Check out 16 Return-To-Work Programs In India For Ambitious Women Like You!
How do we learn what is okay and what is not? This chilling poem explores the roots of domestic violence.
Flat No 101
Father hits mother
Mother stays silent
Goes back to kitchen
And cooks silently
Ram is 4
He watches it all,
Hits his doll.
The doll stays silent.
Ram learns his first circle of wrong lessons,
Violence is okay.
Flat No 102
Maria is 14,
Her boyfriend pushed her over a fight
Everyone told her-
He loves you hard, so he hurt
Its okay
Maria stays silent
Flat no 103
Sapna screamed at night
Her live in partner hit her one more time.
Everyone smiled –
She deserved it.
She is a slut.
She lived with a man without a knot tied.
For a SLUT,
Flat no 104
His friends were watching the IPL match.
He hit his wife with a rod,
For the food was not piping hot.
Everyone heard but kept quite.
It’s “Ghar Ki Baat.”
So, when it is ghar ki baat,
The Building
The building heard the screams and the cries everyday,
But acted as if nothing happened the very next day.
Just like Dhitarastra, Gandhari and Karna, everyone knew to look down, without a frown.
In Sita’s building too, just like Doryadhana, everyone knew one lesson,
That violence, when against women, is always okay!
Top image via Graphicstock
Proud Indian. Senior Writer at Women's Web. Columnist. Book Reviewer. Street Theatre - Aatish. Dreamer. Workaholic. read more...
Women's Web is an open platform that publishes a diversity of views, individual posts do not necessarily represent the platform's views and opinions at all times.
Stay updated with our Weekly Newsletter or Daily Summary - or both!
UP Boards Topper Prachi Nigam was trolled on social media for her facial hair; our obsession with appearance is harsh on young minds.
Prachi Nigam’s photo has been doing the rounds on social media for the right reasons. Well, scratch that- I wish the above statement were true. This 15-year-old girl should ideally be revelling in her spectacular achievement of scoring a whopping 98.05% and topping her tenth-grade boards. But oddly enough, along with her marks, it’s something else that garners more attention – her facial hair.
While the trolls are driving themselves giddy by mocking this girl who hasn’t even completed her school yet, the ones who are taking her side are going one step ahead – they are sharing her photoshopped pictures, sans the facial hair, looking nothing less than a celebrity with captions saying – “Prachi Nigam, ten years later”.
Doctors have already diagnosed her with PCOD in their comments, based on photographic evidence. While we have names for people shamed for their weight – body shaming, for their skin colour- racism, for their age- age shaming, for being a female- sexism, this category of shaming where one faces criticism for their appearance has no name. With that, it also has zero shame attached to it.
Please enter your email address