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Phoney Concern
The Attack on Tehelka for Using Call Girls - This is an
Intervention Petition Submitted to the Chairman National Human Rights
Commission, by Madhu Kishwar
Hon’ble Justice J. C. Varma,
It came as a shock that the National Human Rights Commission has admitted
a petition against Tehelka for "using sex workers to entrap
Army officers in the course of its sting operation" at the behest of
Shakti Vahini, an organization very few people had heard of till they
sought the intervention of the NHRC and the Delhi Police to take action
against Tehelka under various draconian Sections of the Indian
Penal Code.
I submit before the honourable Commission that the charges levelled by
Shakti Vahini are frivolous, wrong, absurd and motivated. They are by no
means inspired by a genuine desire to seek justice and rehabilitation for
call girls. Their petition appears to be part of a blatant campaign to
deflect attention from the very serious evidence of corruption against
some of the top political leaders of the ruling party and power wielders
in the Defence Ministry. It is very alarming that the NHRC has, by
admitting this case, lent some credibility to the absurd and malafide
charges levelled against Tehelka by Shakti Vahini.
The chargesheet prepared by Shakti Vahini alleges that the Tehelka
team had attempted to "destabilize our country and with a view to
overawe the government of our country, have indulged in various acts of
criminal conspiracy, cheating, impersonation and above all sedition."
The charge of sedition is punishable with death or life imprisonment.
Tehelka is also alleged to have "seduced various officials of
the Indian defence establishment from their allegiance and their duties
and encouraged them to be disloyal to the nation". Therefore, Shakti
Vahini has sought action against Tehelka under Section 131 of the
Indian Penal Code. This very stringent provision provides for life
imprisonment for anybody who "attempts to seduce" an Army
officer "from his allegiance or his duty".
Charge of Sedition
The complaint further states that Tehelka carried out its
journalistic exposure "with the motive of shaking the confidence of
the entire nation against the armed forces"; that it attempted to
"bring into hatred and contempt and excite disaffection against the
Government of India and the armed forces". However, the main peg
used by Shakti Vahini to hang all their wild and motivated allegations is
the pious pretence of seeking to protect the rights and lives of the
exploited prostitutes. To quote from their letter to the Deputy
Commissioner of Police:
By their admitted acts of firstly procuring call girls/prostitutes and
providing them to the said army officials for the purposes of prostitution
and then by clandestinely filming the said officials committing sexual
acts with the said women, they [Tehelka staffers] have clearly
committed acts, which not only have the effect of denigrating women, but
are also grave offences punishable under the Indian Penal Code and the
Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act, 1956 (PITA).
Without any supporting evidence Shakti Vahini further alleges that
Tehelka tapes have been used for subsequently blackmailing the
officials concerned and make them "say or do things which jeopardize
the security and integrity of our country".The whole case rests on
the unsubstantiated allegation that the entire Operation Westend was
carried out "with ulterior motives to destabilize the polity and
governance of our country".
According to Shakti Vahini since it is "not ascertainable whether the
call girls procured by Tehelka.com had attained the age of
majority" they may well have used minors which would make the offence
even graver. Also, since these acts of supplying call girls took place in
a hotel located 200 meters from a place of public religious worship,
educational institution and hostel, therefore, it is additionally an
offence against "public decency, apart from being punishable under
PITA" [Prevention of Imoral Traffic Act]. Furthermore, "since
the said women have been filmed committing sexual acts with the said army
officials, Tehelka has committed yet another cognizable offence
under the Indecent Representation of Women (Prohibition) Act,
1986".
It is unfortunate that army officials and top level politicians allowing
their decisions regarding purchase of defence equipment to be influenced
by lavish entertainment, cash and sex bribes does not bother Shakti Vahini
and others targeting Tehelka. But Tehelka offering filmic
proof of these corrupt and antinational acts becomes suspect in the eyes
of Shakti Vahini and others who have jumped in to defend those accused of
corruption.
