The Forbidden Daughter by Shobhan Bantwal Read Free Book Online

rejoined, her voice drip-ping with bitter cynicism. “Where are they going to find perfect little girls to keep them happy?”
    Baba ignored her caustic comment. “Has China not made it possible for people to have only one child, and if they want a boy, they can have a boy?”
    “And look what’s happened in China, Baba. They have such a shortage of girls that men are forced to marry their cousins.
    Many of their men are either doomed to remain single or resort to some dreadful measures to acquire a wife.”

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    “India has not come to that point, and never will,” said Ayee, joining in the argument. “We have more girls than we know what to do with. Look at our own family—already one girl and another on the way. What sins did we commit in our previous lives that we are punished with girls?”
    “Girls these days achieve just as much as boys, if not more,”
    argued Isha. “They’re assets, not burdens.” She was sorely tempted to say something like, Ayee, what are you if not a female? Have you looked at yourself in the mirror lately? And didn’t you give birth to a girl many years ago? I suppose that makes you worthless, too, just like me?
    But she curbed her tongue, because talking back to one’s in-laws was certainly not allowed in her family. Also, realizing that Priya had stopped fussing and was curiously observing the adults arguing, Isha took the opportunity to push the toast in front of her. “Eat.” Besides, she didn’t want an impressionable five-year-old to be exposed to her in-laws’ contemptuous and outdated views about girls.
    “Just because they get educated and hold jobs doesn’t mean they are not a burden to their families,” growled Baba, clearly in a fighting mood and itching to prolong the dispute. “In the end, after all that money parents spend on girls, they have to get married, and then their earnings go towards the husband and his family.”
    Isha didn’t want to continue the pointless debate. She had things to do, like getting her child to school. “I don’t agree with that philosophy, Baba. You and Ayee can believe what you want.”
    “What!” Baba rose from his chair, the veins in his neck visibly bulging, the color rising in his face. “How dare you talk to me like that! Just because your husband is no longer here, you think you can say whatever your long tongue wants to say?”
    Regretting her outburst, Isha swallowed hard. “I’m sorry, Baba. It must be the strain of the last few weeks.” Perhaps sens-ing her mother’s fear, Priya burst into noisy tears once again.
    Isha realized that with her desire to argue she had inadvertently made a bad situation worse. Why hadn’t she just shut up 36 Shobhan Bantwal
    and let the old folks hang on to their arcane beliefs? “Priya, if you don’t want to eat, fine. Let’s go upstairs and get dressed.”
    She put Priya on her feet and rose from her chair.
    “I don’t want to go to school.” Priya rubbed her swollen eyes with her knuckles.
    “You will go to school!” growled Baba.
    “I won’t! ” Priya retorted. Unfortunately she’d picked the worst day to be bratty.
    “I will not tolerate disobedience and disrespect to elders in my house.” Already incensed with Isha, Baba pushed his chair back with a screech and came around the table toward them.
    Before Isha could do or say anything, he grabbed Priya by the arm and whacked her bottom.
    Shocked by the unexpected assault, the child let out a high-pitched scream. And for that she got whacked a couple more times, and harder, too.
    Isha stared in disbelief. Priya had been reprimanded, punished in other ways, and yelled at, but never dealt with physically. A moment later, regaining her equilibrium, Isha stepped forward, her breath coming out in gasps. “Baba, stop it!
    Please!”
    When he stopped and let go of Priya, the child ran into her arms, the sobbing now literally choking the breath out of her.
    Her skin felt hot to the touch and