Movie Review; TALVAR - An Indictment of the Indian Legal System?

The Hindi movie ‘Talvar’ ,released on 02.09.2015, has brought alive the ghosts of the infamous ‘Arushi Talwar- Hemraj’ double murder case of 2008 into public discussion again. On 16.05.2008, 14 year old Arushi Talwar was found dead in her bedroom in her Noida apartment, and the dead body of the domestic help Hemraj was discovered at the terrace of the apartment next day. The CBI Court found the parents of Arushi, Dr.Rajesh Talwar and Dr. Nupur Talwar, guilty for the double murders.( Judgment dated 26.11.2013 in Sessions Trial No. 477 of 2012, Court of Special Judge, CBI, Ghaziabad), )The endeavour here is not to test the validity of the judgment in the light of the revelations in the movie, as it would be a puerile and egregious exercise. The attempt herein is to juxtapose the information revealed in the movie with the factual circumstances unfurled in the judgment so as to examine whether there are any missing links in the chain of events, and thereby to ask whether the call for a wider probe and further investigation into the matter is warranted or not. In other words, merely to analyse whether the issue has attained a proper sense of closure.The movie, directed by Meghna Gulzar and scripted by the Vishal Bharadwaj, attempts to shed light into the areas which were omitted by the investigation. It follows the docu-fiction pattern, documenting the events pertaining to the case with certain fictionalizations to render it suitable to cinematic medium. There were three teams which carried out the investigation, one by the State Police, and two by the CBI, and the film presents the versions of the three teams before the audience, and leaves it to the audience to draw their own conclusions. Some critics have compared the movie’s narrative style to that of Japanese classic “Rashomon” directed by the Akira Kurasowa, wherein multiple versions of a single incident are weaved together to present a multifaceted account of truth to the audience.The genesis of crime.The viewers are introduced to the crime scene with the arrival of maidservant, and her inability to open the outer mesh door. She finds the door locked from outside. At this juncture, it is pertinent to refer to the discussion of the evidence of Bharti Mandal, the real life maidservant, at pages 86 to 91 of the judgment. It appears that the maidservant deposed before the Court that the door was not locked from outside, contrary to her initial statement before the police. She also admitted in her cross examination that she was deposing as per the instruction of investigation officer, clearly suggesting that she had been tutored. However, the Court brushed aside such inconsistencies and discrepancies on the ground that she was an “illiterate and bucolic lady from the lower strata” and that her testimony ought not to be discarded on the basis of inconsistencies.(Page 91 of judgment).The local police who arrived at the crime scene are depicted as carrying out the process with callous carelessness and ineptitude. They failed to cordon off the crime scene, resulting in the finger prints and the forensic evidence getting mutilated due to incessant flow of visitors. According to the police it was an ‘open and shut case of murder committed by the missing servant Hemraj, and announces a reward for tracing him out. The police commit gross negligence in their failure to examine the terrace of the building, where the body of Hemraj had been lying since last midnight. Although some of the visitors bring to the attention of the police the presence of blood stains in the lock of terrace door and stair railings, the police officers dismiss them as rust. It was only on the next day by 10 AM that the body of Hemraj was discovered in the terrace in an advanced state of putrefaction.The discovery of the body of Hemraj a day later struck a major blow to the police, as it pointed out severe ineptitude on their part, and the initial theory of servant killing the girl came crumbling down. Coming under severe media criticism and public pressure, the Police felt constrained to find a solution to the case at the earliest. Thus, the theory of ‘honour killing’ was devised stating that the father killed both of them in a fit of rage upon finding them in an “objectionable, if not a compromising, position” and that the mother abetted and aided the crime. That the Talwars slept throughout the night without knowing the double murders which happened in the adjacent rooms was brought up as a suspicious circumstance against them. The parents explained that they used to sleep with the doors and windows closed and the Air Conditioner in their room was very noisy, making it impossible to hear voices from outside. Also, the fact that they specified the exact time of death of Arushi to the pundit at Haridwar before disposing off her ashes in Ganga was also used to frame them. However, they explained that the approximate time of death was mentioned to the pundit as they were told that the time of...

Movie Review; TALVAR - An Indictment of the Indian Legal System?

Manu Sebastian

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