Our fine art of botching up a probe…

Harish Khare

On Wednesday evening, a ‘terrorist,’ armed with a knife, managed to break into the outer periphery of the Palace of Westminster, the seat of the British Parliament. He was shot dead, promptly and efficiently. But what was remarkable about the whole terrible incident was that there was no reckless rush among the British media to identify the deadly intruder. The nearest attempt was to suggest that the intruder was perhaps a person of “Asian origin.” It was only after two days of diligent investigation that the London police was able to declare that the dead man was born Adrain Russell Ajao but now used another name, Khalid Masood. There was a professional touch to this reticence.

A similar professional calm was on display in Washington when the FBI Director, James Comey, was asked to testify before the House Intelligence Committee on the nature of the Russian involvement in the Trump campaign. Despite provocation from the Congressmen, the FBI Director did not say a word more or a world less, than needed to be said. He, instead, preached to the Congressmen that “the FBI is very careful in how we handle information about our cases and about the people we are investigating.” Cool as a cucumber, as they say. 

Such calm and professional styles stand in sharp contrast to how we do business in India. Within hours of an “incident”, our agencies whisper in the ears of this or that favourite newsperson the precise name of the Islamist organisation involved. Sometimes, even the seniormost politicos rush out to add to the clamour. 

It is not just agencies dealing with security matters that leak like a sieve but even the CBI and the Enforcement Directorate are forever telling the media about “incriminating documents” discovered after every “raid.”

Often the objective is not to find the culprit but to use an incident to create a political narrative. The leadership in our agencies is obliged to understand the political masters’ requirements and fashion their investigation accordingly.

Yesterday, a reader wrote to recall how the British police reacted in April-May, 1980, when some armed gunmen had stormed the Iranian Embassy in London and taken a number of hostages. The situation was brought under control after five days of siege. Our reader recalls that all that BBC reported was that the SAS men “disappeared into the thin air” after performing their rescue act.

Our agencies have not appreciated the professional need to remain faceless, nameless; instead, we seek medals and media space. The Western media culture understands the need for secrecy. On the other hand, we have no qualms in besmirching people’s reputations and destroying hapless citizens’ lives.

All this has not served our cause. The NIA, our premier agency, has heaped professional shame upon itself by changing its investigation goals after a change of government in New Delhi. Its professional reputation is in the mud. No neutral international observer is willing to accept our agencies’ presumed foolproof evidence against Hafiz Saeed. 

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IT was reported the other day that the Punjab and Haryana High Court disposed of a case of culpable homicide after 34 years and the accused, the dead man’s wife, walked free. Thirty-four years. What a shabby reflection on our presumed premier investigation agency. And, what a sad comment on our criminal justice system. Worse then Charles Dickens’ Bleak House. 

It also occurs to me that Chandigarh seems to be having a particular taste for murder. This week, we had this horrible case of Ekam Dhillon murder. What I find particularly abhorring is the deceased’s wife, mother-in-law, brother-in-law and friends calming cutting up the body and nonchalantly going about disposing of the pieces. 

And, then earlier, we had the Saketri village murder, on the outskirts of Chandigarh. Young men murderously settling scores over an alleged insult.

Something seems to be going terribly wrong in our society. Too much anger, too much money, too much greed, too much prideful aggression, too little respect for law and its deterrence. No wonder we rank so low on the global happiness index. Maybe because all the social ‘reformers’ have become entrepreneurs, promoting dubious brands’ doubtful politicians; and, the so-called ‘cultural organisations’ are busy providing foot-soldiers for the never-ending electoral battles. The social order is becoming precarious and fragile. 

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ALL of us know a doctor — or rather have to know a doctor. At least, one if not more doctors. Because someone or the other we love — a daughter, a son, a grandchild, wife, husband, parents, in-laws, friends — falls ill or gets injured and needs medical attention and care. A doctor becomes ‘god’ in that moment of intense personal vulnerability. 

In India, as in any other society, all of us have strong views about doctors and hospitals. Each one of us can tell a long story — a tale of anger, frustration, satisfaction, exasperation — about an encounter with this or that doctor. Each one of us feels fleeced and short-changed after every visit to a hospital; sometimes we feel blessed having been healed by the magical touch of a surgeon or a perfect diagnosis. 

Rarely do we get to know or feel the need to understand as to what goes on in the doctor’s complicated universe — the imperfections in medical knowledge and care. That is where we must meet Atul Gawande, a US-based surgeon, public health activist, and writer. Over the years, he has produced a number of best-selling books. 

I find him fascinating not only because he is an engagingly brilliant writer but also because he opens the door and lets us in the mysterious world where a doctor often stands between life and death. He gives us a glimpse of the inherent nobility of the medical profession — the god-like gift and opportunity to save a human life. “Our decisions and omissions are moral in nature,” he writes in the introduction to his first book, Better.

Gawande tells us that after all the advances in science and technology, the knowledge, the experience, the tools and the environment often prove inadequate: “The knowledge to be mastered is both vast and incomplete. Yet we are expected to act with swiftness and consistency, even when the task requires marshaling hundreds of people — from laboratory technicians to the nurses on each change of shifts to the engineers who keep the oxygen supply system working — or the care of a single person.”

He is simply an excellent storyteller about his craft. Take for instance the chapter, entitled “Naked.” He talks about what the surgeon and the patient should wear at the time of examination. Practices and protocols differ from the United States to Ukraine to Venezuela, he tells us. Then, there is the ticklish question: should a nurse or chaperone be present when a male doctor examines a female patient? 

I recommend him to all my younger journalist colleagues. He displays to a perfection the writer’s basic skill: power of observation, to observe the details, to see patterns and then make the most technical topics into a very, very readable and accessible language. He forces us to understand the critical importance of such mundane chores as “on washing hands” or on “the Mop-up” after an operation.

Or, the importance of making a checklist of things that need to be done by a doctor. “There are a thousand ways the things can go wrong when you have got a stab wound,” he writes about an emergency room experience, when the doctors had forgotten to ask the patient for the nature of the weapon. 

There is a larger, simple message in Gawade stories: irrespective of the field of activity, we need to understand: “what does it take to be good at something in which failure is so easy, so effortless.”

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OUR new rulers in Punjab seem to be determined to want to squander away their goodwill even before the honeymoon period is over. Drunk with power, perhaps. I do not know what they are drinking, but whatever it is, it certainly can’t be coffee.

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