Guise of Rehabilitation
Apart from the arrest and prosecution of the Tehelka team, Shakti
Vahini petition demands that Tehelka should be compelled to
disclose the identity of call girls used in the sting operation so that
government can "rehabilitate" them "in consonance with the
provisions of the Immoral Traffic Act" and an antiquated provision of
the International Convention for the Suppression of Traffic in Persons to
which India is supposed to be a signatory. Article 16 of this outmoded
convention of 1949 vintage stipulates that "the parties to the
present Convention agree to take or encourage, through their public and
private educational, health, social, economic and related services,
measures for the prevention of prostitution and for the rehabilitation and
social adjustment of the victims of prostitution…"
And what does this "rehabilitation" package involve for the
women concerned? Here the Shakti Vahini enthusiasts take recourse to
another antiquated law, namely the Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act 1956
(PITA) which has been long condemned for being anti-women because it
mandates the punishment of the victimised prostitutes. Shakti Vahini’s
idea of "rehabilitation" of prostitutes is to have them
imprisoned or detained in a "corrective" institution under
Section 10 A of the PITA which provides for a detention of a minimum of
two years which can even extend up to five years.
In government run nari niketans or "rehabilitation homes"
women do not have the rights that criminals in regular prisons have. Not
only are the living conditions far more appalling than in prisons but
these institutions are far more unsafe than ordinary jails. Let us not
forget that Kamla, the young woman purchased from a flesh market of Madhya
Pradesh by The Indian Express reporter Ashwini Sarin mysteriously
disappeared from Delhi’s nari niketan despite having the entire
national media’s gaze fixed on her fate—all because she was a living proof
of the involvement and complicity of some power wielders in the Madhya
Pradesh government.
If the treatment being meted out in government custody to a well off
person like Shankar Sharma is any indication, these vulnerable women are
bound to be under much greater threat if they come in the clutches of the
police. They might just "disappear" as mysteriously and rapidly
as did Kamla. By demanding that the call girls be taken into custody,
shakti vahini seeks to endanger their lives even further. Therefore, it is
not surprising that even after Shakti Vahini’s efforts on behalf of
prostitutes were widely broadcast through the media, neither the two call
girls nor any of their associates showed any inclination to take up Shakti
Vahini’s offer of help and "rehabilitation".
The ludicrousness of this petition to the NHRC and its real intent becomes
evident from the following press release by Shakti Vahini:
If Tejpal is correct and no action is taken against him then the
message will go across the country that it will be lawful to use sex
workers, prostitutes and women to get a work done. Sex workers will be
used for any thing. From procuring deals to getting big contracts
everywhere people will use sex workers and will take refuge in the fact
that Tejpal was not arrested. Also if we don’t arrest Tejpal we will give
prostitution a licence….We are very concerned on the impact of the
Tehelka fallout on the country women who will be used like this, as
sex objects, as bribe, their bodies will be sold. Many women will join
this as career because Tejpal has made it legal… Already sex industry and
traffickers are increasing day by day and if no action is taken against
Tejpal this industry will grow by leaps and bounds.
Reading this outburst, one would get the impression that Tarun Tejpal is
the man who invented the practice of prostitution, that it was hitherto
unknown to human society, at least in India! The petitioners labour hard
to present the defence officials and others charged with gross impropriety
and betrayal of the trust and responsibility that goes with their high
offices as hapless victims who were trapped by some hostile forces out to
subvert India. The truth is that the Tehelka team have merely
lifted the curtain on a small part of the evil drama being enacted
routinely by our defence establishment and that Tehelka is
attempting to expose existing corruption rather than inventing it. They
have laid bare before the nation concrete evidence of how senior army
officials and politicians in-charge of defence purchases are risking the
lives of our soldiers and making India vulnerable to external aggression
and putting the lives of millions of Indians in danger by allowing cash,
kind and sex bribes to determine key decisions regarding purchase of
weapons and equipment required by our armed forces to provide for the
security of the nation.
Sadly enough, the position taken by Shakti Vahini is very similar to the
smear campaign against Tehelka launched by an influential section
of the media. Some of these papers have been dutifully reproducing every
wild allegation levelled by government agencies and those accused of
corruption without the slightest attempt to verify the veracity of the
charges, including those that belong to the realm of the ridiculous.
