An update on the Keenan Santos murder case

The main accused Jitender Rana has applied for bail and the hearing is due on July 7. For those of you that can turn up in Sewri for the hearing, please do so.

Here is what Benjamin Fernandes had to say about the upcoming hearing and the accused and his family members.

"Rana has applied for bail. His bail plea will be heard on 7 Jul at 2.45 pm as also the charges will be read out to him and the other 3 accused. The next court date will be an important one in this court case.
The accused were brought to court today, 2 hours before the court session during which time they spent socializing with their friends and family. It looked like they were at a family picnic, every one of them were happy to be there. The accused were kept inside the police van right outside the sewri court and their families had gathered around the grilled windows and were having a long chat. I was sitting in a car with tinted windows parked right ahead of the police van, so I had a close view of the entire gathering.

When the court session was about to begin the whole group went up to the 3rd floor and waited outside the court room, none of them entered the court room though, as their lawyer had advised the crowd not to enter the court room. I sat on the first bench at the entrance to the court room, so that I could take a close look at each of the accused. And as they were were brought in, I locked eyes with each of them one by one by one as they entered the court room. Rana put on an innocent smile to the judge when his lawyer submitted his bail application, but he could not hide the sinister viciousness in his killers' eyes.

I am hoping that the bail plea is turned down by Judge SP Deshmukh, considering the viciousness of this double murder, and with Rana's connections he may well disappear and go hide with his boss in Malaysia as is usually the case with criminals on the loose."
 

This case is about the freedom that we, Bombayites, deserve. Freedom for women from sexual harassment, freedom for young people to take a walk in the evenings without being attacked by criminals. We need to stand by the families of Keenan and Reuben. Those two brave young men could have been any of us.

How scary is the fact that people with pending murder cases are roaming the streets of this city? I am talking about the Ranas and Palandes of Bombay, who use the loopholes in the antiquated Indian legal system to carry out their reign of terror with the loose backing of politicians and some rogue policemen!

While I was away

It's great to be back home to know that the bandits in uniform, the Mumbai Police have gone on a rampage to destroy this city's nightlife. Armed with 19th century laws, these criminals are arresting mothers in restaurants and accusing them of being prostitutes. Life goes as normal in Khetwadi and Kamathipura, where human beings are in cages and sold to sex-maniacs!

The police are also filing charges against a bar for over crowding (I wonder why the Western and Central Railways get away with it?)

In the meantime, you have politicians and senior police officials openly supporting this thugish behaviour. What has happened to my city? Is this the same place where I could be at a nightclub till 6 am (college days in the late-1990s)? Who are these criminals that claim they are only doing their jobs?

The job of the police is to serve and protect. And they fail EVERYTIME a bomb goes off, they fail when chain-snatchers have a free run of the city. They fail when 10 men in a boat turn up from across the Arabian Sea and hold the city to ransom.

I realise all this is nothing but an attempt to create a class war. You see, it's fine for criminal elements to blast music well into the night during religious festivals. They can disturb the public, grope women and vandalize and that's all fine.

The aim of these "authorities" is to mobilise the lower classes so as to keep the middle class from questioning them over corruption. Ironically, it's the corruption of the police and politicians that keep the lower classes poor in the first place!

There is a particular degree of arrogance among the politcians, civil servants and the business houses that any kind of behaviour will be accepted. I have news for them, this city will sink into the bottom of the Arabian Sea if enough people decide they won't take this kind of non sense anymore.

Glorious May days in Bombay

Some people hate this month complaining about the humidity and the heat, but I love Bombay in May. How wonderful is it to have roads free of school buses and cars and rickshaws ferrying kids to and from school. It is so much easier to get from one place to another in May that I almost wish that more parents sent their children to boarding school.

This May has been particularly beautiful with the sea breeze regulating temperatures throughout the day. I love the freshness of the evenings. Ice creams at Naturals, aam pannas, delcious mangoes from Ratnagiri, late sunsets, beautiful evenings. Yes, the rains are just a couple of weeks away and then this city and Andheri in particular will turn into a gigantic mess.


Thankfully, there is still some more time to enjoy this wonderful month.

Could this be the Russian answer to Kolaveri Di?

An anonymous Live Journal send me the link to this video. I initially thought the email was spam but when I clicked on the link, I realised that this is really a cute Russian rap song that pokes fun at Siberians the way Kolaveri Di does at Tamilians.

I can't stop laughing each time I watch this video.

Sibirskaya Zima

The writing is on the wall for Kingfisher

In December when the media was on a frenzy over the imminent collapse of Kingfisher Airlines, I still flew on the 'King of Good Times' a few times and noticed that their service and food was excellent. I appreciated the professionalism of the crew and how the flights were on time.

A few months later, using a free flight to Chandigarh, I was on an erstwhile Deccan aircraft and all they served on a 2 hour 15 minute flight was a stale sandwich and a bottle of water. The crew looked demorialised and there was an air of bankruptcy on board.

Again on a Delhi-Bombay flight as my companion was flying free, the signs were visible. Sure, there were monitors with GPS on the seats, but the food served was indeed the same stale sandwich and they had no inflight entertainment. No headphone set that they would later collect.

It looks like Vijay Mallya's airline is on its deathbed and will close down anytime. What a tragedy for what was a 5-star airline and the best in India!!

Images from Naggar

You can see all the images from Himachal here

Bad Apples in the Kullu Valley

No place on earth would be complete without its own set of idiots and good-for-nothings. Naggar is no exception to this rule. The village, which is one of the safest in India, was witness to a mugging! That's right, a western-style mugging.

A Russian artist was walking to her guesthouse around 10 pm, when three people attempted to snatch her bag with a laptop. She tried to resist but they pulled it away and made a dash. The fear of getting beaten up, stopped her from chasing them. Since it was already late, there were no people on the streets to help her.

The artist went to the police station to file a complaint and the "efficient" cops managed to find one of the trio. She told them that all she wanted was her laptop back, since it had several of her designs. The cops then said, they wouldn't file an FIR but could arrest the guy.. Funny logic, isn't it?

She gave the criminal 2 days to return the laptop, but the man denied being part of the mugging. So smug is this criminal that he went and told others in the village that he is just a petty thief. He only steals shoes and jackets and small things. Not laptops and expensive products! The man in his early-20s is known to befriend foreigners to get a drink or smoke. This was the first ever incident of its kind in this Himalayan Hamlet.

When I spoke to the owner of the guesthouse, where the artist stayed, he told me that the police would act in a way that they filed a FIR and follow up the case. When I said that such "comedy" was unacceptable, he insisted that the cops would find the laptop as soon as it was put on sale!! When I told him that the criminals may have sent it down to Chandigarh, the man told me to go ahead with the FIR.

The artist, who didn't want the criminal to be tortured in lock-up, then proceeded to file the FIR since this young man was being extremely smug. I think the villagers of Naggar should teach their "petty thieves" a lesson. Socially boycott the family (who rushed to defend the criminal) and stigmatise the thieves in other ways. Naggar will lose its only source of livelihood if tourists stop visiting.