According to the new Nepalese law men and women have equal rights. But there are still problems, especially in the rural areas: Women very often don't get their rights in practice, because the laws are often not implemented and a lot of women are not aware about their rights. We can find still massive discrimination against women in the Nepalese society, for example because of traditional social setting based on hirarchy such as  the patriarchal system, religion, costoms, rituals and others. That is why women are still suffering from physical, mental, economic and sexual violence. With our activities we want to aware women and men of rural areas about women rights, Domestic Violence and the Domestic Violence Act, to promote gender equity and support women to claim their rights and to participate in the political process. As the government of Nepal has adopted the active participation of the gender and socially marginalized groups, HURF Nepal is raising its advocacy on the mainstreaming of the gender and social inclusion. GESI is measured with seperate indicators and HURF Nepal has been adopting GESI Sensitivity in its all aspects ( Organizational, Legal, and Outreach ). Furthermore, Intersectional Inclusion is focused with new strategic focus. HURF works as a resource organization on Gender mainstreaming and social inclusion issue in Koshi Province. HURF capacitates the elected representatives of local governments and different level stakeholders.

Thematice Objective
 Increased meaningful participation of excluded groups/communities and reduced all sort of discrimination and exclusion.

Program and Projects

•  Awareness, Empowerment, Campaign and Networking (gender based violence, domestic violence, caste based discrimination, gender equity, gender responsive budget/program and social inclusion)excluded groups LGBTI, person with disabilities)
• Support for the person in needs women and girls (legal & psycho-social support, shelter)
• Advocacy, lobby Technical support (policy, structure, development implementation)

HURF Nepal focuses on the following major programs: 

Awareness Campaign and Networking 

 - gender based violence,

- domestic violence,

- caste based discrimination,

- gender equity, 

- gender responsive budget/program and

- social inclusion

Support for  persons in need 

- legal & psycho-social support

- Shelter especially poor, women, girls and sexual minorities 

Experiences of HURF Nepal in this field : 

Awareness and campaigns:

 HURF is campaigning together with other NGOs of Ilam District and with local government agencies on the occasion of the International Women Rights Days in March and the international "16 days of activism against Gender Violence" in November on the issues of Domestic Violence, human and women's rights.

Networking:

HURF is a founder member and former Secretariat of the regional Eastern Network: "Campaign against Domestic Violence, Eastern Region Network - 2009",  which was founded in  2009 and which consits out of 9 organizations.One of the activities of this network is campaigning, for example the Six days campaign in the eastern region of Nepal. On the occasion of the 16 days of activism against violence against women, the eastern region network conducts campaigns with plenty of activities against domestic violence.

Social Inclusion and Caste Discrimination

Even though caste-based discrimination has been forbidden for the last 50 years in Nepalese laws, still the caste based discrimination and untouchablility exist. Dalit are still regarded as untouchable in Nepalese society. Similarly, the term of social inclusion has just been started (since 2063) in Nepal HURF Nepal has been leading this campaign since 2001. HURF Nepal is now working in the field of  Inclusive Mainstreaming, Gender Mainstreaming and social inclusion. The activities are focused on awareness and empowerment of marginalized groups to eliminate discrimination on the basis of cast gender religion and ethnicity. 

Awareness about caste based discrimination, untouchabilty, positive discrimination and social inclusion 

HURF organizes regularly awareness and interaction programs related to social inclusion and caste based discrimination and has given leadership trainings to empower Dalit communities. In cooperation with NHRC HURF organized  programs to discuss on  the effective implementation of the new Act Against Caste based Discrimination and Untouchability  with different level stakeholders in Easter. HURF also provides legal support in cases related to untouchability in Eastern Nepal.

Community Awareness on the concept of positive discrimination, has been conducted very first in Nepal, since 2012 with support of Umverteilen Stiftung, Germany. The project has been conducted in Ilam and Panchthar District.  

Social inclusion - an important cross-cutting issue for HURF

Social inclusionIn all programs of HURF, its committees and policies inclusiveness is considered as a main issue. HURF founded several inclusive committees like the Human Rights Education Committee, the Community Mediation Committee, Women Rights Groups and Child Rights Awareness Groups, which serve as resources and supporting groups on the local level.