Women of the People

To become public is to be seen and accounted for in history. The journey of Nepali women from within the boundaries of domesticity to the openness of public life is a move from obscurity to memory. A history of women is first and foremost a social history.

Kathmandu | 1961 Prem Kumari Tamang of Nuwakot and Lal Maya Tamang of Dhading put in Dillibazar Prison for their opposition of King Mahendra’s coup d’état. Shanta Shrestha Collection/Nepal Picture Library

Kathmandu | 1973 A program organized by Panchayat women’s class organization to discuss women’s role in national development. Badri Binod Dhungana Collection/Nepal Picture LibraryKathmandu | 1973 A program organized by Panchayat women’s class organization to discuss women’s role in national development. Badri Binod Dhungana Collection/Nepal Picture Library

Mass rally organized in Kathmandu protesting the rape and murder of Namita and Sunita Bhandari. It was popularly believed that high members of the Panchayat government were responsible. Hisila Yami Collection & Sukanya Waiba Collection/Nepal Picture Library

Baglung | 1966 Women in Baglung vote in a local election during the Panchayat period. Photos by Wayne Stinson

Kathmandu | 1981 Image from the mass rally organized in Kathmandu protesting the rape and murder of Namita and Sunita Bhandari. Sukanya Waiba Collection/Nepal Picture Library

Image from the mass rally organized in Kathmandu protesting the rape and murder of Namita and Sunita Bhandari. Hisila Yami Collection

Dang | 1965 Members of local Panchayat women’s class organization in Dang Deukhuri. King Mahendra’s Panchayat government had established women’s organizations across the country as one of the seven official “class organizations”. After the coup of 1960, these class organizations were a key tactic in displacing the political fervor of the democratic movement. For the Panchayat government, these state-sanctioned organizations were a way to co-opt popular participation, control opposition, and reproduce state legitimacy to rule over all spheres of social life in Nepal. But they played a part in activating women at local and regional levels into exercising representation, self-governance, and accountability. Issues like social welfare, legal aid, education, adult literacy, property rights, economic empowerment, and marriage laws gained early momentum through women’s organizations. Photo by Jay Cross

Kathmandu | 1947 Photograph of the members of the pioneering Nepal Women’s Association formed to support the anti-Rana, pro-democracy movement. Shanta Shrestha Collection/Nepal Picture Library

Kathmandu | 1981 Image from the mass rally organized in Kathmandu protesting the rape and murder of Namita and Sunita Bhandari. Hisila Yami Collection

The history of Nepal’s struggle for democracy and progress over the last century is dominated by men and treats women as auxiliary. Women themselves, however, were guided by this new era’s promise of inclusion in a universal community. Looking into this history from women’s perspective brings attention to the ways women made new positions and new subjectivity possible through their entry into popular politics and public life—and also the ways these possibilities made the contours of male-dominated history susceptible to new meanings.

Social worker Punyaprabha Devi Dhungana founded All Nepal Women’s Association in 1951, through which she launched several campaigns to raise awareness about women’s oppression. Also seen is the facade of her organization’s office building in Thamel, donated by Kaiser Shumsher Jang Bahadur Rana. She used to walk to the office from her home in Chabahil and drop in door to door on the way canvassing support for the cause. Badri Binod Dhungana Collection/Nepal Picture Library

Starting with the movement against the Rana oligarchy, we move through the decades seeking to transmit the memory and amplify the visibility of women in Nepal’s political history. The images and the narratives of the past needed to be freed from the grips of economically and culturally dominant groups and presented to disclose—in the true spirit of inclusion and democracy—the diversities, differences, and dissensions of Nepali history.

Kathmandu | 1979 Workers of Nebico Biscuit Factory picket outside the gate in solidarity with eight women who were fired from their jobs. Led by Sulochana Manandhar, the sit-in lasted 45 days inside the Balaju Industrial Complex. Sulochana Manandhar Dhital Collection/Nepal Picture Library

Kathmandu | 1951 Women take out a rally to demand their right to vote during the pro-democracy revolution of 1951. Sahana Pradhan Collection/Nepal Picture Library

Kathmandu | 1981 Nani Maiya Dahal giving a speech at Khula Manch after she shockingly defeated Panchayat bigwig Jog Meher Shrestha at the National Panchayat election 1981, the first election through universal suffrage since King Mahendra’s coup in 1960. Also seen are images of her victory rally in New Road. Dahal was an outlier candidate and even her nomination was not backed by the confidence that she could win. At the time, she was better known as a maverick in Kathmandu circles. Nani Maiya Dahal Collection/Nepal Picture Library

Kathmandu | 2001 GEFONT Collection/Nepal Picture Library

These images are part of Feminist Memory Project, currently under exhibition as part of Photo Kathmandu, is curated by Diwas Raja Kc & NayanTara Gurung Kakshapati. For more information about the exhibition, and Photo Kathmandu 2018, please visit the festival website.

[Feature image: Kathmandu | 1981, Women from all walks of life gather for a mass meeting in Kathmandu to submit a letter of protest to the government following the rape and murder of sisters Namita and Sunita Bhandari in Pokhara that rocked the country. Hisila Yami Collection/ Nepal Picture Library]

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Women of the People

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