Every day since her daughter Geetika Sharma hanged herself on August 5 last year, Anuradha Sharma (51) spent hours thinking and talking about the case.
Her routine remained unchanged — every morning she would prepare lunch for her husband and son. Later, her husband, Dinesh, dropped Anuradha to her office.
At 2.30 pm, she took a Metro to Hauz Khas, where her son Ankit (22) works as a fashion designer. Here, Anuradha and Ankit would have lunch together and then go for a short walk near the lake located inside the 13th Century Hauz Khas Fort. During the walk they would discuss “the case”.
At night, Anuradha went through the diary she maintained on the trial of Geetika’s suicide. She noted every development — significant or minor — and would often check the meaning of legal terms on the Internet
Ankit recalls: It was “a battle she was determined to fight”.
On February 15, the routine was altered. “She (Anuradha) called me at 2.30 pm on Friday saying that she was busy and asked me to have lunch without her. Something happened between 2.30 and 5.30 pm, (during this period she) returned home, went to my sister’s room and hanged herself exactly the same way Geetika had. Those three hours have the missing link to my mother’s death,” Ankit told Newsline on Sunday.
Geetika, a former MDLR airhostess, was found hanging in a room at the family’s Ashok Vihar residence in Northwest Delhi. In her suicide note, Geetika named her boss, former Haryana minister Gopal Kanda and MDLR general manager Aruna Chadha.
The two names figure in Anuradha’s suicide note as well.
Ankit has reportedly asked police to inspect call records of Anuradha’s office phone, which he believes can give vital clues to what made his mother take her life.
Deputy Commissioner of Police (Northwest) P Karunakaran did not respond to Newsline on this.
Ankit says his mother was very scared. She was also concerned about Ankit’s career and safety.
“She would tell me that Kanda can harm me once he is out of jail. If someone had threatened her, it was done very neatly. I checked her phone (call and text logs) and found nothing suspicious. Perhaps, someone called her on the office landline,” Ankit says.
He says he wanted his mother to stay happy.
“I wanted to show her that I needed her. So, I would eat the food only when she cooked it. We had made plans that I would go to London for my post-graduation after the trial ends and mom would come along. She supported me. She was sad, terribly sad after Geetika’s death, but even that grief had a fighting spirit. I was convinced she was normal now and would live for me. Her death shocked me; I feel broken, lonely,” he says.
Apart from her suicide note, police found a letter that Anuradha addressed to Ankit. She asked him to “be very strong” and fight for Geetika.
“She wrote ‘tonight, I will sleep with Geetika. You are now a grown-up, son’. The battle has just begun. I am going to fight this case till the end. I am the only and the biggest threat to them,” Ankit says.
I ask myself, “Why this happened? Why should we live to see our homes burning to ashes?”…
Until yesterday, I met a community who are strong, confident to turn India bright… SAM workshops
It was a feeling like never, I have seen crowd of negatively influenced people but for the very first time I saw people in groups positive enough to scare darkness away from my mother land.. So, I send for all my brothers and sisters to come join youthful voice to roar against evil and darkness and to pick our mother back to her glory…
Jai Hind!!!
Jay 