Arsh was the ONLY child of her parents. She was by all means a typical sweet,
lively and charming teenager who becomes center of attraction as she makes her
way through the crowd. She was loved and adored by all her family members.
Friends, cousins, relatives, .. all seemed to feel happy and comfortable around
her. She had a ‘forever-ready-to-avail-every-chance-to-be-happy’ kind of
personality. She had reserved yet friendly behavior.. she was blessed with such
a radiant personality that no one could take their eyes off her.
But that is all gone now. It’s all past. She is not what she used to be.
Something has changed her. but what? ..
This is about a little girl, Arsh, who had to pay a very high cost to understand
how this world works…
This is about an incident which completely.. COMPLETELY broke her existence.
It’s about the devastation that turned her into a living dead. It’s about the
girl who became a victim of the desperate social evil of this society.
Gone the girl once she used to be. Her twinkling eyes which once had the power
to sparkle through the dark are full of gloom and pain now. The wind her heart
held, used to jiggle the world in joy and glee but that wind has stopped
blowing. Her heart has gone still because its crippled and broken. She has lost
her charismatic self. Her self-esteem is crushed to the point that its next to
impossible to bring it back to the level once it was.
She stays in her room all the time. She doesn’t even like to talk to her mother
whom she considered her best friend.
“What has turned her into a cold person?” One of her Aunts asked.
“COLD?
No, DAMAGED” Her mother answered trying to cover the pain in her tone.
4 years have gone by but nightmares still don’t let Arsh sleep. She suddenly
wakes up, seems scared. Shivering with pain and horror she hugs her knees to
herself , her arms tighten around them and her gaze shifts horrifyingly fast
from one corner of the room to the other. It breaks her mother heart to see her
only child like this way, so small and frightened and hurt. It makes her want to
rewind the time and undo the incident that damaged her daughter. She silently
prays to God to get her back to life. The happy life she was born with.
Its been 4 years since she’s spoken to anyone. she is becoming expressionless by
each passing moment, not laughing or crying either. She seems to be gone too far
from the dimension in which we live..
Her mother craves to hear her sweet, cackling laugh. She blames herself for this
loss. She knows that she cannot forgive herself no matter what she does. She
could have protected Arsh, only if she had understood what she meant when she
said “Don’t let him in mother. I don’t like him. He is not a good man”. Only if
she could read Arsh’s eyes. She unintentionally led other man destroy not only
her daughter’s life but her life also.
Arsh is no longer the girl who is adored by everyone. She is just another victim
of desperate social evil. Her 1st cousin raped her in her own house and torn her
life into pieces. She lost all hope in humanity. She is physically alive but
inside.. she’s dead.
They tell us to protect ourselves from the outside world but what about the evil
souls which follow us in our family?
Rape is a social evil. No one is immune to it, and age is no bar. It has ruined
many lives and continues to do so at a frenetic pace. From infants to senior
citizens to corpses, rape has become a diabolic symbol of power in an iniquitous
world. The tragedy is that 80% are perpetrated by fathers, brother, relatives or
friends. Six out of ten occur in the home or in the home of a relative or
friend.
The lines of communication between parents and their children should always be
tension-free. Children must be made aware that there is a small number of wicked
people in society and they need to learn to protect themselves from those wicked
people. Parents should also be alerted by sudden withdrawal, loss of appetite,
nightmares or refusal to go to school, and investigate into the matter.