Saudi Arabia: The Only Country In The World Where Women Are Not Allowed to Drive

by Aryn Baker

Maha al Qatani settles herself in the driver’s seat, adjusts her headscarf, and with a quick prayer turns the key in the ignition. “I’m not nervous,” she says, even if the uneven tenor of her voice betrays tension. “When we lived in the US I always drove my kids to school.” But this is Saudi Arabia, the only country in the world where women are not allowed to drive.

In taking to the traffic roiling along one ofRiyadh’s main thoroughfares, al Qatani is defying a longstanding prohibition against women drivers, one that just recently landed another woman driver, Manal al Sharif, in detention for nine days. The issue of women driving occupies a gray area inSaudi Arabia.

It’s not banned by any formal law, and in some desert communities women do drive unmolested. But in the major cities it has been long prohibited by religious rulings backed by an official order from the Interior Ministry.

In May 2011, Sharif took that ruling head on by posting a video of herself driving on YouTube, and calling for a nationwide protest drive on the 17th of June. It was a bold move that earned the ire of the authorities. She was charged with disturbing the peace and inciting protests. Since then several other women have posted videos and photos of themselves driving online, and spread the message via Twitter.

In one of the most peculiar revolts to have been inspired by the Arab uprisings, al Qatani and dozens of women like her have taken to the streets. They are leaving their drivers at home, and taking their positions behind the wheel. They are driving to the grocery store, to the doctor, or to pick their kids up from school. Those thankless errands may plague women round the world, but for some women inSaudi Arabiathey are a long dreamed of privilege. One by one, with no fanfare and no banners, they are claiming their rights with a simple spin of the steering wheel.

Al Qatani signals right and turns into a narrow alley in front of several men who stare into the window of the SUV, mouths agape. She is faced head on by a car coming in the opposite direction. “Yallah,” she exclaims. “Doesn’t he have any sense? I am a woman!” Her husband, Mohammad al Qatani, chuckles from the passenger seat, delighting in the shocked expression of the facing driver.

When al Sharif first went on YouTube with her campaign, it ignited a nationwide debate over whether driving for women was a privilege, or a necessity. Several women declared their intention to make their opinions known on the 17th, but al Sharif’s detention and subsequent public shaming deterred many would-be drivers, who feared that the cost of taking a stand would be too high. Not al Qatani. “If no one sacrifices, no one will get their rights,” she says.

And al Qatani is prepared to face the worst. Next to her is a coach bag stuffed with the essentials for a potential prison stay – deodorant, comfortable clothes, a hairbrush and a prayer mat. Earlier, I had asked her if she was afraid of getting picked up. “I really don’t care,” she said. “It’s my right. I didn’t do any crime, I didn’t kill anyone, I didn’t sell drugs. Those people need to be in jail. Not me for doing my rights. If they do this, it’s a big mistake.”

We pull onto the highway crammed with traffic. Few drivers notice the woman in the black veil driving alongside them. A few children point and smile, but al Qatani is more concerned about the gridlock than potential witnesses. “I hate traffic,” she groans. “Even if I had permission to drive, I will still make Mohammad drive.” Mohammad al Qatani, a seasoned activist and passionate supporter of women’s rights, chuckles. “This is about having a choice,” he says.

The levity is interrupted by the bark of a police horn. We pull over. The cop walks up to the drivers side, and, flummoxed by the sight of a woman in a full-face veil at the wheel, scurries over to the passenger side to confer with Mohammad al Qatani. Mohammad steps out of the car with the cop, and is escorted to the waiting cruiser. Maha al Qatani films the scene with her iPhone, fearful that he will be taken away. Then she calls a friend to check in on her three kids, waiting at home. By this time we are surrounded by six police cruisers. Another cop leans into the passenger side window to bark at Maha al Qatani. “Does your husband know how to drive?” he asks. Al Qatani replies yes. “Then why was he in the passenger seat?”

Maha raises her normally quiet voice in defiance. “I am taking my rights. I am driving. Why do I have to rely on Indians and Pakistanis to drive me around?” she shoots back, referring to the common Saudi practice of hiring immigrant drivers.

The officer looks stricken. “I don’t know what to do,” he says plaintively. He has never been faced with a female driver before. “If I raise it up the issue of her driving it is wrong. If I let you go it is wrong.” Maha al Qatani just stares him down.

