Woman without a past or a future

This came from a friend Sayyah in Maharashtra.

MK was found on the road in a village of Maharashtra and brought by a ‘good Samaritan’ to a Home for mentally ill destitute women in 2007. We would have liked to talk to her; that is what we do but it is not possible because this is a woman without a past or a future.

The Home has a visiting psychiatrist, resident nurses, psychiatric social workers and many times even a psychologist who look after the women rescued from the roads. The psychiatrist had diagnosed MK with Mental Retardation with Behavioral Problems… overly talkative, excessively cheerful, she did not seem to understand what was being told to her, her responses were inappropriate. She had grandiose ideas; she thought she was a police inspector! She reported that her family had blamed her for their misfortunes and had asked her to leave. The social workers sent her family letters and postcards at an address she gave but the Indian Postal Service sent those back, stamped with failure. We do not know anything more of her past.

At the Home, MK was feared for she had great tempers boiling inside. She did not make many close friends, preferring to be outdoors and engaged in hard, manual work rather than women’s work inside the cool shelters of home. She had the strength of many men, it is told, being large and strong in constitution, so she voluntarily participated in the construction work underway at the Home that was expanding to accommodate those like her; ‘mental’ women. She planted the gardens of the Home that have grown tall and straight today. However she was stubborn about her chores indoors or attending the prayer sessions, she fought with everyone, she did not like to socialize, rather she would talk to herself, do badbad, laugh inappropriately. She wanted to be married, a young woman like her, not yet 30. But a home for women has no men.

In fits of rage, she would try to run away from the Home. How could MK survive the rigours of the world outside the walls? The social workers had to track her down and then persuade her to come back. Sometimes she would be beyond persuasion. Then for her own good they would be obliged to bring her back anyway … but she was so strong, two-three men could not hold her down. Battle-weary, they found they could not handle her uncontrollable violence after two years. In January 2009, she was to be sent to the mental hospital , equipped to deal with violent cases like hers.

The court order, required to commit someone to a mental hospital, was followed through clearly. She was accompanied by a psychiatric social worker who recounted in front of the court that MK is psychiatrically ill and needs hospitalization. Two doctors, one the personal doctor of the patient from the Home, the other an external, neutral party, both though from the local Mental Hospital gave (almost similarly - worded) accounts as to her mental state. The district magistrate spoke to her in person and found her responses insensible. On January 23, 2009, under Section 20 and 22 of the Mental Health Act, MK was committed to the famous local Mental Hospital, situated half a kilometer away from the even-more-famous Jail for three months.

It is doubtful if anyone visited MK during her stay at the mental hospital, certainly not her psychiatrist or anyone from the Home. In the first week of March 2009, the Mental Hospital contacted the Home that MKs health was in critical condition and she would need to be shifted to the local General Hospital. A social worker and the nurse from the Home visited her before she could be shifted. She was sitting propped up in her bed, eyes dull but still cogent that she had visitors from the Home. She had partially healed scars on her arms. MK, the one with the strength of many men, seemed unable to support her own weight, as if her back would not hold her upright again.

Within the week, MK died in the care of the Mental Hopital.

Cause of death- unknown.

No death certificate has been issued.