If you haven't figured out that I'm a cynical person and sometimes have these nutty conspiracy theories, you certainly will after this post. But at least, hear me out, or read me out in this case.
OK, I won't delve into the rumours about how Junior bats for the other team or how much a night with 'Ice Maiden' costs and how many times 'The A' has done her - well, an accepted standard according to one Bombay journalist at the Press Club there was to count the new diamonds that his wife was wearing. Shit, I just did.
Anyway, I must specify that these are all rumours and I may or may not subscribe to them. But, back to the point, I will be a cynic and say that there is something really fishy about the shaadi - I mean given that Amar Singh did all the dalaali and the UP elections are due (just after shaadi time) and that the UP government is getting a bamboo pole shoved up its backside by the media for well, everything that is going wrong in India nowadays. And ironically, almost everything that is going wrong in India nowadays seems to be happening in Uttar Pradesh. Just look at Nithari - I mean, the CBI has come and discovered more bodies. (By the way, do Outlook's and India Today's design teams get together and have a drink every once in a while - "you use a solarised blue picture and i'll use a solarised red one")
How best to get all bad news off the front pages and off Aaj Tak - get two of Bollywood's two worst actors (well, they're beautiful people, but lets not get into their acting skills, eh - I just saw Guru, even Mani Ratnam couldn't save them) married off. This is no doubt, the biggest star-wedding in a while and it has been expected even. But actually getting Amitabh Bachchan to CALL (he did, really!) up editors to inform them that this event has happened. That is actually what happened on Sunday evening, people didn't call up Amitabh - he called them up. Now, from what I know of celebrities after watching shows that the kind people at E! bring us - celebs use the media but are usually quite reticent about things like this - just look at the TomKat wedding or even the Bragelina spawn incident in Namibia. But, instead these guys have gone all out to court publicity (Amar and Amitabh) and giving interviews to channels that beam into the Hindi heartland - ie: Uttar Pradesh among others.
Now, one opinion - the one that the mainstream media which doesn't indulge in mad rumour-mongering because respectable journalists like Barkha Dutt work in the mainstream media after all - will say that the Bachchans thought it best to engage the media. Well, I'm just floating a different idea, which would make a lot of people ask me what on earth have I been smoking? (Nothing terribly exciting, I must add) Miss Dutt, we are a democracy and I am entitled to my opinion, even if you think otherwise - so :-p to you! By the way, I must clarify that to the best of my knowledge, I'm a fairly respectable member of the the mainstream media and if you really want to know who I am, read this blog well enough, its not exactly a state secret!
Oh yeah, I just have wild opinions, for more on the the Ash-sekh (though Ass-Ekh sounds nicer I think) shaadi - please read Greatbong!
Showing posts with label Nithari. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Nithari. Show all posts
Tuesday, January 16, 2007
Monday, January 08, 2007
More notes on Nithari
This blog is not a news source, if you want to know the latest on Nithari – click here – Google News is a fairly decent service. The ‘Lynch Mob K’ thinks that there are a lot of kids dead – these two people have all but admitted to killing them, so we should do the right thing and string these two guys up. But, then the ‘Rational K’ kicks in, now this bit of me doesn’t argue against the death penalty – I won’t pander the ‘Liberal Left K’ somewhere in my inner soul (deep down we all have a bit of Liberal Left in all of us) and take up cudgels against the death penalty.
Now, there are a couple of things that are blindingly obvious – things that you’ll never hear or see in the papers. The UP Police have done a spectacularly botched job – and I’m not talking of not taking complaints from migrant labourers. But we aren’t getting into the callous attitude of the UP Police whose money making ability is second only to the Mumbai Police.
Given that my television alternates between Discovery T&L, AXN and Star World (Yes, I live in South Delhi, but I was sensible enough to get DTH two months ago) I end up seeing a lot of CSI. Now, the truth is that investigations even in the Land of the Free don’t happen ‘Crime Scene Investigation’ style. But carrying out bones and bodies in gunny sacks without basic forensic work? I mean, this happened in Uttar Pradesh, our Land of the Free Criminal, so we have no clue if Moninder and Surendra are being made the scapegoats for what one of Mulayam’s henchmen did? I mean Mulayam’s brother considered Nithari ‘small and regular’.
Now what? We are subjecting the two suspects to a technique that has on the whole been fairly discredited in the west – as being against Human Rights. What ‘Narco Analysis’? It would be far more effective to dope these two with a decent hit of LSD and then see them mentally disintegrate when you show them pictures. Hey, I’ve seen people on LSD admit to affairs and worse – if they go into a bad trip, all sorts of little secrets can come tumbling out. But can the testimony hold up in court? I’ve asked criminal three lawyers this and all three of them say that any ‘confession’ from this sort of method (though good enough for the CIA) may not hold up in court (which is why Telgi’s admission of his ‘accomplices’ has never made it to court and might never will).
All that I’ve seen in Nithari is the dark side of our Police Forces and Investigative methodologies (not even an Edit on this, by the way) and the completely tasteless way in which the media operates in such cases. The media themselves are in no small part responsible for the destruction of forensic materials in their haste to get a better ‘picture’ or story and inept UP Policemen didn’t help.
And I haven’t even gotten to the bit where I believe the police across the country assists in the running of child exploitation rackets.
Now, there are a couple of things that are blindingly obvious – things that you’ll never hear or see in the papers. The UP Police have done a spectacularly botched job – and I’m not talking of not taking complaints from migrant labourers. But we aren’t getting into the callous attitude of the UP Police whose money making ability is second only to the Mumbai Police.
