THAT LADY ON THE STREET!

The sun shines to the best of its ability thus filling the prevailing atmosphere with mirth and gaiety. The city (Siliguri) of West Bengal yet again bustles up with the din of its noisy humdrum. The busy traffic single-mindedly whizzes past, the crowd runs a rat race towards something or nothing at all! Yet to utter dismay not one soul cares to halt, sensitize, feel and ponder about the lady who sits there all day and all night over the heap of stones staring at some distant vacant point.

Her attire and appearance would frighten you. She is donned with a considerable amount of criss-cross of wrinkles across her pallor. Her unkempt, grey keratin sways wildly in the strong breeze. If examined closely on can sight the colony of ‘scar copies scabies’ (lice) running helter-skelter over her forehead. Multiple layers of dirt and filth over her face-‘Does she even recall her original skin color?’-one can wonder! Round red pieces of glassware whish adorn her meek wrist jingle as she claps her hand at the sight of a school bus. ‘Could she have been educated in her past?’. The sacred-bangles! Are a clue that she might have been married and happy –once upon a good time !. She gets up, her torn and tattered attire showacases ‘unwilling obscenity’. As she tries to walk in vain , she is compelled to sit down again with a jerk, agonising in withering pain as she keeps her hand over her genital area. Sigh ! What could have been the cause the ‘excruciating’ pain?- A mere infection that could amount to a serious STD if not treated? Or a brutal/ many brutal sexual abuses that follow and haunt her every single night as she sits over her heap of stones unguarded and unprotected, her bare flesh serving as a prey to the vicious drooling wolves who cannot take charge of their libido and lust.

This was but – a plight of a single ‘mentally-ill, destitute woman who dwells under the night sky in a shady Indian street (Of Siliguri-West Bengal).Statistics show the possibility of more than 1,50,000 such women flourishing in the nooks and corners of our ‘indifferent’ nation.

About the lady mentioned above-flying and jocular rumours have it that some drunkards put over her face a mask of some Bollywood actor (because they were disgusted of her filthy face) and gangraped her!! When this true/untrue (nobody bothered to find out) news reached the people- a striking majority ‘laughed out loud’at the innovative idea of the bollywood mask! Has humanity lost all its essence? With the given factual description I attempt to spread awareness  about the deplorable and sporadic conditions of our nation (dipped in mordernization) among the public comprising of ‘you’ and ‘me’. Also, you may call it a request, reminder of duty or label me as a’harbinger’ of unwanted trouble but as a responsible youth of the nation I (On behalf of my organization L-RON. ) humbly put forward a pleato the local governing bodies and functioning NGOs to kindly look into this grave matter and take necessary steps for the rehabitiliation of the ‘mentally retarted-sexually abused-women-of Indian streets’.

·         Nationwide there are only 37 state run mental hospitals.

·         There are 3500 registered psychiatrists. (i.e. 3 per million)

·         Needed accommodation in rehabs (as concerned) is 1,00,000-available seats are 2000.

·         Currently 4 half way shelter homes are sanctioned by the Government-built none!

Mind baffling! Flabbergasting!—We know it but now it is not the time to lament over the spilt milk. It is ‘high time’ to bring about a necessary change in the way the things are functioning in our nation.

 So the next time you see a ‘lati’ (i.e. a mentally unfit person in the local dialect) instead of “ewwwww-ing” and passing lewd remarks, for a change let compassion overpower your soul. Feel her pain, imagine the horrid conditions through which she must have battled, try to look for the “lady” in her and when you have accomplished this strenuous task waste no time in spreading awareness about her wretched conditions( that is the most you can do at your level) so that the people in power exercise their powers for the welfare of these”children of a lesser god”

As Putlibai (father of Mohan Das Karamchand Gandhi once said”If in your lifetime you succed in saving or improving a single person’s life your life is a success).

 PS: The lady is mentally unsound so it was a difficult task to capture her in a film ( Kindly excuse the quality )