Nepal's illegal orphanage trade is breaking families. Devi's story reveals how hard they are to mend

Updated

A 10-year-old girl forced to pose as an orphan walks the road back to life with her parents in the remote Himalayas. Her story reveals the harm being done by the good intentions of charitable Australians.

She keeps watch on the doorway, watching, hoping and watching again. In the next few minutes, 10-year-old Devi will see her mother Kalawati for the first time in almost a year.

Kalawati has been sending text messages all day as she passes through village after village on foot. Closer and closer. Darker and darker. The sun has long gone and evening has set in.

Devi is the last child to be reunited with her family.

She glances back at the other children already in the arms of their mothers and fathers, telling stories of the things that have happened.

But this will not be a simple reunion.

Like many of the other parents, Devi's mother has mixed feelings about her child's return to their home in the Himalayan mountains.

They are part of the complicated story of child trafficking in Nepal, where children are falsely portrayed as orphans to lure volunteers and donations from places like Australia.

Some children become lost in the trade, never to find their way home again. For those who do make the journey back and are reunited with their parents, many find what's been broken is not so easily put back together.

A life framed by the peaks and valleys

Imagine the biggest mountains you can think of, then stack them on top of one another and imagine them again.

That's how big they look. Big jagged peaks, biting at the sky.

This is Humla, one of the poorest and most remote parts of Nepal. Journeys are measured in days' walk, rather than kilometres, so rugged is the terrain.

Narrow tracks, swing bridges, landslides and waterfalls punctuate the way.

Many villagers have lived nowhere else, their whole lives framed by the peaks and valleys.

Devi's mother Kalawati is one of them.

She's small, sure-footed and strong, but tired.

There's little medical care in the deepest folds of the Himalayas — three of her six children died of illness in infancy. She has a list of aches and pains from years of working and walking these mountains.

She's aged in her 40s, as far as she knows, but doesn't have an exact birth date. Her voice is louder than the other women, not because she's confident but because she's partially deaf.

She earns money from farming and carrying heavy loads on her back along the precarious tracks between remote Himalayan villages.

"I have three children, my husband doesn't give much interest to provide education to them," said Kalawati.

"For survival I have to work as a porter. Now due to my age I feel weak. Now I can't walk like before and I feel weak."

Kalawati wants something more for her children — education and opportunity. That's why she sent her youngest daughter Devi away almost a year ago believing she would receive schooling in Kathmandu. Instead, she was forced to pose as an orphan.

The traffickers who recruit children for illegal orphanages target poverty-stricken, remote parts of Nepal like Humla. They know many uneducated parents are desperate for a better life for their children.

The trafficking syndicates often recruit members of the child's own extended family to persuade the parents. The mountains and the isolation can make it almost impossible for parents to travel to Kathmandu to retrieve their children.

Some children are given false names, some are even issued with false death certificates for their parents. Others are too young to remember the real names of their family and community. They become vulnerable to exploitation, abuse and neglect.

More than 15,000 children live in orphanages in Nepal but more than 80 per cent of them are not orphans at all. Nepal is trying to crack down on the trade. The government has increased the sentences for child trafficking and set up a special police unit to raid illegal orphanages and rescue the children.

Devi was found in one of the raids.

This is the day Devi was found in a makeshift orphanage on the outskirts of Kathmandu.

She looks pale, feverish and wary after six months of living in appalling conditions.

Half house, half cattle shed, some of the children slept on pieces of foam on the ground.

What their parents had hoped would be a better life had turned into a nightmare.

The manager of the orphanage failed to secure sponsors, so she stopped providing for the children. They were left to fend for themselves, preparing their own food and walking alone to seek medical help at a local hospital when they fell ill. The manager's husband was violent towards one of the smallest children.

"I did not like the whole thing," said Devi. "We stayed hungry. We used to get sick always."

Devi and the other eight children — all from Humla — were then taken to a transit home in Kathmandu, operated by aid organisation Forget Me Not. It was founded more than a decade ago by a group of young foreigners including Australian lawyer Kate van Doore.

Forget Me Not started out operating an orphanage until Kate and her colleagues found out the children they were told were orphans had living parents. They were "paper orphans", made so only by their fraudulent documentation.

"It was a very emotional time because we had our suspicions by then, so to have them confirmed was emotional for us," said Kate. "It was just completely overwhelming shock I guess. It was a real shock."

"Love, you can't buy that. You can't just pay for that to happen. That needs to happen in a family."

Forget Me Not then completely changed its mission from orphanage to reuniting children with their families. The children are asked questions about their families and villages so the reintegration officers can trace their past.

"Reintegration officers are the ultimate detectives. They're working with tiny shards of information to try to piece together a child's history," Kate said.

It's a long and complicated process. Some of the children are so traumatised by their time in illegal orphanages they refuse to speak. It's an exercise in trust.

And there was another group whose trust Kate had to secure — Forget Me Not's financial supporters. She immediately told them the confronting truth: that the donations they had been making with the best of intentions were in fact driving the separation of children from their families. Incredibly, more donors came on board to support the charity's new vision.

Seven years later, Kate is concerned to see many Australians still funding and volunteering at orphanages, unwittingly perpetuating a multi-billion-dollar global industry that exploits children for profit.

"Even when we found family for these children, some of our donors and some Australians were saying to us, 'That's great that you found their family, but you won't let them go back there, will you? Back to poverty? Because the kids will be better off with you, won't they?

