HEROIC WARNING
Telegraph, June 07, 2006

It may be inadequate to simply see it as a heroic
death. Heroic it truly is, but what is more important
about the death of Anil Kumar Singh is its poignant
irony. Many people before him had fallen to criminals’
bullets on trains running through Bihar. Singh’s
death, however, has a different story to tell. He had
retired as a deputy inspector-general of police in a
state where policemen are known to look the other way
when criminals strike. Worse, Bihar’s lawlessness has
largely been the result of dark links among policemen,
politicians and criminals. This backdrop makes Singh’s
death particularly ironic. He died fighting a gang of
train robbers who had attacked the passengers. Sad as
it is, the incident shows that there still are
policemen, even in Bihar, who are inspired by a sense
of duty. What is more, they live — and are prepared to
die — for the sake of their duty. In Singh’s case, the
call of duty stayed with him years after retirement
from his job. If his death smacks of the violence that
pervades life in Bihar, it also inspires a hope.

For the chief minister, Mr Nitish Kumar, this comes as
a warning. He may have inherited the state’s
lawlessness from his predecessors. But it has been
more than six months since he assumed office. It may
not be a long enough time to clean up the mess, but Mr
Kumar should have used it to start the process.
Singh’s death suggests that the chief minister has not
really made much of a difference to the state’s
administration. This cannot be a good omen for a new
regime. After all, Mr Kumar won the elections last
October more because of the division in his opponents’
ranks than the strength of the coalition that he
leads. The failure to check crimes will further expose
the government’s weaknesses. The new rulers of Bihar
hope to lure investors to the state by projecting an
image of change. But many painstaking attempts at
image-building may be undone by a single incident as
the one that claimed Singh’s life. Not just the death
on the train, but also the violence during the recent
panchayat polls was a sad comment on the state’s law
and order situation under the new dispensation. It is
a vicious cycle that has been Bihar’s undoing. Its
economic backwardness is directly related to the
state’s high crime rate. Mr Kumar needs to prove that
he has the will and the ability to change things.

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