Devi
Devi Khadka is leading a quiet resistance. As she travels around Nepal, listening to stories of wartime rape survivors, and creating a unified voice for justice, she knows that she’s poking a hornet’s nest. Nepal’s leaders want to bury the shameful truth of wartime rape. As the only public face of survivors, Devi has decided that she can no longer stay silent. But her TikTok dancer teenage daughter, Rosy, just wants her to be a mum. In 1997, seventeen-year-old Devi, was arrested, accused of being a rebel, tortured, and raped in custody. A civil war had just begun. Rebel leaders revealed her as a rape ‘victim’. Tagged with this shameful taboo, Devi battled depression, social ostracism, joined the rebel frontlines, and rose through the ranks, even serving as a member of the parliament when the war ended. Shot as an immersive verité, the film travels with Devi, as she consolidates the voices of survivors. As Devi confronts her former lawyer and seeks consolation from her counsellor, the film dives into deeply intimate and vulnerable moments. Through her diary, supported by archives, Devi reconstructs history erased to rewrite the destiny of thousands of women in Nepal.
Subina Shrestha (Nepal / United Kingdom)
Rosie Garthwaite (United Kingdom)
Heejung Oh (Republic of Korea (South Korea))
Asmita Khadka (Nepal)
Mediadante
Seesaw Pictures
- Put concerted international pressure on the Nepali government to make immediate legislative and policy changes to address gaps that have prevented conflict-era rape survivors from seeking justice.
- Build international awareness on the justice gaps for Nepali CRSV survivors, the impact of this impunity on sexual violence in Nepali society today and the wider global resonance of this issue in the context of #metoo movements. 3. Help create a societal shift in attitudes towards the stigma of sexual violence within Nepal to promote reporting.
- Empower the upcoming Murad Code at Nepal and the broader international level.
- Help strengthen mechanisms, frameworks and networks that will administer mental, physical and psychological welfare services to victims of conflict-related and other sexual violence in Nepal.
- Mobilising Coalitions: Galvanise NGOs behind the film, creating partnerships to apply collective pressure on the Nepali government.
- Elevating Devi: Provide Devi with an international platform by providing her with the opportunity to make key interventions at high-level policy events.
- Evidence Gathering: Support women to register CSRV-related complaints to Nepal’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission without fear of repercussions.
- Put concerted international pressure on the Nepali government to gather evidence for incidences of CRSV.
- Child Wellbeing: Address the barriers to basic child rights and address the needs of children born from wartime rape.
- Legislative change: Advocate the extension or total removal of Nepal’s statutory limitation of rape reporting (currently at one year).
- Add pressure for the transitional justice act to be brought up to the international standards.
- Add pressure to the government to recognize CRSV survivors and give them the same reparation packages that other wartime survivors have received.
- Provide information and training to security services about how to better deal with reports of CRSV or sexual violence and assault.
Subina Shrestha (Nepal / United Kingdom)
Funders
StoryBoard Collective
Funders
StoryBoard Collective