mind it

This one is crazy. utsav sharma actually did what the nation hailed as the thing to do in rdb and was promptly presented as the maniac on medication with a penchant for violent catharsis and a history of assault and battery that was described as having more to do with his mental state than with his motive. In brief, utsav is the 29-year-old who hacked at ramesh talwar with a cleaver because he was fed up with the “absolute laxity” of the criminal investigation in the aarushi talwar murder case. No, he has nothing to do with aarushi. And he has been fed up before. February last year he posed as a journalist to attack sps rathore, the former Punjab police officer accused of molesting ruchika girhotra, driving the poor girl to suicide. That attack was carried out with a penknife. Rathore incidentally got away lightly for his role in the death of the girl whom, when she was 14-years-old, he had molested in front an eyewitness.
Protective parents might have pleaded with the authorities to let the boy be declared mentally unstable and kept under observation and constant monitoring, total responsibility for which they would surely have promised. Indeed, the brazen acts can only be the work of a lunatic. I too feel horribly depressed by the ‘miscarriage of justice’ in this country, my blood boils too when I find our leaders and captains as being no more than venal, corrupt idiots whose claim to respect is not what it should be. I too feel frustrated that we give them that respect regardless. But I sure am not going a killing anyone.
But here’s a thought: maybe, since no one’s died by his hand yet, he didn’t want to actually kill anyone. Just scare them, embarrass them. Terrorize them that they are as vulnerable and exposed as the victims they did to death. There is a reason I say this. Utsav won a gold medal when he graduated in fine arts from the banaras hindu university (I know people who’ve studied there) and has just passed out of the nid last month (I know people who’ve been to nid). Speaking for myself, for all my sensibility, I don’t think mustering a gold medal is any piece of cake. And this is art and shit involved here. Among one of the mental processes of an artist is to find an expression that would echo. A very creative and personal signature but one that would nonetheless have to resonate with a meaning which communicates itself through the imagination.
Now to build a case on the evidence available, it would be too simplistic to term the subject a mental case and pass our verdict. It is one thing to be on the side of civil society and justice, due process and the course of law but to go tut tut and shut away as delinquent someone who wears his indignation on his sleeve because that is not the prescribed way to protest is dangerous.
Make no mistakes, utsav has committed a crime. He should be arrested, tried and sentenced according to the laws of the land. But to brand his activism as an act of madness and keep him under supervision, that is cynical. And it is cynicism of a grave kind because it cuts at the very sap of feeling that makes human beings civilized. For it is uncivilized and vulgar how even after committing great misdeeds our criminals can live among us (to be sure we cannot ostracize or outcast our felons, the shot at re-assimilation is their greatest hope but that is a different matter — can’t be politically correct all the time man) to popular acclaim.
So this man here too deserves his right to be taken seriously. It is a serious thing he is trying to say.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/delhi/I-only-wanted-to-hurt-Talwar-not-kill-him-says-Utsav-Sharma/articleshow/7364668.cms

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruchika_Girhotra_Case