Lady With Blue Scarf

It was a pleasant evening with light rain after a hot week. That day was a weekly  off for me, so I with my wife Sheela went for some shopping and there after we planned to take Metro from Nehru Place to Badarpur.

We were walking towards Metro station and suddenly I saw a lady with suspicious expressions. She was going towards Metro, but instead of entering Metro station, she walked towards food court area. I felt something wrong so I tried to follow her, but I lost her because of too much crowd. I asked my wife if we can have some a cup of tea before leaving for home, she agreed and we moved towards food court area.

 I was trying to search her, but there were too many eating joints and I didn’t know to which side she might go. I asked my wife to sit in the garden restaurant and wait for me so I could check out various eating joints to get something good for her.

I moved towards restaurants and started looking them one by one to locate that lady and in a few minutes, I was able to find her. She was sitting in the Starbucks Café, sipping her coffee and staring out of the window. A blood-stained knife lay next to her handbag covered with her blue silk scarf. I tried to read her face; it was full of sadness, but a kind of satisfaction also visible. It looked like she was starring on a hoarding which was visible through that rain filled window. It was an advertisement of some renowned children’s product brand. Now it was difficult for me to overlook all this. Though I was on and off that day, but the policeman inside me was always on duty, so I bought a coffee and walked towards the lady.

I asked her, ”Ma’am if you don’t mind can I take this seat? “She looked around and found that restaurant was full and there was no vacant seat except the one next to her. She nodded with agreement while kept a forced smile on face.

        I knew that Sheela was waiting for me outside so without wasting any time I asked, “Ma’am let me introduce myself, I am Suhas and…” She interrupted, “And you are a policeman, Sub Inspector Suhas Sharma, Badarpur Police station.” I was shocked to hear her. She continued “I know you very well; I had seen you in your last department event, which I attended with my husband Senior Inspector Rajat Kohli.” It was the second shock for me. Now I was desperate and I pointed my finger to her blue scarf and asked directly “Is this your stuff?” She replied calmly “Yes it is, the scarf and the knife,” and a deep sorrow was visible on her face. 

 I was looking at her face and she could feel the confusion and irritation on my face. She said again “I have murdered someone and you can arrest me for that.” After a pause, I asked, “Can you tell me who you have murdered and why do you do that? And the last question, where is the body?” It was a long silence for about a minute and then she started “It is Mr. Rajat Kohli who has been murdered and the body is still in the Room no. 603 of Hotel Luxury”.

I immediately called Nehru Place Police station to check the Hotel. I was waiting for confirmation from police team. It was a long silence. My face was full of tension because I was worried about Sheela, who was waiting for me, but that lady (Mrs. Kohli) was quite comfortable and relaxed. Now I had no other option but to call Sheela inside the Starbucks Café. In next two minutes, she was there beside me. I introduced her to Mrs. Kohli. I brought coffee and sandwich for her. After about 10 minutes, I got a call from police team and they informed me that they indeed have recovered Mr. Kohli’s body from the hotel room. Now it was confirmed that what Mrs. Kohli had so far narrated was true. I asked Sheela to go back home as I had to arrest Mrs. Kohli and take her to the Police Station. Sheela, of course, was not happy as it spoiled our evening but being a policeman’s wife she had encountered such situations many times, so she was used to it.

We were at Nehru Place Police station, Mrs. Kohli was sitting calmly on the bench and I was narrating the entire story to the duty inspector. We again asked Mrs. Kohli if she wanted to say something. But she didn’t say anything. Then, the duty inspector called lady police in-charge to guide Mrs. Kohli to the lock-up. There was an unknown expression on her face.

An 'Fir' was registered and the case was filed against Mrs. Kohli. I was still not clear what was in her mind? After one week, there was the first hearing of the case. The Judge had gone through all evidence and the statements submitted and he asked Mrs. Kohli, “Look, Madam, I have seen everything and it is very clear that you have murdered your husband Senior Inspector Rajat Kohli, but so far we do not understand the motive behind this murder. We would like to know your version before proceeding towards judgment. You are free to put your points whatever you have in your mind.”

