[2][3] Another term, kodarwa, is often used to refer to strong men who cultivate the lands of landlords for wages or payment of debt, similar to haruwas.
[4] Even when only the patriarch of the family is contracted as a haruwa, the women and children are forced to work for the same landlord for little or no payment; such a woman worker is referred to as jaan.
[4] Families in extreme poverty, usually from the historically disadvantaged castes,[5] enter into a haruwa–charuwa contract with landowners, called jamindars or girahats,[3] forced by economic circumstance.
[6] Due to a lack of bargaining power, they are forced to accept outrageous interest rates, often compounded,[4] which means that the debt can never be repaid via labour.
[8][9] A less egregious form of haruwa–charuwa practice involves families in extreme poverty working on a temporary or seasonal basis under unfair contracts.
[8] There is a very high incidence of forced child labour, often unpaid, including children under the age of ten, among the haruwa–charuwa families, who are often also subjected to emotional and physical as well as sexual abuse.
[11] A Freedom Fund survey estimated the number of bonded labourers under the haruwa–charuwa system nationwide at around 97,000 adults and 13,000 children.
[1] Nepal has previously categorically abolished the kamaiya and haliya systems and freed thousands of bonded labourers, many of whom have begun to return to their former masters due to severe poverty and lack of alternative opportunities for livelihood.
[10][3] The interim constitution of 2007 stipulated a policy for upliftment of marginalised communities including haruwa–charuwas; however, it has not resulted in any concrete programmes.
[3] In the annual budget for economic year 2011–12, the government had included provisions for education and employment of haruwa–charuwa communities and for providing loans at affordable rates for self-employment.
[3] Haruwa–charuwas have not been able to benefit from similar such programmes of subsequent years that target the economically marginalised communities and freed forced labourers, for the same reason.
The programme aimed at sustainable elimination of child labour and reintegration of families under forced-labour systems as free and economically independent members of the society.