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My parents were born In India, but spent their early life in Bangladesh, the then East Pakistan, and later in Karachi, Pakistan. This Implies that I literally descend from the entire patriarchal belt of South Asia. The status gained by being born and brought up as a South Asian female taught me about all the losses ordained by this position long before I learnt, through international exposure, experience and education, that it was the result of Gender difference and Gender discrimination. I hail from an educated background. Becoming a medical doctor was my childhood dream. In spite of many hardships, I was able to obtain my degree In medicine. However, that was not all I dreamt of. I wanted to be a Cardiologist. Cutting a long story short, I could not transform the second part of my childhood dream into a living reality. An arranged marriage was placed on my cards. I was married not to live happily, thereafter but to experience the traumas of dowry violence, marital rape, unplanned pregnancy, denial of the right of abortion followed by a demand for having an abortion done (at an advanced stage of pregnancy on discovering by the in-laws and husband that fetus was a female), physical and psychological violence. I ended finally as a divorced woman (I had to fight to get divorced} to be stigmatized in an environ largely consisting of constipated minds, sycophants, vultures and much more. From that point till to date my life followed and is still following a rocky pathway. I made some gains on merit through personal hard work. I do not claim that I achieved peace for myself, as peace is not merely absence of visible violence but I have achieved the freedom to make certain choices including the freedom to think with my own heart, mind and soul and look at this world with my own eyes.

by Dr.Rakhshinda Perveen, 1998