Chairperson of National Human Rights Commission, Kedar Nath Upadhyaya, is the Chief former Justice of the Supreme Court. He was appointed in the present post on 18th Sept. 2007. He had a long cherished career in Judiciary including twelve years in the Bench of the Supreme Court of Nepal. He attained retirement from the post of chief justice in the year 2004 after serving in the position for aperiod of fourteen months. Prior to the appointment in the Supreme Court Mr. Upadhyaya had occupied several important positions both in the Executive and the Judiciary. Mr. Upadhyaya had participated in the UN fellowship program on Human Rights in Canada. He had attended UNHCHR Workshop on Justiciability of Economic Social and Cultural Rights and the colloquium on Access to Justice. Immediately after his appointment in NHRC Nepal, he led the Nepalese team in the APF Meeting in Australia.For Newsinnepal.com, Ganesh Ghimire and Kishor Poudel   talked with Upadhyaya about current human rights situation of the country.

Q:How do you assess the Human Rights situations of the country before and after the formation of the Maoist led government?

Upadhyaya: First of all major political parties have failed to implement various agreements reached in the past. Among them one is to move ahead through consensus and failed to form the consensus government.
As far as the issue of human rights violations is concerned incidents of human rights violations have been continuing though the actors had changed. The youth wings of ruling Maoist and CPN-UML continue to take the law and order situation into their hands and continuing the act of murder, violence and abductions. And the YCL is taking the lead role in this context. The incidents of violence, murder and abductions continue in various districts of tarai region and the ruling political parties are also adding fuel for these incidents. The situation of human rights is getting serious in some tarai districts due to escalating violence. Lately, criminalization of politics is increasing which is a dangour sign for the human rights. Three journalists Birendra Sah, Uma Singh and JP Joshi were murdered and the whereabouts of journalist Prakash Thakuri remained unknown. Though the perpetrators involved in these incidents have been identified but the government remains mute spectator in these incidents. In the name of political consensus the government is trying to protect criminals. The culture of impunity is increasing in the country as the government decided to release the persons, who are undergoing trial on the cases of serious nature.

Q: Which side do you think is mostly responsible for not such poor Human Rights situation of the country even after the formation of new government in republic Nepal?

Upadhyaya: Though many incidents of human rights violations have been committed by the non-state actors, the state did not seem serious towards ending it. The government failed to hold accountable to those involved in organizing strikes, general shut down and other protest programmes for fulfilling their political interests. The government failed to boost the morale of the security forces. As security officials have to please political leaders for promotions in the senior posts, they were more concerned on promotion rather than being engaged in their real work. The government should end such irregularities immediately and boost the morale of security officials. There is a need of reconstitution of the security body after firing some corrupt officials of the security forces. Particularly, courts should also be accountable as the cases of grave human rights violations should be tried in a transparent way without any interference.

Q: Don't you think that the efforts of NHRC were not sufficient in this regard?

Upadhyaya: No, the NHRC is doing its best in all possible ways. NHRC recommended the government about the incidents of human rights violations but the state is not serious. If the government had only implemented the recommendations made by the commission it will contribute a lot for the protection of human rights in the country. Currently the work of NHRC is limited merely to the recommendations. Many people were either victimized or displaced during the 10-year long armed insurgency, so, at least the government should provide possible compensation to them but the state failed to pay proper attention towards it. The conflict victim will take the sigh of relief only if they were provided with some relief.

Q: The Interim Constitution 2063 BS has made the NHRC as constitutional body, but it seems that NHRC failed to work effectively. Why it becomes so?

Upadhyaya: The NHRC has been given constitutional status legally but there was no improvement in other aspects. The state made the Commission constitutional body to use it in its favour because autonomy entrusted to the Commission earlier has been snatched so the Commission failed to be a strong mechanism. More works needs to be done to empower the commission but the Commission has to recommend the government for these activities. However most of the recommendations are moving from one ministry to another ministry and departments but works are not taking place. Especially the NHRC has not been able to function effectively as it does not have permanent staffs and most of the staffs of the Commission are either recruited as temporary staffs or appointed on contract.

Q: The government recently introduced an ordinance on disappearance, how NHRC is taking it?

Upadhyaya: The government has asked the NHRC for suggestions over the ordinance and NHRC has presented clause-wise suggestions on the ordinance as per the international norm. Formation of such commission is in line with the Comprehensive Peace Agreement.Some controversies are emerging about the issue which shows that there was not serious discussion with all sides about the issue. The government should present the ordinance at the Constituent Assembly to make it free from controversy so that all will agree on the serious issues like that.

Q: Could you shed light in the provisions needs to be amended in the Ordinance related with Disappearance?

Upadhyaya: NHRC has given the clause-wise suggestions over the ordinance to the government as per the request of the government. The Commission will prepare a common understanding by holding discussion among the government, all the political parties, which has representation in the constituent assembly, and civil society in this regard.

Q: What should be done to improve Nepal's human rights situation in the days to come?

Upadhyaya: Growing trend impunity is a major obstacle for not improving the situation of Human Rights. All political parties have to express common commitment for ending existing trend of impunity. Next thing is that the trend of giving political protection must end immediately. The youth wings of the ruling political parties should immediately stop the trend of taking the law and order situation into their hands, which will also reduce the criminal activities to be committed by other groups.

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