Left right left right pyjama deela topi tight....

That a rape verdict takes nineteen years to be pronounced when an entire village was brutalized, and all it's women raped,  speaks volumes of the need for reforms within our judicial system. That it took the villagers three years of insistence before their  FIR was filed holds true that corrupted power continues to be the cancer of this nation.

I have had the harrowing experience of filing an FIR after a traffic police van rammed into my car; and I escaped being injured by a mere whisker. My car was badly damaged through no fault of mine, and the police attempted all methods of cover-up and contaminating the scene of the accident to save the culprit since he was "one of them"! Though the print media covered the case meticulously for three days, my FIR though filed, never say the light of day and no action was taken. It was as if NOTHING happened!

The police stations in India are territories that  are full of swaggering crude men who hold little respect for women.  With the stench of urine and sweat hanging heavy in the air, men in ill fitting uniforms occupy positions of authority that are never subjected to close monitoring. Women are mostly objects of titillation for those who sit behind those desks at which people are supposed to take their problems. Most often the "time pass" syndrome has kicked in to seal off any potential of conscience keeping that these men may have once felt.

Most often these jobs do not get selected by  individuals for reasons of committed service. As a result it is for making a quick buck and using the uniform as a tool of power to serve oneself that gives the police a very bad name, in most instances. That rape and plunder, genocide and harassment, and above all apathy can be often seen as the calling card of the police force of India,  is indeed a sad state of  governance.

Today with the countries attention on the Punch and Judy show of P. Chidambaram and Pranab Mukherjee taking center stage, stories of women being mercilessly beaten by cops in Bihar's Nalanda's district for staging a peaceful protest and desiring to file a missing persons report, seems to have been put on the back burner  of our conscience. Que cera cera....whatever will be will be?  Good grief, those are corny lyrics of an old song! Who ordered this to become the new refrain of our National Anthem ? Perhaps the uncomfortable truth to that answer is you and me.