*Trigger Warning: Violence*
Hopelessness has become something of a national epidemic. As columnist Karol Markowicz wrote, “The economy is booming. Crime has fallen dramatically all over the country. We’re richer and safer than ever. Yet we’re in the middle of this terrible malaise.”
We were in a literal shock and shaken when we heard the news. There was a mix of trauma, upsetting emotions, feelings of numbness, disconnection, and anxiety that wouldn’t go away. The most widespread news, that spread all over the world, highlighting Nirbhaya, who was sexually assaulted on a running bus, near Munirka on December 16-17, 2012 in South Delhi.
There were six persons who were involved in the crime and also severely assaulted her before throwing her out, onto the road.
After spending a short time in Delhi hospital, She was rushed to Singapore for emergency medical treatment. We were praying and hoping Jyothi Pandey alias Nirbhaya will get healed in Mount Elizabeth Hospital Singapore and my few friends from Singapore were ready to go and visit her. But as destiny had it was not to be. She breathed her last and passed away on December 29, 2012, at Mount Elizabeth Hospital in Singapore.
This eventful and horrible crime was given many voices that were never heard. No government has been able to instil fear in the minds of criminals and neither can remove fear from the minds of women so far.
In spite of the fact that women are touching every sphere of influence and reaching out to every corner of the world; be it medicine, space, pilots, army, doctors, engineers, teachers, or computers. But, fear is something that needs to be conquered. And if you are shifting priorities, it becomes much more challenging.
It is a well-known fact that women establish the most unfortunate and the least incredible sections of their networks. They are denied equivalent access to instruction, education, jobs, location, equal opportunities, social norms, time, pay, property, finances, social insurance, basic leadership power, and opportunities, just as command over their very own body and life.
On the other hand, when we hear about “the administration” or “the economy,” the news can be good or bad. If we are not careful, we can set our hopes on the government or the economy to determine our future well-being. Sometimes it relieves you of the pain; other times it sustains you in the midst of it.
I remember that quite recently I was reading one of the articles in a Time Magazine by Author Greg Easterbrook who mentioned: “Love, friendship, family, respect, a place in the community, the belief that your life has a purpose—those are the essentials of human fulfilment, and they cannot be purchased with cash.” And not with anything else whatsoever.
It helps a great deal in surrounding yourself with professional people who are passionate, talented people who have committed their lives to a greater purpose.
Nirbhaya was like many others who were living with a strong purpose and zeal to accompany them to serve the people. Ambitious, simple, and hardworking, Nirbhaya’s dream was to be a physiotherapist. She was enrolled in a physiotherapy program. She had two younger brothers and her family spent their savings so “Nirbhaya” could study further.
Nirbhaya being a physiotherapy intern, supportive of her family, and her dreams nurture in a small little way. But her dreams were short-lived.
And the wait is over.
At long last finally! after 7 long years, India’s daughter# Nirbhaya gets JUSTICE! the judgment by the Supreme Court gave the final verdict.