Sadhana Joshi
PLAYER DETAILS
Name (or alias): Caitlin
LJ: fireball_says
AIM SN: QuothTheFireball
BASE CHARACTER PROFILE
Name: Sadhana Lallan Joshi (originally spelled Sadhna Lallan Jyotishi in NP canon)
LJ: sadhana_joshi
Played By: Bhumika Chawla
Birthdate: January 14, 1988
Age: 18
Gender: Female
Wand: Banyan wood, 9 inches, phoenix feather core
Blood: Pure
Birthplace: Karandih, Bihar, India
Location: Knockturn Alley, London, England
Status or Class: lower middle class
Race/Culture/Religion: South Asian/Indian/Hindu
Family:
Guardian #1's Name/Age/Occupation: Lallan Joshi (father)/56/Businessman and shopowner
Guardian #2's Name/Age/Occupation: Chanchala Jyotishi (mother)/deceased
Siblings' Names/Age/Occupations:
Induj Joshi (oldest brother)/early 20s/yet to be determined
Deep Joshi (next oldest brother)/early 20s/yet to be determined
Pet Name/Species: N/A
OWL Scores:
Astronomy: O
Charms: E
DADA: E
Herbology: A
History of Magic: A
Potions: A
Transfiguration: E
Other Subject #1: Divination: O
Other Subject #2: Arithmancy: E
NEWT Scores: (Put N/a if it is not applicable):
Astronomy: O
Charms: E
DADA: E
Potions: E
Transfiguration: E
Optional Other Subject #1: Divination: O
Optional Other Subject #2: Arithmancy: E
10 Words to describe your character:
reticent, loner, prissy, prude,
EXTENDED APPLICATION
Personality:
Despite the fact that her actions often come across as deliberate, Sadhana doesn't plan things out ahead of time and tends to live in the moment. It's not her fault when other people get hurt, even if she was the one who hurt them - they were asking for it or somehow bringing it upon themselves. Sadhana is mature, responsible, with aristocratic air (despite a 'country bumpkin' upbringing). She is, simply put, a huge priss. She's highly perceptive and quick to judge, and is confident in her judgments; she rarely second guesses herself. She'd take brutal honesty over superficiality at any time; she lets people know where they stand with her. She's completely unfake; it's not worth the time or the energy for her to pretend. She's also very good at redirecting internal negative energy.
It is certainly possible that Sadhana intimidates people; she's standoffish and supercilious and doesn't put up with nonsense. Sadhana makes no apologies. She has a distant, composed, and slightly exotic allure that curious people might find fascinating - from a safe distance. Sadhana is extremely choosy about which people she allows to be around her, which is part of the reason that, in her seventh year of Hogwarts, she has pretty much no close friends - nobody really lives up to her standards.
Strengths:
Sadhana is a studious person, very well-rounded magically speaking, as she applies herself to her academics. She is also very musically talented, good at singing and dancing, though not many people see that side of her. She is also multi-lingual, able to communicate in several South Asian languages and dialects, most notably Hindi, Urdu, Bengali, Tamil, Telugu. Even-tempered and level-headed, able to think quickly on her feet when she has to, and a very capable spellcaster make Sadhana a surprisingly talented duellist, though she typically only duels as an absolute last resort.
Weaknesses:
Sadhana is very, very serious and rarely laughs or even smiles. She is very much indifferent to her classmates, their joys, their struggles; she doesn't let herself become attached to anyone or anything because, as far as she knows, she might leave it all tomorrow. Sadhana's biggest foible, though, is an unwavering obedience to her father, who doesn't exactly have the best intentions. Magically speaking, she does well in most classes because she works hard at them, not out of any natural inborn talent. The only classes she is naturally good at are Divination, Astronomy. She works very hard and study in all her subjects, so she does actually do very well in school. Because her academic excellence is almost entirely the result of her hard work, she tends to be very proud. Being a pureblood from a very ancient ancestry in India, she'd probably be proud as all get out even if she was a Squib.
