Crime in Delhi: The changing face of public outrage
In the posh neighborhood of Panchsheel Park in New Delhi, a gentleman was found dead outside his ground floor bedroom. Rumors about the circumstances of his death shocked the colony until the police declared him “murdered”. The confusion was further fueled by the victim’s son announcing his father’s unfortunate death on the colony’s WhatsApp group and asking everyone not to speculate on the reason behind it. This message was sent on November 25.
However, it was not until November 28 that The Times of India reported the incident. Until then, there was no mention of crime in Delhi in newspapers or noisy TV channels. There were no reporters with OB vans or video cameras in the lanes to investigate the murder, which was filled with so many possibilities.
Three days after the incident, the Times of India finally reported the murder. This was unusual, as in the past, they were usually the last to report crime stories, which were usually the staple diet of the tabloid or local Hindi press. I am not sure if anyone reported this story in the Hindi language media or in the local pages of Delhi newspapers, but of late, there has been a decline in interest among reporters and publications regarding crime stories.
Crime in Delhi: An Evolving Definition of Crime
Politics, and a certain kind of politics at that, has captured the imagination of the common man. It is not that crime has decreased, but the definition of crime that angers the society is rapidly changing. Someone should document whether police conduct has changed since secularism is the defining principle of our laws and daily conduct. Now, with right-wing politics and morality casting a long shadow over politics and society, identity crimes and crimes against women have given way to financial and cybercrimes.
This does not mean that the old crimes have disappeared. The scary truth is that drugs, theft, murder, and crimes of passion coexist with New Age crimes.
When I was editor of a local daily newspaper in the early 2000s, we were constantly searching for space in an overcrowded news and magazine market. At that time, controlling Islamic terror was a major issue that bothered the police. Each arrest of people from the minority community was linked to the spread of terror by Islamic groups from the Kashmir Valley.
I remember that in December 2002 there was an encounter between Delhi Police and Kashmiri terrorists. When my reporter briefed me on the encounter, I told him to stay on the ground and not leave after the cops left. My instincts were wrong.
As the posse of police and reporters left, my reporter heard someone yell “fake encounter.” A person who went to park a car in the basement saw two men being dragged from the car while intoxicated. A practicing doctor, he was appalled when he witnessed him allegedly shooting drug-traffickers in cold blood. Since the next day was a holiday, no newspaper was printed except for the local daily where I worked. We managed to put our scoop on the front page about the fake encounter at Ansal Plaza. The crime bust in Delhi put the cat among the pigeons.
Meanwhile, 7/8 dead bodies were found on the train tracks. I asked my crime reporter to investigate the case and check at the hospital where the autopsy was performed. We found that most of the deceased were organ donors. Did they donate against their will or otherwise? We will never know, but we managed to highlight the issue through our exposé.
Another interesting investigation that I managed to conduct through my young team of journalists was tracking beggars after they were arrested by the police. The reporter who was doing the story followed the police car and found himself in a beggar’s palace. Surprisingly, the beggars were not without support. A well-heeled lawyer bailed them out. A day later, they were back on the road. We could not find out whose brief the lawyer was holding.
Crime in Delhi today is as under-reported as it used to be. What outraged society was the media, often amplifying polarizing issues to create outrage over non-fiction. However, the real loser is the news consumer, whose right to information is increasing.
This article first appeared on Sanjay Kapoor’s Substack. Here is the original link to the source. Click here to follow Sanjay Kapoor on Substack.