FOUND DEAD
westland publications ltd
Shantanu Guha Ray is a Wharton-trained journalist with nearly three decades of experience in both print and electronic media. He is the India editor for Central European News (CEN), a Vienna-based wire agency and a writer for Firstpost , one of Indias largest news and current affairs portal.
A recipient of the prestigious Ramnath Goenka award, he also won an award from the Washington-based Overseas Press Club of America and received the Laadli Media award for his work on cervical cancer tests.
An author of several best-selling books, Shantanu Guha Ray lives in New Delhi with his wife, daughter, and two dogs.
FOUND DEAD
SHANTANU GUHA RAY
westland publications ltd
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First published by westland publications ltd 2017
Copyright Shantanu Guha Ray 2017
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978-93-86224-54-5
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For, Keya and Oindrilla, my strengths in life
Contents
Ponty Chadha
Sheena Bora
Rizwanur Rahman
Sunanda Pushkar
Neeraj Grover
Jiah Khan
Shakereh Khaleeli
Shivani Bhatnagar
Vijay Palande
A million thanks are due to various newspapers, magazines and online news portals The Times of India ; The Economic Times ; The Indian Express ; Hindustan Times ; Mumbai Mirror ; India Today ; Outlook , rediff.com and Firstpost .
The ebullient Sudha Sadhanand, who shaped my writing, pushing me time and again to gather fresh and exclusive information for the chapters. My wife, Keya and daughter, Oindrilla, who gathered background material for some of the chapters, regularly updating me on the latest developments in each of the nine cases. Ushinor Majumdar of Outlook in Delhi, who provided vital inputs; Tarun Tejpal for his guidance; several crime reporters in Mumbai; Debashish Panigrahi of the Hindustan Times ; Vivek Aggarwal and Manish Pachouly, who once chased after criminals and bookies and later joined corporate jobs.
My heartfelt gratitude to each one and in the hope that we all stay clear of crime and punishment.
Does crime work; does it sell? Do people enjoy reading about it in broadsheets, watch debates over mysterious deaths in television studios? I was asked by a young friend who was ruing the fact that seldom does good news get reported and how as a nation, we were a bunch of voyeurs. I told him what may sound terribly trite to several, but said it anywayit does the world over, and also for millions in India who gleefully consume such news first thing in the morning, wait up late night to watch crime shows, in which poker-faced anchors in all-black outfits expound with great authoritymany adopting bizarre over-the-top aggression, as if there is no tomorrow.
I must confess that for a long time, even I was blissfully agnostic about the unprecedented interest shown by national dailies in running crime stories as a leadunless it was the horrific Dr N.S. Jain-Vidya Jain murder case or the brutal rape and killing of Geeta and Sanjay Chopra in the SeventiesI was often flummoxed why anybody would want to read a stomach-churning item in the morning, before I learnt one of the most clichd reasons for its acceptance, which was obviously based on economics. Several years ago, I was made privy to an editorial meeting at one of Indias most successful news channels, wherein top editors had thumped the table to claim how nobody in the business of news could commit the sacrilege of ignoring the three Cs in their daily shows: crime, cinema and cricket. Over the years, I have noted, albeit sadly, how yet another C (comedy) has also found its place under the C umbrella and continues to attract fabulous TRP ratings for some channels.
I remember the night the Sheena Bora case had broken across television channels. A friend from Mumbai had called to have a quick chat and we ended up speaking for over an hour. He wanted to know every little detail in the case, scratch the bottom of the barrel as it were, to feed on every little crumb. I finished talking to him and later found myself mulling over the case late into the night. The questions he had raised got me thinking that several amongst us may deny it vehemently, but the voyeur in us makes it difficult to sideline crime. However, this is not to say that criminality or deviant behaviour is normal, acceptable and necessarily saleable, but as a genre, it does intrigue several people in different ways.
As a journalist, I had chosen to write about business, finance, sports, even features, but crime wasnt a beat that was assigned to me. But somehow, I always followed unusual deaths and had even pondered over writing about the reason why it so fascinated me. There was also this other debate in the recent past about why crimes in Indias rural areas seldom found mention in national dailies or front-ranking TV news channels, whereas murders, rapes and suicides in Indias metropolises made it to headlines in newspapers and prime time shows.
I do not claim to be a social scientist, but shall risk an explanation which propelled me to meander into this genre. The reason, I feel is that in white-collared crimes, one often sees a reflection of the self; the ones who get killed and the ones who kill are People Like Us (PLUs) and that is a trigger for several to mull and obsess over it for days on end. Why does a teenaged daughter of a doctor couple die one night? For she, pretty much like my daughter and other children, went to the same school and wove the same dreams? Why did the wife of one of the most erudite ministers in India die a sad and unfortunate death in her hotel room? That their marriage may have run into rough weather is as normal as it can get! Why did Rizwanur Rahman die piteously in faraway Kolkata, for he had fallen in love with a rich girl from another community? If this was a transgression, then it is indeed an extremely clichd one.
Every single case in this book manifests our innermost fearsif this could happen to them, then however much we may claim to be part of the so-called great urban Indian phenomenon and feel secure in possessing the capabilities of recognizing the signs of an imminent danger, several of us unfortunately still remain vulnerable. That we the denizens of urban India, who have had the privilege of best education and owing to which an innate ability to not manifest the barbaric cruelty of yokels is not only presumptuous but ridiculous. For the reasons to commit a crime almost remain the same, except that in most parts of urban India and in this book, both the victims and perpetrators were PLUs.
