Resilient Voices

When one says “women in Haryana”, the image that often comes to mind is of a shy, timid woman, her face hidden behind a veil, standing quietly in the shadow of a man whose moustache is long enough to touch his earlobes. But that is just an image. Bring the lens closer and you will see that deep within the folds of Haryana’s villages―in places where you least expect to hear voices of change―change is quietly taking root. And leading that change is not always well-built, loud men, but soft-spoken women, sometimes giggling, sometimes resolute, tucking their pallus with their lips as you ask what ignites that fire in their eyes.

Here are the stories of five such women, quietly rewriting old narratives, cheering each other on, and making sure the path they walk is one they build together.

She Waited 20 Years. Then Helped Her Daughter-in-Law Change the World

She was about 15-years-old when she was married off to an older man in Nidani village of Jind district in Haryana.

When asked how old her husband was at the time of marriage, Savitri shrugs her shoulders, charms with her toothless grin and says, “I don’t know. When I got married, I didn’t even know how to wear these kinds of clothes,” pointing towards her traditional Haryanvi salwar and shirt. The neighbourhood women, however, said he was about three years older to her. Her husband, who worked in Assam, soon left after marriage.

A young child, she was just happy that the man wasn’t in the same room as her. But a month passed, and there was no news of him. Months turned into a year, and one year turned into 20. For 20 long years, there was no news of her husband. For 20 long years, she waited patiently for him to come back. With neither education nor money on her side, she didn’t know what to do. However, when the wait turned into a hopeless journey of loneliness and societal biases, her husband’s younger brother offered to marry her.

At the age of 35, Savitri finally became a wife and then a mother of three children. But her wait is not her story. Nor is the fact that she got married at a tender age of 15. Her story begins after her children grew up and got married.

“My son works in Gujarat, and my daughter-in-law Sonia, along with her five-month-old baby, lives with me. I am very fond of my daughter-in-law. She reminds me of who I could have been if I had a chance,” the now 85-year-old Savitri says, with a hand on her daughter-in-law Sonia’s head.

One day, Sonia found out about the requirement of a Community Social Worker (CSW) at the Mission to the Desperate and Destitute of India (MDD of India) in Haryana’s Jind district. Without telling her mother-in-law, she quietly went to meet the officials at MDD of India’s office in Jind. MDD of India is one of the 250 partners of Just Rights for Children, India’s largest network of NGOs working for child protection and child rights.

At MDD of India, the officials explained the tasks and importance of a CSW member and how she would need to visit villages in the neighbourhood and generate awareness about child marriage and even stop any impending child marriages.

“When she came home and told me about this opportunity, I knew that she had to do it. Our children need to be protected, and who knows this better than I? So, I told her to go ahead while I would take care of the household chores and her son,” Savitri recollected even as her married daughter stood beside the two women of her house with pride and joy.

Today, as Sonia visits villages, talks to families, and explains the many consequences of child marriage, the entire day, Savitri ensures that the baby is well-fed, happy, and the food is ready when her daughter-in-law comes home after a long day of triumphs and victories.

Holding Each Other Up As They Hold Child Survivors Together

Who holds the one who is saving everyone from falling into a pit of despair and hopelessness? Where do the superheroes who support and uplift children draw their share of support from?

Apparently, from one another!

At least for Garima and Renu; they usually end up crying and consoling each other after a long, stressful day of counselling child survivors of sexual abuse.

Both Garima and Renu are support persons associated with MDD of India in Karnal district. Support persons under the POCSO Act provide crucial emotional and psychological support to child victims throughout the legal process, from investigation to trial. They help children navigate the legal system, ensuring their well-being and enabling them to testify effectively against offenders.

From a four-year-old child who couldn’t even tell what or who abused her to a 15-year-old girl who―after a year of being raped and abused by her 30-year-old husband―ran to police for help, these support persons lend their ears, hands, and hearts to these children.

“Every child who comes to us is a child who has experienced the worst, often at the hands of the closest family members. Every child is a heartbreaking story, and while the rulebook says that we mustn’t cry when talking to them, there is never a day our throats aren’t choked up,” says Garima.

Renu adds, “When we are with them, we hold our composure as efficiently as we can, but once we are out of the room, we rush to each other. Sometimes their pain is too much for us to bear, and we need to cry our hearts out.”

But crying is not all they do for each other. Sometimes, when a child is not opening up and is very stoic, they seek each other’s advice on how to counsel them.

“A child survivor of marriage in the Child Care Institution of MDD just wouldn’t open up. She kept her answers to yes and no, and because of her past betrayals from the families, she had immense trust issues,” recounts Renu.

“But we discussed how to break the ice with her, and one day, when she opened up about her two younger sisters at home, we knew what to do next,” continues Garima.

Both Renu and Garima then informed the officials at MDD of India about the impending danger for her sisters and that they needed to be rescued too.