Driving, says al Qatani, is not a woman’s right but a human right. Driving, she says, “is just the first step.” One she hopes will bring more rights not just to women, but to men too. After a tense half hour, Mohammad al Qatani returns with the cop at his side. Maha shifts to the passenger seat, and Mohammad takes the wheel. He silently hands her a yellow sheet of paper. Maha al Qatani stares at it for a moment, her brow furrowed in confusion. Then she breaks into peals of laughter. Raising her fists in a victory salute, she shouts, “It’s a ticket. Write this down. I am the first Saudi woman to get a traffic ticket.”

For anyone else a traffic violation would be a headache. For Maha al Qatani, and Saudi Arabia’s women, it is making history.

Why is the World Running Out of Water When 71% of Earth is Covered with Water?

By Dr Habib Siddiqui 

Nearly 71% of our earth is covered with water of which only 2.5% is fresh water, and the remainder 97.5% is salt water. Of this fresh water nearly 70% (or 1.75% of total water) is frozen in the icecaps of Antarctica and Greenland. The remainder 0.75% of the total water is perhaps the world’s most important resource that is found in lakes, rivers, reservoirs, underground aquifers and other sources.

Water demand is increasing rapidly worldwide. Of the fresh water consumed by humans, nearly 70%is used to produce food. In Asia, e.g., 86% total water withdrawal is in the agriculture sector. Fresh water is also consumed for household, municipal and industrial uses. As the world population rises, while water consumption per capita increases with urbanization and the rapid development of manufacturing industries, the fresh water supplies are increasingly becoming smaller with contaminated lakes, rivers, groundwater aquifers and reservoirs.

Large parts of the world are running out of water.

A paper presented by the World Bank entitled “The Aftermath of Current Situation in the Absence of Work” concluded that Yemen will run out of water in the period between 2020 and 2050. Sana – the capital of Yemen – is likely to be the first capital city to completely run dry in a few years. In parts of Pakistan and India, groundwater levels are falling so rapidly that from 10% to 20% of agricultural production is under threat. Some 60% of China’s 669 cities are already short of water and the current record drought in several of China’s region is directly linked to their problems with water scarcity. In northern China, rivers now run dry in their lower reaches for much of the year. The Yellow River, the so-called birthplace of Chinese civilization, is so polluted it can no longer supply drinking water.

The division of the river basin water has created friction among the countries of South Asia, and among their states and provinces. The Indus River Basin has been an area of conflict between India and Pakistan for about four decades. Spanning 1,800 miles, the river and its tributaries together make up one of the largest irrigation canals in the world. Dams and canals built in order to provide hydropower and irrigation have dried up stretches of the Indus River. India and Bangladesh have also dispute over the Ganges/Padma and Teesta Rivers water and India is resorting to water theft there as well. Nepal and Bangladesh are also victims of India’s water thievery. India had dispute with Bangladesh over Farakka Barrage, with Nepal over Mahakali River and with Pakistan over 1960 Indus Water Treaty. As I have noted elsewhere, the damns and barrages built inside India on many of the common rivers have made navigation inside Bangladesh during the dry seasons almost impossible.

India is busy building dams on all rivers flowing into Pakistan from occupied Kashmir to regain control of water of western rivers in violation of Indus Water Treaty. This is being done to render Pakistan’s link-canal system redundant, destroy agriculture of Pakistan which is its mainstay, and turn Pakistan into a desert. India has plans to construct 62 dams/hydro-electric units on the Chenab and Jhelum Rivers, which would render these rivers dry by 2014. Using its clout in Afghanistan, India has succeeded in convincing Karzai regime to build a dam on River Kabul and set up Kama Hydroelectric Project She has offered technical assistance for the proposed project, which will have serious repercussions on the water flow in the Indus River.

China has built some 20 dams on the eight great Tibetan rivers while some 40 more are planned or proposed for construction in coming years.China also admitted that she is building a dam on the Yarlung Zangbo River, which will rise to 3,260 meters, thus making it the highest dam in the world. The river originates inTibet, but then flows intoIndia and Bangladesh where it is calledBrahmaputra and Jamuna, respectively, and is a major water source for millions of people. Recently, the Chinese government has taken on a grand, ambitious and $62 billion expensive project called the South-North Water Diversion Project to divert at least six trillion gallons of water each year hundreds of miles from the other great Chinese river, the Yangtze, to slake the thirst of the north China plain and its 440 million people.

