Black Stiletto

The heels dug in. Innocence. Heels that caused dents in the tracks. Heel marks don't leave trails on concrete.

HORRIFIC. It was not the cry against the piercing sole but the pack that descended not allowing the heel to claim innocence.

The heels maintained their composure, we are told. It is a shoe store - heels on celluloid, heels in books, long promos and extracts to mark the day of the heel. To mark territory for new heels.

The heel went on a city tour, a city where she dreamed of walking on clouds and stamping feet all over them even if it was to make them weep. She went and prayed in church. Gods do not talk, god did not create heels. God is vegetating in imprisoned imaginations.

The heel turned her face away as a picture of skull and ribcage "intact" was flashed. News bulbs flashed. Innocence flashed. See, the heel had only made a few dents. Where are the pieces?

Black stilettos are statement pieces. They stand tall and when they fall it is merely a fashionable trip.

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The heels belong to Maria Susairaj as she walked out of jail for a press conference. (I have cropped the newspaper picture.) Neeraj Grover's "friends from the TV industry" don't see the irony of the same industry offering her Rs 5 crore to appear in the reality show Bigg Boss.

It is okay to hold candle-light rallies. But will they be able to ensure that news channels do not give her some sort of heroic status? Will they be able to ensure that ads promoting any film on the subject are not screened?

Justice has to go beyond the courts.

- - -

A friend has told me that I often tend to get too personally involved in news stories. I see people. If oversensitivity is a crime, then I plead guilty.

I don't wear black stilettos.

No RIP for Neeraj Grover

300 pieces of a human body and a three year sentence. Maria Susairaj is free today; her fiancé Emile Jerome has got ten years. Not for murder. He is “guilty of culpable homicide not amounting to murder besides destroying evidence and his fiancee Susairaj of only destroying evidence”.

Those body parts are incidental, not murdered. Not a human being.

Maria was caught between two men fighting; Jerome was angry and jealous. It was not pre-meditated. So? Isn't there some background? I had recently put forth some of it in the second part of a piece.

Here is part of Maria’s confession which the judges relied on:

She knew Neeraj Grover. He called and wanted to come over. She said, no. He landed up. She took him in. Jerome called at 11.30. Her phone battery died, so he called on Neeraj’s number. Neeraj asked to stay the night there. At 7.30 am, Jerome appeared. Neeraj had woken up. The two men fought and Jerome started hitting Neeraj and then he got a knife and stabbed him. She tried to stop him but he shut her mouth. Then in her words:

He threw me on the bed and raped me. He never put the knife down. This was at about 8 am. He also beat me and threatened me not to tell anyone about the incident. I told Emile to take Neeraj to a hospital. He said Neeraj would not die for 4 to 5 hours. He asked me to go into the bathroom and take a bath and he again raped me.

How can a man hold a knife and rape a woman? After the first incident, could she not raise an alarm? A kitchen knife cannot do so much harm. Besides, did her lawyer not say that she was a virgin?

After 11 am, Emile dragged the body of Neeraj into the bathroom. Then he told me to purchase bags, curtains, a knife and some room freshener. While I was buying these things, Emile was constantly on the phone with me. When I came back to my house, I handed over the knife to him. He asked me not to come into the bathroom and to instead clean the hall, which was blood-stained.

What does the judgment state?

When he took the flight from Cochin suddenly and without permission (from the navy) Jerome did not have intention (to kill) till he landed at Maria’s house. He had the intention to kill thereafter.

and

Jerome called on Grover’s phone. Jerome was nervous and upset after that. Jerome booked his ticket on May 6, 2008 at 11pm

Obviously, for the fiancé, a situation where he finds this young boy with his fiancée, he is bound to get upset. He lost his control.

During scuffle he took the knife from the kitchen and stabbed deceased Neeraj Grover. The accused was provoked by the circumstances.

What were the circumstances? Losing control? Maria had already told him about Grover, he had dialled on his phone to talk to her. She let him stay at his place. Nowhere is there any accusation that Neeraj forced himself on her. In fact, she did not get what she wanted from him by way of her career aspirations.

If this judgment is to set a precedent, it would mean jealous lovers/spouses can kill anyone they suspect including their partners. Partners assisting them to get rid of evidence spend only three years in jail and that includes the time of the trial.

There is no RIP for Neeraj Grover. Or the 300 pieces of him.

End Note:

I am upset by the Times of India illustration because it shows a smiling Grover, as though he seemed to have gone happily or asked for it. I know it is unintentional but a little sensitivity is called for. By reproducing it here, I realise I too can be accused of the same. I am trying to make a point and clarifying it, so do excuse. TOI's reportage has been extensive, though, and I have relied on it here.

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Updated on July 2, 7.22 pm:

The audacity of hopelessness is getting blatant. The judge has ordered Maria Susairaj to pay Rs. 50,000 and Emile Jerome Rs. 1 lakh to Neeraj Grover’s parents as fine. If a person dies in an accident on a public transport, the state compensates. Why insult Grover's family with this paltry amount? Is this what justice is about?

Jerome had the guts to ask the judge to reduce his 10-year sentence. Maria Susairaj had nothing to say because she has not been proven not guilty. Sure. She is concerned about the taint. She need not worry. Film-maker ram Gopal Verma who has already made a film on the case and released the first cut with well-timed precision now wants to cast her:

“Yes, I would want to take her in my next film, if she is willing. Sometimes, it is not really just about acting. It is the combination of popularity, curiosity etc. And I am sure with the kind of life that she has led behind bars, she must have emotionally matured enough to be a decent actress.”

