C25 Food for Thought

Sarvani was now even more anxious; they had come to her house, and she was trapped. No one seemed to know what to do. They couldn't lock themselves in forever - it was impossible.

"I am going to open the door," her father had a look of determination on his face. "Perhaps they will listen to me." Though she was sure his optimism was misplaced, she could stop him from trying. She sat closer to her mother, the latter holding her tighter, giving her comfort in that stressful situation. The sound of a door being opened could be heard; there were faint sounds of someone talking. They could hear the door being closed again and footsteps approached the room they were in.

"They just wanted to remind me that Sarvani would be detained in the same class if she doesn't go to college today. They even offered to lend me one of their bikes so I could drop her in college."

"Did you accept father?"

"Did you expect your father to refuse the most powerful gang in the province?" Sarvani paled at her mother's words.

"But father...."

"Don't worry child. I told them I would drop you on my way to office using my office car and they agreed."

"Just like that?"

"Yes."

"Perhaps, we were overthinking." he looked at his wife. "Make no mistake. They are every bit evil, but the problem is they are very slippery word wise and action wise. They leave no proof or trace of their actions even though everyone knows what they are and what they do. We have to be very careful like them using diplomacy like what the Pandavas did during their exile."

"Oh, why did you have to accept this posting?" His wife lamented. "We could have chosen to go to some other province!"

"I wasn't given any choice. Besides, it is almost time for me to leave for my office. So, get ready quickly."

"Yes father." The two women got busy, one getting ready for college while the other packing lunch for both father and daughter.

The day passed by quickly without any incident. Sarvani was so surprised that she even dared to smile at her good luck. Though a part of her mind warned her that it seemed too good to be true, Sarvani felt that she might as well enjoy her pleasant moments while she could. Her friends were equally surprised to see her so happy and didn't say anything that might depress her. It was the last period of the day - taken by the history professor. Almost everyone in the class would be waiting eagerly for him to finish; some even sneaked out of the class after the attendance was taken. So, he had resorted to taking the attendance at the end of the class. So, they were forced to attend the class for the sake of attendance.

As the professor droned on and on about some battle that changed the fate of some nation that didn't even exist now, the peon came with a message. The Professor looked at the slip, read it silently and then looked up at the class that was waiting with bated breath. He looked around, increasing the anticipation even more and finally his eyes rested on Sarvani.

"Sarvani has been given detention by the Math Professor and she will report to him in his department today after this class." A gasp came out of Sarvani's mouth at the turn of events. This meant that she had to walk home. The college would already have informed her parents about it, so her father would be there to pick her up. By the time she was allowed to go, her father would be doing his second shift in the office. He worked two shifts - The first shift and the third shift. Each shift was of four hours.

When she entered the Math department, she was shocked to see all the male lecturers in that department busy correcting homework, assignments, projects, preparing for the next class and so on. She realized for the first time that the teachers also did a lot of work that was taken for granted.

"May I come in sir?" The Department Head Professor AVS as he was known by everyone, looked up. "Yes. But please leave your dress and shoes outside." Sarvani couldn't believe her ears. Did she hear correctly? "Yes. You heard that right. Now leaves your clothes and footwear outside and come in. We have a lot of work to do." Sarvani hesitated.

"Perhaps she wants to do it on the road where every passerby can see what she is doing." another professor remarked. That brought a bright red tinge in Sarvani's cheeks, and she reluctantly slipped out of her clothes, stepping into the room bare bodied and bare foot. If she didn't have her books, she wouldn't even be able to make an attempt to save her modesty. What would they do to her?

The readers are requested to pause here and ponder on the issue of this kind of abuse of women. If you have to live in this kind of world, what would you do? Will you make an attempt to stop these atrocities on women or would you encourage the perpetrators by being a part of those atrocities. I leave it to the wisdom of the readers to decide. You might ask me what the purpose is of writing this story. It is simple - atrocities must be stopped irrespective of gender, caste, creed, religion, nationality etc. An atrocity doesn't become good if it is done by someone belonging to the same community. Till people develop this outlook, and condemn every crime impartially, things will become worse and worse. Most of the descriptions are fictional but might become a reality if people remain mute spectators to crime. The matters are made worse by the unscrupulous women who resort to legal terror for their nefarious agenda. Too much of anything can backfire and defeat everything. The fact that men were burdened by pro-female laws that were basically used to terrorize, destroy and oppress men using legal terrorism created a deep sense of injustice in men. This smoldering anger finally led to the misogynist society where men ensured total dominance over women. We continue Sarvani's troubles in the next chapter.