More articles by

Prathima Nandakumar
Prathima Nandakumar

KARNATAKA

Fighting chance

36-Gauri Loud and clear: ‘I am Gauri’ rally in Bengaluru on September 12 witnessed a huge turnout.

Despite conspiracy theories drowning saner voices, those who seek justice for Gauri Lankesh have not lost hope

The size of the special investigation team appointed by the Karnataka government to find the killers of journalist-activist Gauri Lankesh grew from 21 to 61 in a week. The investigation, however, seems to have made little headway. The cops, with the help of Andhra Pradesh Police, have been sifting through the footages of some 1,500 CCTVs (including the two installed at Gauri’s residence, where she was shot on September 5), examining call records and computer data, and analysing ballistic and forensic evidence. They have also been going through the contents of the old issues of the Gauri Lankesh patrike, a tabloid she published, even as conspiracy theories blaming the radical right and the ultra left have drowned the saner voices seeking justice.

But those who seek justice for Gauri have not lost hope and are not willing to give up. A convention held in Bengaluru on September 12 witnessed a huge turnout and struck a defiant note by taking on the forces trying to silence dissent. Writers, intellectuals, journalists, activists, students and common people poured into a rally, which was attended by Gauri’s inconsolable mother, Indira, and siblings, Kavita and Indrajit. “You are all Gauri,” said Indira, releasing a special commemorative edition of the tabloid. It could well be the last edition of the publication, if not bailed out of the financial crisis it is facing.

But, more worrying is the fact that the investigations of the killings of Narendra Dabholkar, Govind Pansare and M.M. Kalburgi—rationalists who had antagonised some religious groups like Gauri did and paid the price with their lives—have hit a dead-end. The preliminary findings of the forensic investigation have revealed that Gauri and Kalburgi, who was killed in his Dharwad home two years ago, were shot at with the same 7.65mm country-made pistol.

The leftists and Gauri’s close friends allege that the communal forces killed her, as she had been a vocal critic of the saffron ideology. The BJP responded with the threat of suing anybody mentioning its name in connection with the murder. The state unit of the Yuva Morcha sent a legal notice to historian Ramachandra Guha for holding the sangh parivar “responsible” for the violent acts.

Another angle speculated was that of Naxalites’ involvement in the murder. Gauri had rubbed the Naxal leadership the wrong way with her efforts to mainstream them. She persuaded former Naxalites Sirimane Nagaraj and Noor Zulfikar to surrender. They are now free birds. Sirimane, however, dismissed the theory and said there was no bad blood between Gauri and the Naxals.

Finding Gauri’s killers will answer some other questions as well—are the killings of free thinkers a sign of fascism rising in India, or is it the vote bank politics overshadowing the criminal justice system? For now, the police say, there is a crime and a killer, and it is all that matters.

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