A whisper from the grave

"The nature of truth, has baffled philosophers all over the world for ages. Like the Holy Grail, it is envisioned differently by different persons in different times and tracts. People who pursue the truth single-mindedly must of necessity tread the lonely path beset with travails and tribulations bereft of expectations of help from anyone except their own conscience to guide them."

 

There is enough said about the book and enough assailed about the author. There is nothing new there. However, looking at the general clamour to discredit the author and her book, here are my few pointers on what I think.

Most people trumped the book as malicious propaganda with no proof of fact. Some jumped the guns saying where are the recordings? why was it not presented in a Court of law? Very valid question. With the current polarized environment there is a widespread tendency to create and spread false news for propaganda rampantly. So, one has to be careful in seeing through the fluff and arriving at his / her own conclusion on each article and about every issue. Looking at Rana's Narrative, one could always take it as a nice fictional writing. Meetings with all those high-Ranking officers, visits to their place, their Interviews, Content of the interviews... Yes, an expert fictional writer could create it all this from the figment of his or her imagination. Why can't they? From days immemorial, mankind had such great minds. Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, Thousand and one nights, our own Ramayana and Mahabharata with so many flavours delivered differently across the land and all of them capturing the imagination of the people. In modern times we have seen the great writer like Jeffery Archer, Ken Follet and many others creating scenes out of history which really are coming out of their fertile mind and capturing readers' imagination like never before. So why can't Rana be? A perfectly Valid question. How can an upstart journalist so conveniently sting so many high ranking, celebrated officers who are supposed to sniff out duplicity from a mile away but have  fallen prey for her charms and spilt so much beans? is it ever possible?!
So how do I sort this out. Is it a fictional account by a motivated mind ( Rana is Muslim and in India Muslims are always motivated in the wrong direction is the justification thrown right?)

Firstly the Book has foreword by Justice B.N.Srikrishna whose profound quote from the foreword is what I have used in the beginning of this note. He has never sounded a dissent or indication of this being fiction. He is a towering personality, a staunch practicing Hindu from a conservative, privileged class. However, He has not shied away from endorsing the book. For me that is a big beacon of clarity.
Secondly, as someone who trumped the book pointed out off handed manner, - there is nothing new here, it was all in the news already. Exactly, the point. She has not faked it all around.
Think of this. The names, the places, the content of all high-ranking officers who have been presented in the book in a bad and not so good light, could have come back on her. One defamation suit from any one of them would have unravelled it all and that could have put her behind the bars for life... So why didn't they? What else other than for the reason that they wanted to avoid such allegations and proofs presented in a court of law or public scrutiny.

She is presenting none of the proofs to public. She is saying that her employers have taken all the proof and she has none of it. It is laughable isn't it?
If you carefully read, she has said none of that anywhere. I have not seen that assertion anywhere in the book, unless I have missed reading something... In the end of narration, she just says that the last footage of her interview with the then CM was handed over to the employer. She has in fact carefully avoided mentioning anything about all the footages or existence of their copies.
Any 2-penny sting journalist knows that the footages could be their insurance against such powerful people. So she probably would have not released them and that is probably the bargain chip that is keeping her well.

So with these nuanced considerations I consider this document is valid and might have large quotient of fact being presented.

Now coming back to the book itself. Again, like in the past by such Journos, this is not an analysis but presentation of facts as they saw during their engagement. So expecting anything beyond a tabloid style narration in this mere 180+ page book, is setting up for a fall. Her language and style are decent and does not hamper the narration in anyway. Of course, many of her references are pointing to past news Articles. Instead if that had also included official records, it would have been good. But then in such situation the main actors have only been too carefull in seeking to avoid that. So, holding that against her does not hold much water. What could have helped is, someone else doing a follow-up on the facts as presented and doing a deeper analysis & field work. Which obviously did not happen here considering the fact that the people being pointed out have become too powerful. Also, most such exposes never saw that level of scrutiny in the past as that of similar works would have made to undergo in the western democracies. Think about this. Those people who are clamouring for facts and quick to denounce this are the same set of people who were ready to believe any slander against Nehru, Indira, Rajiv, Manmohan or any other past PMs and leaders without any proof.

On the contrary if one takes a sceptical eye on this book and only ends up considering those confessional documents alone by the police officers and telephonic recordings and call records used to establish the culpability of those and their powerful controller, it is damning and diabolic to say the least. In history of India consecutive governments have used state and non-state actors to settle personal and political score. Nothing new there... But the scale and extent this has gone through is staggering. Forget their interview to Rana, (or Mythili, her identity she chose for this assignment) the official documents presented in the court of law to apprehend these people by the commission of enquiry that the court or government of the day had established itself is a searing proof enough to call out the culpability. yet we ignore them and say it is motivated. If that is not motivated what else is??!