Editorial
Death of domestic help
Are we living in the medieval days?
Barbaric, brute, inhuman -- there are no other words to describe those who beat a little girl so mercilessly that she succumbed to her injuries. Eleven year old Putul was a domestic help at a businessman's house in Khulna city. It was reported that his family members beat the girl with club and iron rod, which not only left her unconscious, but broke her legs also. She apparently sustained fatal injury on her head too. How could they? What serious crime did she actually commit that they resorted to such violent, unspeakable means to punish the little girl?According to newspaper reports, Putul failed to wake up early in the morning which enraged the mistress. If that is true then we are simply speechless. Could this be a reason enough for beating her so badly that it finally took her life? The girl was working there out of sheer compulsion in the first place. When girls of her age go to school, play with siblings and friends, spend happy times with parents, Putul was forced to work as a domestic help. Her poor farmer father had no other option but to steal her childhood. But that did not give her employers any right to treat her so inhumanly! We shudder to think what trauma she actually went through earlier. It's high time we delve deep into our conscience and ask -- is this how we should treat innocent children from poor backgrounds? It's obvious that all the awareness campaigns and seminars have had very little effect, because Putul wasn't the only victim in recent time. We have read about other similar incidents of tortures on domestic help, we have also heard about the offenders getting caught, but we have heard very little about their punishments. The law itself is strict enough, but the implementation is lacking. Even in this case the offenders are at large. We demand that they be caught as soon as possible and if proven guilty, punished severely.
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