I started writing this topic long time back. Considering the seriousness and controversiality of it, I did not feel like posting it for a long time. I just decided to make full use of my "freedom of expression".
These days we discuss a lot about human rights. I am not here to discuss the meaning of the term, I leave that to wiki. I just want to narrate a small incident which took place quite a few years back:
I was traveling in a local train. Being a Sunday the train was free from its regular rush. Suddenly I heard a woman yelling and crying, though all in rural Bengali, I could understand no word of it. Generally I am not a very inquisitive person, and like keep out of personal affairs of anyone. Somehow, this time I could not hold myself back. The train had stopped at a station and a man was desperately trying to pull a girl in late teens out of the train. Both of them were dressed shabbily and looked typically the way rural India, Below Poverty Line depicts. They were surrounded by curious people all trying not to miss a single moment of the show. Lewd remarks came about bringing family issues in public and creating a scene from a sober semi-urban gentleman. Without any thought, I held the hand which was dragging the teenager and said : "Chharun. Ok chharun bolchhi. (Leave her, Just leave her I said)". The man, hardly in early twenties looked at me and got very puzzled. This was perhaps the first time someone came in between him and his wife creating menace in public. I heard the some rural women, passengers in the same train coming up with the excuse that the man is the girl’s husband! I told the man that he has got no right to beat his wife, even if he is her husband. Whether it was the steel in my voice or the abruptness of the situation I don't know, the man left his wife. By this time the train started and the man got out to the station. The poor girl was narrating her life, how she is beaten each and every day. Today she found a chance to escape and just ran to the station and caught this train. She even gave birth to a child(probably a girl), who was mercilessly killed by her husband and in-laws. I could not catch her entire story since by this time many rural "well-wishers" were already comforting her and her tongue was also different from the urban Bengali that we speak. She got down at a station from where she could reach her parents place.
This happens perhaps in every corner of the world. How many of us give it a proper thought! We only start talking about it when we see someone very near, suffering. I would have loved to take this as a one off case, but unfortunately its not. What bothered me more were the remarks of the crowd present inside the compartment. They were telling me that the guy is her husband, subtly implying that I have not understood the situation fully and that is why I have come to rescue and since a man is executing his birth right of beating his wife, I should not intrude. I still cannot forgive myself for not accompanying her to the police station. God knows what happened to her after that. Maybe after a few days she was sent back to her in-laws to get the remaining quota of abuse and merciless beating!
I am not saying that the entire society is moron. The above were only the remarks passed by some rural uneducated people. What depresses me more is the way we educated people think. Most of the guys I have spoken to do not want to give this a thought! My friends take it personally and often come up with excuses as if it is him who has done the crime, or better they avoid it altogether. My colleagues argue that IPC section 498A is absurd and utter rubbish. It is just a weapon to put poor guys in trouble. Yes, I am aware of the fact that like others, this section of the law has also been misused. But more than 90% of the cases filed are true events.
63 years of independence! Do all of us have the right to live freely? Do all of us execute our rights properly? I have so many things in my mind. Putting all those would be too much for one topic. I leave it to my friends to interpret and let me know what you feel.