Confident in Crookery
The most informative and frightening aspect of the Tehelka expose
is not that military officers and Ministry of Defence officials as
well as the Defence Minister’s closest associate proved themselves to be
such unashamed bribe seekers, but rather that they felt so safe from the
risk of exposure that they did not take the simplest precautions
government crooks take in most countries: they did not even bother to
check on the antecedents of the imaginary "company". Nor did
they seem concerned that they might have to justify the quality and
appropriateness of the equipment being offered. They let themselves be
conned by a mere "visiting card", accompanied by relatively
small bribes with a few routine inducements, including the services of a
few call girls thrown in as extras to try to add a touch of authenticity
to the fictitious company that Tehelka’s reporters had invented.
It is also significant that not one of the officials or politicians caught
taking bribes expresses apprehensions about being caught or thwarted by
fellow officials with a reputation for probity. They talk disparagingly
about those who do not deliver even after taking bribes but not once about
fearing obstruction from any upright decision maker. This in itself shows
how corruption and sleaze exposed by Tehelka are matters of daily
routine and deeply entrenched in the functioning of the Ministry of
Defence and our entire political establishment.
The core issue we need to keep in focus is that Tehelka has opened
just one small window into the decision making process at the highest
levels in the most sensitive and vital ministry entrusted with the
security of India. The iron curtain of secrecy in matters pertaining to
defence have made it the least accountable part of government operations
in India, and therefore encouraged gross forms of corruption in defence
purchases.This expose should have triggered off many more follow up
investigations and a concerted campaign by concerned citizens, including
women’s organizations, for greater transparency and exemplary punishment
of the guilty as well as demanding that Official Secrets Act be replaced
with a Right to Information Act.
Instead, we are witnessing the sad spectacle of vested interests jumping
in to strengthen the hands of the culprits in government by putting the
Tehelka team on trial, instead of trying to push the expose up to
the levels required to stop the corruption.
Ethical Considerations
The two episodes involving the use of call girls form a relatively small
part of the entire expose. And yet, the entire effort is sought to be
trashed on account of those incidents. In matters of ethics, one of the
considerations one needs to weigh carefully is the harm caused by a
particular action against the good that might come out of it. If we accept
this as one of our yardsticks, then it is imperative that we look at what
Tehelka set out to do, including the potential benefits to our
society from their endeavours to uncover the sleaze and corruption that
characterises defence procurement deals.
In all, four women appear as actors in this drama. Two of them are
professional sex workers who are clearly in it for the money, and are
altogether unaware of the actual drama behind the scenes. In that sense
they are the ones trapped unwittingly – not the defence officials who they
"entertain." Using them without their informed consent is
indeed morally wrong. However, when weighed against the public service
performed by Tehelka investigators and the potential importance of
the investigation, the unethical use of call girls becomes more
comprehensible, if not completely justifiable. My rejection of the way the
sex workers are treated relates primarily to the lack of any opportunity
for them to decide for themselves if they were willing to participate in
the sting. Participating in a sting is not the same as willingness to sell
sex. Their activities were put on camera without their knowledge or
consent, thus also violating their right to privacy. However, I believe
the Tehelka investigators have a reasonable explanation for
believing in the necessity of employing those women in the manner they
chose.
Those sexual encounters provide deep insights into the crudity of mind and
level of self-debasement of some of our top brass in charge of national
security. Having people with such low self-esteem in key positions of
power poses a great danger to our lives because such people cannot be
adequate guardians of the national security and well-being of our
citizens. It explains why our country has become so vulnerable that even
a fourth rate military power such as Pakistan dares to attack us time and
again and gets away with it while inflicting heavy damages and casualties
on our armed forces, despite the fact that India possesses the largest
standing army in the world. Our people, who are falling easy prey to the
jingoism unleashed on us by the very people who are profiting from
jeopardising our security, should better know all this. It is no
coincidence that Defence Minister George Fernandes makes the shrillest,
loudest and most jingoistic noises about external threats to India in a
clear attempt to create a siege mentality among our people so that they
forget to ask pertinent questions about bringing our internal saboteurs to
account before the law.
