Sanya Runwal is a 17-year-old student studying at Cathedral and John Cannon School in Mumbai. She began reading stories of victims and their families, and they frustrated her to no end for days. So she began writing in an attempt to not feel so helpless. Every single story of hers has been inspired by true events. Sanya believes that nobody is inherently evil and that everyone is just a product of their environment.

My name is Sanya Runwal and I am currently in the 12th grade at Cathedral and John Connon School. I am 17 years old. My favourite quote and the one that I aspire to achieve is: “Create a life that you don’t need a vacation from.” I am an amalgamation of my experiences: success and failure, both. I am what I am today because I was given the opportunity to live, learn and grow. I am confident in my voice because my opinion was valued. My helper’s wasn’t.

She was that nameless girl you read about in the newspaper, felt bad about and then instantly forgot as soon as the page was turned. That was my way of not being completely overwhelmed with the barrage of horrifying news that covers our newspapers every day, except now, for me, that nameless girl had a face and one that refused to leave my mind. She had survived. But what about the countless that don’t? I gathered up enough courage to start reading stories of victims and their families. I couldn’t sleep properly for days after. This feeling of intense frustration at my inability to do nothing, simmered under my skin. So I started writing in an attempt to not feel so helpless.

I didn’t want to write about that happy ending because the truth is that most of these women don’t get a happily ever after. The truth is ugly but it’s still the truth. Every single one of my stories is inspired by true events. The aim of these stories wasn’t to depress the reader or drag our country’s name through the mud and neither is it an attack on men. Nobody is inherently evil and I believe that everyone is just a product of his or her environment. I hope that my stories strike a cord deep enough within and your sympathy leads to action, because together we have to change this environment that has trapped both men and women in a vicious cycle of suffering.