Asma BK hits the ground running

Asma BK has been running all her life: she ran away from her home in Rolpa at age 13, became a child worker in a brick kiln in Kathmandu, ran from job to job. Rescued by a child shelter, she now runs marathons.

On 27 April, Asma finished the London Marathon in 3 hours and 27 minutes and was in the top 15% of 56,640 runners. She was representing Nepal and the organisation that helped transform her life, Child Rescue Nepal (CRN).

“This was my first time outside Nepal, and I was nervous because I had not run in a race with so many participants,” Asma told us after returning to Kathmandu. “Everyone was so much taller than me.” 

Today at 22, Asma is already a high-level trail runner. In 2022, she completed the Manjushree Trail Race, a 100-mile tack around the rim of the Kathmandu Valley, in 39 hours and 51 minutes: the fastest time for a female and fifth fastest overall. 

Asma was born in the remote mountains of Rolpa, and lost her mother when she was 10. Her father was away. At 13, she and a friend decided to run away from home. Like many Dalit families from Rolpa, she found work in a brick kiln on the outskirts of Kathmandu.

“It was very difficult, we worked from five in the morning till seven in the evening,” Asma recalls. A 2021 survey showed that there were nearly 35,000 children between the ages of 5-17 working in brick kilns. The numbers of child workers on farms, in eateries or as domestic workers has never been counted.

After two weeks of dusty work carrying bricks, Asma knew she had to get out. Her older sister found her a job in a guesthouse near the bus park in Gongabu. But the work was hardly easier.

“The owner of the guesthouse would shout at me all the time, and it was very distressing,” Asma says. But she found a way to cope. One of her duties was to help the employer’s  children with their homework, and Asma taught herself to read and write.

The guesthouses around Gongabu bus park are notorious for being a hotbed for child trafficking. Shakti Samuha, a group established and run by human trafficking survivors since 1996, identified Asma as being at high risk of being sold to sexual slavery and rescued her.

Asma was taken to a shelter run by the Esther Benjamin Memorial Foundation, where she studied and completed a vocational training program. The classes opened up a whole new world for her.

“I didn't even have the confidence to speak up and write my own name, but soon I could converse in English with different people,” Asma says. 

In 2022, the renowned Nepali ultra-marathoner Mira Rai was holding trail running programs for girls who rescued girls. Like Mira, as a child Asma was used to running up and down mountains back home in Rolpa and she discovered that she had remarkable endurance and stamina.

“Running came easy for me,” she told us. “As a child, when I ran my head cleared up and I would not think of my mother.”

Asma trained for the race for four months, largely on her own. Having escaped her previous circumstances was a huge driving force, and not something she took for granted. 

“I had to put up with a lot of pain, and I felt that I have to keep working hard so that I do better in life,” she says. 

In London, Asma found herself running against athletes dressed up as refrigerators and washing machines. She expected to finish in under three hours, but says it was a hot day and the sun was very strong. 

Bhaskar Karki of CRN says the London race gave Asma new exposure and confidence. “I've found her more determined than ever to continue running and to represent Nepal on the global stage.”

Asma has moved out of her shelter, and joined the Armed Police Force team to train at the Lagankhel track. Future plans? Asma says: “I hope to run in big international trail races and one day coach children in circumstances similar to mine.”