The Delhi Detective's Handbook

by Tarquin Hall

  ANCIENT MEDICINE OF INDIA AND ITS APPLICATION TO SOLVING CRIMES

  Ayurveda is an ancient form of medicine native to India. The oldest texts on Ayurveda are the Charaka Samhita and Susruta Samhita. The latter was composed nine centuries before the birth of Jesus. They are medical encyclopaedias written in Sanskrit language. They identify eight distinct medical fields:

  1) General medicine, curing disease and all.

  2) Paediatrics, that is the treatment of children.

  3) Surgery.

  4) Cure of diseases of the eyes and ears.

  5) Psychiatry, including demonology and exorcism and treatment of mental diseases produced by past experiences.

  6) Toxicology.

  7) Elixirs, the science of macrobiotics or lengthening lifespan.

  8) Aphrodisiacs.

  Susruta Samhita was highly developed for its time, way ahead of anything Europe would know for centuries. It is “divided into 184 chapters and contains descriptions of 1,120 illnesses, 700 medicinal plants, 64 preparations from mineral sources and 57 preparations based on animal sources. The text discusses surgical techniques of making incisions, probing, extraction of foreign bodies, alkali and thermal cauterisation, tooth extraction, excisions, and trocars for draining abscess, draining hydrocele and ascitic fluid, the removal of the prostate gland, urethral stricture dilatation, vesiculolithotomy, hernia surgery, caesarian section, management of haemorrhoids, fistulae, laparotomy and management of intestinal obstruction, perforated intestines, and accidental perforation of the abdomen with protrusion of omentum and the principles of fracture management, viz., traction, manipulation, appositions and stabilisation including some measures of rehabilitation and fitting of prosthetics. It enumerates six types of dislocations, twelve varieties of fractures, and classification of the bones and their reaction to the injuries, and gives a classification of eye diseases including cataract surgery.”13

  The author of the Charaka Samhita was one Susruta. Within the text, he established an elaborate code regarding the training, duties, privilege and social status of physicians. In actual fact it is the origin of medical ethics no less. Susruta, also renowned as the father of plastic surgery, wrote on forensic medicine also. These chapters “were so carefully written that they are in no way inferior to modern knowledge on the subject”.14

  The Charaka Samhita also contains a chapter on toxicology. Poisons were classified into plant products, animal products and artificial products. “Not only were the symptoms, signs and treatment of poisoning described in detail, but also modes of administration of poisons, character of the poisoner and examination of suspected poisonous materials. A poisoner could be known from his behaviour and movements – he will not answer to questions, will keep silent, talk irrelevantly and so on. Poisons were administered through food and drinks; tooth stick; oils and materials for massages; medicaments; water for bathing; articles of clothing; snuffs; smokes and surmas15.”16

  REGARDING HISTORY OF FINGERPRINTING

  R. K. Tewari and K. V. Ravikumar of the Bureau of Police Research and Development, Ministry of Home Affairs, New Delhi, have written on the subject in History and Development of Forensic Science in India:

  “The application of science and technology to the detection and investigation of crime and administration of justice is not new to India… Its detailed reference is found in (the) Arthashastra… Indians studied various patterns of the papillary lines, thousands of years ago. It is presumed that they knew about the persistency and individuality of fingerprints, which they used as signatures. Even Mr. K. M. Kata, a frequent contributor to Nature, stated that the Chinese records proved the use of fingerprints in an ancient kingdom of southern India. The Indians knew for long that the handprints, known as the ‘Tarija’, were inimitable.”

  The handprint of a certain Mr. Konai made on a contract in India in 1858.

  A GREAT INJUSTICE TO INDIA

  Britisher Richard Henry took all credit for the science of fingerprinting, but in actual fact it was two Indian police officers working in Calcutta that made the breakthrough. According to G.S. Sodhi and Jasjeet Kaur of University of Delhi,17 Sub-Inspectors Azizul Haque and Hem Chandra Bose were working in the Anthropometric Bureau in the late 1890s where they worked out the classification formula for fingerprinting ahead of Inspector General of Police Richard Henry. Henry went on to present a paper on the classification of criminal records at Dover, England, before the British Association for the Advancement of Science (BAAS). This he did without the acknowledgment of his Indian colleagues, thereby taking all credit. It was nothing less than a great injustice. Thus it is long overdue for the so-called Henry’s System of Fingerprint Classification to be re-named.

