Some 232 violence-victim rehabilitated young girls have been rebuilding their shattered lives after falling prey to social curses like child marriage, dowry, abuse, violence, repression and trafficking at premature ages.
These young females have now started new journey through various income generation activities to attain self-reliance and dignity for restructuring their lives anew overcoming the terrific traumas they suffered at early ages.
Head of Programme (Coordination) of RDRS Bangladesh Manjushree Saha, also a noted women rights activist, made all these things possible through her hard endeavors and sincere efforts at the Rehabilitation Center “Alokita Bhuban” of the NGO since 2009.
She rehabilitated these repressed females through providing treatments, legal aid, counsel, education and vocational training on various trades and providing necessary inputs paving way to achieve self-reliance through income-generation activities.
Talking to BSS, Manjushree said all these rehabilitated victims have been hailing from economically backward and extremely poor families of different rural areas in all eight districts under Rangpur division.
The victims were divorced or driven away by husbands after tortures for dowry, abused, victims of domestic violence, repression and abduction, gang rape, tortured for polygamy of husbands, unmarried mothers and widows or trafficked.
Loosing all hopes in life, some of them lost mental balance, others were attacked with serious diseases and tried to commit suicide to get rid of agony in life as the whole society became a dreadful place for them, she narrated.
“I, along with my colleagues, went through the case study of every victim girl first and identified illiteracy, extreme poverty, early marriage and lack of awareness among their guardians as the main reasons behind their tragic stories,” she added.
She said it was not so easy to get them recovered from the unbearable traumas they suffered in premature ages before becoming able to understand about life; Manjushree said adding that more such victims are still undergoing the rehabilitation process.
Talking to BSS, rehabilitated Kajoli, Akhteri, Laboni and Armina said they were physically immature having knowledge about conjugal or sexual life, but witnessed horrifying episodes amid merciless tortures by husbands and inmates in their lives.
Victims Mahmuda, Swapna, Ruma, Torulota, Nazia, Khadija and Shukho Rani said many of them could not even record cases with police and even after filing cases, some of them had to stay in safe custody of police.
Victims Nahar, Pratima, Sultana and Hafiza said they are now earning well through income generations activities at homes, their parents are much aware now and they are leading new life with dignity in their families and society as well.
The rehabilitated young women, mostly aged between 13 and 17 years, thanked RDRS Bangladesh and Manjushree and expressed determination to root out all these socials curses from so that no more adolescents would suffer similar tragedies in the society.
