Saturday, May 21, 2011

I wonder why

It was 26 April 2011, 6:15 AM. I was going through Times of India front page while having my morning tea. At the bottom of the page I saw an article which caught my attention. The article was about Aruna Shanbaug, a nurse who was strangled and raped by a sweeper of the same hospital on 27 November 1973 after which she was left in a vegetative state till now. To be very specific, she is in a vegetative state since last 38 years. Sounds terrible? It does.

I learnt that an appeal was made for mercy killing for her by her friend, a journalist Pinky Virani. The appeal was rejected on the Women's Day 8 March 2011.

The article ends here and there starts my curiosity.

I couldn't resist and searched as much as I could about Aruna Shanbaug on google. The more I learnt, the more curious I became. Finally I couldn't stop myself from placing an online order for the book 'Aruna's Story' written by Pinky Virani.

After I was done with this book, I was forced to ask myself 'Does god really exist?'. One can see the height of life's unpredictibility by reading this book. A girl who was as happy as she could be turned out to be the most unfortunate one in the next 30 mins. 10 mins to be very specific, changed her life forever and changed for the worst.

She was happy that she came out of her village and got a decent job in Bombay (now Mumbai). She was happy that she was going to get married to a doctor who was also a good human being. She was happy that her fiance was about to finish his MD and going to start his own clinic. She was happy about everything which was happening to her.

She left her hostel and started staying with her sister to save money for his fiance clinic. She had already applied leaves from 1 Dec (just 3 days after the incident) to get married. Everything was planned for her and who knew none of these was actually going to be executed!
Not only was she one of the most beautiful nurses of the hospital but also was a quick learner and very sharp minded. She came to work as usual that day and little did she know what the destiny had in store for her. The book mentiones that she had consulted a couple of astrologers and they all told her that she had a one in thousand horoscope. She indeed had.

She paid for being true. Sohanlal, the person who is responsible for turning her life to hell had better plans than her because he got them executed. He not only raped her but also left her in a state which is worse than being dead. If you read the book, you will find that she had asked a fellow nurse to accompany her in the evening when she was supposed to go to change her uniform in the basement where later she was raped the same day. Aruna had gone  to the basement alone. Only if some one could accompany her that day, her life wouldnt have turned so miserable.
I am disturbed whenever I think about her. She was having a life as normal as mine, yours or anyone's. And it changed. I wonder why did this happen to her. I wonder why didn't she die instead of going in a vegetative state for ever. I wonder how unpredictable life can be. I wonder why I am struggling today for everything, for better job, better pay, better lifestyle, better savings, better future; when life is actually so unpredictable!

I just couldnt keep my thoughts to myself so kindly bear with this piece of life's bitter truth.