Family

 “Mom”, I yelled.

 “I don’t want to clean! Why all this just for a day which simply passes by”.

Dad interrupted, “Ya if we didn't have Diwali some people would not even clean their houses”

Okay! I know it was a taunt for me

“I am cleaning dad, don’t add fuel on fire”

“Exactly! You today’s youngsters are of no use, you’ll only want to party, you’ll got no responsibilities, not bothered about traditions, cultures…” and I guess my mom continued till she realized that I was not listening.

I continued with my “mess-cleaning” removing old clothes, arranging books and my dad winked at me from behind the curtains.

‘That’s his hobby, why can’t mom realize dad’s having fun, why does she has to take everything seriously’, I murmured.

“Whatsapp?” my sweet little innocent brother obviously has amazing timings.

“Just go!”

“No, I am just asking ‘what’s up’?”

“I know what you are asking, go I said”

“Ya! You’ll only want phones all the time; I wonder with whom do you’ll chat so much? Even we don’t talk so much. It’s affecting your studies. See other students, they travel all over on scholarships, I am not saying you don’t study, all I am saying is you need to be focused, these computers and cell-phones will drag you down someday.”

And yes mind it- My mom never says anything, nobody’s mom actually does.

“Ya, Ya I know”

“Wait, let your friends come home today I’ll show them your cupboard. Let them also see how clean you are, I’ll even tell them you don’t brush or even take bath for days”

“Mom just two days I didn’t bathe, you are not telling my friends anything, whatever, even their cupboards are in the same condition”

“I am telling them, shouldn’t I?”

Out of everybody she asked dad, snap!

“Ya of course you should honey, let them also know how their friend is”

“Exactly” finally mom came down to one word replies.

“Mom just see they are laughing behind you”

Urgh! I got up and left disgusted, locked my room, sat up and reluctantly I smiled

‘Surely my family comes with a package of different opinions, but I love them, we all would be incomplete without each other and yes I am going to miss this once I leave this house’

No “honour” in killing

"Violence of women is always a violation of human rights; it is a crime. Let us take this issue with a deadly seriousness that it deserves."

-Ban ki-moon, United Nations Secretary General

September 2010- The decomposed bodies of Inder Pal (22), a farmhand, and Maya (18) were recovered from the fields of Phoolkan village, Sirsa. The couple were neighbours and wanted to marry. They were killed by the boy’s family. Inder was forcibly married two months before the couple was killed.

August 15 2013- Murder of a 15-year-old girl, whose body was found from Bhakra canal, patiala, turned out to be a case of honour killing with police alleging that she had been killed by her own parents.

18 September 2013- Dharmender Barak, 23, and Nidhi Barak, 20, were allegedly killed by members of Nidhi's family in Garnauthi village in the northern state of Haryana on that disgust Wednesday evening.

But honour killing is not only restricted to rural areas, it has also been reported in urban areas like Tamilnadu and Hyderabad.

Newspaper reported the story of an 18year old girl being tortured and beaten up for falling in love in Delhi, august 2013.

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Recently, there has been a spate of honor killings in the country. But what is honour killing?

"Honour killings" are murders by families on family members who are believed to have brought "shame" on the family name. The apparent "shame" could be caused by a victim refusing to enter into an arranged marriage or for having a relationship that the family considers to be inappropriate.

This tradition was first viewed in its most horrible form during the Partition of the country in between the years 1947 and 1950 when many women were forcefully killed so that family honour could be preserved.

When are we going to draw boundaries? Or are we just going to wait till our child is a victim of it?

 In May 2008, Jayvirsingh Bhadodiya shot his daughter Vandana Bhadodiya and struck her on the head with an axe.

In June 2012, a man chopped off his 20-year-old daughter's head with a sword in Rajasthan after learning that she was dating men.

Are we seriously living in 21^st century? Where one part of India is adapting the ‘live in relationship’ dogma, the other part is suffering through this? What is wrong in loving? Aren’t we taught to love and care since childhood? Castes matter so much? Aren’t the lower castes- ‘humans’? Don’t they have feelings?

Why are they even known as the ‘lower castes’? Why this bias? So many questions go unanswered. We all are human beings with feelings, emotions, god didn’t differentiate between us, aren’t these self-created boundaries?

We cannot fall in love and marry the person we love but we are expected to do an arranged marriage and loose our virginity the very same night with a ‘stranger’?

Is that our values? There is nothing wrong with arranged marriage but neither is love marriage wrong. With advancement in science and technology, film, agriculture, service sector, the mentality of the people need not necessarily be advanced.

Rich or poor, educated or uneducated- surely doesn’t matter. There is no honour in “killing”. Humans do not have the right to write down death sentences of innocent fellow humans.

According to a post in a well known newspaper on 18 September 2013, love-related disputes were the third most common motive for murder in 2012, after personal vendettas, and property disputes and affairs of the heart which resulted in 2,549 killings in 2011, up by 184 since 2010.

In some states, “love affairs/sexual causes” accounted for the highest number of murders, according to the 2012 data released by the National Crime Records Bureau.

The crime statistics bureau does not differentiate between murders because of relationships gone wrong and “honour” killings, despite repeated calls from activists for a separate record of crimes committed against couples who may break caste or religious barriers to marry.

Harsh Malhotra, who set up the voluntary organisation Love Commandos in 2010 to help protect young couples from their disapproving families, said that his organisation receives 600 to 700 phone calls every day from couples who face opposition from their families for marrying outside their caste or religion, with the most coming from Andhra Pradesh, followed by Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Punjab.

Haryana reported 50 relationship-related murders last year, while neighbouring Punjab had 83.

Even after getting married, some couples “have to run like they have committed a crime”, he said.

At least 1,000 young people are killed in the name of honour every year, according to figures compiled by the All India Democratic Women’s Association.

When love can be so fatal, why are we even taught to love? 66 years of independence and we are following these traditions? Why? Just because our parents followed them? Or their parents followed it? Lose your virginity the very first night and if the marriage fails-no issue but sleep with a man before marriage and if it fails-regret it? I am not writing something “illicit” here but I am a girl with principles and hence I am writing this. Times are changing and we need to change along, stand for ourselves, build our boundaries, our own principles and guidelines, walk on them and be tomorrow’s change. 

That pool of red paint

She lay in a pool of red paint. Being forced, raped, tortured and murdered. Another way of proving male chauvinism. Her family cried. The red painted wall had black spots. The girl who was two months pregnant was now dipped in red paint, merely because seven months later a girl child was expected to enter the world.