http://tinyurl.com/sdpmo
"Isolated from family and friends, the young "living goddesses" of
Nepal are revered, their every need accounted for and their every
motion interpreted as divine instruction.
From the age of four, many girls chosen as "kumaris" live their
childhood lives through a series of rituals, having little contact
with the outside world. Those most revered are forbidden from letting
their feet touch the floor.
But the nation took a major step yesterday towards abandoning the
centuries-old tradition, after its Supreme Court ordered an inquiry
into whether the human rights of the girls are being violated.
There are around a dozen living goddesses in the Kathmandu area.
While lesser kumaris attend school and lead relatively normal lives,
the most important are confined to special "kumari houses" and only
allowed out for religious ceremonies.
According to tradition, kumaris are selected from the Buddhist
community and subjected to rituals, including being left in a room of
severed goat and buffalo heads for a night. If they prove their
fearlessness, and meet other criteria, they are worshipped as a
goddess by both Hindus and Buddhists until they first menstruate,
when a replacement is found.
Pundevi Mahajan, the child rights lawyer who filed the case, insisted
that she aims only to reform the tradition, not abolish it.
Nevertheless, conservative activists have lodged their own court case
aimed at protecting the tradition unchanged.
Chanira Bajracharya, 13, who as the Kumari of Patan is the second
most important living goddess, gave a rare interview to The Daily
Telegraph. She leaves her house only 18 times a year to officiate at
local festivals and has no friends her own age, but said she opposed
any dilution of the tradition.
"As a kumari, we are not supposed to be touched by dogs or leather
shoes or by menstruating women," she said, before asking, "If
everything is allowed, and we are allowed to go out, what is the
point of being a kumari?"
However, she warned: "If such things are done, then people might die.
If one pollutes the kumari, then the person might die. So tradition
has to be maintained."
Although in recent years the most important kumaris have received
home tuition to compensate for lost schooling, campaigners say that
they are ill equipped to fully reintegrate into society when their
years in the kumari house end.
"Maybe some people say that a goddess doesn't need human rights,"
said Anup Singh Suwal, a community leader who supports reform. "But
after she is a goddess she has to become a human again.""
--
William T Goodall
Mail : [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Web : http://www.wtgab.demon.co.uk
Blog : http://radio.weblogs.com/0111221/
I think a case can be made that faith is one of the world's great
evils, comparable to the smallpox virus but harder to eradicate. -
Richard Dawkins
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