Media Foundation

A chronicling of displaced lives

Jul 17, 2011

The decade-long internal conflict Nepal witnessed, accounted for more than 16,000 people losing their lives and many more being displaced. These are simply the official figures; there is no knowing or understanding the pain and angst undergone by the direct victims of the conflict. Healing the Wounds and Ghauma Malam—the English and Nepali versions of the same book—document the voices of these conflict victims and also feature information that might be useful for them.

The books were launched in the capital at a programme hosted by Media Foundation, a non-profit media group, on Thursday. The event, which was held at Pareli, Baluwatar, also saw discussions on the subjects of the displaced and their various problems take place. Healing the Wounds is a narration by journalists on peace and conflict victims, and presents 10 first-hand accounts by victims in the form of narrative profiles written by journalists.

These accounts represent a cross-section of victims; some from the most excluded sections of Nepali society including those killed, lost, disabled and displaced during the decade of conflict. The stories reflect how the progress in dealing with past human rights atrocities has been painfully slow. Although complied and published by the Media Foundation with support from UN Peace Fund Nepal and OHCHR Nepal, the book focuses on the victims themselves. Their traumatic experiences and their perspectives on the justice process are highlighted along with the state of the peace process and institutional efforts in transitional justice.

Since the storytellers here are journalists, the narrative is presented in a journalistic format. However, while regular news reporting and feature stories are dictated by deadlines and space constraints, they often do not directly speak about individual human conditions. The booklet, however, enables journalists to reframe the lives and plight of the victims in a more integrated, structured and personal manner.

The 10 cases chronicled in Healing the Wounds were randomly selected in terms of the nature of victimisation—killed, lost, disabled and displaced. Although these narratives do not reflect the magnitude of the entire conflict, they can be taken as representations of the suffering that thousands of Nepali citizens went through at that time.

Directing the entire research and writing process was Media Foundation’s Dharma Adhikari. The book has tried telling previously untold stories by focusing on cases that have not received wide publicity.

The Kathmandu Post, 15 July 2011

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