Bhutanese refugees in Nepal are facing grave humanitarian issue: SAHR

South Asians for Human Rights (SAHR), a regional network of human rights defender, believed that the Bhutanese refugees in Nepal are facing a grave humanitarian issue which needs the immediate attention of the government as well as the neighboring countries and the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) before it reaches a critical point.

SAHR has been monitoring the state of the Bhutanese refugees of Nepali origin living in Nepal.

Issuing a statement, SAHR believes that it is critically important for the government of Nepal to positively address this issue as their own issue.

According to the SAHR, 6, 577 Bhutanese refugees of Nepali origin live in Beldangi of Jhapa and Pathari Sanischare, Morang district in eastern Nepal. About 1, 000 of these refugees are said to be disabled, infirm or elderly.

While talking to them, SAHR found that most of these refugees are living in these camps with the firm intention of returning to Bhutan.

SAHR urged the government of Nepal to allow these Bhutanese refugees of Nepali origin who are living in the country since 1990 on humanitarian grounds with the assistance of international organizations, according to the statement.

However, SAHR is concerned that these have not been entitled to any rights or benefits as refugees.

In addition, the UNHCR’s engagement with the Bhutanese refugees to provide healthcare and the World Food Program’s provision of food had halted in 2016.

Subsequently, these refugees have been deprived of basic entitlements such as education, healthcare and food and housing in order to achieve a dignified standard of living in Nepal.

SAHR is concerned that the dwellings living in the camps are the same temporary makeshift constructions that were provided to them in 1990.

At present, they are left to fend for themselves resorting to cautiously indulge in menial work with meagre insufficient earning risking government scrutiny leading to punitive actions, the statement further reads.

Currently, SAHR learns that the government of Nepal only provides Rs 15 per student at the Early Childhood Development Center and there are only 150 students in the camp who benefit from the program.