"Poverty is just a lack of resources. Resources we can fix. Love, you can't buy that. You can't just pay for that to happen. That needs to happen in a family."

A complicated reunion for mother and daughter

Devi and the other kids have been at the transit home for more than three months. The day has finally arrived for them to start the journey home to be reunited with their parents.

Bags are packed and beds are stripped. The children have red and white flannels pinned to their t-shirts so they can clean their faces on the long journey back to Humla. It will be two flights and at least a day's walk until they reach their villages.

"From the child's side, it's a very happy moment to meet their parents. But from the family side ..."

Forget Me Not works with local Nepalese organisation the Himalyan Innovative Society to deliver the children home safely.

"The children, they like their home," says DB Lama, director of the Himalayan Innovative Society. "Devi is very anxious to reach her village. So it's a very good journey for them. They are strong."

The small plane lurches up and down and side to side as it bumps its way through the clouds. Many of the children are clammy with air sickness. DB Lama reassures those who are struggling. He's from Humla too, so he knows how difficult the journey can be.

"Oh, it's very tough. Very tough, very rough," he says. "The people live in such conditions that nobody can imagine how tough their life is.

"The communities in Humla, they're very poor."

The children with strong stomachs look out the window, desperate for the first glimpse of their villages, as the aircraft gets closer to the capital of Humla, Simikot.

Simikot airport is at almost 3,000 metres above sea level. The pilot barely needs to make a descent. The runway is so notoriously dangerous it has its own collection of YouTube videos of crashes, near misses and heart-stopping landings.

But the flight lands safely. The children set foot on the ground in Humla for the first time in almost a year.

"From the child's side, it's a very happy moment to meet their parents," says DB Lama. "But from the family side ... they sent them for a better education — paid money — but now they're back."

Devi waits patiently all day as the parents of the other children arrive one by one. Her mother, Kalawati is still walking through the darkness to reach Simikot.

Eventually, it's time.

At first, Devi can only see her mother in silhouette walking up the passage way and hear the familiar jingle of her mother's traditional jewellery.

Then Kalawati emerges through the doorway. Devi rushes forward, bowing at her mother's feet, respectfully.

But her mother pushes her away and puts tradition first. Custom dictates she greets the men present before turning her attention to her daughter.

Devi cries, desperate for her mother's embrace.

Kalawati doesn't yet fully understand what her daughter has been through.

The reunion is awkward and complicated. Devi and the eight other children have returned to a life their parents didn't want for them.

Her village is deep in the mountains, in one of the most impoverished and isolated parts of Nepal. Humla ranks in the bottom three of Nepal's 77 districts on almost every measure of development.

Kalawati paid several months' earnings to send her youngest daughter to the capital Kathmandu and trusted she'd be looked after.

"We sent Devi for the best. My husband is simple, so we thought she would get a good education there. I was worried and I regretted sending her," Kalawati says.

It's only when Devi tells her of the awful conditions at the illegal orphanage that Kalawati starts to understand. There is a mixture of sadness, regret and frustration that her plans for her daughter have unravelled.

"I thought she was studying, so I didn't cry," Kalawati says. "I used to miss her a lot but I wanted her to get an education."

The relationship between mother and daughter is out of sync. Devi is worldlier after her time in the city. When she and her mum go to sign the documents confirming her return, Devi signs her name, but illiterate Kalawati can only leave a thumb print.

"Once they come back to their family, there is a hierarchy of family members. They have to respect each of the family members differently," says DB Llama.

The reintegration officers will monitor Devi for the next three to five years. Funding will be provided for her to attend the local school so she will receive an education, but be safe with her family.

Together, mother and daughter begin the walk from Simikot back to their village of Thali. Two aunties join the hike, Devi leads the way.

Her face is animated and full of contentment as she walks the tracks of the valley with her family.

The river roars below and the steep hillsides tower above. It is achingly beautiful. Women drying produce on the flat rooftops of their huts greet the women as they pass. Tea houses dot the path home.

Homes of mud brick and timber planks cling to the mountainside, amid rising tiers of green crop terraces. It's a precarious existence. Farmers are preparing stores for the cold months ahead when the snow will close in. Herds of livestock graze on the hillsides as craggy peaks shrouded in mist loom in the distance.

Mother and daughter walk hand in hand much of the way, their closeness returning as they walk the familiar path home.

News of Devi's return reaches the village before she does. Devi's older sister is standing dutifully to welcome the family back home. Devi bows and keeps walking.

The older sister who has been stuck back in the village and Devi who has experienced, lost and regained so much will have some talking to do. Later.

For now, it's just the simple pleasures. Devi stands in front of the house, soaking the golden light that peeks over the mountains and onto the village.

She and her mother and sister chew local cane, chat and laugh. This is home at last.

"Now that she is with us ... we will look after her and with your help we will provide education here," says Kalawati.

"I'm so happy Devi has returned home."

Watch the full episode of 'Paper Orphans' on iview and YouTube.

Credits Reporting Sally Sara Photography Alex Barry Digital production Matthew Henry Cinematography Ryan Sheridan Drone footage Anil Katwal

News archive courtesy Image Channel Nepal

Topics: human-trafficking, community-and-society, charities-and-community-organisations, children, family-and-children, relief-and-aid-organisations, international-aid-and-trade, human-interest, human, charities, nepal

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