Meerut: At the end of a dusty road in Bulandshahr’s Joligarh village, sandwiched between two buildings is a green-coated house where Shabnam Rani has just returned to after attending a Supreme Court hearing on her petition challenging nikah halala and polygamy.The 29-year-old woman gasps for breath after every sentence and takes long pauses between words ever since she was attacked with acid by her brother-in-law last Thursday for moving the apex court following her husband's triple talaq to her. Some of the acid had splashed on her neck.The brutal assault took place when Shabnam was on her way to meet Bulandshahr senior superintendent of police KB Singh to file a police complaint against her in-laws. Burn wounds dot her neck, hands and arms, but the strike, like all the abuses heaped on her before, has failed to break her spirit.“I was disowned by my husband when I exposed his affair with another woman barely a year after our wedding," Shabnam told TOI on Monday. "Things changed for me after triple talaq was held unconstitutional last year. With the help of an NGO, I went to the Supreme Court challenging my divorce. Since then, my in-laws have been forcing me to undergo halala with my brother-in-law. I would never do this,” Shabnam said. Halala is a law that requires a woman to marry and sleep with another man in order to return to her first husband.Originally from Jasola in Delhi, Shabnam married Muzammil, who is in his 30s now, in 2010. They lived in Okhla where Muzammil worked as a taxi driver. The couple's relationship soured around 2013 and Muzammil gave her triple talaq the same year. Shabnam, along with their three children, was then forced to move to her in-laws' house in Bulandshahr.Just a matriculate, she remained completely dependent on her in-laws for the upkeep of her three minor kids. “My in-laws refused to accept me and asked me to leave their place. It was only after our neighbours intervened that they allowed me to stay in the house. But the physical harassment continued. I was not given a single penny for the maintenance of my children. I had to often beg for money,” she said.It was in May this year that Shabnam met local activist Sameena Begum, 37, who runs an NGO called Mission Talaq to help victims of instant divorce. “I have been in touch with Shabnam for the past five months. Circumstances deteriorated for her after she moved the apex court. A day before she was attacked, her in-laws, including her brother-in-law, had put pressure on her to undergo halala,” Sameena said.The Supreme Court last Friday issued a notice to Uttar Pradesh additional advocate general Aishwarya Bhati on Shabnam's plea seeking security and medical treatment. Subsequently, a bench of Chief Justice Dipak Misra and Justices AM Khanwilkar and DY Chandrachud on Mondaydirected the state government to ensure medical treatment and compensation for the woman.“The court’s intervention is a ray of hope for me but I don’t know if my ordeal will ever end,” said Shabnam.

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