Bangalore housewife seeks refuge from fatwa in law

It was a desperate bid to escape torture, but Reshma, 24, now finds her whole community ranged against her.

On May 18, heads of the community (Jamaat) summoned Reshma and her parents to a mosque, where she was beaten in front of nearly 300 onlookers.

A fatwa was later issued that Reshma leave the city in three days; her parents were told to leave in three months.

If they did not do as they were told, the Jamaat threatened that Reshma’s father would have to crawl around the locality on his knees; Reshma would be paraded on a donkey, her head shaved.

Sounds like a bizarre medieval tale? This is real-life news, from Vidyaranyapura in North Bangalore.

And what was the young housewife’s crime? Nothing, she says.

Her husband Dastagir suspects her of infidelity. Married in 2005, the physical abuse had started early. “However, he also said he loves me,” Reshma said.

Things spun out of control when the couple took in a tenant, Nagaraj. Dastagir and Nagaraj grew close, and the tenant often had meals with the family.

In time, Dastagir began to suspect that he was being cuckolded by his tenant, and kept an obsessive watch over his wife’s movements.

He would rope in children in the neighbourhood to spy on her. “He beat me often, for no reason. He pretended to leave for work, then got on the neighbour’s terrace to watch,” says Reshma.

As it grew unbearable, Reshma reached out to her parents. They suggested that she ask the tenant to vacate. Even after Nagaraj moved out, the torture continued without cease.

On April 26, in a bid to commit suicide, Reshma went to the railway tracks near Yelahanka station. Nagaraj found her there, and persuaded her to escape to his aunt’s house in Raichur, where she stayed for a fortnight.

Dastagir got wind of where she was, and brought her back. He complained to community leaders, who refused to hear his wife’s side of the story.

Reshma has since approached the Vidyaranyapura police, who took up a complaint against the men who issued the fatwa only after deputy commissioner of police HS Revanna intervened.

A petition has also been filed with the state human rights commission.