Scars for life

Hey. I’m Nivedita & I come from a well-known working-class family in an uptown, posh neighbourhood in Delhi. My father was an IAS officer from the Madhya Pradesh batch, and my mother, on the other hand, was a home-maker She was also a well-educated, well-articulated lady who studied at Miranda House College, worked for quite some time in a leading newspaper as an editor and eventually married off to my father, by my maternal grandfather in an arranged set-up.

?I was second among my siblings, first one is my elder sister, then me & lastly younger brother. Being a daughter of an IAS came with its own set of perks & advantages, my elder sister got her driving license at 17 years of age without even stepping a foot from her home, and we all got our passports home delivered to us we have never even seen the gates of the passport office, the only thing I remember is one uncle came up to our house, took our photographs, my mother gave him all our birth & educational certificates and after a week we all got our passports.

I naively thought this is the standard process of getting a passport or a driving license from the authorities, for everyone. One day when I was playing badminton in my neighbourhood with our house-help bhaiya(brother) he was cribbing to someone about his elder brother's failure in the driving license exam and how he had to reapply for the same now, I strangely looked at him and said. ‘ Bhaiya , what’re you saying? The official comes to your home and handover the license to you, how can someone fail in something like this? Listening to me, bhaiya gave me a mild grin and went back to what he was doing.

From the surface, my story looks similar to any other upper-class bureaucratic family, nothing fishy as such. However, as I grew older and started hitting my puberty mark, I begin to discover some of the skeletons lying in our closet, waiting to uncover.

I still remember the day, January 25th, 2018, it was a usual day except for me something was about to change forever. My mom was not in the house, she had gone to my mama’s (maternal uncle) house for 2-3 days. I, & my brother were all alone, I was sitting in my room, listening to songs on iPod, grooving & minding my own business. My brother was in another room.

Feeling bored, I thought of taking a little detour outside, I climbed down the stairs & went into the kitchen to grab something, all of a sudden I saw our guest room door was slightly open which BTW was opposite to our kitchen. It was strange, as we used to keep the room close only on occasions like when friends/relatives came over to our house for a sleepover, we opened it. I slowly walked towards the door in a state of confusion, I creped through the space, and as soon as I looked inside, the ground beneath my feet moved.

My father was sitting on a couch, and beside him sitting was another man whom I seem to remember, I have seen frequently coming over to our house and he was a minister in the state, in front of them was a young woman, in her late teens, a pretty lady head down with embarrassment and meekly removing her clothes, while my father and his friend watched her do so. By looking at the girl, one can assume that she did not like it. From her face, you can sense the shame & the embarrassment she was going through. I was standing there at the door, in utter disbelief and still trying to wrap my head around what the hell I just saw.

My father and his minister friend were smiling by looking at the young girl as if they were enjoying themselves while the girl removed her suit, and then her bra, as she was trying to remove her pyjama’s I don’t know what came to my mind I just shouted “Papaaaaaa........what’s going on?”, heads rolled to my direction, my father looked at me, his friend immediately jumped from the couch as if he has seen some ghost. My father came up to me and said ‘Beta, what’re you doing here, go to your room’, I asked him while tears were rolling through my eyes, ‘Dada what’s all this?” My father replied in a stern voice. “Nivedita go to your room, now!” Saying this he slammed the door in my face. I stood there for god knows how much time, crying silently while still trying to comprehend what just happened.?

That day, I didn’t sleep for the whole night. In the morning I called my mom and told her to come home as soon as possible, my mom got petrified as she thought that either I or my brother is sick. She came home and straight away came to my room, I was lying on my bed; she checked my temperature I did catch a fever she told one of our servants to call the doctor. During this time I didn’t tell her anything,?I didn’t have the courage, to hell what her husband was doing behind her back.

Finally, one night when I told her about the whole episode, she nonchalantly replied to me “Nivi(my pet name), kids should stay away from adults matter, your father sacrifices so much for you all, you should concentrate on your studies and just keep your nose away from your father affairs”. I was aghast by my mother's response as if someone has pinned down my emotions & I was the one to be blamed for. The statement by my mother broke my heart into pieces.

?I tried to confront my father the other day, but he slapped me hard, called me a bitch and strictly told me to behave otherwise he will throw me out of the house, my mother came up to me and told me to forget all of this and don’t talk about what you saw the other day ever to any of the family member again. She told me, to sweep it under the rug and just move on and concentrate on something else.

Later I came to know that my father used his clout to do all kinds of dirty work for ministers and his other seniors, their whole nexus used to trap young, marginalised girls who were in some or other form of distress and needed help from the authorities. They used to promise these girls, help mainly government jobs & these vulture ministers along with my kingpin father in return used to quell their lust by taking their sexual advantage.

?Some girls came from broken families, some were dirt poor, and some were only earning members of their families where their father was either an alcoholic or paralyzed. You could cry your heart out if you listen to their sobbing stories, but my father! Huh, he was a demon in disguise.

?His narcissistic personality was such that he didn’t even feel ashamed while looking at me; he behaved normally as if nothing has happened. I used to think how this man even in his clear consciousness could look up in the mirror and not be disgusted by himself. And my mother, I don’t know what happened to her, she knew what my father is doing but instead of raising her voice, she is telling me to keep quiet.?I felt like choking while living in this house.

My whole world came upside down, all my dreams came down crashing. I was living a nightmare that doesn’t seem to end. However, I knew one thing, no matter how much I crib my family will shut me up, I had to acknowledge the hard reality but I can’t make peace with it. I mean, how you can after getting through all of this?

Finally, I decided to behave normally, I used to laugh at my father's jokes, tease my younger brother & share how my day went with my mother. You might be thinking what exactly happened to me? Well, I was just playing along, biding the right time to get the hell out of here. I knew at this age, I can’t do anything on my own. But when the time comes, I will run away to never look back again.

One day I got the opportunity that I was longing for, one of my friends was planning to do her graduation from Sweden, & her family and my family knew each other. I too convinced my family to permit me, to complete my graduation from the same college. I didn’t have a hard time convincing my dad about the same, I told him about the opportunity and he was happy to send me over there, it was a prestige issue for him too.

The day I landed in Sweden, my happiness had no bounds. I was walking in the streets of Uppsala like a free bird, who was living in a cage before. This is my third year in college, & I have not gone once back to my home in these years even during semester breaks, whenever my mom or my elder sister asks me why I’m not coming home, I just tell them I’m busy with studies and alongside I’m working on some projects with my faculty members so can’t come now will come once I get free. Off course, I’m lying to them; I’ve no intentions to come back. My father rarely calls me but when he does, he asks me only about my studies which he knows I’m doing pretty fine.

Initially while living here all by myself; it was painful for me not to think about my family. I would be lying if said, I didn’t miss them. I miss my baby brother and my elder sister too, I wish I had told them the truth.?After all, they are a part of me but I can’t forget my parents for what they did, especially my father. My dada was my hero once, he is still a great father however, he is a disgusting human being.

?My only hope is to settle here after the completion of my studies, I want to go so far away from my parents that their shadow can’t even fall over me.

The scars I’ve will forever remain ingrained in me, I can’t erase them from my memory. I sometimes wish that the fateful day of January 25th, 2018 had never happened in my life.