Brijlal Chaudhari

I come from Nepal and grew up in a Tharu family that is indigenous to Terai, the southern plains. I have a BA in Economics and African Studies. Currently, I am studying Masters of Public Administration at Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey. Before Middlebury Institute, I was in Montreal as Jeanne Sauve Fellow. I worked as Chief Operation Officer for over five years at a youth-based, grassroots NGO called Sano Paila (A Little Step) in southern Nepal. I am also running Paurakhi Saving & Credit Co-operative Society Ltd. and providing access to financing for the rural population. While I was growing up, I read about armed conflict every day in Nepal. The Maoist rebels and security forces fought for a decade. Ten years after the conflict, the situation is still gloomy because the state is still prioritizing violence as a medium to suppress minority groups and their voices. Hence, the Summer Peacebuilding Program will be an excellent opportunity to identify conflicts and explore different kinds of conflicts and their root causes. I aspire to learn appropriate tools for dialogue, mediation, negotiation, arbitration, non-violence communication and practice them through field visits and working with a client.