THE GIRL,THE CITY AND THAT TIME

The distance between Ruchika’s home,House No. 363 and No. 469,the residence Rathore was then supervising the construction of in the same sector,or the lane where her only friend in those three lonely years and the only eyewitness in the case,Aradhna Parkash Gupta,lived,or from Ruchika’s home to the lawn tennis club where Rathore,then president of the Haryana Lawn Tennis Association,would often watch Ruchika and Aradhna play in the evenings,ranged from roughly 200 to 400 metres.

RC Kathuria,the high court judge who would later drop the abetment to suicide charge against Rathore,shared a boundary wall with Ruchika’s home. The nameplate outside No. 362 still announces Kathuria’s name. But Ruchika’s family moved out of No. 363 following her suicide — after selling off their house to Rathore’s lawyer.
If Sector 6 was not unusual in its breadth,or rather the sheer lack of it,it was,and still is,distinctive in another way. In geographical terms,Sector 6 is poised on Panchkula’s edge and at the doorstep of Chandigarh. But in terms of the kind of people who live in it,Sector 6 would be considered the heart of the city.

Most senior government officials,bureaucrats and judges live in Sector 6. If Chandigarh is the planned city of two and a half governments where the ‘industrial area’ is banished to the edge of the city,the university is a sealed enclave,a large number of roads and lanes end in cul-de-sacs,and most houses turn their back to the main road,Sector 6 is the closest approximation of Chandigarh’s ‘sarkari culture’ in Panchkula.
It was much more so in the late ’80s and early ’90s,when Ruchika,daughter of a middle-level bank manager,was moving into her teens,and when the commercial elites that developed in Chandigarh at the turn of the century had yet to come to the city,riding on the back of a newly burgeoning IT industry.

Today,Chandigarh is the commercial hub of the northern region; it has the largest number of banks in north India outside Delhi. But in the late ’80s and early ’90s,says historian M Rajivlochan,who had then recently come to the city,and who was researching a social history of Chandigarh,it was a different place. He recalls being particularly struck by the fact that almost every young girl he spoke to,wanted out. “This was something I had never come across anywhere else. The boys spoke Punjabi and Hindi,the girls spoke only in English. And the girls didn’t want to stay in Chandigarh.”

GIRL,INTERRUPTED
There are no photographs of Ruchika as a teenager,except the one that has now appeared everywhere. It frames the young girl looking straight into the camera,a fringe covering her forehead,hair upswept,over-large hoops dangling a little awkwardly from her ears,belying her attempt at sophistication.
That photograph was probably taken in passport size at a Panchkula studio for some admission form,says Aradhna. She cannot remember whether it was taken before or after the ‘incident’.

It must have been before,says Aradhna’s mother Madhu Parkash,who is the main petitioner in the molestation case,“because afterwards,Ruchika became so subdued. Earlier she would bounce into the house with a bang…
Afterwards,I don’t remember her dressing up anymore. Every conversation with her would keep coming back to the case.”
After the incident,adds Aradhna,Ruchika could not walk alone in Sector 6. “Even if she had to go to buy bread in the market,I would go with her. Every other day,there were goons outside her house,threatening calls…”

If Aradhna was the self-professed tomboy,Ruchika was into fashion,accessories,hairstyles. What drew the two girls together was a shared love for tennis. “We met for the first time in the Sector 6 market and chatted about lawn tennis”,recalls Aradhna. The year was 1989. The families of both girls were still coming to grips with tragedy. Ruchika’s mother had passed away in 1988,Aradhna had lost a brother in 1989.

Ruchika constantly spoke about her mother to her new friend. “She would say her mother had been the most beautiful woman in the world”. Aradhna remembers feeling protective about Ruchika almost from the day they first met.
Her mother’s untimely death explains in part why there are no photographs of Ruchika in her teens,says Aradhna. “In those days,photographs were only taken on special occasions. After Ruchika’s mother died,there were very few celebrations in their house. Then the incident happened. The few photographs that must have been taken were lost in all the shifting around Ruchika’s father and brother had to do after her suicide.”

