The story of an Acid Attack Activist

[Music]

namaskar

my name is so difficult to tell people

why i do what i do it’s a

amazing journey that i have had in my

life trying to be help to the helpless

hope to the hopeless and

a warrior for those who are fighting

for changes in laws

and seeking justice in this country

i call myself a human ambulance

someone who’s always ready to reach out

when you get a distress call it’s been a

phenomenal journey

for a very very long time now

i never wanted to come out in the media

never wanted people to know what i do

my life

in this field of survey started when i

was just about 14 15 years old

my father had given me money to pay the

electricity bill

and i happened to cross beer hospital or

government hospital

where i saw a mother crying with a child

in her hand

i gave the money to her rather than

paying the electricity bill

when i went home and told my father what

exactly happened

he was angry for a while but when he

heard the whole story

he didn’t say anything to me so i

realized if you actually go out and help

people

your parents don’t complain my life

turned around again

in the same hospital february 22nd 2015

when i met this girl called sangeeta

magar

and another girl called seema basnet at

peer hospital

they were attacked with acid and

when i saw that face i just could not

get

over it it was so painful and so

horrific

i didn’t know what to do

when i found out that a man had actually

done this heinous crime

i was ashamed of being a man for a while

having three daughters at home

a beautiful wife a mother

surrounded by women all the time i

i just i just could not believe a man

could be

as inhuman as whoever this criminal was

and then i reached out to them i reached

out to the helpless parents

and my fight to get justice

and my fight to make a law in nepal

regarding

the most heinous crime acid attack

continued from then on

single-handedly for a very very long

time

till more and more people joined in and

the voice

was loud enough for the government to

hear it

very recently the government of nepal

passed three laws

one which was the most important part is

the restriction of sale

of acid and other corrosive material in

nepal

two is the imprisonment part where the

criminal

would get between three to eight years

initially now it has been increased from

five years

to 20 years for acid attack and up to 25

years which is life imprisonment

if any acid victim or survivor

dies within a year of the acid attack

due to

the crime on the social

side all these kids belong to very very

nominal

families so for them education and

employment and healthcare was a

nightmare

the government of nepal now provides

complete medical

help to any of the survivors

lifelong for the damages done by acid

most of them are now employed with

either the private sector

or government entities they have a

reason to come out

of their homes and for the first time in

last six seven months

there has been no asset attack in nepal

i’m sure that the laws

and of course there are issues where we

need to still fight on

to get uh more people aware of the crime

and aware of the laws that are in place

the fight continues

apart from acid i always have this

feeling

that one of the most painful thing a

human being can ever go through

is to be burnt alive unluckily for a

place like nepal

there are very few burnt hospitals

actually there’s just three of them that

are functional and all three are in

kathmandu

so when people get burnt in villages

it is a tremendous tremendously painful

journey to kathmandu and if they

come here alive the treatment starts for

the first time

basic first aid treatment at villages is

also very very unheard of

it is there are crimes that happens

people throw kerosene at their wives and

set them on fire for dowry

there are other issues now there are

issues related to

social media uh jealousy factor and so

many things that

people get burnt alive it is a fight

that continues

poor people get burnt because most of

them have open

stove cooking at home you know why no

one notices burns

is because no one cares a dam about the

poor

affluent families and well our families

usually do not have burn cases

because we’ve got sophisticated cooking

equipments

and we’ve got other facilities

when someone gets burned you cannot you

cannot imagine that feeling

i have gone through that for decades

i’ve seen people

with wounds that you cannot explain in

words i can feel their pain

i can feel their agony on top of that i

can feel their helplessness

person like me keeps fighting and

raising voice against

the health care system in our nation the

reason being is

we do not have a health care system

when when you go on trying to be around

these people when you have

when you visit hospitals when you visit

their homes when you visit

first aid centers you know you feel so

privileged

i carry the best phone in the world

because i’m around people who are

unfortunate than me

i wear the best clothes because i am

actually around

very very unfortunate people who are

semi-dressed

most of the times when i come back home

i realize how

lucky i am to be who i am so it is a

journey that my friends my families

everyone has supported me all along

it is a journey that provides

hope a journey that provides little bit

of compassion a little bit of empathy

and a lot of self-satisfaction

when people talk to me about kovid i

actually have a very different version

to this

thing in nepal every disease is a

pandemic for a young

for a poor person whether it be heart

ailment

lung ailment a broken bone appendicitis

