You can spot her in a crowd because there aren’t many lady auto rickshaw drivers in the City. Rashmi T N drives her auto rickshaw from morning till late evening without a break. “I have to repay the loan. Work also makes me forget my past,” said the 28-year-old.
Rashmi chartered her life as a young girl, from Madikeri, with dreams of making it big in Bangalore. Raped and subsequently married to her rapist at the age of 16, she turned a new chapter in her life with an early motherhood and a drunkard and abusive husband as company.
She began working at a garment factory in Madiwala. To her horror, she realised that she was pregnant the second time. “I delivered another girl child. I had to run the family on my salary of Rs 1,300. I had no leaves left. So I left behind my two-weeks old daughter at a day care centre and joined work,” said Rashmi.
Things worsened when she realised that her second daughter had a congenital heart problem.
“I had no one to turn to. Bharat used to beat me up every day and come home drunk. My parents, who had separated long back, also washed their hands off me because I had married against their wishes. Doctors at the Victoria Hospital told me that my daughter’s surgery would cost around Rs 60,000. One day I left my daughter at the hospital and that was the end of it. People asked me about her, I told them that she was in the hospital,” added Rashmi fighting her tears.
At the threshold of her 20s, Rashmi took to sex work to bring up her elder daughter. “Bharat’s demands were increasing by the day and he had become very aggressive. I began soliciting clients while working at the garment factory. I wanted a decent life for myself and my daughter. I compared myself with my sisters, who were well-settled in life. At the garment factory, I met another man Gunakar, who claimed to love me,” said Rashmi.
Gunakar promised to set up a small restaurant in partnership with Rashmi. “I had some money in the chit fund. I took a loan of Rs 97,000, which I gave him on condition that the restaurant would be registered in my name. He turned out to be a cheat. I filed a police complaint against him but he fled the City. Meanwhile, my daughter, who was staying with me and studying in a good school, left me and started living with her father. I was devastated,” she said.
Rashmi decided to change her life for good, “I approached an NGO — Society for People’s Actions for Development and worked there as peer educator. Then I applied for a loan for an auto rickshaw through the social welfare department. Four months ago the loan was sanctioned and I bought the autorickshaw. I work 15-16 hours a day, with a determination to make a decent living for myself. I want to live a new life,” said Rashmi.