Child Brides of India

By C. Stanton Leman

Chapter 18: Absolution (Mg, rom, prost, no sex)

After performing our morning duties quietly, we went downstairs to breakfast. I made a detour to the study, opened Haseeba’s file and retrieved her father’s name and address and then went to the dining room.

In front of my parents, I showed Priya the information and told her, “I’ll go see her father this morning after I drop you girls at school. I’ll try to find out which brothel he sold her to. If I get the information I need, I’ll call you and we’ll go get her together. Is that satisfactory with you?”

“Thank you, Sean,” she said with tears in her eyes. “The sooner we make this right, the sooner we can get on with our lives.”

Mom said, “I think this is the right thing to do, Priya and I am really proud that you’re not going to leave her like this.”

Dad scoffed and said, “I’d let her rot.”

Priya laid her hand on his and said, “Father, Allah will forgive and bless me for my atonement and we shall be better for it.”

Looking at her, he replied, “Maybe you’re right.”

We finished breakfast and Dad headed off for the office, while we got ready to leave. Mom kissed Priya and said, “Everything will be alright, have faith.”

Turning to leave, Priya said, ‘I do, Mom, I do.”

After picking up Sarah, the two sisters talked quietly on the way to school while I contemplated what the day might bring. I dropped the girls off at school and headed for Radj’s office.

When I gave the limo driver the address, he said that it was in a seedy part of the city. I told him just to drive. Arriving at his office in a dilapidated, rundown tenement building, Nanda Radj was sitting in a filthy office cluttered with stacks of paper behind an old, weatherworn wooden desk. When he saw me enter in a neat, pressed business suit, he rose, wiped his hand on his shirt and stuck out his hand.

He was a fat, sweaty and dirty man with balding wavy hair that looked greasy. There were two grease balls in the room that probably did his dirty work and I wondered which one had slit Radj’s son’s throat. I shook his hand and offered my salaams. He offered a seat and as I sat, he asked me if I was interested in buying one of his properties.

I politely declined and said to him, “I’m here about your daughter.”

He looked at me with shock at first, and then with a perfunctory look said, “What daughter? I have no daughter.”

“All right then,” I began again, “I’m here to find out where I might locate a girl named Haseeba. I’ve heard she was sold to a brothel and I’d like to find her. I heard you might be able to help me.”

Leaning over the pile of papers on his desk in an aggressive manner, he said, “And why would you want to find a certain whore named Haseeba? There are thousands in New Delhi, why her?”

“Let’s just say we have unfinished business,” I replied.

“And what would this information be worth? Perhaps a finder’s fee?” he asked.

“Why yes,” I replied and I reached into my pocket, pulled a roll of bills and counted out ten 100 rupee notes (about $22.50 U.S.) as he counted with me and I held it up.

“How much was she sold for?” I asked him.

“Well,” he started, “I don’t know for certain, but I heard she was bought for 100 rupees.”

“Where can I find her,” I asked.

“I heard she works down on G. B. Road in a brothel owned by a woman named Ramya.”

As he started to reach across and take the money, I pulled my hand back and warned him, “If your information isn’t reliable, I’ll be back for this.” I then handed him the money.

While thumbing the money, he looked at me and said, “Oh she’ll be there, alright.’

I stood for a moment and let him and his goons get a look at my six-foot frame and said my salaams politely before turning to leave.

When I got in the car, I looked at my watch: eleven am. I knew Priya had lunch period at twelve-thirty. That gave me enough time to go by the office, pick up a security guard and pick Priya up at lunchtime. She’d only miss a half-day. I told the driver to head to the office. I called the school and got Priya excused from her afternoon classes. I waited until eleven forty-five to call Priya, knowing that she’d be in between classes, and told her to go to the office and pick up her release slip from school and meet me out front at twelve-thirty.

After picking up the biggest, meanest looking guard on duty, I left to pick up Priya. When I got to school, she was just coming out the front doors. Priya looked surprised when she got in the car and saw this monster of a man sitting here. I told her we were going to a dangerous area and that I wanted to both get in and get out without any trouble. She just nodded in agreement while looking at this smiling giant. I told the driver to take us to the red light district on G. B. Road, and then we left to get Haseeba.

Calling the G. B. Road area a slum is being merciful! It was filthy with garbage everywhere and raw sewage running down the middle of the street. There were barkers outside ramshackle flophouses barking their wares from ‘innocent virgin’ girl children to the Kamasutra specialists in full view of the police. We began asking around for Ramya’s place with no results. Our guard told Priya that they probably thought we might be the authorities from the government. I had Priya talk to a policeman and tell him that Haseeba was her cousin and we wanted to find her. I slipped him a 50-rupee note and he pointed out our destination.

We went inside and nearly fell over from the stench! Priya asked for Ramya and an old, fat, wrinkled toothless woman emerged smiling and asked what our pleasure was.

With Priya translating, I asked the woman if she had a girl working there by the name of Haseeba. She replied that she was new, fresh, and very nasty and that she was very compliant and aimed to please. I told the woman I know she paid 100 rupees for her and I would give her 1000 rupees to buy the girl.

The woman looked at me in shock, licked her bottom lip and slowly smiled. I counted out the bills and asked her to take us to her. We walked down a dimly lit hallway passing closet-sized cubicles that displayed girls from about five on up. Some had dogs and monkeys lying with them on mats. She led us downstairs to a damp, wet cellar and pointed to a corner cubical, turned and left.

