoj says, “After project training, my family started to divide work among themselves and today there is much more unity, peace and harmony among all our families as well as in the community. We are all working together for positive change.”