I am innocent

Disclaimer: The sequence of events and the utterances below, is a reflection of authors imagnative skills. All links to any recent events is purely accidental

The other day, I was caught while crossing a red light in my bike. Being a fast learner from recent events, I immediately proclaimed “I am innocent”. These words are effective weapons used by the powerful and well connected when caught red-handed. (Color Red is no more relevant, the crime list has grown in proportion and variety. Hidden cameras, being of cheap quality, cannot tell the color of hand. The color of banned narcotic substance is typically white.) The constable fell into the psychological game plan of my reverse logic, and started to get the feeling that I was perhaps connected and powerful. On his further queries for my driver’s license and RC book, I replied again I am innocent. Such incoherent and irrelevant repetitive utterance of the same words is the prerogative of the powerful. Additionally, ordinary tax paying denizens and their progenies don’t venture into illegal possession and smoke (sorry drive) at the same time.

The seed of doubt that I earlier laid, with respect to me being some “rayees baap ka bigda baccha”, was sprouting as a sapling. Further nurturing the young sapling of doubt, my co-rider announced that he was my lawyer, and that he would do all “speaking from legal perspective”, and the third pillion rider took upon himself the role of my spokesman.

The spokesman addressed thus: “He is not a habitual offender; otherwise he would have been caught repeatedly. He would have withdrawal symptoms like, “fear of police and driving”. Additionally, Youth is the time to make mistakes and learn from them, because when you are old, you may not have time to learn”. The constable perhaps was not used to such barrage of words, let few minutes of silence pass away. The words of wise statesman did not seem to have any desired effect, the spokesman used the most effective deflector ever discovered in this country of ours, since our independent political evolution started . “This whole incident is a definite sinister game-plan of anti national forces, to tarnish our image, for reasons behind human comprehension and intelligence”. (Authors Note: The “anti national forces” mantra though being oldest in politics, is universal and absolute, and is freely used by all parties in the political spectrum.( On the negative side, the usage of this deflector , means that ship of the individual is sinking, and all his crew is on the process of launching their own ship. ) Lesser potent variety of this deflector are the utterances where in the “foreign forces” are replaced with “politically motivated forces”. In the next level of deflectors are “anti secularist forces”, “anti people forces”, “anti farmer forces”. One should realize that using the deflectors require certain status in the hierarchy of politically corrupt.)

The release of “anti national forces” mantra had an immediate effect on the constable. He knew that “arm of law has far reach”, but was strongly aware that it cannot pierce through the shield of “anti national forces” mantra. The sapling was morphing to a good plant.

My lawyer, not to be left behind, said, “A person has to be innocent first, for him to be labeled guilty. You cannot label a guilty person guilty, as he is already guilty. So my client is innocent and hence cannot be guilty”.

Imagine the state of the poor constable facing a proclaimed innocent driver, teamed with a brilliant lawyer, a wise spokesman-statesman, riding together on a bike, without helmet/RC book/license, breaking the red light. The constable was touched with fear and love by the words of elderly statesman and was confused by the truth of my lawyer’s word (Truth and lawyer, ha, ha, ha). Additionally he inferred that a lawyer-spokesman luxury is reserved for few who are rolling in rupees. And of course the repeated usage of the great one-liner along with utterance of “anti-national” mantra, is how the rich and well-connected speak, when duress descends upon them. The seed that I had laid few minutes back had nurtured into a full grown tree and dropped me its fruit, as the constable let us go free.