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Participatory Democracy in the Himalayas
With funding from the UK Government’s Department for International Development, Karuna are carrying out a project that will increase the democratic representation of Himalayan communities at local, regional and national levels. The project will be implemented in the high altitude belt (above 2500 m) of the Indian Himalayan region across 5 states.
The indigenous communities of the high altitude Himalayan region experience social & political exclusion due to the geographical barrier presented by the mountains and the fact that they are of Tibetan-ethnicity which is in contrast to mainstream India. Typically, education levels are low, as is access to health care facilities, there is limited access to villages by road, most people survive by subsistence farming, and they suffer neglect from mainstream policies as these fail to get established in the region. These are among the poorest people in India.
The project will work with these people, particularly focusing on women, unemployed youth, other marginalised groups to build community organisations for people-centred development. It will create a High Himalayan Network, a pressure group of indigenous people, to improve interaction amongst the communities and with govt representatives, as well as to develop advocacy around rights & issues. Recognising their insulation as central to the discrimination suffered by them, the project will establish Resource Centres for information flow that facilitate the indigenous peoples' ability to make informed decisions and to communicate with the rest of the world.
Himalayan Voices, an institution to be created in the national capital, will aim to enhance the visibility of the indigenous people at the national level in order to develop appropriate policies and development action for the target communities. The economic disadvantage suffered by the target groups will be addressed by facilitating microenterprises in the agricultural and non-farm sectors through vocational training and technical and business development inputs.
