Sunaina

Today it is my sixth consecutive day of absence from work. It has become my habit to disappear suddenly without informing my considerate employers. All because of my alcoholic husband’s malicious habits. He is a daily wage worker, works at his whims and hammers me at his wishes.
I often wonder why my employers never thought about my being so accident prone. When enquired about my gouged eye or many blue black marks on my body I lie to them about the small accidents I meet with.

Oh, I forgot to introduce myself.

Hi, I am Sunaina. Thirty six years old, frail, weakly built and thoroughly thrashed, mother of two young girls. I work as a maid in nearby society flats to run the family. That is all for my initial introduction.

Right now I am feeling miserable and helpless. My husband has been missing since last four days. Normally at the end of the day he goes to that desi liquor shop in the nook of PR road and comes back heavily drunk at around midnight. Being an old customer to that shop and an acquaintance of the shopkeeper, he gets the hooch on credit and sometimes a place to sleep over in the shop itself.

My husband is a simple uneducated man. Responsible or not, till date I am not able to figure out. He has taken a life insurance policy of Rs 1 lakh for my gloomy days and always dreamt of a small house of our own. He had taken care of me when after the second childbirth my condition had got deteriorated and there was very little hope of my survival. He also helps me by dropping children to school.

After a family dispute with his parents and younger brother over a one roomed chawl and us being thrown out of the only roof we had, it was an extremely tough time for both of us… At that time I was carrying his second child; his job & income were irregular and so I was forced to look for sundry jobs. Since then I have been working and he has been drinking.
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And just now, the people who had gone to search for him have come back.. come back with the news of his death. His body was found near the railway tracks 2 Kms away. I am blank. I don’t know how to react. Slowly people have started pouring into my small tenement. I am still not been able to hear anything from my painful right ear which bore the brunt of his anger a week back. It is swollen and an odorous liquid is oozing out.
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Now the usual stuff… praising the dead, mourning and contrived crying have taken over. The very close people (or the "family") have started to assess the profit & loss. Apparently they found out that profit rules over loss.
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Two days have gone by; I am shifted to the same place from where I, along with my husband, was thrown out. Tomorrow we all leave for our native place to perform last rituals and also to decide the fate of me, my daughters and all my belongings/savings.
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I am sitting in a corner in our native place where all the decisions are being taken by elders. Some decisions have to be taken now, just now. They can’t wait for the grief to subside.

Although in our caste, remarriage is allowed, they have decided that I will never remarry. To my utter surprise, my younger brother-in-law has willingly taken over the responsibilities and so all my belonging and savings are now his. Also, since I don’t have any son, the entire property (however small) including the chawl in the city will go to him.
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We have come back to city again. It is almost two months now. The mourning is over. The money that came from my husband’s policy is with my brother-in-law. He needs it to buy an auto-rickshaw which in turn would help the increased daily expenses. After all, we three are dependent on him now in addition to his own family and the parents-in-laws.

I have taken their permission to join work to supplement the family income. All this time my employers have been kind and patient and have tried to help me in all respect.
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I have rejoined work and I hand over all my earnings to my in-laws. Life is extremely difficult now, not that it was easier earlier. Now it includes doing more chores for a bigger family before I leave empty stomach for work and by the time I hit that mat in the corner, it is past midnight.
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Off late, my daughters are falling sick very frequently. I can not take them to doctor as I neither have the time nor the money. The elder one has been pulled out of school as she has to help and look after younger kids at home. The other day she was not given food because she did not do so. I feel miserable. Is protesting a crime ?
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No, this is not the life I had wanted. Good education for my daughters, full meals, our own roof on our head not a borrowed shelter, a good peaceful life and a caring father for my daughters... that was all I had longed for.

I want to live life.. for me and for my daughters. I am not going to givein. I will accept the offer of madam where I work, to open a bank account and will start saving. I’ll again enroll my daughter in school. I know my current partly emolument is not enough but I am determined to make my wish true.

I’ll do whatever I can.. to live life… my life.
The dawn has started. Time to get up.
And some decisions have to be taken now, just now.

Note:- Recently widowed Sunaina works as a maid in our house. Slightly different version of this story was published in this month's issue of Justfemme.

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