In Nepal, research conducted on menstruation shows that girls usually between the ages of 6-12, most pre-menses, become aware of menstruation through their mothers, relatives, and school and are taught that menstruation is an “impure” state of “impurity”, a state of “shame, humiliation” and a state of “powerlessness”. They are told this directly with words as well as see it visibly through watching their mothers, sisters, and menstruating individuals in their communities’ practice menstrual restrictions.In other hand, around the same age, boys are also taught or aware through their family, school and community that their absence of menstruation means state of “purity”, “power” and “superiority”. They see that the men in their lives and the community were not bound to any restrictions, or limited in any way, that they instead have the power to limit and restrict the ones who did menstruate. As they grow up, girls are then socialized for tolerance, acceptance and dociletendencies, and discouraged to question where boys are encouraged and awarded for questioning, challenging, and privileged to use violent words and actions under the guise of “boys will be boys”.  As children develop, they began to understand the power dynamic and become aware of the cause and effect of power and privilege but are indoctrinated through society gender norms and values and thus act on their conditioning. Girls continue to replicate their learned and internalized docile behaviours while boys continue to hold and display power, both playing into the roles of the victim and the perpetrator.

Menstrual Practice is underlying cause for GBV

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1. Between 40 and 50 percent of women in European Union countries experience unwanted sexual advances, physical contact or other forms of sexual harassment at work (World Health Organisation (WHO),
   
2. Early and forced marriage is a violation of women’s rights. Almost 750 million women and girls alive today were married before their 18th birthday, and more than 20,000 underage girls are illegally married every year (UNICEF)
3. An estimated one in three girls around the world will experience physical or sexual abuse or violence in her lifetime (United Nations Population Fund)
4. Women and girls account for 71% of human trafficking victims, with nearly three of every four trafficked for the purpose of sexual exploitation (United Nations (UN))
5. At least 200 million women and girls alive today have undergone FGM, with most experiencing FGM before age of 5 (UNICEF)
6. One in 10 women in the European Union report having experienced cyber-harassment since the age of 15 (including having received unwanted, offensive sexually explicit emails or SMS messages, or offensive, inappropriate advances on social networking sites).
7. The risk is highest among young women between 18 and 29 years of age (UNWomen)
8. Eighty-two per cent of women parliamentarians who participated in a study conducted by the Inter-Parliamentary Union in 39 countries across five regions reported having experienced some form of psychological violence while serving their terms (InterParliamentary Union)
9. According to a 2016 ActionAid Survey, 79% of women living in cities in India, 86% in Thailand, and 89% in Brazil have been subjected to harassment or violence in public, as had 75% of women in London, UK (ActionAid)
10. In a survey of 3,706 primary schoolchildren from Uganda, 24 per cent of 11 to 14-yearold girls with disabilities reported sexual violence at school, compared to 12 per cent of non-disabled girls (UNWomen).
11. At least 140 countries have passed laws on domestic violence, and 144 have laws on sexual harassment. However, though laws exist, there are extremely low levels of compliance, and implementation of regulation in majority of countries due to variety of reasons, some due to weak or no enforcement power and others due to the violent patriarchal culture of society.   For example, 37 countries still exempt rape perpetrators from prosecution if perpetrators are married to or or subsequently marry the victim (World Bank Group)
12. In Australia, Canada, Israel, South Africa and the United States, between 40 and 70 per cent of female murder victims are killed by their intimate partners (WHO)xi. 12. Conservative estimates suggest that 20,000 to 50,000 women were raped during the 1992-1995 war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, while approximately 250,000 to 500,000 women and girls were targeted for rape in the 1994 Rwandan genocide (UNIFEM)
13. Approximately once every ten minutes, somewhere in the world, an adolescent girl dies as a result of violence (UNICEF).
14. Around 120 million girls worldwide (slightly more than 1 in 10) have experienced forced intercourse or other forced sexual acts at some point in their lives. By far the most common perpetrators of sexual violence against girls are current or former husbands, partners or boyfriends (European Commission).
15. Women who have been physically or sexually abused by their partners are more than twice as likely to have an abortion, almost twice as likely to experience depression, and in some regions, 1.5 times more likely to acquire HIV, as compared to women who have not experienced partner violence (WHO).

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Therefore, Radha Paudel Foundation will urge each of you to mark this day and encourage to save your daughters, granddaughters and entire planet for the sake of human right.