  ANCIENT CODES

  As earlier intimated, codes were widely used during the golden age of Maurya and Ashoka, but there is plentiful evidence to suggest they were widely used earlier also. One proof comes from the world famous Kama Sutra, a compilation of texts dating back 400 years before Jesus. Often regarded as a manual for sex, it is in fact much more, being a guide to “virtuous and gracious living that discusses the nature of love, family life and other aspects pertaining to pleasure-oriented faculties of human life”.18

  Thus there are four sections in all, these being:

  1) Dharma – that is virtuous living, as previously intimated.

  2) Artha – material prosperity.

  3) Kama – aesthetic and erotic pleasure.19

  4) Moksha – meaning liberation.

  Kama Sutra recommends that women should study arts like cooking, dressmaking, massage, even carpentry and all. Furthermore, it recommends the learning of “secret writing” so as to carry on liaisons. Simon Singh in The Code Book20 provides details thus: “One of the recommended techniques is to pair letters of the alphabet at random, and then substitute each letter in the original message with its partner… Instead of ‘meet at midnight’, the sender should write ‘CUUZ VZ CGXSGIBZ’. This form of secret writing is called a substitution cipher.”

  David Kahn writes in The Code-Breakers: The Story of Secret Writing21 of another kind of secret writing recommended in the Kama Sutra called muladeviya. “Its cipher alphabet consists merely of the reciprocal one with all other letters remaining unchanged. Muladeviya existed in both a spoken form – as such it figures in Indian literature and is used by traders, with geographical variations – and a written form, in which case it is called gudhalekhya.”

  Those who have read Mr. Tarkin’s account of Case of the Deadly Butter Chicken regarding my unmasking of an international illegal cricket betting syndicate using a certain kind of encryption based on the Abjad Arab-Perso numerical system, will know that my own father-in-law, Brigadier (Retired) Rajendra Mattu, is himself a master code-breaker, as well as Gymkhana Club sudoku champion. He has a registered IQ of 137 and speaks seven languages, including Tani. He is a topper at bridge, also. It is Brigadier Mattu with whom I consult regarding all coding matters and he has been most helpful in the past. This has prompted him to prepare his own monograph on the subject of the history of Indian codes and ciphers and I am happy to report it is soon to be published by the Indian Institute for Defence and Strategic Studies and Analysis (IIDSSA), Dehradun. He is to be commended for such a wonderful and worthwhile achievement, which is a culmination of his life’s work and a salute to his due diligence and dedication also.

  Kindly note following: India has long been a world leader and world beater in the field of mathematics. Aryabhata, who was around in the 5th century, established the irrationality of Pi around 12 centuries before it was “discovered” in Europe. Also, he proved through astronomy that the earth rotates on its axis and furthermore that the earth rotates round the sun. His calculation of the time it takes the earth to fully rotate was out by 3 minutes per year. His calculation of the earth’s rotation was 99.8% accurate also.

  SO-CALLED “PUNDITS” IN BRITISH TIMES

  Owing to their pinkish complexion and general enjoyment of creature com
forts, Britishers found it challenging to penetrate the further reaches of the Himalaya, including Nepal and Tibet, as well as ever inhospitable and dangerous territories such as Afghanistan. Thus they made use of willing and capable Indians to make these dangerous journeys into hostile territories. The so-called “Pundits”, who were nothing short of spies-cum-surveyors, worked for the Great Survey of India, travelling in disguises like priests and merchants and horse traders and all. Naturally, they were far more capable at blending into the surroundings than Europeans and acquired the local languages. One such Pundit named Kinthup was the first person to make the discovery that the Tsango River in Tibet is a tributary of the mighty Brahmaputra. To map the vast territories into which he and his undercover colleagues ventured at great risk to life and limb, they developed cunning means by which to conceal their equipments, including sextants22. Furthermore, they developed ways to measure distances without drawing attention to themselves from suspicious locals. Thus they trained themselves to walk in a precise and exact manner, each step recorded by a bead on Buddhist malas. These rosaries were adapted with each having 100 beads instead of 108. Maps and notes were secreted inside prayer wheels also. Their success was unprecedented. Thus these Pundits revealed a natural Indian ability for covert work.

