Cops slapping boys and girls in a park in Meerut might sound amazing to most of you. But given my experiences, it does seem normal to me. It is probably much worse in smaller towns. I grew up in a small town called Chittoor. And here are the stories related to the cops there.
When I was a kid, my uncles used the lines ‘if you don’t eat we’ll hand over you to the cops’ or ‘the cops are coming, get to bed, now!’ Right from when I was a kid, I was scared of the khaki-clad ilk. I used to be scared of watchmen, neighborhood Gurkhas, and of course the cops. When I turned sixteen I’d laughed at my stupidity, ‘I can’t believe I was scared of cops’ I thought they were people of reason. That, they ‘took care’ of only the bad guys. It was the ‘rebel’ in me probably. Also, it was a romantic period in the history of Chittoor I guess. It was probably the Maniratnam movies. Or probably Ramgopal Varma’s debut movie Shiva. We were young and proud; of our long hair; of our ‘loves’; of our courage… you get the drift?
Let me give you a backgrounder on how Chittoor was back then: there were two or three gangs, loyal to one party or the other. Every other day, some one or the other was murdered. Even the high school elections were conducted with the backing of the so called goondas. One used to think thrice even to question a ten year old boy, for one never knew or was able to forecast the resultant repercussions. Yes, even a ten year old boy. The district administration would slap the section 144 (unlawful assembly) whenever a prominent (notorious?) person was killed or if a gang war broke out.
Once, on a humid, obscenely bright day, the ‘long bell’ (the ‘go home’ bell) started ringing at eleven or so in the morning. We all ran out, thrilled that we could go home so early. However, the thrill lost its fizz when I reached the bus stand. The whole place was cordoned off by cops. Some ‘prominent’ member of a faction was hacked to death. The assailants had used the cover of smoke bombs to execute their mission. I had to walk all the way home that day. Yes, yes I am talking about this small town called Chittoor; go easy on your jaw. Another such incident was when the leader of a gang was hacked to death when he was on his way back from the court. They threw mirchi powder on his face, as he was riding this moped. When he fell down, screaming his lungs off, the assailants emerged from their perch and hacked him to death. The pillion rider was stabbed too, but he managed to run a couple of kilometers, holding his intestines in his hands, and lived to recount the tale. I don’t know if the pillion rider testified. I mean, testify = death in these parts of the world. Note: almost all these killings happen in broad daylight. Don’t ask me where the cops were when the murders happened. They were probably beating boys and girls up in parks and college canteens.
Another incident which springs to my mind is when Anil, BRBK Rao, and I stayed up all night in the Dairy quarters. It was the Shiva Rathiri and people are supposed to stay up all night praying to lord Shiva or singing bhajans in a temple. We decided to have a ball. So we hanged in the quarters. BRBK lived there as his dad used to work for the co-operative Dairy. The quarters had sandal colored two-storey houses, and a small park in the middle of the quarters. There were a couple of swings in the park and we always hanged there. So, that night, after a marathon swing session, we buried our backs in the sand by the main gate. At about 1 a.m. BRBK’s elder brother Bhupathi arrived, clutching a Telugu novel. He just went to the street light by the gate, sat under it and started reading the novel on revolution by the downtrodden.
Suddenly we spotted a couple of night beat cops on their bicycles on the road. They paid no attention to us but only until Anil started screaming ‘gun gun gun!’ They came at us and I was still reeling from the shock. I mean I had never seen a cop so up close. My knees started shaking as I unconsciously got to my feet from the sand and stood in attention. Anil and BRBK were in attention too.
‘What the ***k are you doing here at this hour?’  One of the constables growled at me. I could feel his eyes pore through me. Out of the corner of my eye I noticed the other cop remove the lathi from the cycle. I was convinced they were going to beat us to death. The crickets paused and restarted their chirping. My tongue was paralyzed. I felt as if my mouth was stuffed with pebbles. ‘Shiva Rathiri sir…’ Anil moaned.
‘Shiva Rathiri? Here on the road? Baadakov! I’ll **** your mother’ the cop roared. He may deny it today, but I was damn sure that Anil wet his pants. BRBK was quite cool. ‘We were about to get inside the quarters sir. Sorry, we will go now.’ That kind of pacified the cop I guess. He nodded and said ‘shut the ***k up and get inside. Now!’ We were about to cross the gate and get inside when a voice boomed out of no where: ‘Yemiteee ee anyaayam?’ (Telugu for ‘this is injustice!’). Bhupathi was on his feet, still clutching the novel on revolution. His eyes were glowing with the spirit of the red rebellion. My heart jumped to my throat. The cops, who were about to mount their cycles and go away, stopped and asked all of us to stay in our places. This time they brought their rifles along to intimidate the three class eight boys and a tenth class boy.  I had tears in my eyes. What kind of a fool would argue with night beat cops about civil liberty, equality, and revolution? Bhupathi would.
As the cops started walking towards us, Bhupathi stepped in front of us, as if to shield us from the oppressive, bourgeois forces that were coming at us.
‘What the ***k did you say you b****rd, son of a w**re, we will stick this lathi up you’re a** and take it out of your mouth…**** **** **** **** ’ One of the cops enquired oh-so-gently. I was counting. Only the grand mothers and uncles were left.
‘Your days of oppression are numbered. I have the right to stand in front of my home any time I want? Who do you think pays your salaries? It is the taxes that we pay that…yada yada yada’ went Bhupathi. The cops would have killed him that night. But the three of us fell on their feet and saved Bhupathy from them.[...to be continued :) I mean for real this time!]