Bengal: Husband, in-laws refuse to take back mentally ill woman

Kolkata, July 1 (IANS) Amateur radio operators (HAMs) are finding it difficult to reunite a mentally challenged woman from West Bengal, whom they traced to Mumbai, with her family.

The woman, mother of a 20-year-old son and a 16-year-old daughter, allegedly lost her mental balance after facing torture from her husband, relatives said.

Thereafter, she started straying from home.

“About six years ago, she was traced to Gujarat and brought back to her matrimonial home in Gangarampur, Uluberia, in the Howrah district of West Bengal. Her husband or in-laws did not bother to get her treated, and she went missing once again,” Ambarish Nag Biswas, secretary of the West Bengal Radio Club (WBRC), said.

The WBRC is an organisation of amateur radio operators with an extensive network across the country.

It works with government agencies to create alternative communication networks during natural calamities like cyclones and also helps in reuniting people with mental ailments, who are rescued by the police, with their families.

A few years ago, the woman was spotted by the Railway Protection Force (RPF) at the Shivaji Nagar station in Pune.

She had been drugged by some people, who were attempting to traffic her.

While the miscreants could not be apprehended, the security personnel rescued her and admitted her to a hospital.

A court then sent her to a shelter for such women in Mumbai, where she remained for nearly 10 years.

“As she spoke Bangla, home authorities, the Mumbai Police and others got in touch with the WBRC, requesting us to trace her family. We got to work and tracked her family to Gangarampur. Her daughter was overjoyed when she saw photographs and videos of the woman. However, the husband and other in-laws have refused to take her back,” Nag Biswas said.

The family contended that they are not sure what she had “been up to” when missing from home.

The organisation also got in touch with the woman’s brother, a government employee, but even he did not seem too keen to accept her.

“We have now requested authorities in Mumbai to arrange for her treatment there. Once her condition improves, we will do whatever is necessary to ensure that she is not deprived of her rights as a married woman,” Nag Biswas added.

–IANS

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