Some stories are so inspiring that they tend to make you forget your own pain and to appreciate & applaud someone’s courage. This woman not only struggled with Polio but also fought the abusive husband and inhumane in-laws for her rights.
What makes her story even more inspiring is how she healed her wounded soul by helping other women struggling with a similar battle. While sharing her inspiring battle with HoB, this inspiring woman, shared:
“I was detected with Polio when I was just one and a half years old. My parents thought I would be a burden, so before I turned 2, they got me married.
I got to know about this a couple of years later—and it felt so wrong. I couldn’t believe that my parents would do something like this just to get rid of me.
When I was 12, my husband started forcing me to work on his farm. I couldn’t even walk properly, but he didn’t care—I was treated like a slave. Then, he got married to another girl without my knowledge.
I wanted to leave, but my parents refused to accept me back, so I was forced to live under the same roof, with him and his other wife.
A few years later, my husband met with an accident and passed away—and that made my life worse. My in-laws started ill treating me. They wouldn’t allow me to go out and barely gave me anything to eat. They even falsely accused me of aborting a child I had through an ‘extramarital affair’.
I couldn’t take it anymore. From the time I was born my reality was a nightmare and it only kept getting worse. It was time for me to speak up.
When I finally did, I was thrown out of the house in the middle of the night. Then my in-laws filed a case against me—to take my share from the family property.
My life had become hell and I could sense my end coming soon. I had nothing and no one to live for. But I had promised myself that I wouldn’t end my life come what may. I lived with the belief that there would be hope; that life would get better.
During this time, someone advised me to take this matter up to the women’s grievance cell in Ajmer. I didn’t have the courage at first, but soon I realized—it’s now or never. So I approached the cell and there, for the first time…I was heard. They supported me, helped me fight the legal battle and at the end of it, I won! — I couldn’t hold back my tears.
That’s when I decided that I won’t let anyone suppress me any longer, and would dedicate my life to the service of uplifting women who had gone through trauma.
It’s been 20 years since that day, and I’ve helped over 2000 women. But, the fight is still on. My past still haunts me sometimes, but it also reminds me that it’s only when you decide to speak up and fight, will things change. I no longer hide myself behind a ‘purdah’ and have stopped living life according to societal norms.
I’ve even started wearing coloured clothes again! I’ve re-built myself from the ashes and broken free from the shackles that caged me for years. And if I can manage to help every woman who is fighting a similar battle, do the same, it would be a life well lived!”
At IFORHER, we applaud her courage to fight difficult circumstances to create a life of dignity and purpose. Neither the lack of her parents’ support nor her abusive husband & in-laws could break her spirit to bring a change in our society and people’s life.
We salute her and hope her story will inspire many more people to fight hard to create a life of dignity and purpose.
