Murder, matrimony, and melodrama: A honeymoon in Meghalaya ends in horror

India Today

a day ago

A tragic murder takes place in Meghalaya while a young couple from Madhya Pradesh is on their honeymoon. The girl goes missing, and they find the mutilated body of her husband. We come to know there is a lover who could have collaborated with the wife. Scary. The sister of the poor guy is an Instagram influencer who's asking for justice for her brother with melodramatic music, while also promoting massage salons. Meghalaya Police claims to have solved the case in 17 days. No, this is not the teaser for the third season of Pataal Lok.advertisementWe later came to know they got married on the same day India was bombing strategic air bases in Pakistan. It goes to show how much mainland Indians underestimate the capabilities of the Pakistani armed forces. No kamikaze drones. No ballistic missiles. Only a wiry guy with a mic in hand, atop a carriage, belted out 'Aaj mere yaar ki shaadi hai,' causing mass destruction to the eardrums in a 100m blast radius. The astrologer has given the auspicious date; there is no postponing. World War III could wait.So they went on with their celebrations, not sharing the same urgency as Mr. Trump, who saved the baraat from a 'major catastrophe.' 'They never give me enough credit,' Trump says, rightly so, like the foofa ji at the same wedding.
What's most interesting is how quickly this took over pop culture. It even stamped over the Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) news cycle. Murders are commonplace, especially post-familial discord. Just pick up any regional newspaper and turn to page 4; you'll find material worth four seasons of crime dramas. So what's different here?advertisementFor starters, it fits in well with the recent wave of men's rights advocacy. The advocates feel vindicated. It bolsters the case where they claim it's the norm rather than an outlier, where men are routinely harassed in cases of alimony abuse and divorce blackmail. It was reignited by Johnny Depp and locally taken forward by the sad end of Atul Subhash. Above all, it's a man bites dog story. Parle-G-fed dogs biting men are common, but the real journalistic story comes out when a man bites a dog. This is that story.And there is enough online footage to go through. The sister of the deceased, who's an Instagram influencer, has shared a lot of content on her page, where OSINT individuals, who till yesterday were looking for the exact spot where we hit the Kirana Hills, are now combing through wedding videos to see signs of evil on the face of the chief accused as she was taking pheras. There are enough free man-hours in India, where people willingly lend their sleuthing skills to subsequent news cycles. The author of this column is no exception. After consuming that financial independence snake oil, he now devotes time to dissecting such stuff via long write-ups. The one who's read this and made it this far is also a willing collaborator. So we're even. Ha!advertisementThe image that haunts me is the one where the mother of the murdered guy is pleading with the media to let her go, as they hound her with their microphones, like vultures poking with their sharp beaks. I know people are doing their job, but someone at the top, the media bosses, should instruct them to take a step back. Thanks.(Abhishek Asthana is the founder of a creative agency – GingerMonkey. He tweets as @GabbbarSingh)(Views expressed in this opinion piece are those of the author)Tune InMust Watch