Village Level Consultative Meeting for Policy Brief

Participants busy filling Community Score Card

Development Exchange Center organized a consultative interaction event to finalize the policy brief on local governance promotion from Chepang women’s perspective in joint partnership with Nepal Chepang Association from 7 to 12 October, 2015 in six VDCs of project sites (Chandibhanjyang, Kaule, Shaktikhor, Siddhi, Korak and Lothar).
The objectives of the program were:
1. To develop a consolidated and commonly agreed upon policy recommendation to increase participation of marginalized communities in local planning and budgeting process.
2. To share draft of policy brief report prepared by task force to local stakeholders to increase participation of Chepang women in local governance.
3. To identify the current situation of Chepang Women from local stakeholders perspective through Community Score card
4. To prepare Action Plan for Stakeholder to empower Chepang Women

Altogether 251 participants attended the program. The participants included 19 local political leaders, 24 government stakeholders, 152 Chepang Women, 4 media personnel, 36 influential male leaders and 17 local NGOs working in the project site for Chepang Women. This event was facilitated by project coordinator with support of president of Nepal Chepang Association and representative from District Development Committee, Bharatpur.
The facilitator presented the contents of policy brief report using powerpoint and flex. Hard copies of policy brief draft were distributed to all the participants before the event. Group work and interaction were the major tools used in the event.

The six-hour event that ran from 10 am to 4 pm was participatory. Time management was a good aspect of the event. During the closing session, attendees’views about the event were collected.About 98 percent of the attendees found the event very relevant and necessary to empower Chepang women. They also showed their commitment to cooperate and support the empowerment of Chepang women. Damodar Bhattarai, VDC secretary from Kaule remarked,
“I found this event very relevant to empower marginalized Chepang Women. I thank DEC Nepal for organizing such interactive event, I am sure the intervention made by this organization will help to uplift this marginalized community but if this empowerment program could be linked with income generating activities the program could be more sustainable.”
Another Chepang participant from Shaktikhor VDC remarked,
“we are glad to participate in this program, thanks to the organizer DEC Nepal who is organizing various programs to uplift our community, we are committed to work on their guidance but we expect government line agencies to be more accountable with Chepang communities.”