Before the incident,the two girls had settled into a daily routine. After coming back from school — Aradhna from DAV school in Panchkula and Ruchika from Sacred Heart Secondary School,the latter being one of Chandigarh’s two prestigious girls-only schools of that time — Aradhna would wait for her mother to retire for her afternoon nap,and then rush off to Ruchika’s. The two girls would walk to the market to buy a snack — in summer,an orange bar from the ice cream cart for Ruchika,a mango duet with a cream-filled centre for Aradhna. Panchkula was still to get a proper ice cream parlour,or its first disco.

In Chandigarh,by then,Sector 17 and in it,Yankee Doodle or ‘YD’s’ and Hot Millions,had become the popular hangout joints for young people. But though Aradhna had an LML Vespa scooter,Chandigarh seemed far away. In 1990,Chandigarh was still reeling under terrorism-related restrictions and bans,such as the one on pillion riding,or on driving a two-wheeler after sundown.
At that time,for Aradhna and Ruchika,even a little adventure on the Vespa within their own sector in Panchkula was something of a hazard. “If the permitted speed was 60kmph and I drove at 70,my father would get to know. Someone would see me on the road,and tell him. Those were times when everyone knew about everyone else.”

Residents of all houses in the lane would get together to watch a movie in the house of the proud owner of the neighbourhood’s sole VCR. “My friend’s father,who was in the merchant navy,got a VCR and we would go to her house to watch ghost movies”,recalls Geetanjali Gayatri,who also lives in Panchkula and was Ruchika’s classfellow,but has sketchy memories of the girl who was “always in tears” in her last days in school. Aradhna’s house was the second in the lane to get a VCR of its own. Ruchika was more privileged — she had a TV and VCR all to herself in her room.
The Haryana Lawn Tennis Association had just come to Panchkula when Aradhna and Ruchika joined the club. “Ruchika had a strong wrist,a good backhand as well as forehand”,says Aradhna. She had pasted a poster of Steffi Graf in her room. She told Aradhna that she wanted to become a professional tennis player.

THE CANCER MAN
After the incident,remembers Aradhna,even Linda Goodman’s Sun Signs failed to distract Ruchika.
Aradhna has carefully preserved Ruchika’s copy of the book. Now yellowed with age and missing its cover,it has Ruchika’s scribbles and several paragraphs are underlined in blue pen and red.

Ruchika wrote ‘Aradhna’ on the page that analyses ‘The Gemini Woman’,and ‘Ashu’ (her brother’s name) where Goodman unpacks ‘The Virgo Man’. On pages that detail traits of the Aquarian (Ruchika herself was one),are several lipstick marks. The name ‘Manik’ is scribbled under the section titled ‘The Cancer Man’.
A little way down that section,these Linda Goodman-esque lines are underlined in blue: “He can be flirtatious and fickle but he can also be sensitive and loyal”. Then again,“His manners can be rough and aloof. His heart is always soft and affectionate”.

“We were always together. There was no question of dating boys,” recalls Aradhna. As was the case in many households with young daughters at that time,she recalls that Ruchika’s brother had been given the room in the Girhotra house closest to the gate. This was done so that his friends could come and spend time with him and leave,all without entering the main living area where they might run into Ruchika or her friends. “If Ashu’s friend wanted a glass of water,Ashu would come in and take it back for him.”

THE LAST DAYS
Ruchika Girhotra was still in class 10 when she was molested and would have entered college in the year she took her own life.
Over the last 16 years,while unflaggingly tracking and pursuing the case,Aradhna,now a mother of two,has wrestled with an abiding what-if. “A few days before she committed suicide,I had become preoccupied with my school examinations. Ruchika didn’t want to disturb me. So we didn’t meet or talk as often…” It was on one of those days that Ruchika watched her brother Ashu,who had been taken into custody,paraded by the police in his own neighbourhood.

Today Aradhna watches the waves of public outrage at the delayed justice in the Ruchika case. There is finally hope,but also so much sadness and regret. “Everyone left her alone in those last days. Everyone turned away from Ruchika,” she says.