Shila Dhimal, newly married wife of Rakesh Dhimal was left with her in-laws when he went for abroad employment in Malaysia 5 years’ ago. Their marital life was going well. They used to have frequent conversation over telephone and in a year or two he used to come back to live together with his family taking months long vacation from his job. Their life took a turn after his last arrival when he spent two months with his family and went back to his work. Since then her in-laws behavior changed toward her. They were angry with her for not having a baby even after 5 years’ of marriage. They started to abuse her verbally for it. At first she kept quiet as she thought that disputes as such emerged in every household. But when she felt that situation was being worse, she shared it with her husband. But he told her to live as per the direction of his parents. But situation turned worst – they started to physically and mentally abuse her calling her with different names like ‘witch’ and many other. When the torture became unbearable, she told it to other villagers. They did their best to reconcile between two parties. But their effort backfired as her in-laws threw her out of house blaming her for dishonoring them among villagers.
She then registered a case of domestic violence at Urlabari Mediation Center. They tried their best to reconcile between Shila and her family but failed. They then referred her to CeLRRd for legal aid. CeLRRd helped her to register case of domestic violence at District Police Office of Morang. The Office sent that case file to Urlabari Police Station. Her father-in-law then agreed to give her NPR.7,000/- rupees monthly during mediation in police station. But in the case of divorce with property/maintenance at court, her father in law submitted response letter that as she had left home with all gold and silver jewelries they didn’t need to give property to her and as they were not in the economic status to give monthly NPR 7,000 to her, allegation was false and baseless and they should be free from it. At last, on the day of verification of witness statement in court, both parties agreed to divorce by giving Shila 10 dhur (169.29 m2) of land in Urlabari along with NPR 250,000. Shila can now pursue new and dignified life. She says. “it is better to be single and live liberated life then to be with husband and family with torturous life”.
