Himalayas burning

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Himalayas burning

Monday, 26 September 2022 | Pioneer

Himalayas burning

A young girl, Ankita Bhandari, is murdered but Uttarakhand Govt’s response is sloppy

The murder of Ankita Bhandari, a 19-year-old female receptionist at a hotel, has exposed for the nth time the underbelly of Indian politics. A worker at the Vanantara Resort in Pauri district, she was allegedly killed by three persons, including the hotel’s owner who is the son of a Bharatiya Janata Party leader in Uttarakhand. According to media reports, the culprits wanted to push her into prostitution, which she resisted. She is also said to have resisted a molestation bid by the main accused Pulkit Arya, son of Vinod Arya. The BJP has expelled Vinod Arya from the party. On Saturday, her body was recovered from a canal. Not surprisingly, the murder has sparked public outrage, not just in the Himalayan State but across the entire country. A young life was snuffed out because the son of a politician thought he could do whatever he wished to — kiss her forcibly, push her into prostitution, throw her into a canal — and get away with it. Ankita’s family members are not just angry but also suspicious of the decisions and actions of the Uttarakhand authorities. Ankita’s relatives and others disrupted the Srinagar-Kedarnath highway in protest. They have questioned the State Government’s decision to demolish the resort where the victim worked, alleging that it is a bid to destroy evidence. They have also refused to cremate the body until they get the final postmortem report. The provisional postmortem report states that Ankita died because of drowning.

The Opposition has supported the family’s stand. Calling it “a planned murder,” senior Congress leader and former Chief Minister Harish Rawat said the demolition was carried out to destroy evidence. The Opposition has also accused the police of lethargy. It may be pointed out that it was the land revenue officials who registered the first information report in this case. Uttarakhand Police chief Ashok Kumar, however, didn’t find that awkward, claiming that the State has “a system of land revenue officials registering FIRs”. The real problem, however, is politicians’ disregard for their basic functions: keeping the administrative machinery well-oiled and maintaining law and order. This disregard is in direct proportion to their fondness for organising events. For instance, days before Ankita’s murder, Uttarakhand Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami celebrated his birthday with differently abled children at Dehradun. He called it Sankalp Diwas (Determination Day). A celebrated slogan of his party is ‘Beti bachao, beti padhao’. Dhami and other BJP leaders have said many nice things about the education and wellbeing of girl child, women empowerment, gender justice etc, and then there have been programmes like the one on Sankalp Diwas where homilies are delivered. But even a million homilies, platitudes and events can’t do what sound administration and good policing can. As it is, Dhami is on a weak wicket politically; he must realise that pro-forma clichés and actions like honouring kanwarias would do little good, but focus on governance can.

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