Before 50 Years Political Status Of Makawanpur
The Nepalese system at the
time was referred to as “panchayat democracy,” based on customary village
headmen. It was obviously a very male dominated, paternalistic type of society
where there would be a natural leader, often a customary leader. In many cases,
something like the chief of a tribe would
be given the title panchayat
of a village or area. Sometimes the term village does not fit in a mountain setting because there would be many distinct areas of settlement, none of which would be large enough to actually need a village council. Most of the people living in that particular settlement would be related to each other so that if they had any problems, it would be sorted out within a family
context. But when there was a
need for some way to span the interests of several families, then you would
call that a panchayat or a village council. There would be someone who would
emerge or who would have been appointed as the person to sort out those issues.
The Nepali-speaking mountain village where I lived, the Palung Valley, had its
own panchayat. It was more formal than in many areas. It
met about once a month and had
an agenda and went over and over issues. It’s hard for me to say whether there
were issues that went unmet and the extent to which the panchayat tended to
favor one group’s interests over another. In fact, I thought at the time and I
think now, too, that it was fairly well representative of the village. It was
Nepali-speaking, however, and there were people in the village
whose native language was not
Nepali, but Nepali was the national language. It made sense for the meeting to
be conducted in a single language. In addition to a caste-based social
organization, Nepal has tribes. India does as well but they’re not a big part of India’s society. They are
relatively more important in Nepal. The tribes often lived away from the
villages and on occasion included hunters and gatherers, but also included
people that were very much on the fringe of society in terms of the reach of government. Sometimes people from those tribal
groups would come into the village to engage in barter trade or something like
that. As far as I recall, they had no relationship whatsoever with the formal
government structure. However, sometimes their young men competed for, and
filled, positions as Gurkha soldiers. Surnames associated with such tribes are
Tamang and Gurung, and you see these names frequently in books about the
exploits of the Gurkha Army.
GILBERT J. DONAHUE
Nepal - Peace Corps Volunteer 1968-1970
Palung, Nepal