My child

Recently, I read in a newspaper, how a father of a child, abducted his own child from the court premises, when the court had ruled out the custody of the child about six years old to the mother, after their divorce.

Well one thing is very clear here, without his explanation, it was impossible for him to think life without his child.

This  reading pushed me back in my memory lane. Long time back, when I was in Bal Mandir, there was a girls named Bhagbati, sorry can’t even remember her full name today. There are all kind of children, who land up in Bal Mandir for so many reasons associated with each child. Every child, has his or her own story to tell, why they have to find themselves, inside the Bal Mandir.

Bal Mandir do allows all visitors to visit their loved ones. I think, it used to be supervised from the distance; if my memory serves me pretty well. Of course, there will be some exception all the time and everywhere.

One day, a man came in, looking for his lost daughter. It is not easy for me to remember my own age, when exactly this incident happened. In my vague memory, I guess I could have been younger than 10 years old. Some of the girls did accompany Bhagabati, when she went to see her father. Today, I am guessing, it must have been off day; otherwise that many young girls would not have gone with her to see him at once. Or it could also be possible, that he must have visited her during lunch break hour of the school, which normally was very rare.


This was his first visit to her daughter. All the girls came to know that Bhagbati was abandoned by her mother in the Bal Mandir, without her father's knowledge. At the same time this news was well wrapped from him for so many years also. So, he was angry to see his daughter there. But more than that, he was angry with the mother of the child; who left his daughter there, without his knowledge, forget about his consent.

He must have been trying to catch up with her daughter, the time that was lost, while she was growing up in Bal Mandir. He could have been thinking, she would rather have been playing on his lap. Perhaps he wanted to play with his child while she was growing up. Maybe she was the apple of his eyes, which I don’t know for sure.

He shared so many things with her daughter and also with her friends, who accompanied her that day. He was a driver, may be for that reason, he did not think it necessary to hide his anger from them; when he was venting his anger for his ex-wife[?]. In the fits of anger and emotion he said, “if he sees his wife again in his life, he will crush her under the wheels of his vehicle.”

I do not remember swarming up the visitors or giving any of my friends accompany, when there was a visitor from their home. Needless to tell you, this time also, I was not there, to witness the high drama and anger felt by this father of a young girl , who did everything possible to find out, where  his child was.

But on the other hand, there must have been a whole different story, behind it. Why the mother left her child in Bal Mandir ? Lets try to find out some of the answers, with some simple questions. Were they married ? If so, Bhagabati would not have been ended up in Bal Mandir. Were they in love ? Maybe, but, why wasn't she keeping her love child ? Where was the man during nine months of her pregnancy ? or the beginning years of her life ? As the man was a driver of long route [?] he must have been away for some time, during her pregnancy or birth time. Was she scared to raise a love child ? Perhaps yes. It was the late seventies time or early 80s Nepal. Who could face the conservative society then, when single mother today finds it, difficult to face now ?

I do not remember at all whether Bhagwati was pulled from Bal Mandir by his father after that visit ? But she was not there with us, when I grew up little more to understand things and  then remember playing with her after that.

The other day, I was watching a crime reality show on Indian TV. There was another divorce, and wife was about to walk out of his life with two small children. He had married but until the court order, she was still living with him. She had  also won the court case of good maintenance for the children's upkeep from her husband, who soon was going to be her ex-husband.

Just weeks before, they were to separated, he lost his control during an usual argument with his wife and killed her. For two days her dead body was hidden in the bathtub. Then he bought a big freezer to keep that dead body. Cut her into thousands of pieces, kept in small plastic bags. Each time he went out he kept throwing one or two bags at a time. He chose   evening hours to throw those bags in  various parts of the Deharadun.

The reason he lost his mental balance, is so clear to him, when he told the interrogating police officers in front of his wife’s brother, “she was taking my children with her, how can she do that to me ?”

Remember the court had given the custody of their children to the mother.

If only she was loved and respected, wanted and needed in his life; what kind of mother would like to separate their child from their father ?

Is this love ? Do these men really love their child, without even showing an ounce of respect to their mothers. Or, maybe, I am the one who is not getting it correctly. It seems to me that their child is more than sigh of love but children feed them their ego ?

How come, men give so little respect and importance to the mother, yet their child seem to be the whole world to them ?

Does the child to these fathers, is just a signature of they being able to begate child ? I am yet to learn, how love dies and yet the act of love keep us reminding, once there was love between those couple, which is dead now. Those children and their condition, force us to think hard about some serious issues that lies in human behaviour.