KATHMANDU - A Nepali
village will give cash rewards to women who refuse to be
isolated in illegal 'menstrual huts' during their periods, an
official said on Tuesday after the custom led to another death.
Parbati Buda Rawat, 21, was on the third day of her period
on Sunday when she lit a fire to keep warm in the freezing mud
and stone hut, but was discovered dead the next morning in
western Nepal's Achham district, police said.
"It appears she died after suffocating," Narapati Bhatta, a
police inspector, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
Outrage led to a parliamentary investigation into the
centuries-old Hindu practice of "chhaupadi", outlawed in 2005,
after a teenage girl and a mother and her young sons died in two
similar incidents earlier this year.
The custom remains prevalent in Nepal's remote west where
some communities fear misfortune, such as a natural disaster,
unless menstruating women and girls - seen as impure - are sent
away to animal sheds or huts.
They are also not allowed to meet other family members or
venture out, must eat frugally, and are barred from touching a
range of items - including milk, religious idols and cattle.
The chairman of Purbichowki village municipality in Doti
district - on the western border of Achham district where the
latest victim died - said he will reward women who reject
chhaupadi with 5,000 Nepali rupees ($44).
"We need to tear down the huts in our minds, change
attitudes and accept menstruation as a natural process in the
life of a woman," said Dirgha Raj Bogati, adding that
demolishing the huts had proven ineffective.
"If we dismantle one hut, they move away and build another
one," he said.
The new reward - a one-off payment to deter families from
using the huts - will benefit 100 women this year, he said, in
one of the world's poorest nations, where World Bank data shows
41% of a 28 million population live on less than $3.20 a day.
Bogati repeated warnings by local officials that families
would be denied state benefits if found practising chhaupadi.
The government introduced three-month jail terms and fines
of 3,000 rupees for those who exclude menstruating women and
girls, which puts them at risk of snake bites, attacks by wild
animals and rape, as well as carbon dioxide poisoning.
Campaigners say few are punished as victims rarely file
complaints against their own family members.
Om Prakash Aryal, a human rights lawyer, urged police to
prepare their own reports and file cases in courts if victims
feared coming forward.
"It is shame that such an inhuman practice still prevails in
Nepal. It is a blot on our civilisation," he said.