Being women: Then and Now
Dr. Mohammad Omar Farooq
[These messages were published in NABIC-L on July 5, 1999]
Salam and greetings.
Two recent stories drew my attention and are weighing heavily on my mind. In this part I, I include those two stories. My comments follow in Part II.
=================== Story I ===================
THEIR ORDEAL DO NOT END WITH DEATH
From Ehsanul Haq [Courtesy: Daily Star, July 4, 1999]
NARAYANGANJ, July 3: Ordeals of a sex worker do not end with her death. She has to bear with social vilification and disregard as long as she is alive. After death, she is destined to more humiliation.
Authorities of graveyards do not allow a sex worker's body to be buried in there. Any voluntary organization also does not want to take the bodies of sex workers for burial.
Jesmin of Tanbazar brothel is no exception. Her body is now getting decomposed at the Narayanganj General Hospital morgue after autopsy. She was killed at the brothel on Thursday.
Authorities of all the graveyards in Narayanganj have refused to allow Jesmin's body to be buried in there. A local non-government social welfare body, Tanzim Association, which takes responsibility of burial of unclaimed bodies, has also refused to take her body for burial.
The same thing had happened to another sex worker, Mala, who was killed on May 29. Father of the girl took the body from hospital but returned it to the hospital after he failed to manage a burial for her daughter.
Authorities of graveyards in Narayanganj refused to allow Mala's body to be buried in there. After several days, the hospital authorities could manage a burial for the decomposed body along with some other unclaimed bodies.
The fate of sex workers coming other than Muslim families is worse. There is no organisation to bury their bodies.
It may be mentioned here that sex workers at Daulatdia, one of the biggest brothels in country, are also deprived of burial. Their bodies are thrown into the Padma, flowing nearby.
Talking to this correspondent, some inmates at Tanbazar brothel urged the government to make an arrangement for burial of sex workers. "As human beings, can't we expect a decent burial after a lifelong repression and social vilification?", asked a sex worker.
======================= Story II ========================
Courtesy: Daily Ittefaq, July 5, 1999 (translated from Bengali report)
Beaten and acid-burnt Rashida dies
Severely beaten and acid-burnt by unknown assailants, Rashida (30) died at Dhaka Medical College Hospital yesterday.
While asleep with her two children late Saturday night in Nawabganj Park slum, four assailants arrived and began beating her badly. At that time her two children Masud (8) and Shilpi (6) woke up. Nobody from the neighborhood responded at the heart-rending cries of their mother. They were hiding in silence in fear of the assailants. After beating her severely, the assailants poured acid on her private parts. Then, they tied her hands and feet, raised above and dropped her to the ground. Then, leaving her in this serious condition the assailants fled.
After the assailants left the scene, the two children started crying holding their unconscious and injured mother. Late at night lot of people heard the cries of these children, but once again no one arrived at the scene. People informed the police of the incident next morning. Police took unconscious Rashida to the hospital in the morning. The children were crying over their mother just an hour before her death. Observing the cries of the grief-stricken children, the patients, visitors, nurses and other staff of the Ward #33 also broke into tears. At 4 am Rashida breathed her last.
Learning the death, the two children, while holding each other, cried where they would go. There was not anyone to meaningfully comfort them.
According to some residents of the slum, those assailants have been pressuring her to have sex with them, which she has been repeatedly refusing. This barbaric attack was result of her not complying with their wish. According to Masud (8), his grandparents live in a village in Comilla. His father works abroad, but does not remit any money for the family. They came with their mother to Dhaka to survive. The whole day Rashida used to crush bricks and barely made living with her two children. They used to live in a shackle in Nawabgonj Park slum. A case has been filed with the police, but none of the assailants has been arrested so far.
Being Women: Then and Now - Part II
Assalamu alaikum.
I am writing this part not to make any intellectual argument. These are just some scattered thoughts and emotions, as last night when I first read those two stories in Part I, about Mala whose ordeal would not end with death, and about Rashida who faced the most barbaric death without anyone responding to her or her children's cry of their lifetime, I was simply overwhelmed.
Being women rarely has been easy. Physically they have been generally weaker of the two sexes. Thus, men have always dominated them, taken advantage of them, objectified them for sex and exploitation. Emotionally they are more vulnerable than us, their "worse half". Thus, when it comes to relationships they don't generally have any say whether to have children or not, or how many. If husband-wife relationship breaks up, who do usually end up with the children? The single mothers! Even in countries such as the USA, there are disproportionately more single mothers than single fathers taking care of children. Most mothers simply can't walk away from the reproductive bond they have engendered; but we, the men, can and usually do.
Mala and Rashida are not isolated cases in Bangladesh. Indeed, the broader reality is much worse. Rashida did not yield to the pressures even without any security or protection. Rashida, the fool, stubborn, and self-respectful! Most Rashidas have already become SAFE by yielding. What right do you have, Rashida, not to yield?
Yet, the cruelty and inhumanity associated with these stories are simply numbing. Last night I could not sleep, not that regularly I am a good sleeper. But the wind was strong. With the windows closed, there were all sorts of noises playing on various parts of the home. Most of these noises did not mean anything, but my numbed emotion still kept hearing the imagined sounds of heart-rending cry, of clamoring scream of pain - it wasn't Rashida, rather the humanity was under attack and no one responding. I wasn't there, but so what. Would I have responded? I don't know.
