My marriage was fixed when I was 14 years old to my aunt’s son who is a truck driver. I did not want to marry, tried hard to stop it but my parents forced it on me saying that we were poor. I have 2 younger sisters and they could ill afford delaying her marriage. I had two miscarriages and my health is poor, I have aches and pains and am always fatigued. With difficulty my husband took me to a doctor (gynae) who said there is some problem with my uterus and that I need treatment. There is so much violence from my mother-in law and father-in-law for not bearing a child - they pull my hair, bang my head against the wall, push me and knock my head with their knuckles. I shout back and scream but it has no effect on them. They are so angry and disappointed that I do not have children.
I could not bear their abuses and was feeling mentally ill. It is then that my husband shifted them out of our house and put them in a tin shed next to ours. We have a common kitchen and their abuses continue relentlessly. I have shared my plight in the women’s group but they tell me that all my problems will be resolved once I have children. I should adjust and carry on with life. I decided to join the Child Rights Protection Forum to campaign against child marriages. My in-laws do not like this either, but it has given me a lot of strength to talk about myself and motivate other girls not to succumb to pressures of early marriage.
Narrative provided by M Venkatarangaiya Foundation in their report ‘…and they never lived happily ever after. The battle for justice goes on: Voices of married girls in Telangana’
