Had it not been for the flat-footedness of the Uttar Pradesh police and the shoddy CBI investigation, the Talwars would have been convicted long ago (The Jury is Out There Somewhere, Dec 2). They pushed their luck too far.
K. Suresh, Bangalore
Why is the media finding it so hard to believe that there can be demons among educated, middle-class people too?
Jatinder, Vancouver
If the judge had to arrive at a verdict based largely on circumstantial evidence, it is only because of the necessarily incomplete investigation. No one other than God and Aarushi’s parents know what actually happened on that fateful night.
Sriram Ranganathan, New Delhi
How is it that when the law has pronounced against the well-heeled, it is being widely held up to be an error of judgement, based only on scanty evidence? The Sanjay Dutts and Talwars of this world, it seems, cannot conceivably be guilty of crimes, whatever the judiciary or the hoi polloi feel about them.
C.P. Nair, Kannur, Kerala
When members of proud, largely rural martial communities are ‘accused’ of ‘honour killing’, the English-speaking middle class condemns them as barbarians who deserve to be hanged. But when members of the said class are convicted for having committed the very same crime, a need is felt for informed debate, to look at every possibility and loophole in evidence. A clear case of double standards!
Mike Desai, New Delhi
Let this shocking and baffling incident be the last we get to read about. If the educated, modern, urbane class of overambitious parents who leave their children in most vulnerable situations and circumstances don’t learn a lesson from this, then we are doomed.
Amrita Muttoo, Mumbai
At the heart of the CBI’s case in the Aarushi-Hemraj double murder case is a perverted fantasy from a patriarchal universe. The CBI and Noida police are convinced that 14-year-old Aarushi was having an affair with her 45-year-old domestic help, and the sight of them together threw Rajesh into a fit of murderous rage.
C.K. Subramaniam, Mumbai
The CBI seems to have put the cart before the horse in arriving at its findings in the Aarushi case. When pulled up for not making any progress, it first decided that the Talwars were guilty and then went about collecting evidence to support that belief. It chose to ignore other—equally significant—evidence. What is most surprising is that the trial judge too agreed with the CBI’s findings.
Venkatesh G. Iyer, Chennai
Near-perfect murder (whoever the assailants were), and near-perfect botch-up by the investigators.
Venkatesan Iyengar, Hyderabad
Poorly written article, which assumes that the reader knows the facts already. Rattling on about the incompetency of the police, the media and other parties does not an article make. It seems to have been written in a very angry mood.
Rajesh, Mathura
The Aarushi case was investigated by the same Arun Kumar who led the investigation in the Rizwanur Rahman murder.
Sanket Biswas, Calcutta
