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Darnal Award for Social Justice announces the 2022 Awardees & Honorees

Sukhadeo Thorat, Professor Emeritus at Jawaharlal Nehru University since 2014, is the chairman of the Indian Council of Social Science Research. He also served as Director of Indian Institute of Dalit Studies. Republica’s Kamal Pariyar caught up with Thorat while he was in Kathmandu to participate in Darnal Award for Social Justice and other lectures.

On March 11, 2018, Grishma Ram, a 15-year-old Dalit girl, was gang-raped in Saptari. Three were handed down sentences in connection with the case, but four perpetrators are still missing.

As you know, the COVID-19 pandemic has made Dalits and marginalized people around the world more vulnerable than ever before. For many communities, having to quarantine for an indefinite period of time is unprecedented; for Dalits, it parallels the social exclusion we have experienced for centuries, unusual only because distancing oneself in order to reduce the chance of COVID transmission has an actual scientific basis, in contract to the socially constructed caste system.

On behalf of the Darnal Award for Social Justice (DASJ) and Samata Foundation, we invite you to join a special virtual conversation with five dynamic Dalit change-makers from around the world on Rethinking Caste Globally

Darnal Award for Social Justice postponed due to Covid-10 pandemic

Darnal Award for Social Justice for 2018 will go to activist Sarswati Nepali from Baitadi. The Darnal Award Selection Committee has decided to award her to recognize and honor her exemplary contributions towards social justice for the Dalit community. She will be honored with five lakh rupees and a citation at an international ceremony on August 15, 2018.

The Darnal award to Chamar shows the marginalised of the hills and the Madhes have a common agenda to pursue.

The First Darnal International Award for Social Justice was awarded to Raksha Ram Chamar (Harijan) from Madhesi Dalit community for his struggle to achieve education and justice for Dalits and other marginalized groups

श्रावण ३२, २०७३- अमेरिकाको स्ट्यानफोर्ड विश्वविद्यालयका राजनीतिशास्त्री एवं हुभर इन्स्टिच्युसनका सिनियर फेलो ल्यारी डायमन्ड अहिले काठमाडौंमा छन् । ‘दर्नाल अवार्ड फर सोसल जस्टिस’ वितरण कार्यक्रमलाई सम्बोधन गर्न अन्य अमेरिकी प्राज्ञहरुसँगै आएका उनी लोकतान्त्रिक मूल्य-मान्यता र वैदेशिक मामिलाका क्षेत्रमा सघन ढंगबाट अध्ययन-अध्यापन गरेका प्राध्यापक मानिन्छन् । यिनै विषयको सेरोफेरोमा उनले आधा दर्जनभन्दा बढी पुस्तकहरु लेखेका छन् । नेसनल इन्डोमेन्ट फर डेमोक्रेसीले निकाल्ने ‘जर्नल अफ डेमोक्रेसी’का सह-सम्पादकसमेत रहेका प्रा. डायमन्डसँग कान्तिपुरका सुधीर शर्माले गरेको कुराकानीको सम्पादित अंश :

Raksha Ram Chamar (Harijan) was awarded the first Darnal International Award for Social Justice on Monday for his endeavour to seek justice for Dalits and marginalised community.

The sudden death of Suvash Darnal, at the age of 31 in 2011 produced an outpouring of shock and sorrow among the international democracy advocates he had befriended—unusual for someone who died so young and whose work had been confined to the relatively small and remote country of Nepal.

The first recipient of the International Darnal Award for Social Justice is a 28-year-old educator, journalist and legal advocate Raksha Ram Chamar (Harijan) who was born into a family of highly marginalized Madhesi Dalit tenant farmers in a village in Nepal’s Kapilvastu district.

Following the 2015 earthquakes in Nepal, the Darnal Award Committee decided to postpone the 2015 award, and to use the monies earmarked for the 2015 award to help reconstruct a school in Sipapokhari. The Gurung Society of New York is also partnering, and has provided additional monies to help with reconstruction efforts.

After much careful deliberation, the Steering Committee for the Darnal Award for Social Justice has decided to postpone the selection process and announcement of the inaugural awardee. The announcement, which was scheduled for August 15, 2015, will now be made on August 15, 2016.