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Today I decided to finally encounter the person who had made that comment about me. After taking the class, I straight away wwent to his office and as usual found him busy on his laptop. I asked for just two minutes of his time.

I am really wondering as to why am I writing? Is it to get the burden off my soul or to make myself a pleader. I am feeling as if I have started taking pity on my condition. If this is the truth then I am really in a pathetic condition. I remember that on January 1, 2006, I had written in my diary that I would not allow any negative comment to rob me of my life energy but I have come to believe that one negative comment from that person has been successful in robbing me of my life energy. No, Mr. Despot I will not let you have your way. I will retain all my positive energy and use it for all things positive. Your comment might have ruffled a few feathers in my life but I believe that those were the weak feathers that would have fallen on their own as well. So you have rather helped me getting rid of the dead wood. I wonder why could I not see the truth earlier? Thanks anyway. I am sure that I will come out stronger after this episode, ready to face anything, even you in your worst role!
I pity you for being so weak that you have to criticize an employee and that too a woman, in her absence. Show your guts and talk to me about all that you spoke behind my back. Writing thee posts have made me get rid of the feeling of desperation that had crept in and now I am able to see reason in the purpose of my being. Everything happens for a reason and perhaps your comment is a way of the destiny to wake me from the slumber and be the person that once I was, fiery and daredevil.

Nothing is more away from the truth than the myth of women empowerment. This truth dawned on me recently although all these years I kept a false hope alive in my heart that the situation is not that bad. Why are women marginalized in all areas of work life? Is it that they are not assertive like the males and are considered a soft target? Or is that the society still expects a stereotyped behavior pattern from the women and any deviation is strictly looked down upon. And less said about the men, better it would be as they seem to unite dissolving all differences when it comes to facing a soft target—a woman seeking power. It is not that men are against all women but they are against women who seek and strive to come on equal terms with the,. It makes them afraid, terribly afraid of being usurped of the position that they cherish to maintain.

Having been in job in this Institute for a long time, who else would know the truth of this hard fact, better than me. If one looks at the seats of power and the occupants thereof in the long history of the Institute, the fact comes to light that women have always had a raw deal at the hands of the authorities. The senior female teachers are at the mercy of much junior male teachers when it comes to certain assignments that are distributed equally among all, at least on the surface.

And does anyone complain about this treatment meted out to women? No one. Men don’t do it as it is the prerogative they seem to relish by virtue of being men and women—who listens to them? A meek feeble voice that gets muffled in the harsh sounds made by the rousing voices of men! I shout at the top of my voice and am singled out of the ordinary and am a betrayer to the long established practice of balance of power. When I try to get what is male prerogative, I am sneered at and am the odd (wo)man out!

And do I get my right—you must be joking. All my representations, pleadings, requests are buried under the mounds of rubbish that is fate of any Government organization. And I keep on waiting like a fool that someday someone will take notice of my representations and soothe the injury of my soul. But the truth remains that women empowerment is a myth that remains a pleasant myth.

The court summons that I served the authorities with were because of the unlawful house allotment that was on way. Now what is so surprising about the entire incident is that nothing ever seems to change In this Institute except the people at the top but having the same very way of dealing with the issues. Sometimes there is so much similarity among the happenings which happen at different points of time but every time they happen, it seems like the repeat telecast of some soap opera. Yes the life in this Institute is nothing less than a soap opera where the leading star changes and along with comes about a change in the people surrounding him. Yes one thing that remains constant all the time is that I am always outside that close group.

I wonder is it that something is wrong with me or the world at large, around me, is wrong? I find it difficult to believe either of the two. About me, I am certain as I also am certain that the world I am part of is neither completely black nor white! But what irritates me and saddens me is the gray area, the area where the people that I trust suddenly go and become part of the black. Now I am not even certain as what I see as black, is black really as from their perspective I may be black as compared to white that I see myself to be.

So, to come back to the story, a house allotment meeting was scheduled to be held on 9th of the last month where I was at number two for two number houses. All the members of the committee had assembled but suddenly the meeting was cancelled without giving any valid reason for. As I was the sufferer and wanted to be heard, and having implicit faith in the judgment of the person at the helm of the affairs, straight I went to him. But what I got was a veiled threat, sugarcoated with smiles, that I was lose the case even if I thought of moving the court. I was shocked beyond belief to find such an indifferent attitude in a person who had been a teacher himself some days back! I knew that day the truth of the adage that “power corrupts and the absolute power corrupts absolutely”.

With no other option in my hand, when numerous grievances complaints written by me fell on deaf ears, I had to move the court. The day I went to the court to sign some papers, I felt so bad. Never in my life had I thought of going to the court for such a matter. I cursed the system that had put such ideas in our mind that we wanted to seek justice. I blamed my upbringing for making me a person who would fight for a cause and would go to any extent to prove her point. I wish I had been like others, a meek little person with no sense of self-esteem that would not even whimper when crushed under the foot of a despot.

Why was I different from the ordinary? But I am what I am today only because I am different. And I am proud to be the person that I am. And herein lies my strength and the essence of my being.

Once again the same old story is repeated. A comment made by the head of our Institute about me in a official meeting has made me seek his reasons for transgressing his limits. Why is it that persons having alleviated to higher positions forget their own time when they too were not at the other side of the table?

The reasons for his unreasonable outburst could be the court summons that I have served on him the previous day. I wonder the veracity of his conduct as was it not in the very beginning that he was having a meeting that a comment mad by him became the hottest topic of discussion among the fraternity of the Institute. I don't have much to complain against him as why should I. He is a person relatively unknown to us and is under watch these days for how he would carry him self. But honestly speaking, he is not cutting a good image.

Commenting like a "nagging wife" while chairing the second most important meeting of the Institute is not at all becoming for the person occupying the highest pedestal in the hierarchy.

What has hurt me more than his remarks, is the apathic attitude of the people I trusted. But are these people to be trusted, is once again debatable. In the other meeting when this person made a very derogatory remark about a woman teacher, I was shocked to learn that many of the so called members of the moral policing force, chose to sit impassively when a female colleague, in absentia, was being mercilessly assassinated. A comment of the kind that "I'll kick her out" made no impact on these very so called friends of the woman teacher and the height was that she was not even present to defend or fight back.

But this time he has attacked a different person, a warrior who would fight back. I would ask him to clarify the reasons for making such an unwarranted, uncalled for remark at a wrong time. Don't we encourage people by not bringing to their notice their high-headedness. If he could loose his cool in official meetings, he has no right to be there in the first place. So once again I would be forced to take up the gauntlet and fight the system that takes women as soft targets.