Mission and Story

Our mission:

The Public Defender Society of Nepal (PDS-Nepal) is a Nepali nonprofit non-governmental organization with a primary mission to ensure fair and effective access to justice, to develop a public defender system in Nepal, and to work to develop the efficiency and sustainability of a Nepal public defender system. PDS-Nepal was spun off from ILF-Nepal, a project of The International Legal Foundation, USA, on April 1, 2017.

PDS-Nepal upholds the human right to a fair trial and life and liberty, by defending poor, marginalized and vulnerable persons accused of criminal offenses, regardless of age, gender and ethnicity. It works to create lasting change in the criminal justice system of Nepal by intensively training and mentoring Nepali defense lawyers to become courageous, proactive advocates for their clients’ rights, while simultaneously working to educate justice sector stakeholders, reform the legal system, and strengthen the rights of the accused, with the ultimate goal of ensuring that every person suspected or accused of a crime in Nepal has access to effective legal representation. Its primary mission is to provide meaningful and effective criminal defense services to the poor and marginalized accused persons through seven offices in Kathmandu, Janakpur (Dhanusha), Birgunj (Parsa), Hetauda (Makwanpur), Bhairahawa (Rupdandhi), Nepulgunj (Banke) and  Mahendrangar (Kanchanpur) which are strategically located throughout Nepal to maximize cost-effectiveness as well as geographic reach.

It also works with government, civil society, and justice sector actors to promote change on a broader scale through training and capacity-building. By working collaboratively with others to implement groundbreaking projects and develop more sophisticated understandings of the right to legal aid, PDS-Nepal is creating impacts which multiply throughout the justice system. Its ultimate goal is to increase the Government of Nepal’s capacity to meet its legal obligation to provide legal aid services to poor persons who cannot afford to hire private lawyers, so that all accused have equal access to competent lawyers.

Out Story: -

In 2006, Nepal’s government signed a peace agreement with Maoist rebels, ending a decade-long civil war marked by social upheaval, political instability and a deteriorating human rights situation. During the civil war, laws were ignored, arbitrary detentions became common, and accused persons were denied the right to fair trial. Many languished in pre-trial detention indefinitely, threatened by torture and without legal representation or trial.

Since the 2006 peace agreement, Nepal has begun rebuilding its justice system. And at this point, a new Interim Constitution, adopted in 2007, that guarantees accused persons the right to counsel and the presumption of innocence; it also prohibits arbitrary detention and the use of torture. Those right guaranteed by interim constitution also continued by the new constitution of Nepal made by constitutional assembly in 2015. Despite these positive developments, Nepal’s justice system remains riddled with problems, which include a lack of access to counsel, prolonged detentions and a reliance on forced confessions.

Nepal is one of the world’s poorest countries. Few accused persons can afford to hire a lawyer to defend their legal rights. The government’s indigent defense system is so woefully inadequate that the poor have little chance of receiving any meaningful access to a lawyer. Nepal’s indigent defense system is a court appointed counsel (Baitanik Wakill) system in which one lawyer is appointed to each court to represent all poor persons charged with felonies who appear before that court. Most Baitanik Wakill are under-compensated. Only few have any knowledge or experience in criminal defense, and they receive no training. Additionally, Baitanik Wakill are largely incapable of protecting their clients’ rights because they are not appointed to cases until the time of indictment, by which time the investigation is over, involuntary confessions have been obtained, and pre-trial detention is completed.

In 2008, the ILF established the first public defender office in Nepal, ILF-Nepal, to fill a critical gap in criminal legal aid services that the Government of Nepal has neither the resources nor the capacity to provide. ILF-Nepal strives to strengthen the rule of law, end arbitrary and illegal practices, and provide quality legal representation to poor and vulnerable persons. ILF-Nepal believes that high-quality criminal defense service for the poor and vulnerable is the backbone of justice reform and reconstruction. Till March 31, 2017,  ILF-Nepal has 17 lawyers in five offices across the country: Kathmandu, Janakpur, Nepalgunj, Hetauda, and Kanchanpur. In nice years of its operation, ILF-Nepal has won significant victories, provided consistently free, quality representation to its clients and set significant legal precedents. It is the only organization in Nepal focused solely on providing criminal defense services to the poor and needy, and the only organization that represents clients in quasi-judicial settings - currently 39% of ILF-Nepal’s cases are in quasi-judicial bodies. ILF-Nepal's well-trained defense lawyers have, to date, handled 5,637 cases where 76% of its clients belong to marginalized and at-risk groups. Among the 5,637 cases handled till March 31, 2017;  59.1% cases were taken during police stage.

The dedicated work of ILF-Nepal’s lawyers has had a demonstrable impact on Nepal’s criminal justice system. In 2014, ILF-Nepal won a 5 year battle when the Supreme Court of Nepal upheld the constitutional right of the accused to be informed of any proceedings taken against him or her, including ordering police and the prosecutor’s office to turn over investigative documents that favor the accused during the investigation stage. In 2009, ILF-Nepal successfully petitioned the Supreme Court of Nepal to acknowledge that the Children’s Act of 1992 had removed juvenile cases from the jurisdiction of quasi-judicial bodies, which had regularly held children in detention arbitrarily and for extended periods. In another recent case, ILF-Nepal won an opinion from the court that recognized that the right to counsel begins at the time of arrest. ILF-Nepal regularly fights for, and obtains court rulings ordering the release of clients who have languished in detention for months or years without a trial or access to a lawyer.

Beyond its defense work, ILF-Nepal works with the legal community to make broader improvements to Nepal’s criminal justice system: ILF-Nepal has trained over 357 Nepali lawyers on best practices in providing quality representation to indigent accused during the earliest stages of the criminal case, and it continues to work with key stakeholders to develop a strategy for institutionalizing an effective, early access mechanism in Nepal. In 2014, ILF-Nepal undertook a significant “Access to Justice” survey, interviewing hundreds of detainees and lawyers to help ascertain the current state of access to justice; this survey will continuously inform and aid ILF-Nepal’s work going forward. ILF-Nepal also worked in collaboration with the Judges Society Nepal and the ILF’s international legal aid experts to examine institutional best practices for the provision of legal aid from jurisdictions around the world, the current legal aid practices in Nepal and the best practices of ILF-Nepal. The ILF hopes that these reports and their recommendations will inform stakeholders discussions on reforms that need to be made to Nepal’s criminal legal aid system.

The ultimate goal of the ILF is to establish sustainable, locally-run, government-supported public defender systems in post-conflict and transitional countries. The ILF therefore works to progressively nationalize its public defender programs: supervision and training is turned over to local lawyers, the International Fellows program ends, and fiscal accountability and management shifts from the ILF’s headquarters in New York to local staff. To this end, in 2012, the ILF completed its fellowship program in Nepal and over the last five years has worked to build the capacity of the organization’s management team to run a nationwide public defender office. In 2014 – 2015, ILF Nepal began the process of nationalizing its office. ILF-Nepal leadership worked with ILF-New York to develop a detailed transition plan that focused on ensuring the sustainable future of the organization including the development of a three-year strategic plan.

In 2015, Public Defender Society of Nepal (PDS-Nepal) was formally registered as national organization and From April 1, 2017, PDS-Nepal is operating all activities for ILF-Nepal as national implementing partner.