SHUBHANGI DERHGAWEN
When I first entered Muskaan Ansari’s modest home, she greeted me with quiet readiness. A stack of hospital files lay in front of her, arranged neatly—a testament to her long and tiresome journey through a healthcare system that had failed her.
Among the papers was a well-worn booklet handed to her by a health worker at the local government public health centre in the eastern Uttar Pradesh town of Ghaziabad. Only her name was filled in—everything else, from weight to blood pressure, was blank.
21-year-old Ansari, unable to read, didn’t know the booklet was supposed to track her health.
“I didn’t even know what it was for,” she said quietly.
In her final trimester, Muskaan developed a 101°F fever and went to the government healthcare centre for an ultrasound. She was turned away.
“I felt like a burden,” she said, the voice heavy with exhaustion. She visited another health centre, which also refused to help.
Desperate, she finally went to a private clinic, but the cost weighed heavily on her family. “I had to borrow money,” she said with a resigned smile. “My mother had to ask for an advance at work.”
What made the situation particularly painful was that the private diagnostic centre where she eventually had her ultrasound was just 100 m from the public health centre that turned her away.
As I sifted through her papers, I noticed a small but significant detail—a note scribbled in the corner of her ultrasound report: “It’s a boy.”
I asked Ansari if the clinic often revealed the baby’s sex, which is illegal under Indian law aimed at preventing female foeticide. “Yes,” she replied casually. “A lot of people are disappointed when it’s a girl, but I didn’t care. My first child is a girl, and I never had any complaints.”
She looked affectionately at her daughter, Jigna, standing beside her. “When she becomes a district collector, I’m sure my Bilal will at least manage to be a deputy,” she said, smiling.
In a country where gender discrimination has led to violence against women for centuries, the revelation of a baby’s sex is more than just a detail. It’s a moment that can shape a woman’s life, especially when it’s intertwined with social expectations.
“Didi, I know how people react when it’s a girl,” said Ansari. “But as women, our fate is sealed, right?”
Her smile faded as she shared her life’s story.
She couldn’t go to school because her younger brother’s education was given priority. She was quickly married off to a man who abused her, left her for months at a time, and abandoned her.
Even during her pregnancy, Ansari was treated with cruelty.
“There is zero empathy from female doctors and nurses,” she said. “I was crying in pain during labour, and they told me, ‘You had your fun when you conceived, so why are you crying now? This is the pain of being a woman.’”
You can read Shubhangi Derhgawen’s full story here.
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