Once upon a time, in a land not so far from here there lived a young Muslim couple in a house by a field. Life couldn't get any better they often said to one another. Then, one day it did. It got better, a lot better (or so they thought). They had a lovely baby daughter who they named Sonia.

They loved her, cared for her, protected her, brought her up with Islamic values, sent her school, sent her to masjid. Made her to wear the hijab to preserve her modesty. How very special she was to them both.

They were so happy with how everything was going until the day that they wished the gound would just swallow them up whole. If only suicide wasnn't haram they surely would have seen that as an option too. How embarrassing, how humiliating. What had they done to deserve this? Why was it happening to them? How could their precious, innocent little daughter be looking at a prison sentence?

"Please tell me it's all lies" they'd often say to one another. Then the words of the judge and the solicitors would ring in their heads and the ugly truth of the situation would show it's face.

It's what happens to others. It's what you hear about in the news. How has it happened to us?

How could our daughter be such filth? Or is the fact that she's just pure evil, worse than her filth? They didn't know the answer to that question. How can they? They even had to stop and think when others asked them their names. They could eat, sit, sleep walk, talk or do any of the other things that normal people do in their day to day lives without being haunted at the thought of what she had done.

How could she get a gang together and try to have someon killed? It wasn't even a straight forward 'let's kill him' They had kidnapped him, imprisoned him, burned him, subjected him to daily beatings, even called his parents asking for ransom money while beating him in the background so his parents could hear his screams. That's just evil, pure evil. There's nothing else to it.

What was his crime anyway? She had said to her 'gang' that he had tried to rape her. If he had, he's evil and deserves a punishment, but that's where the police and legal system come in? You can't just get a 'gang' together and burn someones face and try to kill him? You can't do all the things she and her 'gang' done to this chap.

As it turned out, he didn't even try to rape her. They were dating for some time and he'd taken some nude pictures of her that she thought might be shown to her parents. Her parents - that's us. I can undersrand why she didn't want us to see them, but to put the chap thorugh this. He's wrong for taking the pictures, but she's also wrong for letting him.

Aarrgghh...!!!! the shame and humiliation. How will we ever leave the house? How will we face the community? Should we just move to Sweden where nobody knows us?

And to think only 21 short years ago the joy she bought to faces. The tears of joy. Well the tears are still there, they're just not the 'joy' sort this time.......

The lives affected were not only of those directly involved. At a time when we need to tread carefully, who would have thought an "innocent fling" between a Muslim girl and a Hindu boy, no different to the fling "Everyone" has these days, will end in such a way.

Be careful what you choose to do. it affects more than just you...