Ethiopiais building three dams, two of them large and one controversial, for environmental reasons. Of these, the Great Millennium Dam, along the NileRiverabout 25 miles from the Sudanborder, will cost nearly $5 billion. The dam will section off a larger portion of the Nile than is used now by Ethiopia, and will have a devastating effect on Egypt. The new Egyptian government has instructed its military to prepare for any eventuality regarding a crucial water dispute with neighboring Ethiopia.

Violent incidents over wells and springs take place periodically in Yemen, and the long-running civil war in Darfur owes partly to the chronic scarcity of water in western Sudan. The Six-day War in the Middle East in 1967 similarly was partly prompted by Jordan’s proposal to divert the Jordan River in response to Israel’s siphoning off of water from the Sea of Galilee all the way to the Negev Desert. And water remains a divisive issue between Israel and its neighbors to this day. Israel extracts about 65% of the upper Jordan, leaving the occupied West Bank dependent on a brackish trickle and a mountain aquifer, access to which Israel also controls. In 2004 the average Israeli had a daily allowance of 290 liters of domestic water, while the average Palestinian less than 70.

International river basins extend across the borders of 145 countries, and some rivers flow through several countries. The Congo, Niger, Nile, Rhine and Zambezi are each shared among 9 to 11 countries, and 19 countries share the Danube basin. The 1569 mile long Ganges/Padma River is shared by both India and Bangladesh. The longer Brahmaputra River is shared between China, India and Bangladesh. Adding to the complications is the fact that some countries, especially in Africa and south Asia, rely on several rivers, e.g., 22 rise in Guinea. Some 280 aquifers also cross borders. Consider also the fact that many of Bangladesh’s 250 rivers originate from the Himalayas and run through India before flushing out to the Bay of Bengal in the Indian Ocean. Bangladeshi scientists estimated that even a 10 to 20% reduction in the water flow to the country could dry out great areas for much of the year.

As global food prices rise and exporters reduce shipments of commodities, countries that rely on imported grain are panicking. Countries likeSouth Korea, China andIndia have descended on fertile plains across the African continent, acquiring huge tracts of land to produce wheat, rice and corn for consumption back home. These land grabs shrink the food supply in famine-prone African nations and anger local farmers, who see their governments selling their ancestral lands to foreigners. The land grabs to the south also pose a grave threat to Africa’s newest democracy, Egypt, in her ability to put bread on the table because all of her grain is either imported or produced with water from the Nile River, which flows north throughEthiopia andSudan before reaching Egypt.

The Nile Waters Agreement, which Egyptand Sudansigned in 1959, gave Egypt75% of the river’s flow, 25% to Sudanand none to Ethiopia. This situation is changing abruptly as wealthy foreign governments and international agri-businesses snatch up large swaths of arable land along the Upper Nile. While these deals are typically described as land acquisitions, they are also, in effect, water acquisitions.
Just as wars over oil played a major role in 20th-century history, there is growing evidence that many 21st century conflicts will be fought over water. In “Water: The Epic Struggle for Wealth, Power and Civilization,” journalist Steven Solomon argues that water is surpassing oil as the world’s scarcest critical resource.

From Turkey, the southern bastion of NATO, down to South Africa, and from China and Indonesia in the east to Mauritania in the west, most of the countries of Asia and Africa are worrying today about how they will satisfy the needs of their burgeoning industries, or find drinking water for the extra millions born each year, not to mention agriculture, the main cause of depleting water resources in the region. According to Solomon our world is divided into water haves and have-nots. China, Egypt and Pakistan are just a few countries facing critical water issues in the 21st century.

Water is irreplaceable and its use in the past century grew twice as fast as world population. Solomon writes, “We’re going to have to find a way to use the existing water resources in a far, far more productive manner than we ever did before, because there’s simply not enough.” That control and manipulation of water resources should be a pivotal axis of power and human achievement throughout history is hardly surprising. Water has always been man’s most indispensable natural resource, and one endowed with special, seemingly magical powers of physical transformation derived from its unique thermodynamic properties and extraordinary roles in earth’s geological and biological processes.

Through the centuries, societies have struggled politically, militarily, and economically to control the world’s water wealth: to erect cities around it, to transport goods upon it, to harness its latent energy in various forms, to utilize it as a vital input of agriculture and industry, and to extract political advantage from it. Solomon says: “Every era has been shaped by its response to the great water challenge of its time. And so it is unfolding-on an epic scale-today. An impending global crisis of freshwater scarcity is fast emerging as a defining fulcrum of world politics and human civilization. For the first time in history, modern society’s unquenchable thirst, industrial technological capabilities, and sheer population growth from 6 to 9 billion is significantly outstripping the sustainable supply of fresh, clean water available from nature using current practices and technologies.”

