Veersammy’s case study was one that depicted a harsh reality which saw a woman being subjected to severe brutality characterised not only by physical but also sexual and emotional forms of abuse. The woman in question had met and married her husband while still very young at which time he had promised to love and take care of her. Her willingness to accept the proposal of marriage was met with the wrath of her family who of course opted to “disown her. She was eventually completely cut off from her family,” Veersammy added.
Happiness would prevail for a while but was soon followed by violence unleashed on the woman by her so-called loving husband. Even after giving birth to three children, the abuse would become even more severe. Further compounding her dilemma was the fact that she was forced to isolate herself from friends and even her neighbours. But even in the midst of all the abuse, Veersammy, recalled that the woman’s worse fear was that “’if he puts me out I have nowhere to go’ since she had no family to turn to. She literally had nobody to turn to when problems emerged. He (the husband) cut her off from everybody, she couldn’t even go to the market or to church which she loved to do.” She also started viewing herself as ugly and undesirable although she was physically very attractive.
One day, the beatings she had grown to expect, was focused on her head. So severe was the blows that she was taken to a hospital in an unconscious state. After being attended to by a physician it was ascertained that she had sustained a fractured skull. Understandably, the attending physician was obligated to call in the police, which was perhaps of little use, as according to Veersammy, “by the time the report was made his relatives got to her and warned her if she told the police that he hit her in the head he would throw her out of his house and take her children away.”
According to Veersammy by the time the police arrived, the woman’s tale was one of “‘I slipped down the stairs and hit my head’.” Her decision to comply with the relatives’ request saw them promising the woman that her husband would never touch her again. “True to the relatives’ word, the man never hit her again but instead he followed through with throwing her out of the house,” Veersammy said.
However, a Good Samaritan would soon come to the woman’s aid, assisting with the construction of small house. Interesting to note though the house was constructed in her husband’s yard. The woman would live there with her three children but was no longer financially assisted by her husband. Without education or skills she was thrust into the world of work. However, with some intervention, she was permitted to have a small food stall at a nearby school. The woman’s financial situation became so dire that her eldest daughter had to drop out of school. What would happen next would prove to be even more nightmarish, as according to Veersammy the eldest daughter, then 12 years old, would allegedly draw the attention of her father in a most immoral way. The matter was soon brought to the attention of the Human Services Ministry and was eventually taken before a court of law. “The child lied in front of a judge because she was warned by her father that if she told the truth ‘I would kill you, your sisters and your mother’. She told the judge in chambers that ‘my father never touched me I had sex with a boy in the village’,” Veersammy noted. The matter was, as a result, thrown out.
It was not until years later that the truth of the matter was brought to light when the young girl was engaged in a conversation with a member of the religious community. Her mother on learning that her daughter was molested by her estranged husband was devastated. “A whole blame game started with the abuse woman because she wasn’t able to detect what was going on…she went berserk…” Veersammy recalled.
The matter was brought to the attention of the police but according to Veersammy nothing was immediately done. Having admitted to being molested, the young woman was soon the subject of physical abuse at the hands of her father. “Her father armed himself with an iron bar and turned up at their modest home hitting her in the head. She fell down and started to scream even as threats of ‘I will kill you’ were belted out by the father.”
This time around the police intervened and arrested the father. Professing to be a man of means, the man promptly informed the woman and her children that he would never be charged. “It so happened when the matter was called in court, the man with an extremely competent lawyer defending him, said that his daughter was about to poison him so he pushed her and she fell and hit her head.” As a result that matter was also thrown out of the court. A restraining order was however obtained which of course the man blatantly defied. When that matter was called up, Veersammy revealed that it was the magistrate this time around who insisted that the woman and her children were “seeing things because you are so obsessed with this man.” This was yet another matter that was thrown out of the court.
According to Veersammy, these are but a few of the matters that are brought to the attention of the WPO on a daily basis indicating that although many women and their children are evidently abused they are not afforded justice.
You must be logged in to post a comment.