Enhancing gender-responsive local governance in Nepal

In Nepal, the caste system determines a person's social status and life value in society. It is extremely difficult to move up in the caste system, especially for those at the bottom. The South Asia Partnership Nepal (SAP), along with UNDEF, through the project “Enhance gender-responsive local governance in Nepal” aims to empower Musahar women and enhance their representation in local decision-making procedures. The project promotes gender-responsive local governance in two rural municipalities and two town municipalities of Sarlahi, situated in province 2 of Nepal. The project adopts human rights-based approaches following three operational approaches: empowerment of Musahar women to claim their rights, mutual accountability of Local Government Authorities, and strengthening of multi-stakeholder partnership for consolidated efforts of promoting gender-responsive local governance.
The project has yielded promising results, such as sessions on gender transformative social norms behavior and social accountability monitoring using the Citizens Report Card.