Nari Niketan, a shelter home for women situated in Karnal, Haryana has all its inmates suffering from mental ailments of one type or the other, says Chander Prabha, vice-chairperson of Haryana State Commission for Women.
Prabha visited the shelter home, one of it kinds in the State, on June 27 after two girls residing in this shelter committed suicide by hanging from a water-supply pipe in the bathroom on June 25.
The vice-chairperson of the commission said, “Most of the inmates staying here at the home are in their teens and their condition is pathetic. Many of these girls are below the age of 15 and have reached here after being caught while eloping with their partner to consummate their marriage.”
“These girls who were school going students have failed to erase the memory of their puppy love from their mind and were suffering from the pangs of separation. In most of the cases the girls have gone against the norms of the rural society they used to live in, to tie their marital knot outside their respective caste and hence getting ostracized by the society in return,” added Prabha.
Few among these girls have also broken the incest taboo by marrying their paternal or maternal cousin within the family which is considered to be a greater evil here.
Haryana is a patriarchal society where the marriage norms are guided by the rules of caste endogamy and gotra exogamy where couple belonging to the same village is also not considered being marriageable. Anything beside this set up of marital rule is considered to be a sin and in turn the couples are either ostracised or in some cases killed, which has been termed as honor killing.
“People of our society strictly adhere by these norms when it comes to marriage. Hence the parents of both the deceased disowned their daughters and even refused to claim their body which depicts the angst in them towards their wards who have breached the social norms,” said Prabha.
Despite counseling being provided to these girls, most of them refuse returning to their parents and instead insist upon returning to their husband’s place, which makes all the efforts initiated by the shelter home futile. In most of these cases girls are below the legal marriageable age.
Prabha spent around seven hours at this shelter home and discussed about various problems faced by the girls residing here. She prepared a detailed report on the issues of the inmates and has made some recommendations for the State Government.
However she was alarmed by the number of residents being put in the shelter home, she said, “The shelter home was meant to accommodate around 25 inmates whereas currently 75 girls are staying here in oppressive environment.”
She further added that though the State Government has asked the authorities to construct more rooms for accommodating more inmates some other initiatives are needed to avert suicide cases here at this facility in future.
Both the girls, who committed suicide, were below 18 years of age. They ran away from the shelter home on June 23 by scaling a wall. later they were traced and brought back form Kaithal the very next day. However they again went missing on June 25 and authorities noticed it during the evening roll call. later that night, after a search was conducted, both the girls were found hanging.