Octopus Squad for Police
Prof Dr P Chandra Sekharan
Octopus Squad for Police
Prof Dr P Chandra Sekharan*
Paul the German Octopus has called a string of results correctly and predicted the World Football Cup Winner. Cassandra, the Australian Octopus at the Sydney Institute of Marine Science has now predicted that Julia Gillard would be the next Prime Minister of Australia. I was wondering why not Octopuses be used in India to catch criminals.
Mr. Ashwani Kumar, Director CBI lamented in an interview to the national newspaper ‘The Hindu’ dated 31.05.2010 that the “The (Supreme Court) Verdict (on polygraph and brain fingerprinting tests) is a setback to Forensic Science”.[Read Chandra Sekharan’s blog on “Supreme Court Verdict is not a setback to Forensic Science” which asserts that the set back is to CBI.] He also wanted our Parliament to take up the issue to overcome Supreme Court Verdict and to revive the above tests and also desired that our CBI has to be better than FBI.
It flashed in my mind that in as much as the apex investigating agency was very much handicapped without the free use of the above tests in crime investigation, why the Indian Johnnies, (CBI sleuths, forensic experts and other police investigators) who were ruling the roost during the last ten years and thrived very well using the above banned tests, should not go in now for an Octopus Squad and establish a new field known as ‘Octopus Forensics’.
The Octopus, if it is a female can be named after the present ‘washing powder’ star who was formerly the most celebrated police woman of India and Magsaysay award winner who predicted “Brain mapping test provides 100 percent correct results and is a most effective tool these days for investigating agencies”. [Actually this celebrity police officer had never investigated any case using the above test]. However if the Octopus happens to be a male it can rightly be named after the man who is known for his remarkable feat of inducting his innovative three-in-one package of tests in crime investigation and has managed to keep (fool) the Indian Police under his spell for almost a decade!
Of course Paul the Octopus from Germany and Cassandra the Australian Octopus may feel sore that they could not get such an honour of being christened with names of such celebrities.
Even the FSLs which had to close their narco shops before the Supreme Court verdict came in, can now raise Octopus squads in line with the already existing dog squads. In fact in order to claim that they are the original inventor, as they had earlier claimed, they can raise Lizard Squads and designate the technique as ‘Lizard Forensics’. The ‘Lizard astrology’ [Palli josiyam] is very popular in their State and found well documented in their almanacs. Parrot card astrology [Kili Josiyam] is also quite popular in India.
It is certain that Octopus, Lizard and Parrot tests if offered as a ‘three- in-one package’, our forensic experts can register 95 % success rate while the investigating police can establish before the Courts the guilt of the accused to the accuracy of 99.9 percent. The Courts can after all declare the cases as ‘rarest of the rare’ and award punishments or upheld the sentences awarded by the lower courts. [95 percent success rate is the claim of the Bangalore group on their previous three-in-one package, while 99.9 percent accuracy is the claim of CBI based on Ahmadabad group’s report on Narco and other tests and accepted by S.C. Bench comprising Justices M.K. Sharma and H.L. Dutta in the murder case of domestic servant Ajay Kumar Pal. The Bench in the absence of any other evidence declared the case as ‘rarest of the rare’]
There won’t be any problem for the DFS attached to the MHA of Government of India to issue manual of procedure for these tests immediately with a rider that the entire procedure is to be videoed and marketed to television channels. Television Channels will vie with each other to buy these videos and telecast to the delight of our viewers. [The DFS has the reputation of, though not warranted, issuing procedure manuals for the already existing hundred years old Narco and polygraph tests and yet to be perfected brain fingerprinting test]
The above tests should at least facilitate the police investigators, concerned forensic experts [in this case it may not be our forensic psychologists but forensic animal behavior specialists], television channels and others to thrive at least for another decade until slowly our apex court may, perhaps take cognizance and ban the tests without consent, but however permit them with consent !
Quo Vadis ! (Please read the article in a lighter vein and try to grasp the prevailing ground realities in Indian Criminal Justice Administration scenario).
* The author is President of Forensic Science Society of India. He suffered the pain of Forensic Science losing is credibility during the recent past and witnessed with distress how forensic science was corrupted with pseudo-scientific intrusions and how the investigating skill of the Indian police was mortgaged to those intrusions [narcoanalysis, brain fingerprinting and polygraph tests].
He partially succeeded in his efforts through the May 5th Supreme Court Verdict. His crusade will continue until Supreme Court completely bans the above tests.
