Momena Jalil, Bangladesh
Denied Freedom

Freedom is a field stretching to the horizon
On the other side of the fence
Freedom is being free
In the cage of denial
Freedom is a murmur
Where speech is forbidden
Freedom is a forsaken touch
For the untouchables
Freedom is knock on the door
Which is chained for eternity
Freedom is a moment of solitude
Before a felony mistake
Freedom is a torn piece of blue sky

From the prison window
Freedom is a beloved face
Lost in nothingness
Freedom is the right to freewill
These condemn inmates will never know again

She was a mother, a daughter, a sister, a homemaker and a beloved wife, but today she is only a prisoner behind bars serving a life sentence. She could be many things, but the situation, time, circumstances and fate took away her every right to live freely in society. The society finds them unfit, because they crossed the line of the law. They were not born to be criminals, but time took them to where they committed crimes… some killed step-children, some were found trafficking between borders, there were too many and too little time for me to know what crimes they were imprisoned for. We had ten minutes and the guards were rushing us. It a taboo to let journalists roam inside a prison. But we have been there, my colleague and myself. We have seen the faces of close ones, people who live among us, and their faces holds the rumors of sisters, mothers... They were some 21 women, and with some of them were children who were free but had nowhere to go, so they stayed with their mothers in captivity. It was a rare chance for us – it was the opening of the new female prison on eight acres of land situated on the western edge of Kashempur. We were allowed in because we were female, and in those ten minutes we learnt what a lifetime couldn’t teach us. It is the strangest feeling, it chills ones heart to ice – that losing one’s freedom removes the right to live a life one is granted.