[Reader-list] Police (sad) Story, Media, Delhi Police joke

[Sudeep K S]

Nivedita Menon writes in The Telegraph:
http://www.telegraphindia.com/1061205/asp/opinion/story_6974692.asp

"According to reports in a leading daily (August 26 and September 4),
Hoshangabad police charged a couple with the murder of their
twelve-year-old son. Their son was indeed missing, and a body was
found near the railway track. The parents confessed to the crime, and
spent over 45 days in jail.."

"Six months after his murder, young Gabbar turned up in town.."

"As for the parents who confessed to the murder of a son who was alive
— "They broke three of my fingers with sticks," said the father.."

"It further involved, in the face of incontrovertible evidence of the
boy being alive, reiterations in court of the police version under
oath, urging the court instead to prosecute Gabbar's family for
producing another person as Gabbar.."

* * *

"what happens to police procedures and media reportage when nothing
less than national security is at stake?"

She asks, "Would this blatant miscarriage of justice have been
reported in the media if the parents had been arrested on a different
sort of charge? If Gabbar himself had not turned up alive? What if
Gabbar had been killed in an encounter?"

"Last month, a woman widely known in academic and activist circles in
Delhi — Sunita of Daanish Books, a small alternative publisher — was
detained by the police in Chandrapur, where she had set up a book
exhibition.."

"..when concerned phone calls and faxes started pouring in, the police
claimed that they had "clinching evidence" (a phrase they repeatedly
used) that this Sunita was a Maoist activist from Jehanabad, where her
Maoist husband had been killed some years ago in an encounter. During
her interrogation, the official insisted that she admit she was from
Jehanabad, despite her assertion that she is from Bhagalpur, and that
she had never lost a husband to police bullets. A policeman told her
confidently at one point, Hum saabit kar ke rahenge ki aap vohi Sunita
hain, Jehanabad ki.."

"..during interrogation Sunita was asked, "Why do you sell books on
Bhagat Singh? The British have left, haven't they?"

"Reports in local Hindi newspapers published the police version
without any further comment or corroboration.."

   *    *    *

Reminds me of an old joke on Delhi Police:

The lion goes missing from the New York zoo. The New York Police goes
all out on lion hunt, but fails. Then they call friend Tony Blair, and
the British Police team arrives. They use all their resources,
searches the Siberian islands and the African jungles, but can't trace
the lion. Then someone suggests that NY take the help of the Delhi
Police. Delhi Police comes to the zoo to check the site, and gets hold
of the bear in the next cell. Bear is taken to the lock-up. Policeman
comes and tells the bear, "bol tu sher hai" (tell you're lion). Bear
is clueless.

The next day, the bear confesses he's lion.

[There are different versions of this story.]