  SECTION TWO

  Crimes in Modern India

  CHANGES TO DELHI ITSELF

  So much of change has come to India in course of past twenty years, it is really remarkable. When I was a young and cheeky whippersnapper in west Delhi, so much of the territory considered part of the metro today was jungle. Close to my home where we used to run around, jaguars came from time to time. It was not unknown for cobras to visit our backyard also. As a boy I used to swim across the Yamuna to pick watermelons on the other side. Just imagine! Today if I tried the same, I would get blisters on the skin and all manner of disease from the water such are the high levels of pollution, industrial waste and raw sewage, making it little better than a stinking drain. But in those golden days the water was quite clear. Even in 1988 when I founded Most Private Investigators, Delhi was little more than a village. Its old world charm was still very much in tact. So sleepy it was with few cars or traffic and local markets where everyone knew their neighbours on a personal basis and people were forever stopping for chitchat. To get a phone line one had to wait months or years at a time, and a bribe was naturally required. To get a car it took longer still. In those far gone days, a joke circulated that you could get any colour of Ambassador just as long as it was white. Now it is quite different. At times, I blink because I do not recognise whole parts of Delhi myself. Cars come in blue, red, yellow, green. Other day I saw a pink one. Everything is available from BMWs and Audis to Ferraris and traffic has reached the motherlode, what with 1,400 or so new cars entering the roads each and every day with a total of eight million plus so far. There are so many of new shops and state-of-art shopping malls also. Those with the means need not go to Paris or Rome for doing shopping. Luxury brands have come rushing in and the creamy layer are snapping them up at an impressive rate. Meanwhile, the city has exploded in all directions. Faridabad, Meerut, Noida have all been gobbled up with luxury apartment complexes, office blocks, shopping malls, golf courses, even one F1 racing track and a restaurant-cum-entertainment facility by name of Legends of India, which one could liken to Las Vegas. The view from the roof of my house in Gurgaon where I moved some years back23 has changed beyond measure. All around where lush fields once stood there are homes and villas and roads as far as the eye can see. Gurgaon is now a world-class city we can say and in many ways it is to be applauded. But the biggest change has come with regard to population growth. At Kashmiri Gate every hour you will see so many of villagers arriving with all their belongings in the world. Thanks to decades of corrupt government policies and caste politics, not to mention incompetence and indifference on part of local officials, rural India is facing a growing crisis. That failure is in turn driving people into the cities in search of jobs and food and I dare say security also. There is no reliable figure for Delhi’s total population these days, but that of the National Capital Region (NCR) is fast approaching twenty millions, that is a ratio of some 27,000 persons per square mile give or take.

  It had been a quiet month – as quiet as it ever got in a nation of 1.2 billion people.

  CASE OF THE LOVE COMMANDOS

  SOME DRAMATIC SPIKES IN CRIME

  Crime in Delhi has reached dizzying heights never before imagined. That is not to suggest by any means that all crimes are getting committed by outsiders. God only knows Delhi has plenty of crooks of the home grown variety. Those drawn from educated middle classes are perfectly capable and adept at breaking the law and thus they are finding new ways each and every day, believe me. That being said, official figures are not to be trusted, reason being so many of crimes go unreported by the aam admi thanks to their fear of interacting with police. In this regard Overseas Security Advisory Council of United States Department of State Bureau of Diplomatic Security (OSAC) stated the following in 2014:

  “While the number of reported incidents increase, many more incidents go unreported. There is a common perception that the government is corrupt and that the police cannot be trusted. In some cases, police officers are involved in the commission of crimes, while other times police are bribed to turn a blind eye. Many victims do not go to the police for fear of persecution and harassment. Even witnesses to crimes avoid getting involved in a judicial process that is painfully slow, inconvenient, and ineffective. These practices have corroded public confidence… Police are ill-equipped and ill-trained and will handle most situations with harshness.”