What about Mala, whose ordeal did not end even with her death? Who doesn't know that in countries like Bangladesh the vast majority of Malas are drawn to this form of livelihood primarily for two reasons: life of dire, extreme poverty often without any recourse; or the most common reason, seduction/abduction and forceful induction of these poor girls at their young age. Once in, it is like Roach Motel: like a roach you can check in, but can't check out.
First, the society fails our women/girls by not protecting them from predatory forces or from the realities of poverty. Then, we have no alternative either to show them way out or to rescue them from their trap. [Many remain literally under threat for life, assuming they would have any life outside anyway once they are in.] Then, I can't imagine how our super-high moral egos reject their dead bodies.
It reminded me of times when female infants used to be buried alive. Being women was not easy at those times; how easy is it now? As my wandering thoughts sucked me into a trance, I visioned a trial. The defendants included me and many faces and names I knew and others I did not. The plaintiffs: a good number of female infants who were buried alive, Rashidas, - I don't know may be even Mala, too. As I sweated with goosebumps all over my body, I kept hearing a somber voice asking not me or other defendants, but those infants, Rashidahs and others:
"For what crime she was killed?" [al-Qur'an/81/at-Takwir/8-9]
"For what crime she was killed?..."
"For what crime she was killed?..."
I started scratching my head and started playing with my beard, but my beard was not long enough.
So many thoughts, feelings, images ran across my mind's screen. My trance was broken with my younger child, a daughter, who needed recomforting to return to her sleep. My fear turned into anger. I kept hearing a distant voice, sounded like Forrukh Ahmed, but echoing someone like Rashida:
"He joro shobhyota!
mrito-shobhyotar dash sphitomed shoshok shomaj!
manusher obhishap niye jao aj;
tarpor ashile shomoy
bishshomoy
tomar srinkholgoto mangshopinde PODAGHAT HANI
NIYE JABO JAHANNAM DAR-PRANTE TANI;
AJ EI UTPIRITO MRITTU-DIRNO NIKHILER OBHISHAP BOW:
DHONGHSHO HOW, TUMI DHONGHSHO HOW!!
Another voice started playing on me with words that I always have cherished in my own mind. A reassuring communist voice, Bhupen Hajarika. It kept singing in my ears in lyrics mixed with my own words:
Boroshar brishti bheja rate
brishtite bhejano rate, brishtite bhejano rate
bostrobihin kono khet mojurer
bhenge pora kutirer
dhiki dhiki jole thaka
tushe dhaka aguner
roktim jeno ek uttap hoi, roktim jeno ek uttap hoi, roktim jeno ek uttap hoi.
brishtite bhejano rate, brishtite bhejano rate
britishte bhejano rate
shonkhaGURU kono shomprodayer
bhoyarto RASHIDAR na phota artonad
jokhon gumre kade, ami jeno tar nirapotta hoi, nirapotta hoi, nirapotta hoi....
roktim jeno ek uttap hoi,
prochondo jeno ek protap hoi,
ami jeno tar nirapotta hoi,
ami jeno shudhakontho hoi.
Boroshar brishti bheja rate,
brishtite bhejano rate.
Ah! This was sung by a communist, not any Muslim or Islamic scholar. Of so many books I read, a communist had the tune to play the music of humanity on my heart! [If you have not listed to the song, here is an audio file.]
I offered, which usually lazily I don't, some late night prayer, for me and for my dear ones, and then for Rashida, Masud, Shilpi, and o yes, for Mala too.
Quickly I returned to bed. The train of thought was still in station, and I jumped on again. We, who are parts of the middle class, sometimes do become victims, but rarely like Rashida or Mala. Quite unconsciously, uncontrollably - betraying my better masculine sense and disposition - a few drops of tear rolled, but soon dried up in the sandy desert of my human conscience.
I asked:
"He mor agneyo bokhkho
he mor agneyo bokhkho oschru koi tomar shilay!
jomeche kannar megh tomar shikhore
oschru koi ontore tomar? [He more agneyo bokhkho; Forrukh Ahmed]
I realized my sobering logic was returning in full force. After all, there are just too many Rashidas or Malas to do anything about it. Also, it was not anyone I knew or anyone close to me. It was not my mother, sister or daughter!
I wanted to say:
"jobe utpritier krondon rol akashe batashe dhonibe na
ottacharir khorog kripan bhim ronobhume ronibe na
bidrohi ronoklanto
ami shei din hobo shanto. ..." [Najrul: Bidrohi]
But my sleepy eyes kept saying:
"klanti amar khoma koro probhu..." and I guess passing the twilight zone of consciousness, sometime I did fall asleep.
I am better now, returning to my senses. I forgot I have an exam to put together. I still have not purchased presents for my daughter's upcoming birthday. I need to pick up two rose bushes for my wife's backyard garden before the store closes. Yesterday, "am diye dudh bhat" tasted delicious - I need to pick up some more mangoes. I have to give finishing touch to my paper on technological change. It's alright, I am better now.
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