DHAKA, BANGLADESH – April 2016. My mother is a working lady, all through her vocation she served in a very ordinary job. In spite of her hardship of ordinary life as a single mother she couldn’t have cared less about me and my brother.
From my childhood I didn’t see my mom to smile from the bottom of her heart, I’ve felt that she was always surrounded by an imperceptible torment, incessantly. My brother and I are like the whole world to her. She gave us the love and care of both mother and father at the same time. She is a working lady, all through her vocation she served in a very ordinary job. In spite of her hardship of ordinary life she couldn’t have cared less about me and my brother.
My mom, a single mother, in a society like Bangladeshi society which is extremely hard to survive as one. Because of dominant Islamic cultural prejudice in Bangladeshi society it is difficult for a mother just to live without her husband. This practice isn’t still welcomed here by the mass.
Recently I’ve visited India under an artist exchange program. There I’ve met another single mother from Kolkata. Yes, her life is still exceptionally battling as well; however, I’ve watched her life and thoughts are altogether different from my mom. In India still single mothers are not welcomed by their society much, but rather as a result of the distinctions in overwhelming religious convictions things are somewhat diverse in Bangladesh and India. She isn’t hampered simply like my mother in view of societal contrasts. She hangs out with her male friends, enjoys drink with them and spends good time. By one means or another she has a few choices to recoup her forlornness and absence of a male accomplice.
Both of these women are struggling as single mothers in many extent. My plan is to work on these single mothers and their struggles throughout Bangladesh and India and I’d like to demonstrate their battles in various structures in view of different societal parameters. (by Sayed Reza)
My mother, struggled to survive as a single mother in Bangladeshi society, where a single mother living alone isn’t welcomed due to Islamic social prejudices.My mother holding a photograph of her youth, she dreamed about a happy family life as like as any other Bangladeshi young girl.My mother, she feels like fulfilled with her children but a very lonely woman inside herself.My mother holding her X-Ray report, she struggled throughout her life for raising me and my brother, now growing older and older by her struggle and pain of her life.My mom, a pious woman. Praying in her room alone. She had very fewer options to survive as a single mother in a society like ours where Islamic prejudices are dominant.KOLKATA, INDIA – June 2016. Shreyasee Bhadhuri, A single mother with whom I met in Kolkata, India. She has chances to hangout with her male friends. By this means she has a few choices to recoup her forlornness and absence of a male accomplice.Shadow of Shreyasee and her daughter while she was playing with her child on the rooftop. Just like my mother Shreyasee has to serve the role of both mother and father for her child.Shreyasee’s daughter. Her mother is the whole world for her, as long as she’s deprived of the care of her father.Shreyasee was having with her male friend over phone; she has one of the very few options to get rid of loneliness.Shreyasee, a single mother and her daughter having good time with each other.Both in societal contexts of India and Bangladesh single mothers are like lonely plants, burdened with loneliness and social prejudices
