Ruksana (not her real name) is not about to let the Covid-19 virus stop her from helping patients in the private hospital where she works. She is a brave, independent woman, proud of her job and being able to support her family and her young daughter.
Seeing her now, you would never guess she suffered years of abuse at the hands of an ex-husband and his family.
Ruksana’s mother and brother have disabilities. Her father is the daily wage labourer and the sole earner of the family. In a poor family with an adult the parents always want to marry the girl off as soon as possible and so she was married off early to a much older man. Shortly after the wedding, her husband’s family started demanding a dowry, and when her poor family couldn’t pay she was subjected to physical, emotional and sexual abuse. When she gave birth to a daughter the abuse only intensified.
In 2018 she came to see a doctor at the charity after being brutally assaulted by her husband, and he referred her to Suchandra Chaterjee, who is Calcutta Rescue social-worker and counsel and runs its Gender-Based Violence Programme. “She was suffering from severe trauma throughout the sessions. But the girl is brave and she didn’t give up on herself,” Suchandra said. She has been supporting Ruksana for the past two years and helped her get on a vocational training course before she got her job in nursing.
Then, in 2019, her husband remarried and she and her daughter were thrown out on the steers.But, with Suchandra’s support, Ruksana went back to live with her father and had the confidence to pass her job interview and begin a new life.
Ruksana said: “I work in a hospital and helping the patients is my duty. In this turbulent time, I am happy to help people. My hospital has provided me with masks, gloves, protective gear and headgear as well. I will keep working.”
Calcutta Rescue salutes this brave woman and wishes for her safety and good health in this challenging time.
You can save more women like Ruksana! Calcutta Rescue provides mental health supports and often vocational training to the gender-based violence survivors to make them independent.
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