Roshni I Am Alive

A gripping saga of epic escape to momentary freedom of a courageous girl from clutches of all powerful criminal flesh traders. Raju sees his reign as Don of underworld and flesh trade collapsing around him when Roshni, his 20 year old daughter and protege to succeed him, refuses to follow his dictate to marry a 62 year old man and escapes to safe confinement of Nari Niketan. At the heart of the plot is the inviolable rule of flesh trade, "Goods once sold cannot be returned, they must be delivered dead or alive."Raju's supremacy of criminal world is seriously undermined as he faces being excommunicated from flesh trade he has ruled with iron hand for over two decades. To redeem he must deliver Roshni to her buyer. He is brutal, ingenious, master trainer and has forcibly initiated many unwilling girls into flesh trade, now he must do same to his rebellious daughter. A routine and seemingly simple operation to make Roshni compliant turns ugly and their fight spills onto streets; neighbourhood; police station; court room and detention centre as she is beaten and abused. In defence she reveals Raju's dirty secrets in court and public. Roshni seeks a life away from two generations of family's tradition of flesh trade and human trafficking and is willing to pay any price for it. Gangsters declare a prize on her head and she is aware of most of the future attempts but she cannot do anything except wait for events to happen. Tortured, hunted, abused, bruised and shamed Roshni remains undeterred and continues her valiant struggle for freedom which is short lived. She wins in Court only to be betrayed by police on duty who help to abduct and hand her over to the criminals for rape, torture and sale. Roshni's journey reveals the most horrible practices of flesh trade and centuries of deep rooted evil gender discriminatory ways of society and the complicit involvement of the Law Enforcement Agencies. Will Roshni survive and be able to get justice? Will she ever be free from mortal fear of flesh traders hot on her trail? Will she overcome ages of social gender discrimination, persecution and stigma of a rape victim to resume a peaceful and honourable life? The Author (Rakesh Thukral) decided to pen this work for being a man with conscious. Using woman as legal tender, wager and exploitation has been a vogue since ancient times. It must be condemned by society and the evils of crime against women must be shared with the general people by revealing it on an open public platform for universal well being. I am pained that women are still used as a legal tender; as wager in gambling, to pay debt, to curry favour, to make quick money. Crime against women goes mostly unpunished, for gender bias and exploitation of women is in vogue in one or other form since dawn of civilisation. Flesh trade and women trafficking is a thriving industry. Women caught in flesh trade have no escape. Society accepts the violators, as the victim is looked down as woman of easy virtue and faulted for being victim of crime. The basic principle of human trafficking and prostitution is that,"The goods once sold cannot be returned, they must be delivered, dead or alive."The alarming increase in rapes, molestation and crime against women are due to complicity of law enforcement agencies and almost zero convictions. Gender exploitation and discrimination has become the chemistry of our body social order. It is our moral duty to help millions of victims like Roshni, for the law enforcement agencies continued to harass, intimidate and threat the victim and witnesses to save complicit for apparent and known reasons. The tormentors deny victims right to work and live in peace and security. People should come forward and support victims like Roshni in various court proceedings against the criminal flesh trade gangsters human traffickers. The dire need to raise a voice against such horrendous crimes against the likes of Roshni should be highlighted.