CAPITAL OFFENCE

The case, as might be expected, created a storm, being put up as the ultimate example of how no woman was safe on the streets of 8216;8216;India8217;s national capital.8217;8217; Even worse, Swiss president Pascal Couchepin was to arrive in Delhi on November 6 to discuss several key bilateral issues.

While every major Central ministry was upping the ante, the Delhi police had very little to go on apart from the woman8217;s description of the rapist and her claim that he was well-dresed and carrying an expensive gun. The only material evidence the investigators allegedly seized from the victim8217;s car was a cigarette lighter.

Over the next few weeks, as the pressure from the media and the mandarins mounted, the police carried out a manhunt straight out of The Day of The Jackal. Licensed gun-users and their likely relatives were questioned by the Licensing Branch of the Delhi Police. More than 2,000 suspects were picked up and questioned.

Of the more likely ones, a couple of dozen photos were sent to the diplomat, who had returned to Switzerland. None made the grade. And then the police thought they had hit paydirt: an old case that could have been related.

On the afternoon of August 27, 2003, Navdeep Randhawa, 24, had allegedly walked into the Swiss Airlines8217; office in the heart of Delhi and robbed it. Randhawa8217;s profile was interesting: Scion of a princely family, he had been reportedly disowned for his wayward lifestyle. Suave, well-dressed and with impeccable English and a taste for the good life, he seemed a perfect fit for the culprit as described by the victim.

But that identity, too, failed to return a positive.

Meanwhile, the police prepared Identikit images and beat policemen worked on the descriptions, even as senior investigators whittled down the list of likely suspects. With no promising leads materialising even a month after the incident, the police hiked the reward for information by an uprecedented eight times8212;from Rs 50,000 to Rs 4 lakh8212;to make it the highest-ever reward announced for clues in a police investigation.

But even this incentive did not work. A year after the rape, the police had even exhausted suspects in the neighbouring states. There had been no breakthroughs, no disclosures, no insights. Officials, however, refused to admit defeat, pointing out that a 15-year old murder in Lajpat Nagar had been solved in 2004 when fresh leads came up. Even the Siri Fort case would be solved, they said8230; eventually.

Two years down the line and many more such heinous rapes later, the status quo persists. With media reports hinting that 8216;8216;influence8217;8217; put the lid on investigations, the cracking of the Siri Fort case, if it ever happens, would be a bonus for the Delhi Police.