Kolkata: In a trauma similar to that of Imrana Bibi of Uttar Pradesh, a Muslim woman in West Bengal who was raped at knifepoint by a village youth was asked by local clerics to divorce her husband and marry the rapist.
Twenty-two-year-old Rehna of Kantabagan village in Murshidabad district, about 210 km from Kolkata, was raped on the night of July 25 by village youth Mansur Mallick while her husband was away in Bangalore on work, local news reports said.
Later, Rehna was asked by the village salishi (kangaroo court) to divorce her husband and marry the rapist.
Rehna was raped at knife-point in front of her four children. She told the villagers about the incident and also informed her husband, a mason, over phone. After the husband, Muluk Sheikh, returned the village court ruled on July 30 that the rapist had to marry the woman.
When the rapist refused to marry her, the salishi ordered him to pay Rehna a fine of Rs.18,000 but only after her divorce was through. Again, the rapist refused, though the kangaroo court ruled that the money would be to meet her divorce cost and for village development.
Strangely, the village elders branded Rehna a woman of loose morals and she was asked to leave Katabagan for her parental home in another village and return only after she got a divorce.
When Rehna and her husband Muluk Sheikh, who stood by her, told the salishi that they wanted to stay together, the arbiters asked them to pay Rs 50,000 or leave. The amount was beyond Sheikh's means.
Imrana Bibi, of Muzzafarnagar in Uttar Pradesh, was raped by her father-in-law Mohammad Ali in June 2005. The local clerics had told the mother of five to divorce her husband and marry Ali. On Oct 19, a district court in the state sentenced Ali to 10 years in prison for raping and attempting to murder her.
Rehna went to lodge a complaint with Behrampore police last month but it was not registered. On Thursday she met additional superintendent of police Shankar Chakraborty and submitted her complaint.
"We will arrest the culprits. Villagers cannot take the law into their own hands," Chakraborty said.
"I felt humiliated. My disgrace was out in the open. They branded me a woman of loose morals and ordered me to divorce my husband. They also told me to marry my rapist," Rehna said after lodging a police complaint.
While villagers continue to brand Rehna a woman of loose morals "who sleeps around", her problem was compounded after her father and stepmother too drove her out.
She was sheltered by an aunt.
"My husband wants to take me back but they won't let him. My husband meets me secretly," Rehna said.
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