Is there no justice? A widow's story

My life changed forever on September 5th 1999, the day the NECON Air plane crashed at Thankot. That day I lost my husband and my five year-old son lost his father- the pilot of the airplane JK Joshi. Nothing can bring back my husband and the life we had, but at least then, I was comforted by the knowledge that he was insured through  NECON Air, that there would be enough for my son's education, and for my job training which could earn enough to keep us both. My husband had always told me this when I worried about him flying. He was concerned about my insecurity if anything happened to him, and he was also concerned that his only child, his, son, should be properly taken care of . Life isn't easy for a widow with a child, and more so for a foreigner.

I was too naive to expect things to go forward smoothly. How innocent I was to trust in the rightness of things.  For more than one year I have been waiting for the insurance that was sent to NECON Air by the insurance company seven days after the crash. (And most of the other affected families are still waiting too). All I have heard are stories, lies and evasions. What is the problem? Although I know from my husband that he had named me as the sole beneficiary, NECON air would like to pay half of the insurance money to my husband's mother (who happens to be the sister in law of the managing director and first cousin of the finance director of NECON Air). I can sympathise with her feeling of the loss of her son  and I know she found it very difficult to accept a ' foreign daughter in law, but  my son's grandmother has a son and husband who are still living and she has property of her own. My son has only just started school, and has only me to take care of him. I want him to grow up respecting his father's family, having faith in Nepal, but now will this be possible?

 NECON Air now claims that both me and my husband's mother  are the hakwallah, the original papers have disappeared or are ' unavailable,' mysterious photocopies with additional names have appeared. I have been asked to be generous, have been offered a higher percentage, have been told the money is coming, or that it has not yet come from the insurance company. Every day something new turns up but I am still here, still living off charity and on the understanding of friends and sympathizers, still waiting for justice and a chance to start my life again. How much longer?

Martina Joshi
Nayabazar, Kathmandu