Freshwater is an Achilles’ heel of fast-growing giants China and India, which both face imminent tipping points from unsustainable water practices that will determine whether they lose their ability to feed themselves and cause their industrial expansions to prematurely sputter. “The lesson of history is that in the tumultuous adjustment that surely lies ahead, those societies that find the most innovative responses to the crisis are most likely to come out as winners, while the others will fall behind. Civilization will be shaped as well by water’s inextricable, deep interdependencies with energy, food, and climate change… By grasping the lessons of water’s pivotal role on our destiny, we will be better prepared to cope with the crisis about to engulf us all,” writes Solomon.

But has our generation grasped those lessons that are so critical for our survival? Basic human needs for water should be fully acknowledged as a top international priority. Basic ecosystem water needs should be identified and met. Our irrigation systems remain very inefficient, wasting as much as 60% of the total water pumped before it reaches the intended crop. If need be, we also have to alter our food habits into growing crops that require less water. Water conservation through better planning, management, and technologies offers great promise to minimizing water usage in household, agricultural and industrial sectors.

As noted by Lester R. Brown, president of the Earth Policy Institute and the author of “World on the Edge: How to Prevent Environmental and Economic Collapse,” for the sake of peace and future development cooperation, the nations of the Nile River Basin should come together to ban land grabs by foreign governments and agri-business firms. Since there is no precedent for this, international help in negotiating such a ban would likely be necessary to make it a reality. Finally, serious water-related conflicts should be resolved through formal negotiations.

Sadly, few agreements have been reached about how the water should be shared; most of those agreements are seen as unjust: upstream countries believe that they should control the flow of the rivers, taking what they like, if they can get away with it. Thus, it is not too surprising to hear India’s whining about Chinese thievery of Brahmaputra water, while she herself is stealing water from Bangladesh on some other rivers that originate from India.

In his lecture at the Geneva conference on Environment and Quality of Life in June 1994, Adel Darwish said, “International law is not clear on the right of upstream countries to control either surface or ground water.” It is also not clear on the shared water courses, rivers or cross border aquifers. That situation, regrettably, has not improved an iota.

The non-clarity of international law remains a matter of grave concern. There are few, if any, precedents that the UN international law commission or the International court of justice could be cited to establish some rules to arbitrate on water sharing; but so far no country has volunteered to do so.

If we want to avoid wars of the future, culminating from water, international laws must be formulated that pledge survival of the lower riparian, downstream countries through equitable share of the common water. Dams and barrages that can alter the vital ecosystem and take away the means of livelihood of the affected people should also be banned on common international rivers. No people should ever have to live with the curse of the dams and barrages like the Farakka (and the proposed Tipaimukh Dam) that kills people!

US Guantanamo Guard Converts to Islam after Chat with Moroccan Prisoner

When US soldier Terry Brooks was sent to join military guards at Guantanamo prison that houses Moslem militants from Taliban and Al-Qaeda, he had not thought he would embrace the religion of those prisoners. After a few chats with a Moroccan inmate, he converted to Islam in 2003.

Brooks was caught by local reporters this week praying in the western Saudi town ofMadinabefore heading for nearby Makkah to perform his first pilgrimage (Umra), which he said had been his dream over the past years.

The Saudi Arabic language daily Okaz said it waited for Brooks to finish his prayers and talked to him about his conversion to Islam. He credited “prisoner number 590” named Ahmed Al Rashdi ofMoroccofor his “landmark” decision. After converting, he was expelled from the army.

Brooks told the paper he was sent toGuantanamolong before 2003 and later started to mingle with some prisoners there.

“I still remember that great moment….the time was around 12:49 am in December 2003 when I embraced Islam…at that night, I took this landmark decision after numerous chat sessions with Al Rashdi,” he said.

“It was a memorable moment in my life…….many prisoners sat around me when I converted and decided to call me Mustafa as their new friend…later I added the name Abdullah so I am now called Mustafa Abdullah.”

Brooks said he had been delighted when theUSarmy decided to send him to Guantanamo as it was an adventure for him since had not seen a prison before.

