ALSphere Foundation
It was the fear of the stigma that took her away!
It cost two lives. Her life and the life of her unborn son!
I remember she was leaving for Patna by the early morning train. I was at the final stages of whisking a cake for her to take along as the shrill ring of the landline phone interrupted me.
‘She’s dead! She’s been killed! He strangled her with her gown belt!!’
I recognized the anguished voice of her brother followed by a loud wail at the other end.
Dead? Dead?? She was eight months pregnant and had been with us the previous evening along with her husband. I had seen her for the first time after her marriage and it seemed as if I was meeting a different person altogether. Gone was the girl who brightened the room with her laughter, replaced by someone who seemed burdened with life.
Just a few hours after I met her, her husband had killed not only her but the eight-month alive and kicking boy within her. Oh, how that unknowing poor unfortunate soul must have suffocated and died inside of her without ever taking an independent breath!
Overwhelmed by grief, I sank to my knees.
All had been well nine months ago…
She was the perfect bride every Indian household prayed for. She was beautiful, soft-spoken, skilled in cooking, painting, baking and what not. She lived in the house opposite to my in-laws and had become a dear friend. I was away in Assam with my husband and could not attend her wedding.
I reached Delhi nine months after her wedding. The next day her mother came to visit me. When I congratulated her she started crying. All was ruined she said! Her daughter was suffering tremendously. As parents, she and her husband were trying their best to sort out the matter.
My friend, her daughter was visiting Delhi on way to Patna the following day and I must meet her and make her understand that her life now belonged at her new home.
‘It seems that she is really in pain. How about divorce?’ I asked alarmed and concerned.
Divorce?? The pregnant daughter of a well-respected family!
Who wants a young recently married girl to come back? What would the relatives say? What would society say? The boy seemed mentally unstable but with love and dedication her daughter would be able to win him over especially now that she was about to deliver her baby.
Divorce was not to be considered. How would she face the world with the stigma of a Divorce? After marriage, the girl enters her new home alive in a ‘Doli’ and leaves on her ‘Arthi’ when she dies.
And so, my friend left on her ‘Arthi’ thirty-one years ago! Still married!!
Divorce continues to be a stigma across the country!
Fingers are pointed accusingly at a divorced woman!!
Lives continue to be sacrificed to uphold the false standards of our society!!!
