Suri, July 20: While Birbhum’s Shiuli Das Bairagya was battling her father-in-law’s lewd advances, another 20-year-old was suffering the same fate 80 km away.

Mosharrat Bibi was driven out of her husband’s home after she resisted her dowry-hungry father-in-law’s attempts to rape her.

Mosharrat was married in 2003 to Naseem Ansari, a farm labourer, from Bidurpur village in the Nalhati area of Birbhum district, 325 km from Calcutta. Her father Safique Khan, also a farm worker, managed to collect Rs 50,000 as dowry.

About six months later, Mosharrat’s in-laws started piling pressure on her for more dowry.

“I knew it would be very difficult for Abba to arrange for more money. He ran our family by working in the fields as a labourer. The money he paid as dowry for my marriage had been saved since my childhood,” said Mosharrat.

“But my in-laws were not ready to accept my explanation and started torturing me. They beat me up and mentally abused me. Naseem, too, did not stand by me.”

Her husband also turned a deaf ear when Mosharrat complained to him that his 49-year-old father, Qurbani Ansari’s, was trying to force himself on her.

“He did not believe me. On the contrary, he accused me of trying to harm his relationship with his father. But only I know how I saved myself from my father-in-law each time,” said Mosharrat.

She said Qurban would approach her when Naseem and the other family members would be away working in the fields.

On Sunday, her in-laws gave her an ultimatum. They told her to get more dowry or get out of the house. Mosharrat then went to her father’s place in Kantabuni village.

She lodged an FIR with Suri police on Monday against her husband, father-in-law and other members of the family.

“We launched a search and arrested her husband yesterday. But her father-in-law managed to give us the slip and is absconding. We are searching for him and some other family members,” said inspector in charge of Suri police station Netai Chandra Das.

Police in neighbouring districts have been alerted and handed a description of Mosharrat’s father-in-law.