Women Power
Journeying with women over the years has been a beautiful experience. The community at Punai chak, most vulnerable community who lost their homes due to development projects of widening the roads and was left to fend for themselves without any alternative arrangements. Being scattered and yet connected they treasure the relationships they have built over the years.
What baffled me when some woman accused one of them of trafficking her daughter? When the other women came to know about what was happening to Munni, a group of them came to the office to apprise us about how Munni was being wrongly implicated. Munni has two small children and every early evening the police would come to Munni’s house and take her to the police station and release her late at night. Munni’s fault was that one person came and asked for the house of Ragini who had borrowed 20, 000 from the person and was not returning the amount. As a result Ragini filed a false case at t he police station. The women vehemently opposed the police action. They all said, Munni is not that kind of woman, she is innocent, Rinki who drives a waste vehicle goes to the police station every night to bring her back home. We encouraged her to learn driving and is now employed in the Patna Municipal Corporation drawing a salary of 8000/- per month.
We decided to visit the Shastri Nagar police station and age to the heart of the matter. So, about 10 women along with Ranjeet and myself went to the police station. Munni was able to identify the lady corpse along with her male companion who used to come to arrest her. The corpses were behaving rudely with the women yet they remained unmoved.
Finally, the Station House Officer appeared we cornered him questioning him why Munni was being harassed. He then called me aside and said that he knows that Munni is innocent and Ragini is not a good woman but since the case is filed he is doing the formality. I asked him that now this should be stopped, she should be released early in the day. The women were very vocal and rejoiced at their collective power.
I stand in humility to witness the courage of the women, their wisdom to safeguard a sister of theirs, their readiness to invest their time for the cause of truth. These simple women continue to teach me profound lessons.
Dorothy Fernandes