“It is now just three months left for your delivery. Moreover, the doctor has advised you relative bed rest,” he said to his wife. “I think you should now move to your parent’s home till you deliver the baby”, he added. “Shall I be at your home only when I am in good health?” the wife retorted.
“What do you mean to say ‘your home’?” he said raucously. “I mean nothing. Just to know whether I have got the desired acceptance in this house, even after being a mother of a two-year-old daughter”? she replied discreetly, taking a deep sigh and added, “By the way, home receives the person in all shades, well or unwell. Isn’t it so?” Hearing this, the husband left the room fuming, “I don’t want to enter into any arguments. It is useless”. The door bunged up.
She sat wordlessly on the bed, ruminating over the ‘traditional bogus’. She knew that most of the women in Kashmir are born to digest and comply with this kind of ‘customary norm’. After a pause, she rang up her mother.
Actually, the husband could never comprehend that his wife was a woman who knew what sacrifice and patience means. It is never so easy to get uprooted for replanting yourself in an unfamiliar soil. And remain patiently strong to survive in the strange soil forever.
She had already excelled with the highest level of forfeit and endurance by entering into wedlock, leaving all her nears and dears after thirty long years, just for him and his family.
Few days later, she went to her mother’s place along with her little daughter. The brother had come down to take her. Her coming meant frequent follow-ups, regular antenatal examinations and all terminal pregnancy precautions as a troubled package for her frail mother. And the mother put up all this lovingly for she knew what the parents of many married daughters in Kashmir have to bear to maintain their marital world!
One day, the dusk appeared quite depressing and with the gradual approach of night, the daughter complained of lower abdominal pain. She was rushed to the maternity hospital and hurried away to the operation theater.
Her mother, who wore an uncertain and despondent look, was anxiously waiting outside the theater. The wellbeing of her doting daughter was the prime concern.
All of a sudden, the door creaked and the doctor came out. The mother stood up from the waiting bench in the corridor and went speechless. Doctor looked into her eyes.
There were drenched unsaid queries. “She has delivered a baby girl”, the doctor declared. “How is she?” mother asked intensely. “She is fine, we will just hand her over to you”, the doctor answered cheerlessly. “No, I mean to say my daughter”, mother reacted impulsively. “She is still unconscious… but we are trying….” doctor replied. “I want to see her”, mother interrupted distressingly. The doctor stood mute.
She developed some delivery related complications. The mother was down in the dumps. Gathered courage and went to see her inside the recovery room.
She sat beside her, disconsolate and dejected. While she caressed her head, the daughter opened her eyes and looked towards her broken mother. She was too drained to speak anything. “God has blessed you with another daughter”, the sobbing mother whispered in her ears. Her condition was deteriorating.
The dreams that she had weaved for her prosperous marital life were tangled. The void in the eyes of her daughter conveyed something cosmic but unfathomable. She was leaving behind two small kids, absolutely alone, in the sea of good and bad people.
Out of the blue, she started gasping. Pulse went feeble and her blood pressure was not recordable. Mother was helpless. She could do nothing but see her daughter breathing her last.
Doctors tried to resuscitate her but all in vain and had nothing to say except ‘we are sorry’. The fatal words pushed mother to the wall. For doctors, it was just another maternal mortality. But for the frail old mother, the apple of her eyes was lost.
The most ill-fated moment for a mother was to mourn the death of her young daughter. Destiny neither allowed the neonate girl to see the face of her mother nor did it let the mother feed her.
The daughter had left two small angels for her mother as a source of both joy and pain. Now the old granny wanted to live for them. She thought of reliving her daughter through her granddaughters.
No sooner did this feeling help her to take respite from the untimely shock, fate had some more suffering in store for her. The father of two small daughters started claiming his “inheritance right” over them.
From asking about the personal belongings of his deceased wife to counting and enquiring for the material things he had given to her, he began to sever his relations with his in-laws on various pretexts.
A few months passed. He re-married. Rejoiced the honeymoon bells while obliterating the memory and grief of his dead partner so quickly. Though he had pledged to take care of both of his daughters, the infant baby was adopted by one of his relatives whilst the elder one was forced to snap relations with her maternal grandparents. In the process, the innocent childhood of both girls was scotched heartlessly.
Feeble granny had no more hopes to live. The pain of separation was killing. She had lost not one but three daughters. Luck was cruel for the newborn girl as well. She got separated from her mother, then granny, and later from her father and sister.
Kismet did not give a chance to two little angels to know the meaning of motherhood. But the people of this world also did not give them any chance. Small wonder, many times people turn more merciless than destiny!
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are the personal opinions of the author.
The facts, analysis, assumptions and perspective appearing in the article do not reflect the views of GK