On mission in a very poor area of western Nepal. With a big dream that is taking its first steps: that of opening a school in Dhangadhi to give a future to the children of those living in this extreme periphery at the foot of the Himalayas.
This is the missionary frontier of Fr. Ajo Thelappilly, an Indian Catholic priest of the Carmelites of Mary Immaculate (CMI), coordinator of the social works of Nepal Carmel Mata Samaj, an NGO that has been active in Nepal as part of the mission that this religious institute opened in the country for a decade.
“We arrived on March 22, 2011,” Fr. Thelappilly recounts, “at the request of Msgr. Anthony Sharma, a Jesuit who was Nepal’s first local bishop and later died in 2015. We belong to the St. John’s province of our institute, which has missions outside our home country as well as in northern India. Currently here in Nepal we are six missionaries active in four different missions: Punarbas and Parasan in Kan-chanpur district and in Dhangadhi and Phulwari in Kailali district, all in the westernmost part of the country.”
Compared to the capital Kathmandu these are much more underdeveloped areas of Nepal.
“The inhabitants belong mainly to the Magar, Chhetri, and Tharu groups known for their ancient traditions and culture ,” Fr. Ajo continues. ”Agriculture provides them with a basic livelihood, but in local markets for their products they earn very little. Occasionally, then, the region receives heavy rains and subsequent flooding, which makes life even more difficult. There are also landless people who are completely dependent on daily work in neighboring India or in Dhangadhi, the most important city in the area. Most of their children work in hotels and markets as child laborers.”