Known as one of the finest officers in the state, Umesh, 33, was getting too hot in Karimnagar not just for the Naxalites (to contain whom he had been handpicked) but also for the local Telugu Desam Party leaders. Within months of his posting there in June 1997, he not only had the Naxalites on the run (often adopting controversial methods), but also got under the politicians' skin. He had TDP MLA B Rajamallu arrested on charges of prevention of atrocities against the SC and STs Act and was soon transferred out of Karimnagar.

Then all hell broke loose at Karimnagar. Subordinates who swore by Umesh's uprightness, revolted and unleashed a rein of terror on the streets, burning buses, beatingup people and breaking everything within sight. By the time the madmen in mufti were finished, the damage was colossal. Of course, they were doing him the greatest disservice because Umesh paid for the hooliganism the next day when Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu suspended him.

After six months in the box, Umesh was reinstated and posted as assistant IG sports and welfare on November 10, 1998. A few days later, he was given additional charge as SP, computers. Umesh landed up there after just eight years of service whereas normally only senior officers are parked here to vegetate.

Not so Umesh. He got down to the job with gusto and left perhaps the most lasting memory of his work when he got up the Rs 35 lakh computer centre in a matter of nine months (it was inaugurated on August 21). An island of modernity in the decrepit DGP's office, the computer centre was only the first step in Umesh's latest obsession: a Rs 4-crore masterplan to link all police stations to the DGP's office for speeding up crimedetection. He had already made a bank of 125,000 fingerprints of criminals and the job of getting another three lakh was apace.

Says a civilian staffer at the computer centre recalling his passion for work, eyes moist with emotion: ``Never have I seen such an officer in a government department.''

City Police Commissioner S R Sukumara has similar things to say. ``Umesh held many important postings and made a mark in all areas. It's a great loss for the department and the government. He had a very good career ahead,'' he says, requesting the media not to make a mention of Umesh's suspension because it ``won't be nice''.

The talk at the spot of killing is no different. Top officials are either discussing amongst themselves are telling journalists what a good officer Umesh was and discussing how if he had been in a field posting he would perhaps have been safer. ``This is the problem with soft postings,'' mutters one of them.

For the hundreds of hundreds of passersby push and peer over the police lines,it is one more occasion to curse the politicians and the ``system'' and for the many shopkeepers at the junction it's time to quickly down shutters as so to avoid a rub with it.

Four hours later, the sniffer dog that set about enthusiastically has returned just as fast and is resting on its perch in the police van. Soon, as the first vehicle rolls past the spot, the chalk marks made by the police are quickly erased. In a little while, the crowd melts and Umesh (after a few sympathetic ptchs and tchs) is a distant memory.

And, as the journalists head for office, they're already revising tomorrow's intro of an expected encounter somewhere in Karimnagar, a police routine after every such incident: ``The police received a tip off about a Naxal party's movement and was lying in wait at....When the police party tried to stop the suspects, it was fired upon. The police returned the fire in self defence and in the ensuing gunbattle, four Naxals were killed......''That's how the system works, doesn't it?