Four young women take turns to face the camera and talk. Their faces are masked, they are unnamed. A drumbeat is heard, as each woman tells her story of abuse. The fifth and tallest one of the lot, however, says she doesn’t want to wear the mask, removes it, and introduces herself, "I am Rahnas PP". Fiilmmaker Leena Manimekalai’s documentary on Kannur-born Rahnas, sexually abused as a child by her father and others that he sold her to, is titled My Story, Your Story.
The most chilling scene in the film is when Rahnas and the family watch on camera, her dad’s video shot by Leena and team at the jail. Even as Harris, the dad, says that he is a new man now and there shouldn’t be another like him again, he also adds that Rahnas never said the word ‘no’. Watching this, the family, while feeling pity on him, also realises he hasn’t really repented.
Rahnas had once run away from a resort she was taken to by her dad, but she was brought back and beaten up. “And he says I never said no?” she asks in the video before breaking down. That’s the only scene we see her torn. She is otherwise very clear about what is past and what needn’t be a hindrance. A diary she had secretly kept to record all that’s happened, not only helped the case, but also appears to have nurtured her language.
“That’s the crucial part of the film. Meeting the convict and listening to him,” Leena says. “I thought it was very important in Rahnas’s story. Legally yes, there was a closure and justice was served. But emotionally I felt there was no closure because the convict was the victim’s own father. I waited for almost two years for the permission to shoot in prison and the family meeting the convict father through the camera is the moment I wanted to create through this film. It was an intense moment for me as well and very difficult to go through," says Leena.
Leena with Rahnas
Rahnas had at first been taken to the Kerala Mahila Samakhya Society, while her dad was put in jail serving two life sentences, and the family – mother and three siblings, moved places. “You just don’t think about it (the abuse), that’s the only way to move forward. It’s really not been that hard as I feared – I have been accepted everywhere I went to, people see me as one among them, not different,” Rahnas tells TNM before the screening of the documentary in Thiruvananthapuram on Monday.
It’s more than a year since TNM wrote Rahnas ’s story, the young woman who boldly came out to tell her story of abuse, insisted that her name be used, and completed her graduation in law.
“I am now a research assistant with an NGO called Gender At Work, studying the POCSO implementation in Kerala. I also give legal assistance at the Nirbhaya cell,” Rahnas says.
Leena says she came to know about Rahnas through comrade PE Usha, a long time friend, who happened to be the project director of Mahila Samakhya Society. "I was discussing with her about my documentary feature Rape Nation that follows the heroes who triumphed their past of sexual violence and turned leaders like Bilkis Banu, Soni Sori, Bhanwari Devi and Manorama. Rahnas became my one more hero. That’s how I started filming her.
“Rahnas is a beacon of hope for any woman who suffers sexual violence. Her story also demonstrates a great example on how the state must play a role in owning up a victim and her future and her wellness. I was thoroughly impressed by the government of Kerala’s role in Rahnas’s life. State took the parenthood of the victim, defended her legally till she was served justice, supported her pursue her studies and nurturing her with her dreams till now,” Leena says.
Minister of Social Welfare KK Shailaja came a little later to watch it with Rahnas, hugged her and called her ‘our child’. “It is always the attacked who stay inside while the attackers happily walk free outside. That shouldn’t happen. As a child, she used to say she wants to be a judge, later she wanted to be an IAS officer to serve the society. Now she stands before me as a mature lawyer,” the minister says.