Dalit Gyan Utsav: Emphasis on prioritizing community issues

Speakers and participants of the debate titled 'Dalit in Nepali Media' under the 'Dalit Knowledge Festival' held at Tilottama in Rupandehi on Wednesday said that news related to the Dalit community is still dominant. The speaker said that the problems faced by the Dalit community are concentrated and the media is not able to raise the issue. "The Dalit community is facing discrimination and injustice in every sector of the society," said journalist Janakraj Sapkota, "We are still only writing incident-oriented news, we are not following up on the incident." He said that he misses writing. "Why is it that only people from the Dalit community have to face discrimination in every sector of society," he said, "We should do journalism to find the cause of discrimination, which we have not yet entered into." did Sapkota mentioned that media workers of that community can feel and write about the pain of Dalits. "Financial security is also one of the reasons why the number of journalists from the Dalit community in the mainstream media is decreasing," he said. Rupa Gahatraj said that the problems, sufferings and success stories of the Dalit community are being published in the media compared to earlier. She said that when there are not many journalists representing the Dalit community, journalists from other communities should also be sensitized to their issues and encouraged to write. "Dalit issues should not be written only by Dalits," she said. She stressed on the need to play a role in increasing the number of media persons of Dalit community. Journalist Madhav Nepal, another speaker of the

debate, said that he was able to understand the issues of the Dalit community only late because he grew up in a different environment. "In the beginning, she was not even going to use some words related to the Dalit community," he said, "I learned about the impact of using such words on the community from Dalit leaders."

Mentioning that the condition of the media is deteriorating now, he emphasized that in the future, people representing the Dalit community in the media should make social networks and the internet a means of empowerment along with the mainstream. Journalist Binod Pariyar facilitated the session.

Dalit Readers and Tilottama Municipality jointly organized the festival which started on Wednesday and will be held for three days. On the first day, discussions were held on Dalit knowledge, skills and labor and on various topics of caste discrimination. On the first day, there were debates on Dalit enterprises, caste science of knowledge, Dalits in Nepali media, people who decorate the society, caste consciousness in art literature, Nepalese education and Dalits, dreams of Dalit people's representatives and so on. Anthropologist Suresh Dhakal said that the contribution of the Dalit community to the development of mankind is historic. He expressed that the development achieved through the skills of Dalits should not be forgotten by the non-castes of Nepal. Similarly, writer Sanjay Kumar Pasi pointed out that there is a need to eradicate the ignorance about Dalit education in the society where the status of Madhesi Dalits is in the third rank. He said that it is worth remembering the history that Dalit education has made the society run. Scholar JB Vishwakarma said that knowledge should be equal for every community.

Earlier speaking at the opening of the festival, Mayor Ramakrishna Khan said that Tilottma municipality is moving towards ending caste discrimination. He said that the municipality is trying to maintain community tolerance within the municipality by building a Dalit strategy. Jageshwar Devi Chowdhury, Deputy Mayor of Tilottama, said that by continuing such programs that contribute significantly to social transformation, the municipality will play its role by giving priority to the Dalit community and cooperating in social inclusion. In the

program, President of Dalit Readers, Rukmani Nepali, said that the program was organized to end the social discrimination created by the caste system by drawing a new history of the Dalit movement. She said that Dalits also have knowledge and as a revenge to the society, the festival will also help to spread the example of Dalit labor, skill and enterprise in the society. She said that since such a festival is going to be held for the first time in the country, speakers and participants from every state are expected to help eliminate the unequal treatment between Dalits and non-Dalits. More than 400 people including Dalit rights activists, human rights activists, journalists and public representatives from different parts of the country are participating in the program.