It was as regular a journey as any other day since it happened. But after knowing it was something more. Let me not waste your time. Here is a girl I have just got to know, namely, Shama. At the tender age of 16, She has probably saw life more than any one had. Coming from a rather humble background, her days as a child were so much different from the days that any child has the right over. When all her job should have been to play, her days went taking care of her differently-abled parents. it is something that we go to unimaginable depths looking for, so as to give some meaning to our empty lives. While there was clearly no denying fact that she was the guardian of parent's lives, the poor soul missed out on her childhood. Performing chores like cleaning the soiled diapers, changing rags that they had for bed-sheets over four times a day making the tender skin on her hands puckered, cooking meals, feeding them, cleaning around the house, she left her with no time, neither to take any lessons at school nor to go for playing. She endured it all, day after day, month after month, year after year until she once looked up and found a well dressed couple looking upon her with eyes of affection and empathy. She didn't understand what they were looking for until her mother explained her after they left that they want her to be a part of their family as their daughter-in-law. She felt nothing, having been rendered stoic, bolstered only by the occasional zephyr of faith quietly sweeping past her. Neither did she feel saddened at the prospect of leaving her parents nor did the countenance spoke of the slightest possibility of gladness at finally being able to escape a life of agony. Her eyes narrating a certain sort of woebegone, apparent only to someone who had courage enough to look deep into her soulful eyes, as if she knew.
She was welcomed into her new home with utmost sincerity, love and hope. Hope because that was what had kept her new family going. Hope that she would take care of her husband, bear beautiful kids and take care of the house. Her husband was just 18 and need looking after just like his parents did. He was differently-abled too and not as lucky as kids of his own age to be able to pursue a career or lead a normal life (who decides what normal is, anyway).
Her environment had changed, but her fate hadn't just as she had stepped into her new home, her mother-in-law had put all the domestic helps on an indefinite furlough. She believed that since she was being generous enough to take the only daughter of the family (that never even had enough food to live on most days) in, she had every right to get the most out of the poor girl's miseries, whose family wasn't in a position to say no to the proposition that had been made. She went about her life as though nothing had changed but, of course, something had. She started spending her days cooking meals for her new family with five members, scrubbing the toilets, taking care of her husband and listening to her mother-in-law ramble on about how she was there to bear children so they can grow up and take care of his father in the wheelchair and how she had a stature of not someone more than a domestic help and how the family had indeed done her family a favor by taking an uneducated girl off their hands.
Everything was going just how her mother-in-law had hoped it would until one day a friend of her, Manju came to her house to meet her daughter-in-law and spotted some marks on Shama's forearms. Upon inquiring, Manju learnt that Shama had been cleaning the house wearing an expensive coat that Manju's friend had gifted her and so she had let her have it. A long exchange of dialogues ensued in which the mother-in-law called Shama all sorts of names and told Manju that she had it coming. Manju saw how wrong her friend was to be beating up a child, who she brought away from her house promising her parents that she would give Shama the place of a daughter in their lives, for such a petty thing like that. Manju understood as did her friend that Shama was like a god's gift to them and their only shot at his son having a reasonable life ahead of him and yet Manju neither jumped to Shama's defense nor tried explaining to her friend that she's been abusing the child and punishing her for something that was the fault of none, but the fact that her only son was going to spend all his life in a wheelchair.
Let us not even try to tell ourselves that we understand the kind of life Shama has waiting for her. But not standing up for someone who has been silenced so much that she doesn't remember having a voice, made me feel just as guilty as the one committing the crime against her. To stand up for someone who clearly needs it is not as easy as giving a lecture or a suggestion. Feel responsible not in writing up these kind of articles but in finding the ways to stand by the side of people who are in absolute need. Guess you might be waiting to see the end of the page. Concluding my part with hoping to see a change.
She was welcomed into her new home with utmost sincerity, love and hope. Hope because that was what had kept her new family going. Hope that she would take care of her husband, bear beautiful kids and take care of the house. Her husband was just 18 and need looking after just like his parents did. He was differently-abled too and not as lucky as kids of his own age to be able to pursue a career or lead a normal life (who decides what normal is, anyway).
Her environment had changed, but her fate hadn't just as she had stepped into her new home, her mother-in-law had put all the domestic helps on an indefinite furlough. She believed that since she was being generous enough to take the only daughter of the family (that never even had enough food to live on most days) in, she had every right to get the most out of the poor girl's miseries, whose family wasn't in a position to say no to the proposition that had been made. She went about her life as though nothing had changed but, of course, something had. She started spending her days cooking meals for her new family with five members, scrubbing the toilets, taking care of her husband and listening to her mother-in-law ramble on about how she was there to bear children so they can grow up and take care of his father in the wheelchair and how she had a stature of not someone more than a domestic help and how the family had indeed done her family a favor by taking an uneducated girl off their hands.
Everything was going just how her mother-in-law had hoped it would until one day a friend of her, Manju came to her house to meet her daughter-in-law and spotted some marks on Shama's forearms. Upon inquiring, Manju learnt that Shama had been cleaning the house wearing an expensive coat that Manju's friend had gifted her and so she had let her have it. A long exchange of dialogues ensued in which the mother-in-law called Shama all sorts of names and told Manju that she had it coming. Manju saw how wrong her friend was to be beating up a child, who she brought away from her house promising her parents that she would give Shama the place of a daughter in their lives, for such a petty thing like that. Manju understood as did her friend that Shama was like a god's gift to them and their only shot at his son having a reasonable life ahead of him and yet Manju neither jumped to Shama's defense nor tried explaining to her friend that she's been abusing the child and punishing her for something that was the fault of none, but the fact that her only son was going to spend all his life in a wheelchair.
Let us not even try to tell ourselves that we understand the kind of life Shama has waiting for her. But not standing up for someone who has been silenced so much that she doesn't remember having a voice, made me feel just as guilty as the one committing the crime against her. To stand up for someone who clearly needs it is not as easy as giving a lecture or a suggestion. Feel responsible not in writing up these kind of articles but in finding the ways to stand by the side of people who are in absolute need. Guess you might be waiting to see the end of the page. Concluding my part with hoping to see a change.
