20 November 2012. “The Resurrected”, a documentary about representative torture survivors in Nepal, was screened on 18 November 2012 in Kathmandu at weeklong Human Rights Film Festival. Many political leaders, human rights defenders, government officials, journalists and general public attended the screening of the documentary.
Advocacy Forum has produced this 33 minute long documentary that includes the sorry plight of seven torture survivors who had to undergo brutal physical and psychological tortures at the hands of the state army and the Maoists during conflict. Directed by journalist Ganesh Pandey, this documentary raises the emblematic cases of conflict in which torture survivors including Jagadish Yadav, Paradeshi Khatik, Ashok Sodari, Hemraj Tharu, Yubraj Giri, Nizamuddin Shekh and Dhaniram Chaudhary’s pains are documented. Likewise, the documentary takes upon the case of torture on former Home Minister Bhim Rawal at the hands of the autocratic Panchayat regime as an emblematic case of that period.
It is a sad fact that torture has not still been criminalized in Nepali law till date whereas international law treats the crime of torture as mother of all human rights violations. Despite constant lobbying by the stakeholders, the government has failed to pass a bill that criminalizes torture. The existing “Torture Compensation Act” is inadequate in dealing with serious human rights violation like torture. It fails to provide justice to torture victims. Advocacy Forum has produced the documentary as part of lobbying for enactment of law that criminalizes torture and provides adequate reparations to torture survivors.
