Wearing Scars Like Badges: Rehabilitation Of Acid Attack Survivors Cannot Be Skin Deep

“Scars are not injuries…A scar is a healing. After injury, a scar is what makes you whole.” ― China Miéville, The Scar.

A fortnight has passed since 17-year-old B* (name withheld), a law aspirant and student of class 12, was attacked with acid by two bike borne men while on her way to school in the Mohan Garden area of Dwarka in Delhi. The incident created an uproar in media and many questions were raised on the competency of the laws against sale and purchase of acid. Both the Delhi Commission for Women and the National Commission for Women issued strongly worded notices against the incident. Three accused have since been nabbed in the case. 

In B’s household, however, the trauma of the attack has become an unavoidable miasma. “My younger daughter who was also there with B at the time of the attack has become shell shocked. She is scared to step out of the house for school or tuitions. She won’t even go out in the neighbourhood,” B’s father tells Outlook. 

The pained father says that he will never forget the day his daughter was attacked. “I will always feel responsible since I hadn’t gone to drop her off that day. I wish no parent has to go through such a horror,” he says. 

After being treated for eight percent burns, B is now recovering at home. Her vision is not yet fully restored but her father seems hopeful. “She is responding well to the treatment and has got some of her sight back,” he said. However, treatment for acid burn injuries can be cost and time intensive.

“So far, we have been bearing all cost of the treatment but we are hopeful that the compensation will come,” he added.

However, Rs 3 Lakh that survivors of acid attack victims are offered under Indian law might not be enough to cover B’s treatment which is likely to stretch on for years. Even after burns and internal injuries heal, facial reconstruction treatments and mental health rehabilitation require repeated, costly sessions with experts. For now, B’s family, seems focused on recovery and justice.

“My daughter wanted to be a judge. She had her exams on the 24th of this month which she could not give. It will take at least half a year before she can get back to normal life again and even more time before she can take up studies,” B’s father said. He has been trying to remain hopeful but he knows that his daughter has a hard life ahead.

Despite stringent laws, acid attacks remain a reality in India with persistent numbers of reported and unreported cases across the country each year. 

Vitriolism, known more commonly as “acid attack” is usually regarded as an adverse form of gender based violence as majority of victims are women. It involves brutalisation of women’s bodies, especially the face, and leaves the victims often with permanent scars, disfigurations and severe medical health problems in case they survive.

The pain of acid attack, however, is not just physical. Acid burn scars become indelible marks on the memory of survivors who often find it difficult to integrate into society. The face becomes not just a ledger for past injustices but also an eternal target for future discrimination.

“Stigmatised People”

Research and literature on the causes and motivations for crimes like acid attack suggest in this type of crime, the perpetrator primary intention is not to kill the victim but to make their life a living hell by leaving them disfigured, maimed and incompetent for employment or interpersonal relationships. Women usually face the brunt of these attacks by jilted lovers, spurned in-laws, or even their own families. 

In the 2021 paper Acid Attack: A Devastating Violence Against Women, researchers Banashree Ghosal and Chandrani Chattopadhyay note that acid attacks lead to physical disabilities like semi or total visual impairment, breathing problems and other forms of disfigurations that may leave survivors unable to perform daily chores or participate in employment sector. 

“In a patriarchal society where commoditization is so high, when a body loses its commodity, it becomes a ‘Waste Product’. As sociologist Erving Goffman has emphasized the concept stigma, acid survivors become stigmatized people," the researchers note. 

The Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale, a popular self-report instrument for evaluating individual self-esteem, found that self esteem and agency are deeply diminished in acid attack survivors. 

Reshma Khatun, who survived an acid attack in 2014, states that recovering from trauma requires both support from family and loved ones and institutional support in the form of rehabilitation schemes and programs. “I was a singer at the time of the attack. My whole life turned upside down after the incident,” she recalls. Following several expensive medical procedures, Reshma has managed to get the vision back in her eyes and eventually undertook a computer science course in Bengaluru and even got a job. But braving the world requires daily struggles. “Even if we manage to get a job, acceptance isn’t easy. People always have questions about our past, they look at us with pity, disgust or even indifference. Like we are damaged goods,” she adds. 

While writing about Psychological Trauma Theory, Dr Sandra L Bloom suggested that the way to providing "sanctuary" was an essential part of any effective treatment for trauma-inflicted damage including its physical and psychological aftermath on survivors. This refers to the creation of “safe environments that promote healing and sustain human growth… and health”. Thus, true and complete healing and rehabilitation from physical, psychological and emotional trauma can only occur when survivors are provided safe spaces to heal, express and self actualise.

Many in civil society have made efforts to ensure such spaces for survivors. The Sheroes cafe founded by Alok Dixit has been providing employment to survivors. Kolkata-based Kanoria Foundation runs an NGO called Acid Survivors and Women Welfare Foundation (ASWWF) which works to ensure acid attack survivors can reintegrate into society.

Tania Sinha, the CEO of Make Love Not Scars, a Delhi-based nonprofit organisation that assists acid attack survivors with complete rehabilitation, including providing financial, legal and educational help through fundraising programs, agrees that survivors require more than just corrective surgery and financial help. In 2014, the organisation set up a rehabilitation center in Delhi where survivors could come to receive treatment and stay. “Initially we used to provide medical treatment certain forms of financial assistance. But we soon realized that once the physical injuries are healed, there is still a long and hard road for survivors ahead,” Singh told Outlook. 

Eventually, the NGO started providing therapy, education, and skilling programs to survivors. But even after being qualified and skilled for a job, Singh says that survivors face discrimination in the job sector. “They tend to not get customer-facing jobs and face other kinds of discrimination such as unequal pay, inhuman working hours or even abuse” Singh adds. 

To attack the problem at a symbolic level, Make Love Not Scars reached out to fashion houses and acid attack survivors and in 2016, with their efforts, several acid attack survivors from marginalised Indian families were seen walking the ramp in New York as part of an awareness campaign to confront oppressive and discriminatory beauty standards. 

For survivors of acid attacks, however, one battle is followed by the next. Acid attack survivor Laxmi Agarwal whose case became a landmark in terms of bringing in new acid attack legislation in the country and eventually inspired the 2020 Bollywood film Chhappak, tells Outlook that for survivors like her, employment is never easy.

Laxmi, who was herself reportedly without a job in 2018 despite winning several accolades for her crusades in support of acid attack survivors, said that the only way sometimes was to “keep on keeping on”. “We hope for a day when violence against women will become obsolete and perpetrators of injustice will get their due. But rehabilitation of acid attack survivors needs more than tokenism,” Laxmi, who is the founder of Laxmi Foundation and has previously been associated with NGOs like Chav Foundation, states, adding that civil society can only do so much. “In the end, only government intervention can bring effective change”.