“When I arrived there, it was a big shock for me… even before I entered the prison buildings, I could see that it was horrible and could suit only cactus and poisonous reptiles….I then asked myself ‘are those people behind the bars really so dangerous that they are worth these costly security measures.”

Brooks said he started to be interested in Islam after his talks to Al Rashdi and other prisoners about Islam,Palestine,Afghanistanand theMiddle East.

“I used to sit just outside their cells at night listening to them…by time, a sort of mutual respect developed between us …I had never believed in God before I went to Guantanamo.…now that I embraced Islam, I can feel the sweetness of religion…Islam is a pure religion and the ultimate right.”

Brooks said he had first concealed his decision to convert to Islam from otherUSguards at Guantanamo, adding that when the officer learned about it, he and the other soldiers began to treat him cruelly and accused him of betraying America. Around two years before the end of his contract, he was fired from the army.

“I am now working on a book about my experience to embrace Islam.…I have just quit my job in the US to devote my time to helping the prisoners inGuantanamo..…what is happening in that prison is really inhuman and violates the minimum principles of human rights,” he said.

Pakistani Christians Talk About Coercion to Convert

Catholic woman kidnapped, drugged, and forced to convert to Islam and marry a Muslim may now be sold abroad.

There are fears for the life of Farah Hatim, the Catholic girl kidnapped and forced into marriage and conversion to Islam in the city ofRahim YarKhan in southernPunjab. As the girl`s family refer to Fides, Farah is constantly drugged and her life is in danger.

Meanwhile, attempts to discourage the family to carry on with the request to free Farah are still in progress. Recently, Qasim and Huma Hatim, the victim`s brother and sister, were summoned by the local police who showed them the marriage certificate, a declaration of conversion to Islam and a picture of Farah, in traditional Muslim clothes. The police concluded that “everything is in order”, stressing the request to abandon all claims on behalf of the family. According to Huma and Qasim, the documents are obviously artifacts. The supposed signatures of Farah are in Urdu – they observe- while the girl used to sign in English. In the photo, moreover, the girl is totally veiled, “to hide the beatings”, they said. “The police wants to convince us to forget Farah, but we will carry on” say the family members.

“It will be difficult to win this battle and get the girl back”, said Lawrence Saldanha to Fides, Archbishop Emeritus of Lahore , and for several years President of the Episcopal Conference. “The law is not in our favor, and then there is a lot of pressure on Christians and public officials’ he remarks.”It must be said that our Justice and Peace Commission document numerous cases like this. And many cases remain unsolved, because Christians are threatened and are afraid to expose themselves. These are blatant violations of human rights, freedom of conscience and religion”.

As already reported in recent months to Fides from local sources, forced conversions to Islam, rapes and forced marriages are increasing in Pakistan. The victims are mostly Hindu and Christian girls, the most vulnerable because they come from poor, defenseless, marginalized communities, therefore easily exposed to harassment, threats and violence. They often do not have the courage to denounce the assaults.
We who are still free must speak out for them. There should be no foreign aid toPakistan until Farah Hatim is released. AndSaba and Anila Masih. And Asia Bibi, Hector Aleem, all non-Muslim captives, and all Pakistani prisoners of conscience, especially those held for “blasphemy.”

In Pakistan, at least 700 Christian girls are kidnapped and forced to convert to Islam every year, according to Fides’ estimate. And sold abroad or not, any fate for Farah Hatim short of her being reunited with her family and legally recognized again as a Christian, and not a Muslim, is intolerable.

There is “no compulsion in religion” (Qur’an 2:256). And so Farah was made to sign a document saying she married and converted freely. Is there “no compulsion” in kidnapping victims’ signing documents, too?
The claim of “no compulsion” is used as a shell game by many. Some quote other verses from the Holy Quran like 9:29 which talks of alternatives to conversion as subjugation or war.

The Christians are saying that the goal is to make life so difficult, so terrifying, and so intolerable as to make the targeted non-Muslims convert under duress… at which point their overlords will crow about their supposedly “free” choice.

And most crucially, after a certain point, the lines between persuasion and compulsion become blurred, and those doing the compelling could care less, because it is difficult, if not dangerous, to challenge those wielding power under Islamic law on where the distinction lies.

An update on this story. “Kidnapped Pakistani Christian may be sold abroad,” from Catholic Culture, June 13 (thanks to Twostellas).
Pakistani Catholic sources have told the Fides news agency that a 24-year-old Christian woman who was kidnapped, forced to convert to Islam, and forced to marry a Muslim may soon be sold abroad.
Farah Hatim, 24, “was forced to sign a declaration stating that she had converted and married to her will,” said a Pakistani nun. “The text was brought to the police and in court, so legally the case is considered closed. It will be possible to reopen it only with a written statement, in which Farah testifies that these communications were drawn out by threats and torture.”