Ploy to Divert Attention
But even if we accept that Tehelka transgressed journalistic norms
by using call girls to uncover the corrupt defence deals, it would be
appropriate to hand over the matter to the Press Council, a statutory body
to handle ethical violations by the press. The government has no
business or the right to sit in judgement over this issue. The authorities
are only using it as a ploy to divert attention from the core issues,
harass the Tehelka team and to destroy Shankar Sharma in order to
frighten the other media barons from investing in serious investigative
journalism.
I believe Tehelka journalists tried to build in several important
safeguards to ensure that these girls would not be identified in the
versions available to the public or to those who might use it against
them. They safeguarded the identities of the call girls they hired to
protect them from harm by steadfastly refusing to give out the names of
the women they used, despite great pressure on them to do so.
They did not make a sensational splash of the portions of their videotapes
that show key defence officials being "entertained" by call
girls and other women posing as call girls. Neither in the released
transcripts nor in the tapes released to the media did Tehelka try
to encash on the "sexy" part of the story.
At the same time, Tehelka did not hide the fact that it had used
call girls for the sting operation. The uncensored unedited tapes, that
include those portions, were handed over to the army authorities way back
in March 2001. The Commission of Inquiry was also given the unedited
version of the 100-hour film. Both these authorities decided not to make
them public. Tehelka also made sure that they were not accessible
to public or the press. The army authorities carried out their own trials,
court-martialed the accused officials, and even found them guilty. For
months after the expose, the officials shown in the tapes as accepting sex
bribes uttered not a word in their own defence. It was only after The
Indian Express highlighted the call girl aspects of the expose on
August 23, 2001, to the neglect of the main story that the accused army
officials began their "offence is the best form of defence"
strategy and tried to put Tehelka in the dock on this and a whole
range of other more irrelevant and ridiculous charges. This also provided
a handle to organisations like Shakti Vahini to jump in to the defence of
the guilty.
Sex Bribes Routine Affair in Defence Deals
It is amply clear from the behaviour of the defence officials that they
were used to demanding and getting sexual bribes along with cash bribes.
One of the officials (Col. Sehgal) even went so far as to insist with the
call girl "entertaining" him that she provide oral, anal and all
manners of kinky sex because that is what excited him most. When she
refused, he took pains to explain how call girls frequented by him
elsewhere performed those acts and if she too learnt to do those things
she would rise high in her profession. He kept goading her even after she
made it firmly clear that she had set certain limits for what she would or
would not do while catering to her clients.
Of all the bribe takers filmed by Tehelka, Colonel Sehgal comes out
as the most hardened and cynical. The gutter language he uses throughout
his appearance, the vulgar jokes he cracks as a habit, the crudeness of
his behaviour towards the women "entertaining" him, the
brazenness with which he conducts these deals indicate that he is an
active, key player in promoting sleaze and corruption in defence
procurement, rather than someone reluctantly seduced into the act. His
defense that he was drugged and seduced by Tehelka who then used
that footage to blackmail him, is too gross to be lent any credence
because his behaviour even in his own home where there are neither call
girls nor any booze, comes out no different.
It is sad that even a man like Sehgal can martial the services of his wife
and use her as a sword to fight his battle. She has chosen to go on the
offensive and lodged a complaint against Tehelka with the President
of India, the Prime Minister as well as the accused Defence Minister,
alleging that the Tehelka team had "trapped" her husband
and that her "husband has been living with a constant threat of
exposure since [reporters] of Tehelka.com first told him about the
filming of his encounter with a prostitute which was thrust upon him by
the website’s investigative reporters". (Pioneer, 28.8.2001)
She has also alleged that her husband "suspected his drinks were
spiked" by Tehelka staffers since on the day of the filmed
encounter with call girls "her husband had returned in a
‘never-seen-before’ drunken state".
