O P I N I O N S

fifty fifty
The khaki school of culture
The apparent carte blanche the police has come to assume in many states, especially Maharashtra, where they are in constant conflict with a youthful and modernising society, is dangerous to say the least.
Kishwar Desai
It must have been a balmy Mumbai day when Kuber Sarup, a 26-year-old media professional, got out of his car and saw a female friend off in an auto-rickshaw in February last year.

ground zero
Cry, my beloved country, till the guilty are punished
Successive governments, including the current one that is headed by a Sikh Prime Minister, have done precious little to atone for what happened in 1984. Two commissions of inquiry and eight committees have little to show in terms of bringing to book the guilty.
Raj Chengappa
There was a sense of déjà vu when an Additional Sessions Judge in Delhi asked the CBI to reopen the investigation into allegations against former Union Minister Jagdish Tytler of his involvement in instigating anti-Sikh riots in 1984.

fifty fifty
The khaki school of culture
The apparent carte blanche the police has come to assume in many states, especially Maharashtra, where they are in constant conflict with a youthful and modernising society, is dangerous to say the least.
Kishwar Desai

IT must have been a balmy Mumbai day when Kuber Sarup, a 26-year-old media professional, got out of his car and saw a female friend off in an auto-rickshaw in February last year. As the friend left, Sarup allegedly made the huge blunder of ‘pecking’ her on the cheek and giving her a hug. Whilst this might be the perfectly normal manner in which to say goodbye in urban India—a Mumbai cop from Khar police station in Bandra found it reprehensible and called it ‘indecent behaviour in a public space.’ If only he could be let loose on the ‘mwaah-mwaah’ air-kissing, shoulder-rubbing high society of urban India—which includes politicians, businessmen, journalists, fashion designers—we would all be behind bars! And I certainly don’t mean the kind of bars where booze is served.

So this local Dabangg accosted Sarup and briskly gave him a lecture on Hindu ‘sabhyata’, on which, naturally, the former happened to be the absolute repository. And if this reprimand wasn’t enough, Sarup was then asked to pay a fine of Rs 1,200. Even though this was turning out to be a rather expensive farewell to a friend, he refused — and was then hauled off to the police station. Finally, because he would have to otherwise spend the night in the cooler, he paid the fine as a deposit, pleading ‘not guilty’ in court. Still not getting the point, our meticulous police officers also diligently appeared in court, no doubt convinced that the entire edifice of Hindu tradition and culture would come crashing down if young men and women bade goodbye to each other with chaste kisses on the cheek.

The case was finally decided this week (after a whole year), proving yet again that these kind of frivolous complaints are what block our courts from taking on the more serious cases. One wonders if the metropolitan magistrate who heard the case was also a devotee of this peculiar brand of sabhyata that forbids any form of affection between men and women, because the matter should have perhaps been thrown out without even a hearing. Instead, it consumed valuable time as arguments were heard on both sides, and the cops lost only because they could not prove what kind of ‘indecent behaviour’ they had seen when they were cross-examined by Sarup’s lawyer. Finally, the young man has been exonerated, but at what cost? Sarup has been magnanimous enough to say that he does not blame the police because they are ‘under pressure’ from some quarters. In an irony, within a week, over 30 Mumbai policemen were caught, and suspended, for taking bribes. One is also puzzled at the kind of ‘culture and tradition’ that they wanted to teach this young man? Perhaps they should read the Kamasutra and be educated on the Hindu sabhyata of 64 different kinds of kisses.

This sort of needless harassment carries on, usually unchallenged, all over the country under one pretext or the other, and the tragedy is that when real ‘indecent behaviour’ takes place, such as rape or molestation, it is often the victim who is locked up and the culprits are allowed to roam free. For far too long the police service has suffered because it has been misused by those in power as a means of aggrandisement, and the beat constable is obviously no different. He is only an obedient foot soldier complying with orders to deliver both cash and culture — a money-making moral police.

Shouldn’t there be accountability from the police, just as there is in the private sector? If someone harasses another, or files a false complaint, there has to be a price to pay. But in most matters where the police wrongly files a complaint (especially over couples) there is no punishment for them. It is these petty and large transgressions by the police that make them more menacing than helpful. Their image needs a huge overhaul, and strict directions need to be given out about whom they can arrest and under what ‘act’. The apparent carte blanche that they have come to assume in many states, especially Maharashtra, where they are in constant conflict with a youthful and modernising society, is dangerous to say the least.

Mumbai, like other cities in India, has had many baton-happy cops, and we have suffered when they are allowed to decide what time women should be out and at what places. From Sarup’s case, it also now seems that the police think they can decide how women are to be treated by their male friends, regardless of whether the affection is consensual.

When we speak of teaching the police sensitisation, we mostly do so in the larger issues. But they also need to be sensitised about the small and hurtful daily transgressions. Relationships are changing; men and women are becoming more demonstrative towards each other in public. It is about time the cops accepted that.