(((An official party line is more-or-less emerging in this
latest BJP scandal. The kid got some pals to go out and
score him some cocaine. Unfortunately, they brought back
some Nigerian heroin. Then the private secretary and the
son trustingly snorted this stuff up, even though the
three mystery guests who actually supplied the "white powder"
didn't use any themselves. Then, before contacting any
cops, the survivors appear on Indian TV to tell "their side of
the story." Then the cops industriously go off to arrest
a bunch of Nigerians.)))
(((So the apparent upshot is death-by-misadventure.
Maybe. Okay. I mean, that was one of the major plot devices in
Tarantino's PULP FICTION. It'll pass muster.)))
(((What I don't quite get is a scenario where Dad's
secretary and the son are cheerily laying out lines of
"coke," snorting them, and keeling over vomiting, while
the three hipsters who actually brought the party-goods
to the party somehow don't snort any themselves.
Instead, they hang around for a couple of hours, kinda
tidying up and wringing their hands, but doing no drugs.
What the heck kind of coke-freak behavior is that?
Are they from the non-coke-snorting caste, is that it?)))
(((Okay: the secretary is dead now, but the kid isn't.
So let's see if he survives his hospital stay (unlike his
dad) and let's further see what he has to say for
himself. If he says, "Yeah, we sent our retainers out with
a big wad of rupees to buy street-drugs at random from
Nigerians, and then we snorted that stuff and we fell over,"
well, fine. We'll just have to hypothesize that,
despite Dad's reputation as a whip-smart technocrat,
the Mahajan family was as dumb as a bag of bricks.)))
?http://www.hindu.com/2006/06/04/stories/2006060416601000.htm
The Mahajan case is top of the pops in Google India
In deposing live on TV, a new trend emerges
by Siddharth Varadarajan
Fugitives seek to tell their side of the story on television before police lay their hands on them
(((I don't understand why kids smart enough to pull this stunt
are also dumb enough to buy lethal smack from Nigerians.)))
Rumours about big political money, foul play and murder
(((Yeah, I would think so)))
New Delhi: From Billy Wilder's Ace in the Hole and Costa-Gavras's Mad City to the Amitabh Bachchan-Shabana Azmi starrer Main Azaad Hoon, the parasitic nature of the media's quest for `exclusive' access to the scene of a tragedy or crime has been widely documented in the West and even in India. Less well documented is the quest in reverse, when a fugitive seeks desperately to tell his side of the story on television before the police — with their infinitely less gentle inquisitorial methods — get their hands on him.
Friday night's "exclusive" pre-surrender televised deposition by Rahul Malhotra, Tishay Khanna and Karan Ahuja — the three young men who were with Rahul Mahajan on the fateful evening the aspiring BJP politician collapsed — was followed on Saturday by Sahil Zaroo, the fourth house guest, meeting the press before handing himself over to the police for questioning. All four men had been sought by law enforcement since Friday morning.
(((Who do you think arranged this? Do you think four doper kids called up a TV station by themselves?)))
Their absence fuelled intense speculation what it was that led to Mr. Mahajan and his late father's secretary, Bibek Moitra, being taken to hospital in a comatose condition. Throughout the day, dark rumours swirled around Delhi about big political money, foul play and murder. Before the day was out, however, the three young men appeared on NDTV to narrate a less sensational if equally sordid tale of drug abuse.
(((If you know the kid and his henchmen do cocaine, and you slip them heroin so they're run over by their own rail-lines, hey,
that's foul play and murder right there. It's just that the victims
look all sordid and dirty because they eagerly did it to themselves.)))
On his part, Mr. Zaroo, who saw himself emerging as the fall guy in the entire escapade and carries the additional burden — in these paranoid times — of being a Kashmiri Muslim, also preferred to submit himself to the media first before bowing to the inevitable. (((Or maybe he's spinning the inevitable because his centipede bosses are way into media leaks for political advantage.)))
Last November, in the eye of a storm generated by the oil-for-food scandal, Delhi-based businessman Andaleeb Sehgal too chose the television studio route to claim his innocence before turning himself over to the Enforcement Directorate.
The closest filmic account of this trend of wanted persons using the media occurs in the climax of Rang de Basanti when Aamir Khan and his friends take over All India Radio in order to confess to the assassination of a corrupt defence minister live on FM. (((Hey, nice Bollywood culture-war tie-in! We're rockin' now!)))
Credibility gap
In many ways, these high-profile "confessions" and "surrenders" tell us as much about the narcotic value of "breaking news" as they do about the reputation of the Indian police. Simply put, public confidence in the professionalism and impartiality of law enforcement is so low that any individual with knowledge of a crime that intersects with power politics and big money would be unlikely to want to get in touch with the police. (((That's so simply put that I don't believe it. It's more like: if you're tearing a political party apart, why not do it right on TV with the vidcams rolling?)))
Indeed, so large is the credibility gap that often the police themselves stage televised confessions. (((Everybody wants to be a director.))) Soon after Mohammed Afzal was arrested in connection with the December 2001 terrorist attack on Parliament, the Delhi Police Special Cell paraded him before reporters and prompted him to not only confess but also implicate others. And when the cameras recorded him saying something that ran counter to the police version of events, all the reporters present agreed not to broadcast the `offending' sound bites.