The nun called for prayer and international pressure to help secure Hatim’s releases.

Iranian Men Banned From Wearing Necklaces

Iranian men have been banned from wearing necklaces in the latest crackdown by the Islamic regime on “un-Islamic” clothing and haircuts.

Thousands of special forces have been deployed in Tehran’s streets, participating in the regime’s “moral security plan” in which loose-fitting headscarves, tight overcoats and shortened trousers that expose skin will not be tolerated for women, while men are warned against glamorous hairstyles and wearing a necklace.

The new plan comes shortly after the Iranian parliament proposed a bill to criminalise dog ownership, on the grounds that it “poses a cultural problem, a blind imitation of the vulgar culture of the west”.

The Irna state news agency said the trend was aimed at combating “the western cultural invasion” with help from more than 70,000 trained forces, known as “moral police”, who are sent out to the streets in the capital and other cities.

With the summer heat sweeping across the country, many people, especially the young, push the boundaries and run the risk of being fined, or even arrested, for wearing “bad hijab” clothing.

Women in particular are under more pressure because of the restriction on them to cover themselves from head to toe. Men are allowed to wear short-sleeved shirts, but not shorts.

“The enforcement of the moral security plan was requested by the nation and it will be continued until people’s concerns are properly addressed,” said the deputy commander of the Iranian police.

Iran‘s moral police usually function under a body whose head is appointed directly by the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. In a live television programme in 2010, president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said that he did not approve of the crackdown.

Speaking by phone, a Tehran resident, who asked to remain anonymous, said: “It’s not only about clamping down on clothing, but they are spreading panic and fear by sending out this much of police into the streets under the name of this plan, to control the society. It’s unbelievable to see a regime that is not only concerned about its own survival but it goes into your personal life and interferes in that.”

Under Islamic customs, dogs are deemed to be “unclean”. Iranians, in general, avoid keeping them at home, but still a minority, especially in north Tehran’s upper-class districts, enjoy keeping pets. Last year Ayatollah Makarem Shirazi, a prominent hardline cleric, issued a fatwa against keeping dogs and said the trend must stop.

Last summer authorities in Tehran also released a list of approved hairstyles in an attempt to offer Islamic substitutes to “decadent” western cuts, such as the ponytail and the mullet.

$150,000 Spent out of a Budget of $1.6m to Help the Bonded Nepali Girls

 Since the year 2000, more than 11,000 Kamlaris, [ http://ww.irinnews.org/PrintReport.aspx?ReportID=76543 ] girls committed to indentured servitude by their parents, have been rescued. But without financial support, those freed remain impoverished and some say they are forced to consider returning to work as Kamlaris. Efforts to free thousands of enslaved girls in Nepal and get them into school need more funding and less government bureaucracy.

One such girl was barely six when her parents sold her to work in a rich household in Kathmandu. In 2007, after 12 years of servitude, she was rescued.

Though the government has a budget of nearly US$2.3 million for the education and vocational training of freed Kamlari girls in 2011, most of the funds remain unspent for reasons known only to the government and its bureaucrats. The poor continue to suffer while the bureaucrats keep shuffling files and delaying matters. The money is tied up in red tape, with officials often blaming each other for inaction.

In 2009, the government had a budget of nearly $1.6 million for 7,000 girls but not even $150,000 was spent. The rest of the money was frozen by the end of fiscal year 2010; the same will happen in 2011.

Government to blame?
It is a big failure of the system and the Nepali government remains irresponsible.

There is concern that many of the formerly indentured girls are already dropping out of school because they cannot afford the fees. In Dang District, western Nepal, about 400km south of Kathmandu, more than 200 former Kamlaris have already dropped out of school this year.

Of the 11,000 girls rescued, 6,500 are now aged 6-19 and were supposed to receive a monthly government grant of $20 for school fees. But the girls have never seen the funds. The cash is usually sent to the school administration which charges for school registration, monthly fees and other things.

All Kamlaris, and many activists, are from the Thauru ethnic group and have the same surname – Chaudhary.

The Ministry of Education, which is responsible for helping to fund the girls’ education, said financial assistance had already reached the Kamlari students.