This is sick. She was acting well enough for the past three years before the courts. Why does he not cast prisoners of war, suspected terrorists, pickpockets and rapists? Let it be made amply clear that both these characters have killed a man. It would be pathetic if Maria realises her career ambitions after being part of a murder to get that blasted career going.

Celebrities, Crimes and Media Manipulation

The media flip-flop is far worse than the fresh evidence that is presented in a couple of prominent cases.

Shiney Ahuja and his wife Anupam are reliving the trauma in glossy paper with sepia-toned photographs tracing their happy life that has been mucked up because a maid cried rape.

Today, the media is recording these beautiful moments but holding back on committing because they say the case is sub judice; the ‘victimised’ say it is sub judice. Then, how are they being featured all over the place and, in fact, influencing public opinion?

Shiney-Anupam

If the “hard evidence” was ignored, then did the media report on that? The forensic lab is “unreliable”, so the DNA results are false. The cops did not ask for the phone call records, and the maid was talking on the phone when the rape occurred. Her hair and clothes were apparently not dishevelled as stated because the CCTV images show her hair neatly tied up and her dupatta pinned.

So, who is at fault here? The investigating agencies? The doctors? Why did these questions not arise earlier? If the samples have supposedly disappeared now, then who is to blame? The issue is beyond proving innocence.

The more important question is about motive. Why would the maid want to implicate Shiney Ahuja? Because it was one-sided love and she asked him to confess a day before the supposed crime took place? Then she comes to work in underwear with old blood stains and around the time when she claims to be raped she calls up an acquaintance? The neighbours take her to the police station while their maid who has got her this job waits for her downstairs where the cameras reveal that her gait is perfect? The neighbours were not on talking terms with Shiney.

So, are the neighbours culpable? Is the other maid culpable?

The Times of India in its 'view' has this to say after giving us a long report:

Actor Shiney Ahuja’s wife, Anupam, has made startling disclosures about the rape charges that were made against her husband. She has cited strong evidence in Shiney’s favour and has claimed that this evidence was ignored by the court. But since the matter is still in court, we will not comment on the evidence. But we can’t help draw attention to the fact that the actor spent 110 days in jail and his career was disrupted. If he turns out to be innocent, he has already been unfairly punished. False charges of sexual abuse and rape against celebrities are not uncommon. The legal system needs to guard against media hype in such cases and deal clinically with the facts.

If the initial trial was fasttracked, then the actor’s appeal should also be speeded up through the system. It would be a shame if he had to unfairly live with a guilty tag and have his career ruined due to judicial delay.

This is trying to force collective guilt on the public. Shiney Ahuja was not such a big celebrity. His fame has increased after this case. It is precious that TOI talks about guarding against media hype when it was a frontrunner in this business and continues to be. Just to jog memory, two other women did accuse Shiney of inappropriate behaviour. Are these just sound bytes for a vulture media?

The same media that is now giving us details about how his wife, when she was away, broke her karva chauth vrat (women fasting for the husband's long life) via webcam with him is now wondering that the maid used the term atyaachaar, which could mean any sort of torture. So, what was the atyaachaar? That he did not reciprocate her love? Does she recall saying in June 2009, “Rape is a very heinous crime and in today’s time it can be committed not just by a man. Even a woman can do it and we all know”? What validity does it now have when the argument is against rape itself?

Does the media ask for fast-track justice in non-celebrity cases? I would like to know how many cases against celebrities have come before the courts? What happened to the sting operation against actor Shakti Kapoor? He was invited on panel discussions and is spoofed on comedy shows where he also appears as a judge. Is there not the possibility of a flip side where the victim is silenced because of the so-called clout of the perpetrator? Abroad many of these women squeal and make a neat packet, so such misuse of celebrity is common.

Jerome, Neeraj, Maria

This brings us to that other case. Did Neeraj Grover, creative head of an entertainment channel. demand a pound of flesh from Maria Susairaj, an aspiring actress? Or did she willingly have an affair with him? Then, what snapped? Grover was killed; his body cut up in small bits and burned and then dumped in the Manor jungles just outside Mumbai. Maria and her fiancé Emile Jerome, a naval officer, were implicated. It was said then that they made love right there after they had chopped the body and even went out for dinner.

Now, they have different lawyers and are trying their best to protect themselves. Maria’s lawyer, after three years, claims that she is still a virgin and could not be in a physical relationship with Neeraj. Is that the pivot of the argument when 48 witnesses have been examined by the prosecution?

The mall where she went to pick up three sports bags and a knife had the recordings. The cops are being blamed for not noticing the knife earlier and in fact are being accused of planting it there.

I fail to understand what the police get out of framing people in such crimes because Maria had admitted to the murder. She says it is because her siblings were being held and it was a forced confession. Jerome’s lawyer says no one checked if Neeraj was still alive when he arrived from Kochi.

There are several legal loopholes that can be used. If the media wants to give the benefit of doubt to people who are implicated in dastardly crimes, then it should not follow the trail in a vicarious manner to start with. The verdict will be pronounced in both these cases. Irrespective of the outcome, the motives for the accusation or the crime remain unresolved.

Neeraj is dead. Why don’t they talk about a young life being snuffed out? And what about the maid in the Shiney Ahuja case? You won’t see her in the pages of Bombay Times at a party like Shiney did with his wife soon after he got bail. Why is she not being interviewed? In some ways, she is already seen as the guilty party and, fast-track or no fast-track, her life has been derailed forever.