Every night my daughter called, crying for me to take her home. The next morning, my husband and I went, but at the doorstep I collapsed—two coffins lay in the yard, and the sight broke me.

— “I must go now. If her in-laws refuse, I will take Kavya home regardless.”

We sped from Lucknow to his parents’ house, more than thirty kilometers away. When we arrived at the red-tiled gateway, I saw something that made the world tilt. Everything blurred and I sank onto the courtyard floor.

At the centre lay two coffins, set side by side, draped in white and garlanded with marigolds; incense smoke curled from the shrine and a funeral horn moaned.

My husband gave a despairing cry, saw me and shouted:

— “Oh God… Kavya!”

My daughter had passed away that night…
Her husband’s family had not informed us after the delivery. The worst cruelty was that beside Kavya’s coffin lay a second small coffin swathed in white: my unnamed newborn granddaughter, the child of Kavya and Rohit Yadav.

I screamed and threw myself toward that small coffin, raw with grief:

— “How many times did you call me, child? Why didn’t I get there in time to save you… How could they hide this from me so cruelly…”

Neighbors began to mutter: