PALAKKAD: Rahman who had hidden his lover Sajitha from his family and neighbours in his room for 10 years at Ayilur near Nenmara said his circumstances forced him to do so and it was his parents who had labelled him as one suffering from depression and mental illness.
Speaking to TNIE from his rented house in Vithunassery, he said his parents had taken him to a psychiatric doctor at a counselling centre in Palakkad. The doctor said there was nothing wrong with him. His family believed someone had done sorcery on him.
He said he loved Sajitha, who lived next door. “Sajitha and I decided to get married, but the circumstances and lack of money had forced us to continue in my parents’ house for so long,” he said.
“I had developed an automatic lock for my room. Sajitha would go to the bathroom, which was outside, after removing the planks of the window at night or when my parents were away.”
Asked why he chose to leave his parents’ house, he said after the Covid second wave, his parents and he had not been able to go to work. Therefore, the food prepared in the house was limited and he was unable to take an extra morsel for Sajitha.