Between the lines...

On 13Th May several bombs exploded in Jaipur in which around 100 people were killed and many others were seriously injured. Two days later a 15 year old girl was murdered in her house in NOIDA near national capital Delhi. The Bomb blasts in Jaipur were carried out by terrorists who are trying to destabilize India. Both the stories were shocking and sensational, the first incident was an attack on our nation, our unity while second raised deep rooted questions regarding family bond and our social values.

Both cases and conspiracy behind them is still unresolved and investigations are on. Initially both stories were widely covered by both print and news media but in matter of few days Jaipur blast story went in background while Aurshi-Hemraj murder case of Noida is still prominently covered and followed by media especially electronic media. In India thousands of crimes take place every day, more heinous and barbaric than the double murders of Noida. What is so special in Noida case ?

On night of 15Th May Aurshi Talwar was murdered in her bed, next morning police started investigations and suspected house servant Hemraj as culprit and declared him absconding. One day later on 17Th May Hemraj's body was discovered on the roof of Talwar's house. This was the first turning point or dramatic input in the story. It highlighted the recklessness and carelessness of noida police on one hand and introduced love-hate-revenge killing angle on other hand which generated huge public interest in this case. In next couple of days mystery surrounding the case deepened, Arushi's parents came under suspicion, extra martial affairs of Arushi's father with a colleague Dr Anita Durrani surfaced, talks of Aurushi's affair with someone through Internet and servant Hemraj were proposed by police which kept and even fueled media interest in the story.

Few days later police arrested Arushi's father Dr. Rajesh Talwar as prime suspect and suggested honor killing or exposure of affairs with Anita Durrani's as possible motives for double murders. But police had only circumstantial evidences against Dr Rajesh, while proposed motive was shaky and police failed to recover murder weapon. This resulted in wide spread criticism of shoddy investigation by UP police and UP chief minister Mayawati requested CBI enquiry to avoid any political gains by Congress on this. The CBI took the case from UP police on 1st June and till now failed to solve the case which by now is being termed as biggest murder mystery.

The major news channels continued to cover the story and gave the case lot of attention and air time. In their effort to beat other channels, every channel sensationalized the story in their own way, raised questions on police's handling of the case and suggested many conspiracy theories. It was very convenient for these 24-hour news channels as they hardly have any substance to present as news and Noida being very close to Delhi it is very easy for reporters to follow the case.

If police/CBI has valid grounds to suspect Dr Rajesh Talwar or compounder Krishna they can make them tell the truth regarding crime motive and weapon using some regular policia methods. Dr. Rajesh is not a professional criminal so he should break very easily if he had something to do with the crime. May be due to huge media attention, Police or CBI is not able to resort to these methods and are spending lot of time and resources on scientific tests such as lie-detector or narco analysis of suspects.

Initially I was also keen on this case and followed it closely but I am loosing interest now and realizing that it is waste of time. Let police and investigating agencies do their job and news channels and we should mind our own business. There are far bigger problems and important things in life than to waste air-time and public resources on such crimes. Too much media activism has its positives and negatives. Media spreads public awareness and keep pressure on public officials to perform their duty but sometimes in media frenzy priority, significance and relative importance of different issues is lost somewhere.

BTW, whoever killed Arushi, I sense, will be exposed soon. After all CBI's reputation is in question, don't you think so ?

Labels: CBI, Crime, Murder, News