Fears:
Sadhana seems like a fearless type, not because she is particularly brave but largely because she is often so calm and collected; she rarely loses her head. But she's actually quite concerned about her family, and her own reputation. She's oddly afraid of everything turning out exactly as she suspects.
History:
Sadhana Joshi was born and named Sadhna Lallan Jyotishi on January 14, 1987, in a small village called Karandih in the eastern Indian state of Bihar. Her family was the only magic family in the rural, remote village, and they lived happily on the outskirts of the village, minding their own business and letting the Muggles mind theirs. When she was seven years old, Sadhna's household and family consisted of her parents, her paternal grandparents, three uncles (her father's younger brothers), two aunts (her father's brothers' wives), two older brothers, a younger brother, and six cousins of varying ages. They lived together in a large house surrounded by vast expanses of crops and paddies; the nearest neighbor was four and a half kilometers away, the center of town, seven kilometers.
On her eighth birthday, Sadhna's father took her and her brothers to fly kites in the village fields for Makar Sankranti, a spring festival celebration in India. When they arrived home, their house and fields were on fire, their livestock was killed or stolen, two of Sadhna's uncles were greivously injured, and Sadhna's mother and grandmother were nowhere to be found. Ignoring her father's protest, Sadhna ran off, following spatters of blood, broken trees, and shouting to the center of the neighboring village; she arrived just in time to see a mob of angry and manic-looking Muggles tie her grandmother to a tree and slit her throat with a sickle. Terrified, Sadhna found her mother cowering against a hut, her wand broken, holding her hands in front of her face while villagers stoned her. She cried out to her, but when the villagers realized Sadhna was the daughter, they called her a witch, seized her and tied her ankles together, dragged her into a dark underground room, beat her with metal rods and bamboo sticks, and tried to pull out her fingernails (Gabby has also given me permission to say that Sadhana is in fact missing some of her fingernails, which never grew back as a result of this treatment). Soon she was abandoned, and was left for dead for three and a half days before her father and one of her uncles found her. Her grandmother's body had already been cremated and her mother's body was never found. Her youngest brother, less than a year old, who'd been at home at the time of the original attack, also went missing and was presumed dead. This has been exposed in game here.
It has been common in very rural parts of India for women to be accused of witchcraft and tortured or killed; they are blamed for anything from unnsuccessful crops to illness to death. This was the first time in India's wizarding community's memory that the Muggles actually managed to accuse actual witches, and this caused suspicion and helped them discover the root of the accusation. It transpired that a Squib relative of Sadhna's father's, a thakur in the neighboring village, had pressured the village ojha into accusing the women of witchcraft, blaming them for the sudden illness and death of a child. The ojha's word caused a mob of frightened but determined Muggle villagers to overtake the Jyotishi household and thoroughly destroy them. The wizarding community and officials tried and convicted the Squib thakur and had him put to death. Sadhna's grandfather, Devendra Prasad Jyothishi, relocated the family to Kolkata, where the whole family - comprised of, at the time, fifteen members - lived in a single room apartment in a Muggle area of the city. Lallan managed to get the family back on their feet by starting an illegal smuggling business of magical plants, animals, and other items. When their business grew to an international level, Lallan moved himself and his branch of the family to London to expand operations. There, he shortened their family name to Joshi, and Sadhna added an extra 'a' to the anglicised spelling of her name; it is now officially on record as Sadhana. Business prospered and his two remaining sons attended Hogwarts, which Sadhana currently attends.
Physical Description: At the least, provide base details of build, height, eye/hair colour, and complexion.
