Her head on a pillow against a fluorescent green wall, a floral blanket covering the stab wounds on her stomach, 24-year-old Sakshi (name changed) has a grim look on her face. She is still recuperating from the injuries inflicted by her brother and uncle a month ago in the name of “protecting family honour”.
Plan to elope
Sakshi had left her house around 11.30 p.m. on January 2 with her distant uncle Dinesh (30), who was married and had three children. Her family at that time had told the police that she had eloped with Dinesh to marry him.
Three days later, on January 5, her brother, Shiva alias Shankar (22) and uncle Rinku (25) allegedly tricked the two into coming to Mayur Vihar in a cab and then allegedly killed Dinesh and stabbed Sakshi. Her marriage to another man was scheduled on February 18.
For the next three days Sakshi was admitted to a hospital, where no family member came to visit her or show any concern for her well-being.
Shelter home
On January 9, Sakshi was sent to a Nari Niketan, a shelter home similar to the one where 20-year-old Shehzadi from Raghubir Nagar is staying currently following the murder of her alleged boyfriend, Ankit Saxena (23), and arrest of her father, mother and minor brother for allegedly committing the heinous crime.
Ankit, a photographer by profession, was allegedly murdered on February 1 because the couple belonged to different communities. After the murder, Shehzadi was sent to a Nari Niketan for her safety.
Sakshi, who has been through a similar phase, is back with her family now. Looking at her 48-year-old mother sitting beside her, she says, “I never loved Dinesh”.
A senior police officer investigating the case, however, remembers meeting Sakshi a day after the murder, at Lal Bahadur Shastri Hospital, where she allegedly cried and told him, “I can’t live without him [Dinesh]”.
As her mother looks at her, Sakshi says she knew Dinesh, who lived with her grandmother in Sahibabad, but denies anything beyond acquaintance between them.
“We were never in a relationship. We used to just talk. On January 2, he told me he will take me for shopping and I agreed,” she says, her glance returning to her mother.
For three days and three nights, she stayed with Dinesh in a temple in Gurugram.
“I asked him to take me home, he kept stopping me and when we came back, he was killed,” she says.
On January 5, according to the police, Sakshi’s brother and uncle coerced Dinesh’s cousin, who was in touch with the two, to call them to Mayur Vihar on the pretext of getting them married.
“Shiva and Rinku had picked up Dinesh’s cousin, who he was in touch with. Dinesh called him asking for help in getting married. The cousin then told the duo, who caught them,” Sakshi’s grandmother Jagbiri had told this reporter two days after the incident. Now, Sakshi denies it all.
“I never planned to marry him. It was my fault that I went without informing my parents,” she says.
She, however, blames her brothers Shiva and Shakti, the latter was arrested later on charges of conspiracy, and her uncle Rinku for not asking her before attacking them.
“If they had asked me before killing him [Dinesh], maybe, the matter would not have gone this far... Shayad woh bach jate [Dinesh may have been saved],” she adds.
Sakshi’s mother says she wanted to meet her daughter at the hospital but the policemen there did not allow her inside.
However, Sakshi’s 15-year-old brother had told this reporter after the incident that “she had dishonoured the family and so nobody wanted to see her”.
Now, her mother says she spent hours outside Lal Bahadur Shastri Hospital where Sakshi was admitted. “I went with my sisters and asked for my daughter a day after the murder, but the police didn’t allow me inside.”
Sakshi spent over two weeks at the Nari Niketan near Karkardooma Court before her mother came to take her back. She remembers keeping quiet through the time she spent there and calls the experience “traumatic”.
‘I was scared’
“I was scared. I wanted to live with my parents. The girls there asked me why I had come, but I did not want to talk. I was in so much pain, emotionally and physically,” she recalls.
Ten days into her stay, Sakshi called her friend and neighbour Pooja but her phone was switched off.
She then called Pooja’s mother and requested her to help her speak to her mother. Sakshi told her mother where she was and asked her to come and get her. The next day, the mother went to the shelter home and met her.
“I went alone. We both cried and I told her to put it all behind her,” says the mother.
On January 24, Sakshi was allowed to go home after she told the court that she wished to live with her parents and did not feel threatened. Her mother gave the assurance of her safety.
Life back home, she claims, has been “just like it used to be before it all happened”.
She says she is scared to go and meet her brothers in jail. “They will blame me for being in that situation,” she says.
Her mother, however, says she has met her sons in Tihar jail four times and they were the ones who told her to bring Sakshi back. “Before I went to the shelter home, I went to meet Shiva and Shakti. They told me to get her home,” the mother says.
“ Iske bahar rehne mein bhi to hamari izzat jati hai [Her staying out of home will also be against our honour],” she adds.
The mother blames Dinesh for “luring” Sakshi but says, “She did what she did. We want to forget it and move on. We are worried for her marriage though.”
Wedding called off
Sakshi recalls speaking to her fiancé, who said no to the marriage after the incident. She says she decided to call off the wedding. “I spoke to him once after I returned. The way he spoke to me, I could sense he doubted my character. I can’t live with a person like that so I told my family not to plead with them.”
Aware of Ankit Saxena’s murder case through media reports, Sakshi says she wonders what will happen to Shehzadi.
“I can’t say if she will choose to go back to her parents or be on her own. But my experience says that at this age, it’s difficult to stand up against your parents,” said Sakshi. As the conversation ends, Sakshi’s father walks in, she looks at him, he doesn’t look back.
