My mind keeps going back to that old man and his ailing wife.  They have not just been defeated by life; they have been mauled by it.  Three of their sons cut down in the prime of their lives by the direct orders of the notorious criminal tuned politician Mohd. Shahabuddin.  Two of the brothers were doused in acid and the third one, though initially let go, was also subsequently gunned down because he refused to be cowed down, and as a sole witness to the gruesome killings of his brothers, was testifying against Shahabuddin in a court of law.  It is nearly impossible to wrap your head around the fact that this savage brutality took place because the family which owned two small time grocery stores was either unwilling or unable to meet the ever increasing extortionate and illegal demands of money by the henchmen of this vilest of Mafiosi. 

   I think anybody who is mature enough to understand the realities of the state in the last 15 years or so is familiar with the ways of Shahabuddin.  In my mind’s eye, I often imagine the town of Siwan, the personal fief and nerve center of his reign of terror.  Now, small towns like Siwan kind of hold a strange fascination for me.  Nothing much happens, a quiet desperation always bubbling underneath the surface.  There is no sense of renewal, only decay.  The place and circumstances are tailor-made for someone like Shahabuddin to emerge as some kind of an intermediary between the state and the people.  And because the modern functional state has been unraveling for a while now, gangsters like Shahabuddin worm their way into the mix and almost by default become the interface between the government and the people.

   A creeping metamorphosis takes place.  The man is courted and patronized by the political class for his considerable ability to deliver votes to the highest bidder in the electoral arena.  You see, we never fail to make such a big song and dance about our democracy.  This is only partly justified; because even though the hardware of our democracy--like regular elections, peaceful transfer of power and a thoroughly autonomous Election Commission—is working fine; but the software of our democracy—like mainly to repeal of inner party democracy, credible source of funding, the near epidemic nepotism and a feudal value system—is absolutely corrupted, and has grievously compromised its capacity to rein in the likes of Shahabuddin.  When you look at his photographs or videos, you can’t escape the feeling that this man actually quite revels in his criminality.  This unadulterated realization that you can’t just intimidate people, but you can crush them to the extent that they are reduced to nothing. 

   Sometimes, I am also mesmerized by the aura of remorseless evil around him, and then I am almost thankful for the kind of vision it provides me with as to how irredeemably diabolical people creep up on society and hollow it out, aided and abetted by the destructive cynicism of the political class.