Given that my television alternates between Discovery T&L, AXN and Star World (Yes, I live in South Delhi, but I was sensible enough to get DTH two months ago) I end up seeing a lot of CSI. Now, the truth is that investigations even in the Land of the Free don’t happen ‘Crime Scene Investigation’ style. But carrying out bones and bodies in gunny sacks without basic forensic work? I mean, this happened in Uttar Pradesh, our Land of the Free Criminal, so we have no clue if Moninder and Surendra are being made the scapegoats for what one of Mulayam’s henchmen did? I mean Mulayam’s brother considered Nithari ‘small and regular’.
Now what? We are subjecting the two suspects to a technique that has on the whole been fairly discredited in the west – as being against Human Rights. What ‘Narco Analysis’? It would be far more effective to dope these two with a decent hit of LSD and then see them mentally disintegrate when you show them pictures. Hey, I’ve seen people on LSD admit to affairs and worse – if they go into a bad trip, all sorts of little secrets can come tumbling out. But can the testimony hold up in court? I’ve asked criminal three lawyers this and all three of them say that any ‘confession’ from this sort of method (though good enough for the CIA) may not hold up in court (which is why Telgi’s admission of his ‘accomplices’ has never made it to court and might never will).
All that I’ve seen in Nithari is the dark side of our Police Forces and Investigative methodologies (not even an Edit on this, by the way) and the completely tasteless way in which the media operates in such cases. The media themselves are in no small part responsible for the destruction of forensic materials in their haste to get a better ‘picture’ or story and inept UP Policemen didn’t help.
And I haven’t even gotten to the bit where I believe the police across the country assists in the running of child exploitation rackets.
Friday, January 05, 2007
Notes on Nithari
"Did you hear?" a panicked friend said half-panting, half-screaming into the cellphone.
"Hear what?"
"About Nithari..."
"Everybody has by now, I mean Aaj Tak is alternating between that and cricket."
"Nooooooo... not that."
"Then what?"
"That Moninder Singh was from college."
"Big deal, so was Natwar and his son."
"No but can you imagine..."
"Imagine what?"
"That a serial killer and rapist went to college."
"So, some these guys tend to be educated."
"I can't believe you're being so callous about this", she tells me in a not nice accusatory tone before hanging up.
Honestly, I have to admit, St Stephen's propensity to churn out highly-educated weirdos has never been in doubt. Case in point, heck, just look at me. But honestly, the media and political circus around Nithari is becoming a bit sickening. Mikes, cameras and dictaphones being shoved into peoples faces. And as usual, one important point is being missed. I learnt this the difficult way in Gurgaon and in Mumbai. Most police forces in India, with the notable exceptions of the Delhi Police and the CISF hate taking complaints.
You can't file FIRs with the CISF, but CISF constables and officers have always been the most helpful policemen I have met and the Delhi Police, say what you will about them and their hare-brained Delhi Traffic Police colleagues and their habit of acting like Mamu's at times are by far and away the best city police force in the country when it comes to filing cases. Sure, sometimes it is a drag filing FIR's in Delhi as well, but in Noida or Gurgaon, short of calling up the SSP getting an FIR filed for a rape or murder is nearly impossible.
Of course, there is the other issue about UP itself. I know the advert that Amitabh is doing is quite nice and all, but if this sort of thing happens in the most civilised part of the state, the rest of it scares me. Thank god my folks never made the mistake of moving out of Delhi!
Back to Nithari, I'm at a loss for words. I don't know who did what, but I think this case will shut up anti-Death Penalty guys for a while. Because, I don't care which school or college who went or what not, those guys deserve to hang.
"Hear what?"
"About Nithari..."
"Everybody has by now, I mean Aaj Tak is alternating between that and cricket."
"Nooooooo... not that."
"Then what?"
"That Moninder Singh was from college."
"Big deal, so was Natwar and his son."
"No but can you imagine..."
"Imagine what?"
"That a serial killer and rapist went to college."
"So, some these guys tend to be educated."
"I can't believe you're being so callous about this", she tells me in a not nice accusatory tone before hanging up.
Honestly, I have to admit, St Stephen's propensity to churn out highly-educated weirdos has never been in doubt. Case in point, heck, just look at me. But honestly, the media and political circus around Nithari is becoming a bit sickening. Mikes, cameras and dictaphones being shoved into peoples faces. And as usual, one important point is being missed. I learnt this the difficult way in Gurgaon and in Mumbai. Most police forces in India, with the notable exceptions of the Delhi Police and the CISF hate taking complaints.
You can't file FIRs with the CISF, but CISF constables and officers have always been the most helpful policemen I have met and the Delhi Police, say what you will about them and their hare-brained Delhi Traffic Police colleagues and their habit of acting like Mamu's at times are by far and away the best city police force in the country when it comes to filing cases. Sure, sometimes it is a drag filing FIR's in Delhi as well, but in Noida or Gurgaon, short of calling up the SSP getting an FIR filed for a rape or murder is nearly impossible.
Of course, there is the other issue about UP itself. I know the advert that Amitabh is doing is quite nice and all, but if this sort of thing happens in the most civilised part of the state, the rest of it scares me. Thank god my folks never made the mistake of moving out of Delhi!
Back to Nithari, I'm at a loss for words. I don't know who did what, but I think this case will shut up anti-Death Penalty guys for a while. Because, I don't care which school or college who went or what not, those guys deserve to hang.
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