Fareed Zakaria is an impressive speaker and has a show on CNN – I heard him speak at an event, and the guy can speak on any and every topic. Very impressive!! I remember his words, “China has progressed because of its government, India has progressed despite its government”. So true!
I watched No One Killed Jessica last weekend and loved it! I love how Bollywood is churning out good movies – Peepli Live, Tere Bin Laden, to name a few, all on my list to watch. No One Killed Jessica is one of them. It is based on a model Jessica Lall, who was murdered in 1999. A politician’s son murdered her because she refused to give him a drink- she was bartending at a party and there were no more drinks and the bar had closed. She was shot dead, and most of the 7 witnesses turned hostile in court. The key witness, himself a model, Shayan Munshi, was bartending that night with Jessica and saw the murder. He refused to cooperate in court either which ruined his entire career. I don’t blame him – if I were a witness and someone at gun-point threatened not my safety but that of my loved ones, I would not put my family at risk for someone who is dead.
In 2006 the accused were acquitted. Media got interested in the case and brought justice to Jessica. The movie was amazing and kept me rooted all the way. It is impressive how media’s power brought the politician to court! Tehelka magazine did an expose on the witnesses and their lies.
I read many more such cases… Nitish Katara was murdered by Vikas Yadav who was against Nitish’s love affair with his sister, Bharati. Vikas was the son of a politician who was himself a criminal. I found it interesting that Jessica Lall’s murderer had spent the night of the murder in Vikas’ house – clearly birds of the same feathers flock together! After 6 years of trial Vikas was sent to prison. All thanks to media. Bharati did not cooperate in court either – not surprising – she succumbed to family pressure.
It is so easy to murder and get away with it in India. If you have money you can get away with almost anything. Such stories of media intervention are inspiring and out of the norm. In all these cases, the trial went on for years and years. Indian politicians are murderers – so many Hindi movies have depicted this that it is an accepted reality.
New York Fashion and My Rants 