a complication in pregnancy for them

every

every physical ailment or medical

ailment

is a calamity

when kovid struck us when all of us

the affluent the educated started

running around hospitals

very very insecure that if someone of

mine

got ill would i find a bed would i find

oxygen cylinders would i find a bed at a

hospital

i felt for the first time that the whole

nation or should i say the whole world

felt like

what a poor man in nepal always feels

like helpless

there is no one he can turn to it is so

difficult for one person to handle

everything

but then as i went on the number of

people who helped me grow

and we’ve managed to save a lot of lives

i wish

we could do more but then whatever we do

we do it with our heart and we’ve saved

a number of lives i call myself a

counselor

i call myself sometimes very very

abusive when i see people give up hope

in kovid everyone i heard everyone

telling each other

hope is the best medicine well it’s not

just in govind

for a poor man hope is a medicine for

all his pains if we still do not realize

that our system needs to change that our

health care needs to change

all the money you have in the world all

the medical insurance in the world did

not work for covid

you know why because the numbers were

tremendous

reach out to these people we talk about

social responsibility clause

health care should be the number one

priority of every social

responsibility of every every corporate

giant that is in this nation it is a

journey that needs to be

needs to be completed it is a journey of

empathy

it is a journey of service

just remember those few seconds every

time you heard of the word kovid every

time you went for a test

every time someone close to you got

tested positive

don’t forget that feeling of anxiety

don’t forget that feeling of

helplessness

because that is what a poor man in nepal

feels all the time

and that is where we come into the

picture to give them hope

to tell them to hold their hand and say

you’re not alone

there is someone and it is saved a lot

of life because helplessness

is the biggest killer in this nation and

i think

all of us if we call ourselves educated

if we call ourselves affluent if we call

ourselves

aware please reach out

there is lot many of us can do

a small amount from many of us can save

numerous

amounts of lives in this country whether

it is acid attack

whether it is burns whether it is

pregnancy complication whether it is

heart ailment

it is the same for every human being

because in my life

i believe in one thing the pain and

agony

of ailment the pain and agony of a

disease

is exactly the same for every human

being and

if things get worse and if we feel

helpless it gets worse

i think for the first time humanity

across the globe

has realized that when the sheer

numbers go up for any disease

it becomes a nightmare

we’re going through one nightmare but

within these nightmares

we are working day and night to save

lives of many burnt victims

who are in different hospitals in

kathmandu

i am a human being i am scared of my

life i am scared of getting

infected but then i always assure my

family one thing

i might or might not die if i

can’t if i get covered but if i do not

reach the hospital in time

these poor kids and these poor women who

come in with tremendous burn cases

will be dead for sure it is a big

challenge for all of us

but if we all unite together such

challenges can overcome

acid attack burning someone for dowry

burning someone for jealousy burning

someone for any goddamn reason

is one of the most heinous crimes that

can ever happen in the world

and we must and we nepalese have managed

to raise our voice loud enough that the

government noticed it

but i still continue the fight saying it

is not just acid

every burn survivor in nepal must get

minimum treatment so we can save their

lives

just because they are poor just because

they do not have a voice

just because they’re from far fetched

areas of nepal

do not overlook them because

remember one thing the burn might not

represent

all of us kovi did whether you’re rich

whether you’re poor whether you’re

educated whether you’re affluent

the anxiety was the same for everyone

and i can assure you one thing

with my experience the most painful

thing

a human being can ever go through

is the feeling of being dead it is the

most painful feeling

and when you are helpless when you feel

there is nothing you can do to save

yourself

it is the worst thing a human being can

go through

let me tell you one thing life and death

i’ve seen it very very closely you

cannot prepone your death

by thinking neither can you postpone

your death by

thinking but if you think right

you can postpone and you can

prevent death of many many innocent

human beings just because they don’t

have the money

they don’t have the resources i hope my

message to the world is loud and clear

it is about

empathy it is about one human being

equal to another human

as far as health care is concerned there

is

no certainty to life there is no

certainty to death

but the certainty of pain

for being helpless is for sure

we all must come together and fight this

helplessness that every individual goes

through in this nation

i hope my message would

create more awareness it is not just

you it is not just me it is all of us

who has the right to live and live a

healthy

and a safe life in this nation and

across the globe

please reach out and help people

at their times of needs your money

you can earn it back but a lost life

cannot come back

if your money can save a life please go

ahead and help someone

thank you so much