Trigger Warning – The post below discusses the unfortunate eve-teasing incident which took place on 10th August in Dadri. It resulted in an accident that took Sudeeksha Bhati’s life. This post talks about her death and crimes against women in general, which might be emotionally triggering for some. If you feel that you’re in a vulnerable headspace right now, please refrain from reading ahead for the time being.
I woke up feeling frozen in an unfamiliar place – a place I have never seen nor been to before – all alone. My head was pounding so hard and my body was killing me. I looked around trying to register my surroundings more carefully. It morphed into a bright clean space, like a never-ending tunnel. As my mind raced, I desperately tried to make sense of my situation. My heart beating so fast, I knew I’d pass out if I didn’t calm down. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. The last thing I could recall was a road crash and only then did it dawn on me, I was dead.
Hi! I am Sudeeksha Bhati, a native of Deri Scanar village in Gautam Buddh Nagar’s Dadri. But I guess at this point, you probably even know what my favorite color is, right? Or was? I presume that doesn’t make much of a difference anymore now, does it? Who must have imagined that during a period of the pandemic, when people are supposed to maintain a distance for their own wellbeing, I would have to endure such a tragic fate?
August 10, 2020. It was Monday morning when my uncle and I left our village and were on our way to visit a relative who lives hardly 35 km away, in Sikandrabad. That’s when the unfortunate incident occurred. I was riding pillion while my uncle was driving. It was not long until two men on a different bike driving recklessly, overtook us several times. The second they began performing stunts and eve-teasing me, I was terrified. Pursued not far off, my uncle slowed down the bike and their bike hit ours which prompted the mishap.
The accident not only took my life but it crushed my family’s dreams along with it. I was a first-generation learner, the eldest among my other six siblings, living in a dilapidated one-room set along with my parents with no modern-day facilities. I was from a village that lacked proper roads and communication and women were hardly seen without veils. In a place where a girl completing even her school education is seen as an achievement, I was sent to a co-education boarding school outside the village, which was a very big decision taken by my parents. But for what? I was a district topper and grabbed a full-time scholarship to get enrolled in a prestigious college in the United States. For what? The medals, certificates that bore testimony to the hardships I faced to reach Babson College in Massachusetts now lay on a broken cot. For what?
I had, for the longest time, been itching to be free from social and economic stereotypes and wanted to change the lives of many women and young girls, especially those in my area. I even urged my little sister Swati to begin a project in March recently and gave it the name ‘Ubharti’. It was specifically for young girls in the village but as it caught up, even boys of poorer backgrounds started studying under its umbrella. I was supposed to head back to the United States on August 20 but instead, I was chased down the road until I lost my life, ten days prior. I was sent to a place of no possible return. My parents lost their firstborn, my siblings lost their role models and my village kids lost their Sonu didi. The project which was started for those kids will now be taken forward without my presence and I believe in Swati, she’ll do right by me. She will complete what we started together.
I sometimes wonder how different my life could have been had coronavirus not disrupted our lives, which is why I was forced to come back to India early as a consequence of the pandemic. I would still be alive and loaded with life while turning my dreams into reality. I had always hoped to return to my country one day and change the face of my village and my community. Be that as it may, I guess, the stars were not in my favor.
Isn’t it ironic that crime rates against women are higher in a nation where nearly 80% of the population worships goddesses?
But the big questions still remain. Will crime against women ever come to an end? How many more women will be subjected to assault? How many more women, like us, will have to lose their lives in vain? How is it that everyone knows at least one woman who was molested but no one knows a molester? These are questions we should ask ourselves as humans.
So, rather than teaching women what to wear, how to speak, how to cook, how to walk, it’s high time to teach guys how to behave, and respect everybody. We exist as individuals and nobody has any right to tutor us on how to live.
And as for me, I am currently with all the other unfortunate beautiful victims who couldn’t make it down on earth. It is somewhat packed in here, but what can we do? We are just dead souls waiting for justice in the court and in anticipation of some good news. This brings me to my final question,
Will I get justice?
Author – Nikita Bhardwaj
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