Pay up, or get ready for third-degree torture

The torturers were well prepared for Pragnesh Soni, an Odhav resident, who was prodded into the biting trap of high-interest loans and sadistic recovery agents. The room he was pushed into had all the implements to make a grown man scream in abject helplessness: hockey sticks, belts, and whips. “I was taken to the office of the moneylender and escorted to a private room above his office, in Odhav,” said Soni, an auto-rickshaw driver. “I was tortured by five people for several hours.”

Vinod Shah, an Ambikanagar resident, was picked up by his moneylender’s henchmen who were as nonchalant about the operation as the police would be about ambushing a criminal. Shah was taken to the house of his moneylender, Kalpesh Gor. “I was first assaulted in the house and then taken to an adjoining room,” Shah said. “I was beaten and held captive in the room for hours.”

Ahmedabad is home to thousands of people like Soni and Shah. They are tormented by private financiers who squeeze out fantastical returns from their victims, and do not care if life seeps out in the process. In fact, the moneylenders realise that the fear of death is a potent ally in extracting cash. That is why they have established more than 100 torture cells across the city and on its outskirts to profit from blood money.

But a former moneylender dispelled the notion that torture was used willy-nilly by his ex-fraternity. “The torture room is the last resort,” the man said. “A defaulter is usually given four to five chances before being roughed up.”