Build is average, height is average, eyes are brown and hair is long, straight, and black. Clear, brown skin. Sadhana is rather plain; she looks pretty good with make up on, but she never bothers with it at school. She'd also look better if she smiled more often; she has dimples that no one ever gets to see. Always wears a bindi, though. Never dressed in Western Muggle style - when she's not in wizarding robes, she's in sarees, salwars, lenghas, kurtas, or some other traditional Indian dress. Neither remarkably short nor remarkably tall - in fact, she's only remarkable in the fact that she's not really remarkable at all. Her body model is Bhumika (sometimes spelled Bhoomika) Chawla.
Significant Relationships:
Family: Optional: Sadhana's family is pretty much the only thing that motivates her. They're the only people whose opinions she will allow to actually matter to her, and affect her life.
Other: Optional: Nicodemus Florentine is slowly becoming Sadhana's first real friend at Hogwarts, despite his inherent awkwardness and the fact that Sadhana still regards him with quite a bit of disdain. She's surprisingly patient with him, largely because she's sympathetic to him after the death of his sister.
Special Considerations:
Shooting Star broom, Chaser on the Ravenclaw Quidditch team.
COMMUNITY SPECIFIC QUESTIONS
Hogwarts:
Year: 7th
House: Ravenclaw
Why are they in that house? Sadhana is an incredibly serious and studious individual who would choose studying over socializing any day. She is able to think quickly on her feet, and clearly in most other cases. Her brain is her greatest asset, and the one she relies most on.
Postion: (Subject to mod approval)
ROLEPLAY SAMPLE
"It's a shame 'sorry' won't bring somebody back from the dead," Sadhana snarled, pushing Naia away from her and towards the door, her wand still aimed at her throat. "And I am not-- was not-- that little girl." Her face was reddening, her eyes glistening with hot, angry tears. "That little girl died that day, those Muggles killed her, just like they killed her mother, her grandmother, and her baby brother. They broke her heart, they broke her spirit, and then they broke her body with bamboo sticks. They...." She swallowed painfully, her harsh, angry voice becoming hoarse. "They beat her, and they pulled out her fingernails, and they starved her and left her for dead when they were done."
All the while she stalked toward the younger girl, cornering her against the entrance to the room. "I am not that girl anymore," she said. "And I can never be her again. Is that a nice end to the story?" she asked with a sarcastic sweetness, reaching around Naia and opening the door to the stairwell. She pressed her wand tip to the other girl's collarbone. "I know how much you Brits love your happy endings," she said, silently incanting Sectumsempra as she made a downward slicing motion with her wand. Before Naia had the chance to even start bleeding properly, Sadhana shoved her out the door and down the steps.
She slammed the door shut, spun around, and stood, fuming for a moment as tears of grief and rage slid silently down her cheeks. Her gaze fell on the Penseive, next to which the fourth year girl's wand lay. Sadhana strode over, picked it up, considered it for a moment... then, just as quickly, she made her way back to the bedroom door, opened it, and chucked the wand down the stairwell before shutting the door again.
MOD-ONLY QUESTIONS
Character Secrets:
Well, most of Sadhana's dramatic backstory has been revealed in game as of this point.
As of now, no, Sadhana does not support Voldemort. She does, however, think he's got the right idea; because of Muggle-related violence in her childhood, she feels that Muggles are somewhat lower than wizards and witches on the evolutionary scale, and thus feels that Muggleborn wizards and witches were pretty much raised by animals and are therefore inferior to purebloods. Her father is actually a smuggler and a criminal operating behind a very respectable business front; he can move dangerous and illegal items in and out of Great Britain and thus works closely with a lot of Death Eaters without actually being one- he intends to return to India in a few years anyway, so why get too caught up in the discordant wizarding community in Great Britain? His sons, Sadhana's brothers, on the other hand, may have ideas possibly of their own. I honestly haven't decided yet whether I want them to be Death Eaters or not, but either way they're likely enough candidates to make Sadhana think they may have possibly joined up with Voldemort's cause.
Character Alliance:
Currently ambiguous; Sadhana could really go either way at this point, depending on who she surrounds herself with, and what events she allows to influence her thoughts, ideas, and actions.