"Between 6.30 am and 9 pm on December 5, almost a dozen government teams in Indore cornered one man." "They couldn't find him. Jitendra Soni vanished hours before the hunt began. He knew he was in trouble." "Between 18 and 30 November, he published in his local evening tabloid, Sanjha Lokswami, and on its YouTube channel, a series of reports allegedly exposing the contents of a CD showing some Madhya Pradesh (MP) politicians and civil servants in a compromising position with women in an alleged honeytrap racket." Following a complaint to the police by city municipal engineer Harbhajan Singh, that he was being blackmailed for Rs 30 million by 2 women who had records of his relations with them in a hotel room, a Special Investigation Team (SIT) of MP police alleged "that the gang of women blackmailed the influential men with the audio and video proof of their encounters into granting government funds and contracts to companies and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) with which they were connected." MP is no stranger to criminal scandals involving politicians and civil servants. There was the Vyapam scam in 2013, in which politicians and civil servants were helping candidates to cheat in selection tests for medical and engineering college seats in exchange for vast sums of money. After the scam broke more than 40 journalists and witnesses died under mysterious circumstances. Two police officers investigating the deaths received threats from 'influential' people. A 19-year old medical student Namrata Damor was found dead near railway tracks on 7 January 2012. Three years later journalist Akshay Singh visited her home but started coughing and frothing while talking to her father. Hours later he was dead. Then Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan of the BJP refrained from asking the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) but was forced to accept it under Supreme Court order. The opposition Congress labeled the CBI a "Compromise Bureau of Investigation" for allegedly tampering with the hard disc of a computer with proof of Shivraj Singh's involvement. Naturally, the Congress campaigned on the scam for the assembly election in MP in November 2018. Although it got more popular votes, the BJP won 109 seats to 114 seats for the Congress. The Congress formed the government in MP with veteran leader Kamal Nath as Chief Minister. The Congress has started a fresh investigation into the Vyapam scam, possibly hoping to involve some BJP politicians and milk some more mileage out of the scam. So what has the Congress done regarding the sex scandal in MP? By 7 December "government departments in Indore struck down on every aspect of Soni's inlfuence. His newspaper's licence was recalled, his gun licence and state-sanctioned armed guards were withdrawn, his son arrested, and nearly every building owned by him and his family raided and the razed -- bungalow, factory, bar, hotel, cafe, tabloid office, printing press." An insane frenzy of revenge without proving any culpability in a court of law. All political parties are organised gangs. Sadly we live in a police state where they can do anything they like. Helpless.
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