In this context, it is important to point out that both Col. Sehgal and
Lt. Col. Sharma (who goes into a separate room with another call-girl) had
spent a good deal of time with the two call-girls and a Tehelka
reporter cracking and listening to what are described by them as
"call-girl jokes", drinking and ordering food. The tapes leaves
one in doubt that both the men are in total command of the situation,
which is also evident in the way Col. Sehgal attempts to bully the
call-girl "servicing" him into providing nauseating and kinky
forms of oral sex.
Even Brigadier Iqbal Singh, who failed to "go all the way"
because he said "he was not prepared", and shows some amount of
reticence, did not express much surprise or moral disapproval when a young
woman posing as a call girl was presented to him. She was made to wait in
the hotel lobby while Singh carried on the "business
conversation" with the Tehelka reporter. The woman is asked to
come up to the room only after Tehelka reporter has checked with
Singh whether she should be invited to join him.
Holding a Mirror
Since the purpose of the Tehelka investigation was to show with
irrefutable proof how those in charge of defence purchase deals have
become habituated to demanding and accepting monetary and other bribes and
how uncaring they are about the quality and appropriateness of the
equipment being purchased thereby compromising national security, they
understandably decided to enact the whole drama as per the rules set by
those incharge of defence procurement decisions. Had these defence
officials been in the habit of demanding trips to Appu Ghar, the
Tehelka team is likely to have taken them to Appu Ghar. But since
sexual bribes play an important role in many defence deals, the
Tehelka team decided to include such bribes in accordance with the
routine norms and traditions entrenched in the Ministry of Defence.
We would also do well to remember that the Tehelka team did not use
the call-girls for any personal or commercial gain, as is proven by their
later conduct in withholding access to these tapes for the public.
Tehelka reporters were simply "acting out" a role.
Seducing defence officials is not their profession or business. As is true
for screen and stage actors, once a person gets to impersonate another
role, there is an inevitable tendency to flow and mould oneself to the
requirements of that particular role and character. Therefore, in offering
sex bribes, the Tehelka team was, in my view, carried away by the
understandable desire to appear fully credible in the eyes of the defence
officials rather than seeking prurient satisfaction for themselves.
Sex bribes are a routine part of corrupt deals all over India. Not to
include such payoffs in the deals might have made the corrupt officials
too wary to participate further. If the Tehelka team had been
unwilling to include sex bribes, it would have been likely to have aroused
the suspicions of the corrupt officials, just as the Tehelka
journalists would have rung alarm bells among the corrupt officers if they
had refused to offer them liquor or join in their drunken, abusive and
obscene conversations.
The explanation offered by Tehelka as to why there was no filmic
proof of the demands for call girls sounds credible: all conversations,
especially between them and men like Sashi, who acted as a go-between,
could not possibly be filmed because some of these conversation took place
on the phone out of the reach of the cameras, others in open spaces where
situating a camera unobtrusively at a strategic point that could record
the event was not feasible.
Ethics of Kamla Case
The Indian Express has challenged the methods used by Tehelka team
by drawing a comparison to their supposed professionally ethical track
record citing the famous "Kamla case" whereby one of its
staffers actually went and purchased a woman for Rs.2500 from one of the
flesh markets in Madhya Pradesh. The Indian Express claim that they
covered themselves ethically and professionally while performing this
"illegal" act by taking five public figures into confidence
before they undertook the sting operation.
However, the comparison if taken to its logical conclusion shows The
Indian Express mode of journalism in a much poorer light. No public
cause was served by it. They failed to make the slightest dent in the
flesh trade, and chose to simply forget about the issues they had raised.
They also took no responsibility to trace Kamla after she mysteriously
disappeared from the government run nari niketan. They endangered
her life by their expose and making a public spectacle of her miserable
and vulnerable life. They did not express the slightest remorse over the
matter even after it became clear that she was used and harmed, rather
than helped by their sting operation. Some years later when a film was
made on Kamla’s story, the Indian Express tried to get a stay order
on the film’s release by claiming "copyright" on her story. This
shows The Indian Express editors in a very poor light.
Need for Transparency
If we had a history of transparency in the defence procurement process, if
it was not unnecessarily clouded in secrecy through the use of the
Official Secrets Act, then there would be no need for Tehelka types
of exposes. Such dramatic and risky operations only become essential when
normal channels of seeking accurate information are totally blocked.
