She was fury; she was wrath; she was nemesis; she was vengeance.

Standing there on a winter evening in the Kingdom of Oudh, betrayed, hurt, and fallen, she vowed in the name of the warrior Goddess Durga, an epitome of her own name Mahashweta, that she would rise again to be the nemesis of her own kin. Realising only later that her revenge would prove to be the nemesis of not only her kin but also the country. As the gentle breeze flowed across her face tangling her messy hair, memories flashed in front of her vision. Memories of nikaah. Memories of the garden. Memories of the happiness she had. Memories of her being at the royal durbar for the last time. Memories of her late son. And her thirst for revenge. She walked barefoot along the ghats of the river Ganges, the holiest river, her delicate feet exposed to the earth for the first time in so many years that she had almost forgotten what mud felt like. Her footsteps leaving behind the trail of imprints that she was yet to leave in the sands of time.

~A MEMORY~

"Shweta! Shweta! don't walk on the mud, beta. Your feet will smell of filth and nobody will befriend you. Remember this.", yelled her mother, Suchitra Devi, wife of zamindar( feudal lord) Pratap Singh Rathod.

"Oh! come on ma, don't start all over again. I feel nice walking barefoot in mud, I feel just so close to Mother Earth. And one day I will leave my footmarks in this very mud which you call filth.", retorted young Mahashweta.

Coming back to present she thought how had she been wronged by everyone, even her husband did not back her. 'They all have stained their dirty hands with the blood of my own child, I will not spare any of them.'

Only time knew the journey of Mahashweta. She had lost her everything to win her love, seal her destiny with the one she had wanted so badly, only to lose her all later. She was not the afraid Mahashweta anymore, the one who feared that her marriage was withering off, the one who feared losing her child to the hands of the devil, instead she was the wrath, who would now cause fear.

It was about 24 years ago when Nawab Amir Ali Mahmud had accidentally met her in the forests of Oudh, and instantly fell in love with her, about 23 years ago when after a year of courtship with the Nawab of Oudh she had taken the plunge of marrying him, and about 21 years ago when they had a baby boy named Hassan Amir Ali Mahmud. She was warned by almost every one of her community to not marry since she was an Hindu Kshatriya and he a Muslim. Her own parents did not approve of their nikaah, or marriage; but nobody showed it up in public since Amir was the Nawab, he could simply abduct Mahashweta in front of everybody. But he did not. He showed up at their place as a khastegar, an ideal bridegroom restoring their nang and namoos, their izzat, their pride and honour. Mahashweta had to make sacrifices to attain her love, yet did not stop loving him. Then what had made her hate her love so much that she was in a murderous rage, that she forgot her vows to her husband that she will be at his side throughout her life as his strength and courage? It was yet another vow breaking the former, in which she promised her slain son justice at the price of the blood of all those who had wronged them. Gentle, cold winds continued to blow, as tears sparkled on Mahashweta's dusky cheeks.