“Justice for these children is only possible when every stakeholder in the ecosystem comes together, not just for their rescue but for their complete rehabilitation. These children have endured deep injustice and harm, leaving them with little reason to trust anyone. But we work patiently to earn that trust, step by step. Our goal is not only to secure their future, but also to ensure that many more children are rescued from similar fates,” said Surinder Singh Mann, CEO, MDD of India.

So as soon as the news of other girls was shared with the NGO, everyone sprang into action, and the two younger sisters, aged 12 and 13, too, were rescued.

“When she saw her sisters, she realised that we could be trusted. The first time we understood this was when one day she said that her husband, now in jail, had broken her spectacles and she had difficulty with her vision,” the two recounted with pride, relief and sadness.

While both Renu and Garima have supportive husbands and families, they confess that no one can understand the trauma they go through while dealing with these child survivors.

“Yes, we depend on each other for our mental health,” they say almost in unison.

From Stitching Clothes To Mending Childhoods, This Child Marriage Survivor Is The Beacon Of Hope For Many

Sunita Malli is in her 50s now. But her wrinkled face makes her look older, or it could be the storms of life that are etched on her face and make her look older. Older, maybe, but neither tired nor hopeless.

Sunita was married when she was barely 16 to a man who was at least 30 years old. Sunita was in Class VIII and was taken aback by this new development. She resisted, but since her father was not alive, her paternal uncle was her guardian and she couldn’t challenge him.

She resigned to her fate, or at least that’s what she thought. A week into married life, Sunita’s husband came home drunk one night and slapped her. The next day, the same happened with much force, pain and abuse.

This continued for a few years. Sunita, by now, was a mother of two. She was also much clearer, bolder and desperate for a better life for her children. So, she did what most women in her village often just dreamt of. One night, when her husband came home drunk and approached her with a stick to hit her, she held his hand with all her strength and pushed him. The husband was too drunk to get up again.

When Sunita heard his soft snores, she nudged her son and daughter from sleep. In houses where fathers come home drunk, children often do not sleep, but train themselves to shut their eyes, ears and pretend.

The children immediately woke up and hugged their mother. Sunita, holding the two young children and clutching a bag with a few clothes tightly to her chest, left the house.

“I reached a neighbourhood village and immediately looked for a place to stay. I found a one-room house and was happy to settle there with my children,” Sunita recounts. With her mother’s help, she managed basic daily needs and got herself enrolled in a sewing school. After two weeks, she started her a little enterprise from that one-room house.

She would work day and night, stitching salwar suits for the ladies in the village. The word soon spread that Sunita could stitch well and deliver quickly.

“Soon, other girls and women started approaching me to learn stitching. I started teaching them. I would take orders from the villagers, teach these girls to stitch and make them work on these suits. So, while I was earning from my customers, I was also earning from teaching other girls,” Sunita reveals her entrepreneurial skills. “Everybody in the village knew that I was the ‘Scooty lady’ who fought with anyone and everyone who supported or did injustice to women and children,” she says.

In one such endeavour, an IAS officer spotted Sunita and saw her passion for justice. He offered her a government job and a salary of Rs 15,000 per month.

“I was stunned. I was supposed to supervise the government’s tailoring centres. I had never dreamt of earning Rs 15,000, so I exclaimed, “Rs 15,000!” But the officer thought that I found that too meagre, so he said that they would pay me Rs 17,000,” Sunita laughs as she remembers. She soon bought a small piece of land too, and a scooty.

Sunita can be easily spotted on her scooty anyday. A child dropped out of school because of poverty, a child being forced to marry, someone abusing a minor―as soon as Sunita gets a whiff of any such crimes against children, she either rushes to the police station or the MDD of India.

“I often call the district coordinator of MDD of India and tell her if any child marriage is taking place in the village. Sometimes I go and explain that child marriage is illegal, but often, I take their help in making these villagers understand,” she says.

Talking about the importance of grassroot networks involving local communities, especially women, Surinder Singh Mann, CEO of MMD of India, which is a partner of the country’s largest NGO network ‘Just Rights for Children’, said, “It is crucial to bring women like Sunita into our network. They are not just survivors of child marriage; they are also champions who are determined to protect the future of children. These women are respected in their communities, they have access to critical information, and most importantly, they are willing to take action. Their resolve to end child marriage in their districts―when combined with the strength of our network―offers real hope for a country that is committed to ending child marriage by 2030.”

Ask about her two children, and Sunita proudly says, “Oh! They are both in the US. Happily married and well settled.”

Sunita sold off her plot of land to send her children abroad a few years ago. She lives in a rented house now with her husband, who promises to never bother her again.

But if one wonders that Sunita, after all her struggles, is back to where she started, with her husband and in a rented house, she smiles and says, “Not at all. I have come a long way. It is not the same anymore. I am not the same person anymore.”

(The author is with Just Rights for Children, which is a nationwide network of over 250 NGOs working across the country on issues of child marriage, child sexual abuse, child trafficking, and child labour)