Hyderabad: He is one of the top-notch professionals, known to lead by example, and his batchmates in the 1964 batch of the Indian Police Service (IPS) swear by him. Back in the 1990s, when he headed the Special Investigation Team (SIT) which would crack the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case and secure the conviction of 26 accused in the case, this IPS officer along with his team would work 18 hours a day, for months together, piecing together evidence and hunting the former prime minister’s assassins.
Devarayapuram Ramasamy Karthikeyan — the retired IPS officer and one of the finest investigative minds in the country — is now Hyderabad-bound to dig out the truth in the encounter killing of four accused in the rape and murder of veterinary doctor Disha. He along with Justice V.S. Sirpurkar who is heading the commission, and former Bombay High Court judge Justice Rekha Sundar Baldota, will be arriving in Hyderabad in the next few days to begin the inquiry.
With Kartikeyan in the commission, the top brass of the Telangana state police is already feeling the jitters.
“It (inquiry) is a long process and I have not yet received the orders. But I will be in Hyderabad and will be camping there till the inquiry is over. I am very familiar with Hyderabad,” Karthikeyan told Deccan Chronicle over telephone from Coimbatore, where he is on a personal visit.
Presently, associated with the Forum for Peace, Harmony and Good Governance in New Delhi as its president, the 1964 batch IPS officer says it is too early to comment on how they would proceed with the inquiry. “I have known Justice Sirpurkar. I have headed inquiry commissions earlier but this would be the first time I would be part of the commission that is enquiring into encounter killings,” he said.
Asked what he felt about instant justice and the encounter itself, the former IPS officer said, “Had you asked me my opinion 24 hours ago, before the Supreme Court appointed the commission, I would have expressed my opinion. But now, it would be unethical as I am part of the inquiry commission,” he said. Karthikeyan previously worked here as IG, South, CRPF. “The commission has only been appointed yesterday and we (the three members) have not got in touch with each other. But we should be in Hyderabad soon.”
Asked whether he felt that six months is a long time and that the commission would be able to complete the inquiry much before the stipulated time, the former CBI boss said that “it is a long process.”
Though Kartikeyan was guarded in his comments and obviously so, in one of the events organised by his forum earlier he spoke his mind while speaking on the topic ‘Accepting Responsibility; Quitting the blame game’.
“Sometimes, when people mess up at work, they dodge accountability and shift the responsibility to someone else. Blaming others for (your) mistake is not a healthy mechanism. One of the most destructive human pastimes is playing the blame game,”' he said, addressing the gathering in July this year. He said that blame game has been responsible for mass casualties of war. “Blame game consists of blaming another person for an event or state of affairs thought to be undesirable, instead of proactively making changes to ameliorate the situation,” he said.