Unfortunately, foreign defence experts and even our enemies seem to know
more about our defence procurements than do the citizens of India.
Today, we face a situation whereby those in positions of power are playing
an active role in criminalising our society. Corruption and bribery have
become integral features of government functioning. Our power wielders
appear altogether indifferent to how their actions are jeopardizing the
security of the whole nation and endangering the lives of our jawans by
denying them appropriate weapons and equipment. We are saddled with a
political regime that does not believe in transparency and accountability
even in day-to-day matters, not to speak of the harmful, deadly secrecy
that surrounds matters related to defence.
The Official Secrets Act is being used no less vigorously today than
during colonial times to cover up the crimes of our rulers. Citizens are
not allowed access even to municipal accounts, leave alone purchases made
for our armed forces. In such an atmosphere our nation is under far
greater threat from internal corruption and saboteurs than any external
enemy.
Since the criteria for most major government decisions, including military
procurement, seems to be how to siphon off public funds into private
accounts, and much of their time is spent on figuring out newer and newer
ways of robbing the state exchequer, our rulers have not had time to learn
and practice the art of good governance, nor cared to develop the required
expertise for taking complex decisions for efficiently administering the
security and economy of such a vast country.
The Tehelka revelation has shaken the confidence of our people
because never before have we witnessed in such graphic detail and
vividness the factors that lead to malgovernance and India’s poor
performance.
Danger to Shankar’s Lif
The manner in which the government is witch hunting Shankar Sharma and
Devina Mehra, violating their human and constitutional rights will have a
chilling effect on the future of investigative journalism in India. This
is what should be engaging the NHRC’s attention.
The methods used to make "an example" of Shankar Sharma are
openly fascistic. All manners of blackmail and pressure, including
wrecking their business, are being put on him and his family with the
clear purpose of making them break down and make them an object lesson for
others in the corporate sector so that no media owner ever dares cross the
line of "discretion" by financing such investigations, no editor
will dare support enterprising journalists who want to take investigative
reporting seriously. The entire business community seems so
terrorised that they have not come out to defend one of their colleagues
whose civil and constitutional rights are being violated.
The fear of his family and friends that Sharma’s life is in danger at the
hands of government agencies is not unfounded. It is he who deserves the
protection of NHRC and not those caught red handed accepting cash and sex
bribes to facilitate dubious Defence deals.
The main purpose of the sting operation undertaken by Tehelka was
to lay bare before the nation concrete evidence of how senior army
officials and politicians in-charge of defence purchases are jeopardising
national security by allowing cash, kind and sex bribes to determine key
decisions regarding purchase of weapons and equipment required by our
Armed forces to provide for the security of the nation. It is indeed
distressing that Tehelka should be put in the dock for performing a
valuable public service with courage, intelligence and at great personal
risk. It is particularly outrageous that Tehelka should be harassed
and attacked in the name of women’s rights.
Manushi's Intervention
Women have a special stake in safety, security, probity in public life and
a less violent society. History provides enough evidence that as the level
of corruption and crime rises in any society it leads to increasing
marginalisation of women. In such a scenario they either appear as victims
of violence or used by men to settle scores with each other and become
their instruments. Therefore, women’s organisations owe it to themselves
not to let the core issues (the need to combat corruption, lack of
accountability of power wielders and consequent malgovernance) be lost
sight of and to push for meaningful reforms in governance, and the
enactment of a Right to Information Act.
Since our organisation is committed to strengthening democratic rights,
rule of law and promoting accountability and transparency in governance, I
on behalf of Manushi Nagarik Adhikar Manch, request you to admit our
intervention petition in the case filed with the NHRC by Shakti Vahini
against the Tehelka team. I also appeal to the NHRC to intervene to
protect the constitutional and human rights of Shankar Sharma and his wife
Devina Mehra whose right to life, right to livelihood and to fair trial
are being systematically violated by unscrupulous government agencies
acting at the behest of vindictive politicians.
Madhu Kishwar
Manushi
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