The Happiness Club

This is in response to Esther’s Weekly Writing Prompt.

The word for this week is Club.

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She was the most jovial member of our Happiness Club regularly taking part in all the activities energetically. Rati had many feathers in her cap from holding a top executive post in an MNC to being a devoted mother to a daughter. She was a kind soul too helping out the weak and the downtrodden readily.

Rati was the first to speak up when Chandra, another member of the Club, was found to have been continuously tortured for dowry. Chandra’s parents belonged to the lower income group and could not sustain the constant pressure of dowry demand (for huge sums of money) from her in-laws. Chandra was well educated but a homemaker. Rati encouraged her to lodge a police complaint,  provided her legal assistance and finally supported her financially and emotionally through a nasty divorce. She even found a job for Chandra in a local school after the divorce so that she could be financially independent and live life with confidence and dignity.

We looked up to Rati for her courageous stand and wise advice in times of exigencies.

***

It came as a shock when Rati made headlines.

She had not been coming to the Club for quite some time. There was no prior intimation from her. She was not even answering calls. We thought she might be indisposed or could have gone out of station on a sudden trekking trip which she often did.

However, the reason for her absence became clear when one fine morning we read the news in the papers –  “a top executive of an MNC found badly manhandled at her posh residence. Her husband, who had lost his job recently because of suspected embezzlement, had beaten her black and blue to let out his frustration.”

The police were called by her teenage daughter who arrested the husband on charges of domestic violence. Rati was immediately hospitalized. When we visited the hospital she refused to see us.

Rati’s story did not end here. She recuperated from physical and mental damage, walked out of her marriage with her daughter, resigned from the MNC where she used to work and opened an NGO to support women from all strata of society who suffered in a bad marriage.

A year later she rejoined the Happiness Club to continue doing what she did best – set an example for other women who due to various reasons did not come forward to fight for their birth right  – the right to a respectful and happy life.

***

This story is based on a front page report read many years back about a female top executive of an MNC who quietly suffered repeated domestic abuse in fear of social disgrace. Rati is a fictitious character to boost the morale of all such silent sufferers who keep on living lives of inhuman physical, mental and emotional torture and indignities due to lack of support and encouragement from friends, family and society.

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Pic is AI generated