Twisha Sharma Death Case: Judging the Judge: The Real Question is How Much Twisha Hid Before Her Marriage

 

I came across some news outlets sharing an audio recording of Twisha Sharma’s brother questioning her mother-in-law Giribala Singh about why she questioned Dwisha about her “past relationships”. As we can hear in the audio recording, the mother-in-law is unapologetic and says she has right to know her daughter-in-law well and needs to be sure whether her past relationships are going to impact her future or not. This part can be understood, and we need to agree that as a mother-in-law, she had right to ask those questions, although her language may be objectionable. But the devil is in the details.

First of all, Twisha’s family has clearly fallen into media’s trap, where the victim’s family thinks that if they keep sharing private details every day, they will be able to feed the media-monster with fodder it needs to maintain momentum and keep highlighting their version of the story on TV screen for days and weeks – the maximum the better for their “cause”. This is a false assumption. The cases ultimately win or lose because of their own merit, not because how much certain versions were telecast on TV screens for how long. Solving crime is not a “popularity contest” for one’s version of story. We have seen this being done by electronic media in every other case. It even happened in Atul Subhash’s case; but did he get justice? His sacrifice went in vain, the judge against whom he alleged got promotion and moved on, his abuser wife got bail, and the court ordered his child to be raised by his evil wife instead of his noble parents. What was the point of all the “media game” in any of the previous such cases? Remember: the dead do not get justice; the dead get nothing. This is why people should stop committing sui*ides assuming they would get justice after death. No one does.

Now, coming to the call-recording by Twisha’s brother.

Everyone knows that “casting couch” happens in film industry, especially with actresses. Twisha worked for some years in advertising as a model and later in South Cinema as an actress. She should have told truths about all her past experiences to her husband and mother-in-law “before marriage”. Assuming that the call-recording is after marriage, why is it that her mother-in-law Giribala Singh asking her about past experiences and relationships “only after marriage”? This is a very important clue, which indicates that perhaps Twisha had hidden a lot about her past from her husband and in-laws.

If Twisha had hidden about her past experiences and relationships with her in-laws prior to marriage, as this call recording indicates or proves, then she was on the wrong ground here. When her husband and mother-in-law were getting upset at her due to these, it can be understood.

There is also an important question which is coming up, where her husband was asking her, “whose child it was that you aborted?” and it is shown as proof of his mental torture towards her.  But this actually only proves his frustration and hatred at her for aborting her child. It seems he believed that if the child was his, she won’t have aborted it since they were married. Or perhaps he was only “taunting” her, as spouses do it to each other when they are upset. The abortion was actually an abortion to their marriage since no marriage can survive without raising a family.

I have still not understood why Samarth Singh had to marry Twisha, if not for “love”. As per news reports, his family is of highly educated top-class people, and then why would he choose an “actress” to marry? Was he seeking a “trophy wife”? From the information available, it does not seem he was seeking a “trophy wife” because in that case, he would have ignored her flaws and past relationships and would have loved her since he loved her only for her beauty. But, from the news articles, it seems he was really upset and angry at her after marriage. It could only happen if he was in “love” with her earlier and as we have seen many times, love and hate are two sides of the same relationship.

All clues indicate that Twisha had hidden many things from her in-laws before marrying, and after discovering all those post marriage, her husband and mother-in-law were upset and hence questioned her. Her chat messages where she is blaming herself for this mess also talk about this aspect. Still, there is no clue and no reason seen to “murder” a “girl with a past”, merely on suspicion; and contrary to her parent’s “hunch feeling”, no clue indicates that she was murdered.

The lessons from all this are many important ones:

1.      It is necessary for couples to come clean about their past experiences and past relationships in front of in-laws well before marriage so that they could make correct decisions about whether to go ahead with marriage or not

2.      If things are hidden intentionally or unintentionally, things can get complicated after marriage, like it happened in case of Twisha

3.      Questioning can be justified, but never harassment or abuse

This is all I could understand from the leaked call-recording by Twisha’s brother. I hope Twisha’s family stops their tirade and witch-hunt against her in-law’s family because they deserve respect and peace as much as Twisha deserved. Just because their daughter is dead does not give them rights to harass, defame and torture a family, merely based on their suspicion.

- Rahul