Open letter to police and media

I have lived for more than nineteen years in Tamilnadu and travelling all around in the country for more than 21 years. I think for any person living on his own in this country (without beacon lights), it will be obvious perception that the social fabric in our country in weak. At present starting form Raj Thakarey to Sheila Dikshit, people are running for the neck of north Indians/ Hindi waalaas in general and Biharis in particular. In Tamilnadu, condition of Hindi speaking people is not hidden to anyone. Frequently fights among the students at various educational institutions are reported in media on the basis of states.

Today Times of India, Chennai edition, on its main page has published an article with heading “7 Bihari students nabbed for terror links”. I don’t want to comment about the inside story as it may sound humiliating either to the police or the person in press who has prepared the article (noting that the person whom they wanted to arrest has escaped and he had come from Delhi!), but altogether it’s a premature press release by the police (I am sure they understand the value of the information passed on to the general public) and a poor presentation by the press.

Such language of reporting is irresponsible and insensible on the part of media. It’s like reporting in Gujarat that & Muslims arrested for terror links!

By the way of presentation, it appears that neighbors, out of their irritation (Biharis are notorious for their ill mannered behavior – being a Bihari I have experienced that) have reported to the police against the students and police has arrested them . . .

Moreover, we all know that there is no identity called “Bihari” as such as there is no clan or religion or caste or language or race called Bihari. In such a situation, mentioning a state name for such defaming news is just ignorance. If they would have given the name and address of those arrested, it’s understandable.

In past I have read news heading as “Two north Indians spoiled the journey” while reporting use of drug to rob the co – passengers (by some other newspaper), and I also know that people in Tamilnadu like such presentation and is not going to stop because of my this writing, still as a reflex I am doing it by writing to the Tamilnadu Police (Complaint No: E11CHI609), Times of India editor and putting it before all of you.

Confused between the two sides of the grinder: Where to go?

Recently we have come across clear picture (don’t know whether it’s clear to all, I will try to make it clear) of different organizations of the Indian government out in public with contradictory visions. Worse than the vision, its painful and confusing for the common person that they are out in open in favor of or against particular persons/ groups. Media keeps reporting on both the sides and people have to make correction in their ideas on daily/ hourly basis! It becomes more sensitive and grave when it is concerned about people lives . . . whether its zail or encounter deaths. As a common man we don’t know whether it’s healthy for the country/ society, but we know for sure that things are not going on smoothly and all is not well! We are living in a dangerous situation where our drivers/ captains are fighting over the direction of the sailing!

Let’s see the two recent and serious examples of the above statement which made me to make such an opinion. As a rule we know that our judiciary is generous. Getting bail or acquitted is very easy as per Indian judiciary system. We used to mock at it few years ago and feel handicap before the corrupt and high handed people. It gave birth to two grave ways. One was rampant corruption at top level which led to billions of loss to the government exchequer. And second was a volley of police encounters to eliminate the criminals who were criminals beyond the doubt of the police; of which people say most of them are fake! That’s police use to kill the criminals not in an ambush but in usual cold situation when they had no reason to fire! Although most of the time common mass have taken a sigh of relief after elimination of such dreaded criminals, in our democratic setup with poor and non clear stand on critical issues of corruption on high places, legal and official confusion has cropped up. Recently that has been clear by the outcome of SIT report of Isharat jahan encounter (a young girl being used by the terrorist organizations as a cover). A common man is at a philosophical loss to whether to support/ rejoice the killing of a criminal or to go by the process of our judicial system. But a still bigger question remains is, if the government’s own hands are not believing/ depending/ supporting each other what about a commoner? How much he should believe the system? Is he safe? As per the reports from the court room, judges are not taking the idea of extra judiciary killings on the name of encounter even though the slain persons were declared or clear criminals!

The other example is still confusing. Recent 2G and 3G scams saw billions of government money being siphoned to few power players! The revelations came from none other than government’s own functionary – CAG. That the political masters were quite unhappy with the estimate was more than clear. But after the arrests were done, CBI (we all know the credentials of the organization – its maneuverability) not only estimated the loss lower than the CAG estimates, it brought it in open in the media and went a step ahead to not to oppose the bail please of one of culprits! And here again the judiciary did a balancing act by questioning the decision of not opposing the bail!

Seeing these two examples, what is clear is, not only there are two faces/ sides among the executives; they are running amok against each other! Is it because the government is with the wrong doer and so a weaker side is being balanced or is it because real confusion at the philosophical level and so only intellectual differences are causing the confusions, will be clear only after some time. But in the mean time, what about the lives lost? What about the days in prison? What about the sympathy waves and heated discussions on the coffee shops? What about ruined relations? What about the wasted time of the commoner?

Whatever be the future, whether the judiciary understands or not, whether SIT accepts or not, whether the police and CBI come out of politician's control or not, the common man must understand that his life is not going to remain peacefull (may not be before the bullets all the time or may not be behind the bars all the tiem) if they take the benefit of the nation lightly. Every effort by all concerned including the government institutions should be made to give this message clearly.

For the government/ establishment, they need to understand URGENTLY that there needs to be sanctity in the cases of benefits/ safety of the nation. They should make arrangement to dissociate the investigation agencies from  the political control and should make them strong so that they can play more decisive role in the decision making by the judiciaries. In the judicial system, there should be enough importance and role for the facts coming through government or nongovernment (media/ whistle blowers) agencies and not just BLINDLY following the COOKED up EYEwitnesses.