TRIGGER WARNING: disturbing content!
When Mannat was 16, her brother got married. He loved his wife – let’s call her Ambreen – and admired how religious she was. She observed the hijab and everything that made her seem like a good Muslim woman.
She had five older brothers, all of whom were just as religious. The eldest one, who was 31 years old at the time told her he was interested in marrying her 16-year-old sister-in-law. Perhaps due to his age or experience, he was managing the family business and everyone held him in high esteem.
Eager to forward her brother’s message, Ambreen talked to her husband about the proposal which he immediately refused. His sister was only 16 and the age difference could not be justified so he knew it was a bad idea.
However, the rejection made Ambreen unhappy and she decided to talk about it with her mother-in-law in the hopes of getting her on board.
So, she did. Along with promising that her brother would pay haq-mehr worth a million in cash as well as a hefty amount of gold. Unfortunately for Mannat, her mother was the greedy type and readily agreed to the proposal. Thus, began a series of emotional manipulation, whereby she would pressurize Mannat into saying yes.
Mannat was only 16 and aspired to be a doctor but her mom’s coercion saw no defeat. “Agar tumne yahan shadi nahi ki to yaad rakhna jahan bhi shadi hoi mein tumhen bilkul support nahi karun gi. Tumhen pata hai susral mein kitne problems hote hein. Mujh se koi umeed na rakhna. Yeh tumhari bhabhi ka bhai hai. Apni behan k darr se tumhare sath theek rahe ga. Waise bhi agar shohar bari umar ka ho to biwi k bohat nakhray uthata hai.”
After days of feeding her such nonsense, Mannat finally gave in to her mother and sister-in-law’s cruel demands. And long story short, she was married.
Right after the wedding functions ended, the torture began.
He sexually abused her every night, continued to rape her even though she told him the sex hurt. In fact, whenever she complained, he flat-out refused to accept she was in pain. He also bit her in different places and her entire body was covered in bruises.
Needless to say, he was sexually frustrated. It was later revealed that he held resentment against women since he had been rejected multiple times before. Turns out, because he was ‘too’ religious, families weren’t willing to get their daughters into such an arrangement.
Despite his claimed devotion to religion, the man regularly engaged in anal sex (read: marital rape) with Mannat. He continued it for three weeks, everyday, until she got sick. She lost a lot of blood and ultimately fainted, upon which her husband’s parents called her family and asked them to take her back.
“Jo larki apne shohar ko satisfy na kar sakay us ka hum kia karen?” they said.
When Mannat’s brother came to pick her up, she was unconscious and he took her straight to the hospital. Once the doctors examined her, they called him in and showed him how brutally her body had been violated. That’s when he realized what was happening all along. Naturally, he was furious but because Mannat was in such bad condition, he had to wait for her medical treatment to complete. She had to go through a procedure to get her rectum fixed. And Mannat and her brother returned home after five days, both mentally shattered.
Knowing that his wife had pushed Mannat into the marriage, things got to the point where he wanted to divorce her. And when Ambreen found out he wanted to end their relationship, she argued she wasn’t the only one to blame “mujhe to talaq de do ge apni maa ka kia karo ge? Woh bhi barabar ki shareek hai.” He knew full well that his mother was equally responsible. In fact, Mannat was the reason they ended up staying together. She urged him not to leave her because she believed her mother was just as guilty.
However, he helped his sister get a divorce and it took her eighteen months to gain whatever normalcy was possible in her circumstances. She resumed her studies and is a practicing doctor now. And guess what? she never got any haq-mehr; not the money nor the cash. Maybe this will be a lesson for Mannat’s mother who should have known better than bargaining her own child for greed.
It’s unbelievable to think that a mother would do such a thing. But it doesn’t end here.
At the beginning of it all, Mannat told her mother about her now ex-husband’s heinous acts but instead of helping her, she told him ‘sub mard aise hote hen.’
One of the times, Mannat even went back to her parents’ house because she decided she had had enough. But her mother forced her back to hell by telling her to keep quiet, as otherwise it would hurt her brother’s marriage. “agar tum ne koi baat munh se nikali to yad rakhna bhai bhabi ka ghar kharab hoga.” Apparently, they were pregnant with their first child and Mannat had to suffer more torture because her mother guilt-shamed her into potentially breaking her brother’s family.
Mannat is one of the thousands of girls forced into marriage everyday; for money, honor and shame. While men like her ex-husband deserve to be apprehended for their crimes, let’s not forget the parents. For a mother – or a father – to let their child suffer, that too, on top of forcing them into a marriage that is utterly peodophilic, is and always will be criminal.TRIGGER WARNING: disturbing content!
