The Daughter I Never Had

A Short Story

Sunita was preparing dinner for her family. Her eight month old son was sleeping in the cradle in her room while her toddler played in the drawing room with her sister-in-law. Sunita had worked as a teacher in a primary school before her children were born. Presently, she was a housewife, taking care of her home and family was her duty. Her family comprised of her husband, his parents, his sister, grandmother and her two sons. Her husband a post graduate, worked at a bank and earned sufficiently to support all of them.

Sunita was making chapattis in the kitchen and was wondering if she was late. Her delay had earned her harsh taunts from her mother-in-law in the past, but what she feared much more was the tight slap from her husband that had left his palm printed on her face. She suddenly heard a child whisper into her ear. Although she could not make out what was being said, it was distinctly the voice of a child, a girl, not more than five. There was no one beside her and she dismissed it. Maybe she was tired.

Two days later while picking up her son’s toys from the floor she heard the voice again, whispering close to her right ear. She did not think much about it till later in the evening when her mother-in-law spoke about how Ammaji was losing her mind with old age. While Sunita knew that Ammaji at times spoke about very old incidents or forgot dates but this was bizarre. She had claimed to see a pretty little girl in the house, dressed in a beautiful frock and she asserted that it was Sunita’s daughter.

Later, that night as Sunita was drifting off to sleep after completing all her chores and putting her sons to sleep, she was startled to hear someone call out to her... ‘Ma’. She sat up with a jerk and found both her sons and husband sleeping peacefully. She could no longer go back to sleep and began thinking about the voice she had heard repeatedly over the past few days and about Ammajis insistence of having seen her daughter in the house. She was reminded of the time when she had been pregnant with their first child five years ago, before her sons were born.

Tears rolled down her sleepless melancholic eyes as she recalled how the gender detection test ordered by her mother-in-law had led to a big upheaval in their otherwise peaceful life. Her premature daughter had been snatched away from her, denied to live, extracted forcefully from her womb in an obscure nursing home in old Gurgaon. Sunita had cried for days, not from the pain, but from the grief of having lost her baby. Her husband although not an active accomplice had remained speechless and powerless in front of his mother’s wishes. The two pregnancies that followed would have met the same fate, but luckily for her, they were both male.

She wondered how an educated woman like her mother-in-law, who had been a school teacher herself, could harbour such hatred for her own creed. How a person could decide to end the life of her own grandchild, just because she was a girl? She could have revolted against her mother-in-law which would have left her homeless and rejected even by her own parents, but how could she fight against a society that considered a son to be the prized possession and a daughter as a burden. With these thoughts running in her mind, Sunita stayed awake till her tired body took over and guided her to sleep. She dreamt of a little girl in the pink frock, her face as pretty as a porcelain doll, bright eyes, pink lips and the most beautiful smile she had ever seen.

As per the 2011 population census, Haryana has sex ratio of 879 females per 1000 males, which is much below the national average of 940.

Interesting Census Facts 2011

§  Mahe district of Puducherry has the highest sex ratio of 1176 females per 1000 males

§  Daman district has lowest sex ratio of 533 females per 1000 males

 

http://www.census2011.co.in/states.php