Kafkaland: Prejudice, Law and Counterterrorism in India

From Mumbai to Bangalore, to Delhi to Madhya Pradesh, Kafkaland examines some of the most prominent terror cases in India, to show that the hallmark of terror investigations is not simply a casual subversion of norms but cynical prejudice and brutal violence inflicted in the knowledge of absolute impunity. It also examines the disquieting trend of judicial abdication, wherein the courts indulgently ignore signs of torture, lack of evidence and absence of procedural norms, while trying terror cases.

Kafkaland challenges the dominant narratives of counterterrorism and the emerging security-industrial complex. Kafkaland is where impunity, bias, suspicion are sustained by laws, where erosion of constitutional guarantees is advertised as internal security, where corporate greed masquerades as national interest.

Contents

Preface

Part 1: Stories from Kafkaland

1. Dr. Narco and Other Stories from Kafkaland

2. The Life and Death of Gulam Yazdani

3. Terrorism’s True Lies

4. Malegaon and the Fiction of Muslim Revenge

Part 2: Law of the Land

5. Death by Encounter

6. Why the Ishrat Jahan Case Frightens Our Commentators

7. Crime and Punishment 95

8. Sinful Liberals and the Investigative Bias

9. Temples of Justice

10. Truth is Stranger than Fiction

Part 3: The Security Metaphysic

11. The Security Metaphysic