Date: 19|08|96

Today I joined at work as an ASP at Karimnagar district. I hope I have a successful journey. Its 11’0’ clock in the night and my phone is ringing; I think it is an emergency.

Date: 20|08|96

Yes, it was an emergency call on day one of my service. I have been surprised by the mysterious death of the forest officers nearby. At the night we reached the spot after searching for three hours facing many obstacles and overcoming them .We couldn’t get any clue because it was too late and the light was insufficient to look over the case.

I went again to see if there were any clues .

After seeing the clues my mind was confused I couldn’t conclude whether it was an attack by the animals or a murder …..?????!!

The first clue of the case was that there were scratches on the body of the officers like that of animal paws but there were also some prints of the bullock carts at some distance. Examining the prints we concluded that the bullock cart which may be involved in the crime is one used for special purposes and there were only three bullock carts of this type in the village.

I immediately called the villagers who were staying nearby and enquired about this, the reason given by two of the owners were reasonably good but the answer of the third owner raised a suspicion and led to another twist in this case.

Date: 21|08|96

“Sir, some people came from the town and asked my bullock cart for one day. Since the amount they paid was also huge, I did not ask them the purpose”, this was the answer of one of the owners. I immediately examined the cart where I found blood marks on the rope, when asked about it the owner replied that “This is summer, so there will be bleeding from the bulls nose”. Being suspicious sent the blood sample to Hyderabad forensic lab so that I could get further more clues in the case.

Date: 28|08|96

After a week of long wait and successful investigation we got a confirmation from Hyderabad that it was not the blood of the bull but the blood of one of the officers. Then I took it as a challenge in solving the case. When I informed this to the villagers there was no response, no one ran away from the village giving another twist in this case.

Upon, inquiring the youngsters in the village I came to know that the murderer was not one but the entire village, all of the villagers planned and killed the officers for harassing them and taking bribes. This case is one of those cases that I couldn’t solve and do justice to my work.

I didn’t know whether I should fight for the officers who work day and night very hard to protect animals from danger and forest from smugglers by risking their life…….

Or

Should I help the villagers by letting them go who are so untied  and stayed together as one when they were about to be arrested and helped each other in troubles…!!!

I am unable to understand what to do. Let me leave this to ……….

Winning entry for the Short Story Writing Contest by Walthati Ramya Sri, CSE G, I Year

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