Guwahati case: The questions about the fateful night of July 10

How many are angry at the Guwahati road-strip?

How many men would say that if this happened to their sister, they would kill the wolves with their own hands?

How many would want that fate for the Guwahati lions?

Since it is Assam, how many were Muslims?

Did you wonder?

You did not?

Did you see the video?

Were the clothes torn?

Could one see anything?

Were you outraged?

How many of the outraged did not find the video that good?

How many of them wished that the video were not pixellated?

How many of them will feel on camera that they feel ashamed as an ‘Indian’?

By how much will the number of searches for ‘Guwahati molestation video’ go up?

Have you searched for it today?

Did you find it?

Could you share it?

Please?

Who else downloaded it?

Someone I know?

Me?

How could you even think?

What about the fathers of the women whose opinion were sought on camera in different metros on this matter?

Even dads are tech-savvy nowadays, no?

Does anyone know the girl’s name?

Does she have a Facebook account?

Any photos there?

What do the papers say?

Any details?

What happened?

I mean, in detail, what happened?

What did they do?

Who did what first?

Who did what next?

Can’t the press-wallahs make out from the unpixellated version?

Can’t they write a transcript?

Where? How? How next?

How else are we supposed to make image sequences in our minds?

Did the local MP give a statement?

What about the DGP?

Why did the police not arrive in time?

By the way, which organisation has the greatest number of rape and molestation allegations against it?

The Police?

The Army?

It can’t be the Air Force, can it?

May be the Border Security Force?

Or the Assam Rifles?

Are 50 policemen safer than 50 men on the street?

Are 50 army men safer than 50 policemen on duty?

Is the Border Security Force the safest of them all?

But Guwahati is far away from the border, isn’t it?

But all places in the ‘North East’ are near the border, aren’t they?

Did they do a background check on her?

On whom?

The Northeast girl, who else?

Does it matter who she was?

Isn’t it enough that she was assaulted in ‘full public view’?

Isn’t it shameful that no one else came to her rescue?

Wouldn’t you, if you were there?

Didn’t everyone say on camera that they would run to her rescue?

What if she were a terrorist?

Islamic? Secessionist? Marxist?

Marxist-secessionist?

What is that?

Like Manipur PLA?

Would the MP still give a statement?

What if the creatures jostling for a piece of her were men in uniforms?

Would the photographer have given the footage to the press?

Where then would be the phone calls from all over?

Would we still have two-hour show on NDTV?

Remember Manorama?

Did incredible India come to her rescue?

Does outraged India’s outrage melt at the sight of the patriotic Khaki?

Does it want to know why one family was mourning through the whole day of July 10th like it has been mourning for the last 8 years?

Thangjam Manorama, Devi.

Picked up by the Assam Rifles late in the night of July 10th.

2004. Raped. Killed.

It has been 8 years.

How will the hangman hang himself?

How will the shooting squad shoot themselves?

Nothing hides selective rage better than a Tricolour blinder.

The writer is a postdoctoral scholar, Massachusetts Institute of Technology