This long preamble is no digression, or a session in storytelling. The Muslim community today is caught in shocked denial as well, particularly after the Jamia encounter and subsequent arrests in many states. It feels isolated, targeted, maligned and, above all, abandoned by the political class, particularly those it has always voted for. It has no leaders of its own to talk to and it no longer trusts those of the UPA, the political formulation closest to them. They feel victimised and see no hope. At the same time they do not believe even a fraction of the claims made by the police forces of six states and a union territory working in close coordination. Not only are they not willing to believe the story of the Jamia encounter, they believe the whole thing, the bombings, the arrests and “framing of young Muslim boys”, is one giant conspiracy against them. Why the police forces of the Central government, Modi’s Gujarat and Mayawati’s Uttar Pradesh, among others, would join hands to hatch such a comprehensively diabolical conspiracy is not a question that is asked often.

On the specifics of the Jamia encounter, there are detailed answers to questions most commonly asked: why was Sharma not wearing a flak jacket, why was the bullet that killed him not found, how did two boys manage to escape from such a tight grip. These questions have been answered in a series of stories reconstructing the encounter in this paper earlier this week. Without repeating any of those details, here are two relevant points. Our policemen are no novices to the business of “encounters”, such as they usually are. But one principle has been followed in all such “encounters”, that nobody is taken alive. It is really suicidal to kill some people in an encounter and keep an eye-witness alive, as happened in this case. Second, if the whole thing was a fake encounter or a cover-up for a friendly fire death in a Keystone Cops operation, where was the need for the police to say that two suspects had escaped? Our encounter cops are by now far too experienced at this business to be so stupid with a cover-up.

... contd.