Dear lk09,

I am glad that your friend’s father is recovering and has been released from hospital. Thank God!

I know the very idea of an arranged marriage is repelling to you, and it would me for me too. Luckily I haven’t grown up in a country where this is expected from girls, and where one of the key role of parents is to marry off their daughters. And where girls are expected to follow that tradition and respect and obey, and compromise, even sacrifice their happiness, for the sake of the tradition and parental and societal expectations. Frankly, it’s sad and disturbing to me, but it’s easy for me to say, not having been brought up in that system.

There is no standing up for yourself in such cases, either you make the people who took care of you all your life sad and disappointed or you make them happy. Either way I won’t be happy.

Well, these people gave you away just because you weren’t a boy, and your mother had to sneak out to visit you on your birthdays. This is how much they loved you. And then, they never protected you from your sister’s bullying, moreover they told you to accept and tolerate her bullying because “it’s just her character, she cannot be helped.” What your parents did was put a roof over your head since you were 5 years old, and provide for your material and educational needs. But they haven’t provided for much more, based on what you’ve shared here.

You don’t owe them anything since you didn’t choose to be born. It was their decision, and they had a responsibility to take care of you. But they didn’t even do that – they rejected you because their own parents and the society told them they should reject you. And then, when your aunt changed her mind about adopting you, your grandfather finally allowed that you be brought home.

I am not writing this to cause more trauma to you, but to express how appalled I am by such treatment of women and girls in India. It’s just so unfair and cruel, and then you’re expected to accept it and live by it, because you’d cause your parents pain and disappointment. But what about pain and disappointment that they have caused to you, and that millions of parents have caused to their daughters??

I wish you, together with other brave, intelligent young women, would stand up against such treatment and such tradition. Are there such civil organizations in India, which promote equal treatment for girls and breaking free from harmful traditions? You’re intelligent, you have a job and now even your own apartment – why would you need to settle for less, for a potential life of misery with someone you don’t love?

You should have the right to choose your own life partner, and also, to make mistakes before finding a suitable guy. In the least, you have the right to have the same treatment as your sister, so they should give you 5 more years.

What’s clear to me is that succumbing to their pressure and outdated traditions is not something that a person with your intelligence, insight and sensibility, should put up with.