The death of Naba Kishore, a journalist in 1980s might ring a bell to many. He was the husband of Chhabirani, a woman whose untimely shook the state of Odisha. My first memory of that heinous crime goes back to 1980 when as a 11 year old, I was hardly old enough to comprehend the depth it yet old enough to recognize its evilness and impertinence to any civil society.
The incident was the rape and murder of Chhabirani, the wife of journalist Naba Kishore who went above and beyond his job to expose the nexus of a cabal of crooks of petty politicians, local officials and small time businessmen in coastal Odisha's Jagatsinghpur, then part of the undivided Cuttack district. It was an unusual bold step for a journo from a state where his fraternity's ethics can be judged by the paens of praise they can heap on you for a bottle of liquor. (Khushwant Singh once wrote that Indian journalists are suckers for freebies and champion consumers of alcohol as long as someone else paid for it. Usual disclaimers apply).
The tragedy happened when the family was trying to escape their village. The journalist accompanied by his pregnant wife and child were chased by criminals trying to flee his village in the middle of night. The moon was pale in the dimly lit sky as they tried to cross the BILUAKHAI river, one of several distributary rivers criss crossing the vast Mahanadi delta in coastal Odisha.
Here is where the details get sketchy. Some say the pregnant wife along with her little kid could not cope with his faster walking husband and fell behind getting separated for ever. Another version - the man had to attend his nature's call and took time to relieve himself near the sandy bed and wash himself clean with the river water doing his ablusion as village living folks do. He lost some valuable time only to come back and regret later - for his wife was nowhere to be seen, her raped, dismembered body only to be discovered a few days later. We probably don't know which one of these versions is true.
But what we know, the men on chase took their turns to rape Chhabirani to death along with her yet to be born child. Her semi buried body from the sands of river was recovered later in a decomposed state. But this incident survived the sands of time to become a folklore of the area for a long time to come. It was the age sans social media in Odisha when internet and cell phones were strictly fantasy. TV was non existent in the state of Odisha. "SAMAJA", the only widely circulated vernacular newspaper of the time with some reach to the interior parts of Odisha carried the news. The brutality of the crime against a pregnant woman raped and killed in cold blood caught the imagination of the common man of Odisha - at least in its thickly populated coastal belt. A local JATRA (Folk Troupe) made a lot of money reenacting this episode with a play named RAPE and MURDER made out of this ghastly incident.
Laxman Mallick, the contemporary MP of Jagatsinghpur from the Congress party was accused of shielding the perpetrators of this inexcusable act. It is said he was made a scapegoat, the fall guy as the entire chain of the higher ups, including the contemporary Chief Minister J.B.Patnaik, an erudite but corrupt and controversial guy allegedly tried their best to protect their political turf by containing the fall out of the crime.
Time flew. Years later, I read the news of the bereaved journalist Naba Kishore getting remarried, becoming a father again and leading a low profile life. Today I read the news of his passing away. In all these years was justice ever delivered to Chhabirani then and those who commited the crime got punished ? Your guess is as good as mine.
The tragedy happened when the family was trying to escape their village. The journalist accompanied by his pregnant wife and child were chased by criminals trying to flee his village in the middle of night. The moon was pale in the dimly lit sky as they tried to cross the BILUAKHAI river, one of several distributary rivers criss crossing the vast Mahanadi delta in coastal Odisha.
Here is where the details get sketchy. Some say the pregnant wife along with her little kid could not cope with his faster walking husband and fell behind getting separated for ever. Another version - the man had to attend his nature's call and took time to relieve himself near the sandy bed and wash himself clean with the river water doing his ablusion as village living folks do. He lost some valuable time only to come back and regret later - for his wife was nowhere to be seen, her raped, dismembered body only to be discovered a few days later. We probably don't know which one of these versions is true.
But what we know, the men on chase took their turns to rape Chhabirani to death along with her yet to be born child. Her semi buried body from the sands of river was recovered later in a decomposed state. But this incident survived the sands of time to become a folklore of the area for a long time to come. It was the age sans social media in Odisha when internet and cell phones were strictly fantasy. TV was non existent in the state of Odisha. "SAMAJA", the only widely circulated vernacular newspaper of the time with some reach to the interior parts of Odisha carried the news. The brutality of the crime against a pregnant woman raped and killed in cold blood caught the imagination of the common man of Odisha - at least in its thickly populated coastal belt. A local JATRA (Folk Troupe) made a lot of money reenacting this episode with a play named RAPE and MURDER made out of this ghastly incident.
Laxman Mallick, the contemporary MP of Jagatsinghpur from the Congress party was accused of shielding the perpetrators of this inexcusable act. It is said he was made a scapegoat, the fall guy as the entire chain of the higher ups, including the contemporary Chief Minister J.B.Patnaik, an erudite but corrupt and controversial guy allegedly tried their best to protect their political turf by containing the fall out of the crime.
Time flew. Years later, I read the news of the bereaved journalist Naba Kishore getting remarried, becoming a father again and leading a low profile life. Today I read the news of his passing away. In all these years was justice ever delivered to Chhabirani then and those who commited the crime got punished ? Your guess is as good as mine.
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