When Mannat was 16, her brother got married. He loved his wife – let’s call her Ambreen – and admired how religious she was. She observed the hijab and everything that made her seem like a good Muslim woman.
She had five older brothers, all of whom were just as religious. The eldest one, who was 31 years old at the time told her he was interested in marrying her 16-year-old sister-in-law. Perhaps due to his age or experience, he was managing the family business and everyone held him in high esteem.
Eager to forward her brother’s message, Ambreen talked to her husband about the proposal which he immediately refused. His sister was only 16 and the age difference could not be justified so he knew it was a bad idea.
However, the rejection made Ambreen unhappy and she decided to talk about it with her mother-in-law in the hopes of getting her on board.
So, she did. Along with promising that her brother would pay haq-mehr worth a million in cash as well as a hefty amount of gold. Unfortunately for Mannat, her mother was the greedy type and readily agreed to the proposal. Thus, began a series of emotional manipulation, whereby she would pressurize Mannat into saying yes.
Mannat was only 16 and aspired to be a doctor but her mom’s coercion saw no defeat. “Agar tumne yahan shadi nahi ki to yaad rakhna jahan bhi shadi hoi mein tumhen bilkul support nahi karun gi. Tumhen pata hai susral mein kitne problems hote hein. Mujh se koi umeed na rakhna. Yeh tumhari bhabhi ka bhai hai. Apni behan k darr se tumhare sath theek rahe ga. Waise bhi agar shohar bari umar ka ho to biwi k bohat nakhray uthata hai.”
After days of feeding her such nonsense, Mannat finally gave in to her mother and sister-in-law’s cruel demands. And long story short, she was married.
Right after the wedding functions ended, the torture began.
He sexually abused her every night, continued to rape her even though she told him the sex hurt. In fact, whenever she complained, he flat-out refused to accept she was in pain. He also bit her in different places and her entire body was covered in bruises.
Needless to say, he was sexually frustrated. It was later revealed that he held resentment against women since he had been rejected multiple times before. Turns out, because he was ‘too’ religious, families weren’t willing to get their daughters into such an arrangement.
Despite his claimed devotion to religion, the man regularly engaged in anal sex (read: marital rape) with Mannat. He continued it for three weeks, everyday, until she got sick. She lost a lot of blood and ultimately fainted, upon which her husband’s parents called her family and asked them to take her back.
“Jo larki apne shohar ko satisfy na kar sakay us ka hum kia karen?” they said.
When Mannat’s brother came to pick her up, she was unconscious and he took her straight to the hospital. Once the doctors examined her, they called him in and showed him how brutally her body had been violated. That’s when he realized what was happening all along. Naturally, he was furious but because Mannat was in such bad condition, he had to wait for her medical treatment to complete. She had to go through a procedure to get her rectum fixed. And Mannat and her brother returned home after five days, both mentally shattered.
Knowing that his wife had pushed Mannat into the marriage, things got to the point where he wanted to divorce her. And when Ambreen found out he wanted to end their relationship, she argued she wasn’t the only one to blame “mujhe to talaq de do ge apni maa ka kia karo ge? Woh bhi barabar ki shareek hai.” He knew full well that his mother was equally responsible. In fact, Mannat was the reason they ended up staying together. She urged him not to leave her because she believed her mother was just as guilty.
However, he helped his sister get a divorce and it took her eighteen months to gain whatever normalcy was possible in her circumstances. She resumed her studies and is a practicing doctor now. And guess what? she never got any haq-mehr; not the money nor the cash. Maybe this will be a lesson for Mannat’s mother who should have known better than bargaining her own child for greed.
It’s unbelievable to think that a mother would do such a thing. But it doesn’t end here.
At the beginning of it all, Mannat told her mother about her now ex-husband’s heinous acts but instead of helping her, she told him ‘sub mard aise hote hen.’
One of the times, Mannat even went back to her parents’ house because she decided she had had enough. But her mother forced her back to hell by telling her to keep quiet, as otherwise it would hurt her brother’s marriage. “agar tum ne koi baat munh se nikali to yad rakhna bhai bhabi ka ghar kharab hoga.” Apparently, they were pregnant with their first child and Mannat had to suffer more torture because her mother guilt-shamed her into potentially breaking her brother’s family.
Mannat is one of the thousands of girls forced into marriage everyday; for money, honor and shame. While men like her ex-husband deserve to be apprehended for their crimes, let’s not forget the parents. For a mother – or a father – to let their child suffer, that too, on top of forcing them into a marriage that is utterly peodophilic, is and always will be criminal.
