Introduction

Maiti Nepal is a non-governmental organisation working from a local community level to an international level. It has its rehabilitation programme in Kathmandu; prevention homes in the districts of Nuwakot, Makwanpur, and Nawalparasi; transit homes at Ilam, Jhapa, Morang, Janakpur, Parsa, Nawalparasi, Rupandehi, Banke, and Kailali and awareness and advocacy programmes in Chitwan, and Kailali.

Maiti Nepal has also been facilitating its rescue and repatriation programmes in Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, Siliguri, Kishangunj, and Pune in India.

In order to develop strong cross-border coordination and networking between Nepal, India and Bangladesh, Maiti Nepal initiated Cross Border Workshops and now it has become a regular feature of the organisation's programme.

Maiti Nepal aims to help girls and women who have nowhere else to turn: girl children from the streets, abandoned children, bonded labourers and destitute women. Started in 1993, Maiti Nepal runs a Child Protection and Rehabilitating Centre for girls and women.

Maiti Nepal also works in different targeted areas of Nepal where girl trafficking occurs.

Activities

1. Child Protection and Women Rehabilitation Centre in Kathmandu.

• Looks after children between the ages of three months to 19 months; others go to school for formal education.
• Teaches vocational training to the girls and women. They are taught to make hats out of natural plant fibre, strings and ropes, string beads, do fabric painting, sewing, stitching, weaving and knitting.
• Counselling services are provided to girls suffering from severe trauma. Physical check ups, hospitals visits, and treatments are other regular activities. Identifying criminals, filing cases against them, identifying and tracing parents, and providing counselling and psychotherapy sessions are ongoing activities.

2. Prevention homes:

At present Maiti Nepal has three prevention homes, one is at Chisapani, which lies on the border of Nuwakot and Sindhupalchowk district. The second one is in Hetauda-Makwanpur district and the third one is in Bardaghat-Nawalparasi district.

• Conduct skill and income generating training to high-risk girls who are in danger of being sold into prostitution.
• Provide non-formal education.
• Train the girls to become activists.
• Encourage formation of groups.
• Provide micro-credit for self-employment, or to establish small cottage industries.

3. Transit homes

Presently, Maiti Nepal has nine Transit Homes in Jhapa, Rupandehi, Parsa, Morang, Janakpur, Kailali, Ilam, Banke and Nawalparasi.

• Provide a safe crisis shelter for a short period for rescued children, girls and women.
• Ensure a safe passage to their respective villages.
• Form surveillance teams and supports them at the border points. Surveillance teams, in coordination with government authorities, intercept girls and women who are in the process of being trafficked, but without violating the rights of freedom of migration of the girls and women.

4. Hospice at Jhapa

• Provide care, affection, and a homely environment for terminally ill survivors of trafficking.
• Provides -24-hour medical care.
• Is a self-sustaining centre with vegetable gardens and fishery looked after by the Hospice resident.

Other Programmes

• As education is the best way to sustain people and raise awareness, Maiti Nepal has established a pre-primary school named Teresa Academy for children up to class 6, residing at its Kathmandu Centre and for children of carpet workers, abandoned children, orphans, lost and found children and so on.
• Identifying criminals and filing charges against them.
• Building networks and self-help groups.
• Public-awareness campaigns.
• Encouraging and mobilising students' involvement in Fighting Against Girl Trafficking.
• Applying pressure on the government and law-enforcing agencies

Details of the Proposed Project

Maiti Nepal has been working against trafficking with the help of the above mentioned programmes for the past 10 years. Since its inception, Maiti Nepal has been focussing on activism. But with the gradual growth of the institution Maiti Nepal seeks to develop the institution with technical aspects e.g. human resource development, office management set up etc. The need for this has been realised to further enhance the work more efficiently and effectively.

In view of the development of human resource we would like to propose a crash course on the basics of computer including Windows, MSWord, MsExcel and MsPowerpoint. A similar kind which was set up for the girls at Maiti Nepal last year. As the girls of Maiti Nepal had a very difficult background, the time taken to complete the course was 9 months. However, since these people whom we propose the crash course for have a stronger background, the time frame would be much less (around 2 months). Additionally, they should also be trained for the multimedia system including, creation and maintenance of database and the use of scanner and printer and email/internet.

These focal points will be accompanied by the girls previously trained, and will hold their own computer classes for students capable of learning the new technology in the respective branches.

Maiti Nepal proposes to South Asia Foundation to provide equal funding for training of its field staff and for the provision of computers to be installed in 15 of its branch offices as listed below:

Transit Office -
1. Pashupatinagar - Ilam
2. Kakarbhitta - Jhapa
3. Biratnagar - Morang
4. Janakpur - Dhanusa
5. Birgunj - Parsa
6. Bhairawa - Rupendehi
7. Nepalgunj - Banke
8. Dhangadi - Kailali
9. Mahendranagar - Kanchanpur
10. Maheshpur - Nawalparasi

Prevention Home -
1. Chisapaani - Nuwakot
2. Bardaghat - Nawalparasi
3. Hetauda - Makwanpur
Hospice -
Satighatta - Jhap
Rehabilitation Centre -
Itahari - Sunsari

The reason for proposing to train the field staff on database and multimedia is:

• The important documents of children, women, patients are manually kept in paper files. This means that the photographs of the girls who are trafficked are also usually lost in the stack of files that are increasing and becoming overwhelmingly difficult to manage.
• By teaching them the use of scanner/database/e-mail/internet, they can keep easily retrievable files of pictures and data which can be transmitted as and when required.
• Further, by keeping an electronic database, information about everyone can be stored, and used extensively over time, when there is a need to track information about a particular person.

As mentioned above, a two months' crash course can be conducted for the field staff on multimedia and on using computers and other accessories. The training would be provided by SAF Nepal IT coordinator Mr. Rajesh Lamichhane and his colleague in Kathmandu for two months.