Sunday, December 17, 2000		Life Ties

Suffering: True test of womanhood?
By Taru Bahl

MUNNA was a beautiful child. Her doe-shaped eyes, dusky complexion and soft looks made her a head-turner while she was still a toddler. Her two elder brothers were her bodyguards. They followed her around taking their role as protectors rather seriously. Her mother was a teacher in a school and father a government servant in Pune. Their family life had its own rhythm and momentum. Munna’s was a predictable but stable childhood. She knew that the moment she turned 20 she would be married.

Her mother had equipped her with all the attributes that a prospective bride ought to have. Every summer vacation she would be packed off to some aunt’s house to learn embroidery, macrame, flower arrangement, music, cooking, baking and crochet. By the time she was in high school, she was the apple of many eyes. Several families in the neighbourhood had singled her out as a suitable bride for their sons, brothers, nephews or friends. She had an ethereal quality which made her appear innocent, fresh and untouched. She was soft spoken and there was nobody she did not get along with.

What made her even more attractive to the conservative middle class gentry was the values which had been instilled in her. While she was good at academics and extra curricular activities, she was not too career-minded, or assertive. An obedient child, she liked to fit herself into any mould her parents or elders wanted her to.

Just before her 20th birthday, she was visiting an aunt to discuss what she could do after her graduation. She wanted to study further and was not too sure if she wanted to do history or sociology. Shammi saw her there. He had this compulsive urge to possess her. He pursued her through an aunt and convinced her parents that he was the man they were looking for. He charmed his way into the family. Being a Major in the Army, he seemed responsible and honourable. He was 10 years older than Munna, but he was handsome and officer-like. She found him very different from the few men she had seen and known.

Shammi did not want any dowry. He just had ‘one demand’ — that his baraat have a good time since his wedding would be the first one for the family after 50 years. Seven hundred guests came from Jammu. The wedding ceremonies were spread over five days and by the end of it, Munna’s parents (although neck-deep in debt) felt they had executed their duty to perfection. Not a stone had been left unturned in terms of hospitality, festivity and gifts.

Shammi took Munna to Pathankot where he was posted. Trouble started from the day of the wedding. Shammi turned out to be an extremely possessive and suspicious spouse. He had checked out Munna’s ‘reputation’ in Pune through his network of well-connected friends. He was satisfied that that she was a sober girl. Yet he imposed a set of restrictions on her. All her sleeveless blouses were discarded. Though she was gifted with a beautiful voice and a sense of music and was sought after at parties and family functions, he forbade her to sing in public.

If she had to sing it had to be for his ears only. He didn’t allow her to socialise without him, not even with the other Army wives. If he found her exchanging more than just a few pleasantries with other fellow officers, he would interrogate her at night. What made her life truly miserable was his acute displeasure at her meeting her brothers and parents. Whenever they came to visit her, he would get into a wild rage, go on drinking binges and get abusive. He felt they would influence her against him and fill her mind with all kinds of radical ideas.

Though Munna’s parents instinctively knew how unhappy she was, they chose to keep silent. They were convinced that it was for her own good that they maintained a distance. They kept telling themselves that she was their girl and she could take much worse, besides she had three children to think of. It is not that they did not worry about her, or agonise over her plight and failing health. In fact, anxieties and tensions on this account had led to her mother developing angina and hypertension. Moreover, as their son-in-law did not like their frequent letters, phone calls and visits, they withdrew even more, "all for our daughter’s sake."

Her brothers were working in the Middle East. Whenever they came visiting, their blood would boil when they heard about their sister’s confinement in the glass palace, as they put it. The parents, however, forbade them from intervening. Munna too stopped reaching out, and devoted herself to the bringing up of the three children.

When a cousin visited her in Goa, she was shocked to see Munna. She was just 35 but totally despirited. Zombie-like, she performed her share of household chores. Shammi was a perfectionist and liked to own and display his collection of trophies, artefacts and souvenirs. Although the home was spic-n-span, the cousin felt it was eerie. In spite of having five vibrant people, the only person who would talk, laugh and joke was Shammi. The children were scared of him and tried to maintain minimum contact. Munna made no attempt to camouflage the fact that she was completely intimidated by him, if not terrorised. The cousin had intended to stay over a weekend but moved out after a day because she couldn’t take the stress and tension which kept hanging like a Damocles Sword over her head.

The first thing she did was to call up her aunt in Pune and tell her to do something about Munna. Her agitation was intense because she could not reconcile the image of her playful childhood cousin to what she had seen during the visit. Couldn’t she fight or stand up for herself? Did she actually believe that he did all this because he "loved her too much?" Wasn’t she an educated, city-bred girl who could fend for herself and her children? Not wanting to be at the receiving end of her sisters-in-laws’ taunts and ridicule or having to cope with questioning stares were surely not reason enough for staying on in a marriage which was so claustrophobic.

Her aunt silenced her agonising questions with a response which froze her heart. She said, "She is our daughter and, therefore, stronger than most people. If there was a system by which you could measure the suffering of a person, Munna’s name would figure in the Guinness Book of Records. Yet, in spite of all this see how she is bringing up her kids. Things are not as bad as you make them out to be. Stop getting hysterical and think of getting married yourself."

Within a month of this conversation, Munna’s parents got a call from Shammi asking them to take their daughter away. He wanted a divorce. He wanted to legitimise his relationship with a Nepali woman he had met during an army exercise in the Eastern sector. By the time Munna came home she was a complete wreck. Whether she would be able to restore her confidence and set her life back on the rails is debatable. But could she have averted this ultimate humiliation and rejection?

If her parents had taken a stand and extricated her out of her marital hell even when she herself was ambivalent are questions which the family must find answers to now. Munna carries a deep sense of isolation and hurt of being let down by her loved ones. She may continue to put on a facade of being alright. She may never turn around and accuse her brothers and parents for not having helped her when she needed them most. But surely this story could have had a different and more positive ending if only the parents had "interfered."