Mrs. Kohli with a very satisfactory and calm expression on her face answered, “Thank you very much for giving me this opportunity. Let me be clear that whatever I would say here should not be considered my justification for any mercy against me. I have done the crime and I am liable for any kind of punishment. But I also would like to put the facts about this incident so that the honourable people present here would think about it, so as to avoid these incidences in the future.

My husband and I were living a very good life as most of you might be aware that Mr. Kohli was much respected in his department because of his performance and actions against crime. Last year, he took a case where few people kidnapped a young girl and asked huge money in ransom. Because of delay in the arrangement of money, they raped and killed the girl. In two days, Mr. Kohli was able to catch those guys and a case was registered. But due to poor evidence, those guys were released from the court.

There was no further discussion on this matter until last month when my daughter was missing for two days. Mr. Kohli was not interested in reporting to Police and he said he would personally solve this case. He called few people and our daughter returned home after two days. There was no physical injury, but she did not seem to be comfortable. She was not meeting anyone and not even talking to us. I tried to check if something was wrong, but she never replied. This continued for about a week.

After one week, we suddenly found her dead in the morning with one note left for her father. She hanged herself with a hook in the ceiling using a rope. I saw her first and screamed out of sorrow and fear. Mr. Kohli came and for some time he kept staring at her body but did not respond. He immediately called few of his friends and arranged to cremate the body so that no one should come to know that it was a suicide. He did not notice that note which I found there and I also kept it in the cupboard. After one day, when I came out of sorrow I remembered about that note and tried to locate it.

It was lying as it is, no one had touched it. I read, “Dad, I was not a kind of girl who could make a decision of suicide due to any of the reason, but today I am totally disappointed with my life because I feel that it is a kind of a curse on me that I am your daughter. Some days back few people kidnapped me and put me in a flat in a city outskirt. It was an under-construction building and a very lonely place. No one came to me for a whole day. At night three people came. They looked at me, I was afraid. One of them said, don’t worry we are your father’s friends, you cooperate with us and we will make your father happy. I started screaming and one of them hit me with some hard thing on my head and I lost consciousness, and the last words I heard were: See her, she should not die.”

After some time, I got my senses back and could hear those people talking to each other. I pretended like I was still unconscious. One of them was asking another, “You told her that you are her father’s friend, do you really know her father?” He replied, “Yes she is a daughter of Rajat Kohli same police inspector who saved us last year in that rape case. We paid two crores to him, and not only saved us, but also protected us from being charged in many other cases. But last month we asked him to make arrangement while we were trying our international member to enter in India and he refused to say it was out of his power. I warned him that he has family and he should not refuse to our work, but he thought I was only threatening. That’s why we kidnapped his daughter. He is still not ready to accept our request. Just now, I had sent him a photograph of his unconscious girl, let’s see.”

Then they moved out of the room. I tried to get up, but couldn’t because of pain in my head and my hands were tied up. About next six hours no one came and after that suddenly two of them came inside. One of them opened my hands and said “Come, your father saved you, he agreed to our work. Let me at least feel you before you get free.” He hugged me and we came outside. They put me in a car and dropped me few meters away from our house. You were criminal because you helped criminals, but now you are anti-national too. I was on verge of losing my modesty because of my father. It is shame for me and I am not able to convince myself to live like this”.

Mrs. Kohli stopped for some time and started again with tears, “This is how I lost my daughter because of that criminal who was known as having the best record police officer. I knew that if I had tried to get justice for my daughter either I would get killed by my husband to save himself or I would have lived a life of widow of an anti- national criminal. I would rather like to be hanged-till-death for the reason which makes me proud and satisfied.”

A deep silence lingered inside the court.