  OSAC adds: “Crime in Delhi is rated as high… The ratio of police officers is approximately 129 to 100,000 citizens (according to the UN, the worldwide average is closer to 350 officers per 100,000 citizens). Contributing factors to the high crime rate include: socioeconomic imbalances, urban anonymity, disproportionate sex ratio (866 female: 1,000 males), overpopulation, unemployment, poverty, corruption, and inadequate policing.”

  Little wonder that going by official figures crime rates in Delhi throughout 2013 more or less doubled across the board. Cases registered in the capital rose to 1,47,230 from 73,902, according to statistics. Thus:

  - Robbery cases grew six fold.

  - House theft cases increased by 300%.

  - Motor vehicle thefts experienced 59% increase.

  - Number of rapes reported saw increase of 31%.

  - Those of murders rose 15% also.

  - Attempt to murder and kidnapping for ransom saw 32% increase each.

  Delhi police attributed these spikes to “rapid urbanisation”,24 the expansion of “new colonies and thousands of unplanned colonies”, the “proximity of affluent colonies to the cluster housing of the underprivileged” which “deepen a sense of inequality”. Adverse sex ratio of 866 females per 1,000 males in the capital was another factor cited. “Easy modes of escape after committing a crime, facilitated by the National Capital Region’s (NCR)25 long borders with three states, resulted in increased mobility of criminal elements.”

  India ranks fifth in the world for kidnappings also.26 A total of 48,219 persons were kidnapped and abducted throughout 2012 as compared to 45,239 in 2011, a 6.6% increase. In Delhi in 2012, there were 3,675 number of kidnapping cases compared to 3,529 cases in 2011. The NCR accounted for 8.9% of all kidnappings and abductions, including 45.8% (595 out of 1,299) of child victims (up to 10 years of age) and 34.9% of children aged 10-15 years (1,710 out of 4,901 victims).

  Regarding theft of personal information, OSAC includes a general warning quoted under: “India’s Constitution does not guarantee a right to privacy, and the government…taps nearly 300 new phones daily. Most local businesses take very little precaution in safeguarding personally identifiable information (PII), and criminals take advantage of this. Theft of financial information and identity theft have become significant concerns.”

  In concl
usion that is why Most Private Investigators Ltd. has been swamped with so many of cases of late. Private security firms across India are booming, also. That business alone is now worth rupees 20,000 crore by God!

  TYPES OF CRIME

  So as to provide an overview of the diversity of types of crimes committed in India today and therefore by default the challenges faced in solving them by private investigators such as myself, listed under are headlines taken from two English language newspapers on one given day chosen on random basis, that being September 24, 2015.

  MAIL TODAY

  SC JUSTIFIES DECISION TO LET OFF ANSAL BROTHERS – this is regarding 1997 Uphaar Cinema tragedy in Green Park in which 59 persons died. The influential owners have been let off by the court, despite total negligence on their part.27 Case has been going on for no less than 18 years. Victims’ families have received little by way of compensation.

  ABC TO PROBE ONION SALE – regarding alleged irregularities in purchase and sale of onions by local government agencies.

  TENSION IN UTTAR PRADESH TOWN AFTER CLASH – two warring communities throwing stones, rioting, burning shops in Uttar Pradesh state.

  JUVENILE SECRECY CLAUSE HITS VICTIMS’ FAMILIES – regarding courts protecting identity of juveniles, some convicted of rape and murder.

  KEJRIWAL DUMPS MISSING SOMNATH – local MLA on the run, facing charges of attempted murder and domestic violence.

  COP TURNS SAVIOUR FOR HARASSED GIRL – a Class 12 girl was driven to try out suicide thanks to constant eve teasing by local boys.