Lookout notice against Gurmeet Ram Rahim's daughter: Hunt for Honeypreet may be a red herring

The hunt for Red October made more sense. So did looking for Mr Goodbar. But the sudden official desire to search for the god-daughter of the Dera Sacha Sauda chief, Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh, seems to be a mix of camouflage and subterfuge rather than any great quest for justice.

There are a lot more important people involved in the havoc of Haryana than Honeypreet from what we have been seeing. If we have to alert airports and train and bus stations for this elusive and dangerous lady, we have to ask: Why was she not detained when she was up close and personal and available?

She was in the helicopter with Ram Rahim. She walked openly with him into the jail as cops watched and helped them along. So, why this hoo ha now?

It seems like diverting attention from the real culprits could well be the reason for this sudden pursuit. The alert was activated very soon after she made a statement to the effect that the BJP betrayed her ‘dad’ and master by reneging on a deal in which he would instruct his vote bank to vote for this party if it agreed to lift the cases and make them go away.

The potential to embarrass a whole slew of bigwigs exists. What better way to destroy even a vestige of credibility than by engaging in a little bit of character assassination? Suddenly, this woman, who was roaming freely and making statements of intent even after the riots, becomes this major criminal.

Something is murky about all of this. Even if she is this big mastermind and the devil in high heels, there are those who allowed her to run the show and they don’t even seem to be in lukewarm water.

The first accusation is she instigated the riots that Black Friday. If anything, the hedging of bets by Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar and the fact that he has gotten away scot-free for exercising rank bad governance makes him far more culpable than Honeypreet.

And it is not just the chief minister but his whole cabinet and the bureaucracy that just stood by and let 1,00,000 people with announced hostile intent camp outside government buildings.

The second accusation is that the hunted woman unlawfully got on a chopper and entered a jail. Gee, people, who let her? She didn’t sneak onto that chopper, she was there smack right dab in the middle. It was the police who let her in and it was the jail staff who welcomed them like VIPs at the courtyard with the police in attendance.

As for that red bag they were carrying being the signal to his followers to riot, oh come on, please let us stop with the drama and enough of treating the public as nincompoops. In this day of Whatsapp, SMS and instant contact, you don’t need smoke signals. Are you telling us there wasn’t a mobile phone in the entourage? Moreover, the mob needed no signal, it was raring to go wild.

The timeline and the presence of police at all these points on the grid of violence indicate that Honeypreet was openly engaging in whatever support she was giving Ram Rahim and being allowed to do so.

It is only when she opened her mouth about the dirty deal that things went south.

This is not a sympathetic rant for Honeypreet. If she is guilty, lock her up. This is more a concern over whether her railroading is being used as a diversion to discredit her so that anything she says about the VIPs who were once best buds with the rapist will be discounted.

As a ploy, it does work. Make her the villain and the bad smell will go away. There is no love for her in the general public. It will be visual fun to watch her brought to her knees. The authorities will come off like they are doing a heck of a job, having been onlookers so far and we will all move on.

Suffice it to say that Honeypreet Insan is probably hiding because she is afraid for her life. If the government really wants her eyewitness account of things and needs to validly question her, it should make its intentions transparent. Promise her safe conduct, guarantee her security and do not see her as a loose thread.