ASD Human Rights Program in collaboration with the Madhesh Human Rights Home (MAHURI-Home) organized an interaction program on “Torture and Accountability” in Kapilvastu and Rupandehi on 3 and 4 July 2014 respectively. About 35 human rights defenders, journalists, civil society activists and government representatives participated in the program to explore the issues of torture in Madhesh and seek accountability to prevent and address the issue through dialogue among human rights defenders, torture victims and government authorities. The human rights defenders presented the cases of torture while victims shared their stories.  In the program, participants raised the concern of lacunas/ gap in the current Torture Act which has no provision of criminalizing torture. The discussions were followed by the responses from the government authorities who expressed their commitment to minimize the torture in their respective districts.