When Namrata (Mona) Gill came to Canada to enter into an arranged marriage, she wasn’t prepared for what life had in store for her.
“I thought I was going to be the good East Indian wife, married for the rest of my life,” says Gill, who is now an officer with the EPS
At the age of 19, Gill was filled with dreams and hopes that would come true in her new homeland. What unraveled right before her eyes, is a reality for many other East Indian women, many of whom do not get out.
“The main reason I left was for my daughter. She was my inspiration and my strength,” she says.
Gill shares her very personal story in a film titled Namrata, which was screened this weekend during the Global Visions Film Festival. The nine-minute documentary illustrates the domestic abuse she suffered for six years and her incredible journey to free herself from the relationship and fulfill her dream of becoming a police officer.
Gill arrived in Edmonton on Nov. 28, 1991 with her husband, who was 10 years her senior, not by choice. A few months before, she was in her first year of college in India while her parents planned her marriage, a tradition that is still widely followed in her culture. Everything seemed normal, but the warning bells started to go off when she arrived in Canada. She thinks back to her instincts while at the alter, which told her to call off the marriage.
“But that’s a big no-no in India, you don’t do that. Nobody wants to marry that girl ever again. She’s thought of as damaged goods,” says Gill.
The abuse started in subtle ways, with her husband controlling what she did and didn’t do, and several requests to her father for inheritance. She didn’t even have proper winter apparel because she didn’t have access to any money. She worked in the family owned grocery store almost 15 hours a day and didn’t get paid. When her husband sponsored his mother and sister to come to Canada, the abuse got worse. She was shamed for being a female and told almost on a daily basis that she was worthless.
“When his mother would be angry with me, she would cover her face when coming into the room, because she didn’t want to look at me, saying that I was cursed,” says Gill, adding that her mother in law would slap her and throw food on her plate.
All the while, things seemed okay to others on the surface.
“He was very nice and polite in front of my parents,” says Gill, explaining she was too afraid to tell her parents about the abuse because she wasn’t sure if they would believe or support her.
She continued to manage the family store and take care of her daughter, Anmol. Over time the abuse escalated to physical beatings.
“He was very clever. He never beat me on my face. I always had bruises on my stomach and my legs, never visible to the outside,” says Gill.
But the regulars who came to the store or made deliveries knew something was wrong; Namrata wasn’t the same person that had arrived in Canada.
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Photo courtesy of National Film Board |
She soon stopped sleeping, for fear of what would happen if she closed her eyes.
“There was never a day that we were happy. There was always something.”
One March evening in 1997, Gill was beaten and almost raped by her own husband. The next day she decided to tell her parents about her situation.
“I told my dad, I’m either going to end up dead or in a mental institution,” she says.
Her father came to Edmonton for a year and eventually helped her leave her marriage along with assistance from the Indo-Canadian Women’s Association and the EPS Spousal Violence Intervention Team. She lived in a WIN House facility for over a month before getting back on her feet.
She was now free to pursue her dream of becoming a police officer.
“I filled out the application and went to hand it in wearing a bright pink t-shirt, a long skirt and flip-flops. I think I may have put them off,” she says, laughing.
She failed two exams but wasn’t ready to give up on her dream yet. While finishing her first year of a nursing diploma, she received a call from Sgt. Sharon Bach of the EPS Visible Minority Job Development Program offering her a position. She completed the seven-month program while taking care of her daughter.
“It wasn’t easy. I still had a lot of self-esteem issues. But I got into class, Class 96.”
But life decided to throw a few more tests her way: “If it wasn’t one thing, it was something else that forced me to work extra hard,” says Gill.
Two weeks into class she broke her foot on the second stress day. But she didn’t lose her position and was given a position with policy management section. All the while, Gill kept up on her physical fitness training and graduated in Class 98 in 2002. She begun her career in South Division.
“I chose a profession that is not the typical career that a traditional East Indian woman would choose. But this is what made me happy,” she says, smiling.
There are times that she still faces discrimination on the job being a female East Indian officer.
“I’ve gone to calls where I’ve been shunned, I’ve been called names by (Indian) men. Being a divorced woman is looked down upon in my culture.”
Gill says she decided to do the documentary to show other women in the same situation that they can free themselves.
She has been working in Police Dispatch/911 Section for the past year and a half.
November is Family Violence Prevention month.
Written by Patrycia Thenu