The life of a promising girl that smashed by the ‘gentle’ rapists

Ebadul Haque ।।

Bangladesh has the highest prevalence of early marriage in the world. Poverty, social customs, ignorance, and superstitions are the critical reasons behind early marriage enhancement. Girls are considered as the burden of a family. They hardly find family support to bring out their latent talent and go forward to fulfill the cherished dream.

Nobody feels their grievance and hardship- it’s a common scenario of our rural areas. Do our urban girls afford to lead their life at large? They do, but the scale is not up to mark.  They have to struggle much as well to get rid of the blow of early marriage.

Most of them abide in an educated society, their parents are conscious, and they have no financial crisis to adhere to the ultimate destination. Why are they dropping out from their goal early then? It appears to me like a burning question after witnessing a pathetic incident.

I was speechless when I failed to secure a promising girl’s life from the early marriage. Now I’m going to reveal the tragic life story of a multi-talented, hard-working, and adept girl.

Supriya (pseudonym), one of my students, got married before 18. She is blessed with beauty and talent. Her family is well off and educated; her eyes seemed bristle with ambition. Despite all the privileges, he had to give in the fate. No sooner had she completed the higher secondary examination, her family married her to an emigrant. She tried heart and soul to convince her family, but her attempt went in vain.

I also tried my level best to get the easy and free girl out of such bounding. But I had to back down, realizing the heart-rending cry of her parents. What happened to her family? Neither were they unable to afford her expenditure, nor they had greed for anything. But they had to sacrifice their all cherished expectations without disclosing the truth.

Do you want to know the actual reason? It’s the oppression of `gentle’ rapists. Yes, the `gentle’ rapists are roaming around all over the country. We can’t recognize them. They’re thrashing our girls. Nobody can take action against them due to several barriers. Let me explain the signs of those gentle rapists and their misdeeds.

Since I had a strong bonding with her family, I went to her parents to discover the reasons behind such a tough decision. Her father desisted from sharing anything with me considering social status. But I stuck to my approach and at last succeeded. Her mother agreed to express some words to me.

It was evening, I was taking tea, Supriya was weeping. Her mother began with a long breath and told me all the tragic incidents of Supriya’s life. After comprehending everything, I couldn’t but support her family. It’s not possible to cover all the phenomena in words. I have to explain some in a nutshell.

When Supriya was in class 5, they lived in a rent house. The homeowner was about 60 years old. One day her parents were out of home, and she was alone. The older man came to their apartment and asked for her parents. She replied as usual.

When she was on the point of shutting the door, the man entered the room again and started embracing her. She was at a loss and unable to get herself free. Had the maid-servant not appeared then, something unexpected may be happened. Since then, her parents found the society insecure for their girl.

She was in class 8, one of her father’s business shareholders came to their house. Her mother was asleep, and her father was outdoor then. She called her father over the phone, and her father told her to treat the man some food until he returns.

When she appeared with snacks to the visitor, he (visitor) requested her to sit next to him. Supriya refused his proposal showing some excuses. But the stranger kept asking her various questions and started to come close to her.

She brought the previous incident in mind and tried to run away. But all of a sudden, the man started rubbing her body. She was not ready for such an embarrassing moment. Hearing her shouting, her mother came, and she got exempt this time as well. This incident made her parents wholly broken.

She had to concede another unbelievable sexual harassment by her close relative. It was a marriage ceremony of her uncle. Their full family was there, and she was enjoying the moments with her cousins. One night while she was sleeping together with her cousin sisters, she discovered someone is trying to put off her clothes. The room was dark; she couldn’t identify anyone.

After a while, she realized someone was touching her sensitive parts. She shouted and found it was one of her cousins who break into her room to rape her. Nobody believed her except for her parents.

Another issue that every girl has to encounter is the relationship proposal. As Supriya is pretty enough, she got dozens of love proposals in the high school level.  She refused all the boys for the sake of securing a bright future. But one of them came to her life as a curse.

A boy used to disturb her on the way to school and coaching. He always abused her, apprehended her hand, and reinforced her to accept the proposal. Even one day, the audacious boy kissed her in front of thousands of people. She was broken down on this incident and shared it with her parents. Her father complained to the boy’s parents, but no result was found.

Being seized with the excessive tease, her father filed a case against the boy. But nothing came in favor of the family. The boy’s family was mighty enough to tackle everything. Meanwhile, the neighbor started to accuse Supriya of such an incident.

The relatives also found fault with her. They had not much strength to side against the boy and protest the harassment. Her father was also unable to appoint a safeguard for her girl due to several restrictions.

Finally, he had to take a tough decision that appeared in his mind long before after encountering all the past tragedies. Thus a life of a promising girl got ruined. I was unable to do anything for the girl and her family as well.

There are millions of Supriya in our country who are going through such unexpected affairs. Nobody is taking action against those `gentle’ rapists. At the end of the day, the rapists prevail, and the victims get smashed. Do we actually know the sexual harassment is being the prime reason behind early marriage in recent days? How can we hope for an equal society without eradicating the rapists?

We must come forward to make a safe and protected society for our girls. If we fail to create a favorable environment for our girls now, we will appear in the first place in the ranks of early marriage and sexual harassment in the world before long. We will also miss out lots of promising Supriya in the near future.

 

(The views and opinions expressed by the writers are those of their own and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of Feminist Factor)