When we pushed the curtain open, there, lying nude on a plastic covered mat was Haseeba next to a half-filled bucket of water. The lighting was very dim, but we could see she looked as though she hadn’t had a bath since she’d got here and was covered in the filth she was lying in. The closet-sized room reeked of urine and feces and she appeared to have bruises on her arms, torso, shoulders and legs. In just a few short weeks, she wasn’t even recognizable as the girl I first saw on those school steps.

Priya immediately began heaving, ran to the bucket and threw up. I simply started to cry at the sight.

Haseeba looked up in a daze, shocked at seeing us at first, and then looked down and away. Thinking we came to gloat, and knowing what her lot in life was now, she looked up and said with a forced sultry smile, “I am the house shit whore. Did you come to feed me?”

Priya, now crying, kissed Haseeba’s dirty face and softly said, “I’ve come to take you away from all this and back to your life.”

Convinced she was only worth what she was forced to endure, she cried, “This is my life, no one can save me now.”

Priya took her hand and pulled her to stand, but Haseeba pulled back and said, “You’ve had your look, now go.”

Priya grabbed her hand again and kneeling down to her pleaded, “Please come with me. We have bought your freedom. Let us take you away from this degradation.”

“Why?” Hasseeba implored. “I tried to destroy you. Why would you want to help me now?”

Priya, with tears running down her cheeks replied, “Because I want you to find what I’ve found - someone to love and cherish me all the days of my life.” Pointing to me, she finished with “He knows my failings, weaknesses and sins, yet he still loves me.”

Shaking her head no, Haseeba cried, “No man could love me knowing I’ve been forced to eat the dung of others.”

Priya smiled at her and said, “If God can forgive, so will a man that He’ll provide for you. Now come, come away from this filth and return to the land of the living and leave behind the girl who lived here to die a quiet death.”

With that, Priya rose, taking her hand, pulled Haseeba to her feet. Priya helped her put on a torn, stained grey-white petticoat and we started to leave. I had to hold her up because Haseeba could hardly stand, much less walk. I took off my jacket and placed it around her shoulders and we left that living hell.

Once outside, I picked her up and carried her to the limo. Once in the car, Priya held her like a babe as she cried out the story of her defilement: the beatings, the rapes and the degradations she was forced to endure without food or drink. Priya just held her crying and let her former enemy let it all out. I cried silently when I totaled up the fact that I’d paid $47.00 U.S. for the life of a seventeen year-old girl.

Returning home, the house was empty, save for the maid. I sent the car to pick Sarah up at school. Priya took Haseeba upstairs and bathed her in the shower and brought her back downstairs in a bathrobe. Pita gave her a plate of food to eat, and she ploughed through it like she hadn’t eaten in days and asked for more.

While she was eating, Priya told me that Haseeba was so sore from the bruising beatings that it was difficult to bathe her without her being in extreme pain. I told Priya that Haseeba and Sarah were about the same size, Sarah being slightly fuller, and that Sarah could bring her something to wear. I suggested that once she had some clothes, we’d take Haseeba to the hospital to be checked out for HIV and STD’s, broken bones and any other medical care she might need.

Priya called her mother’s house and Sarah was just getting home. I had the driver wait and Sarah got Haseeba a couple of changes of clothes and headed back to our house. While waiting, I explained to Haseeba that Sarah was bringing her some clothes to wear and that we were going to the hospital to take care of her medical needs. She simply sat in an almost catatonic state as I spoke as if not really caring what happened to her.

When Sarah arrived about fifteen minutes later, they took Haseeba upstairs to get dressed and I gave the driver and the guard 500 rupees each and told the driver to take the guard home. They came downstairs and Haseeba was dressed in a pair of sweats and we all got ready and left for the hospital.

After her examination and blood work were finished, the doctor said that besides all the bruises, Hasseeba had a five mm tear in her rectum that needed sutures and several broken ribs. They elected to keep her in the hospital for several days, by then her blood work would be completed.

We explained to Haseeba what her condition was and that we’d stay with her for a while. Priya stayed with Haseeba in the emergency ward and held her hand as they sewed her up and we stayed with her until she was settled in a room.

With an IV inserted in her hand, Haseeba took Priya’s and said, “I owe you my life. I would have died a horrible death there.”

Priya kissed her on the cheek and told her, “You owe me nothing except to find happiness in your life.”

We said our goodnight and left a sleeping Haseeba for home. Priya and Sarah spoke in Tamil all the way back to Sarah’s place. After we dropped Sarah off, Priya sighed with relief and said, “Allah has spoken to my heart, and to show kindness to an enemy has brought me forgiveness and a great blessing. Thank you, Sean for doing this with me; I couldn’t have done it on my own.”

“Don’t thank me,” I said softly, “today I was merely your instrument. It was you, all you today, and I m so lucky to have you as my wife. I love you so much, words can never express.”

At home, we filled Mom and Dad in on the events of the day, and that Haseeba was now in the hospital recuperating from her ordeal. Mom hugged Priya and told her how proud she was of her daughter-in-law. Dad was remorseful about what he’d said earlier and added, “I cannot imagine a country where the life of a young woman is only worth forty-seven dollars. It’s just inconceivable to me.”

We ate a light supper and headed upstairs. After showering and saying prayers, we retired to bed. From all the events of the day and Priya being so strong for Haseeba, Priya melted in my arms and cried herself out.