BENGALURU: The Nanavati murder case had the country’s attention with stories of honour, love and lust rocking headline in a trial that was distorted by media and political interference.In her new book In Hot Blood, Bachi Karkaria aims with her research to breathe new life into the drama that unfolded when dashing naval officer Commander Kawas Nanavati shot dead his English wife Sylvia’s lover businessman Prem Ahuja.City Express caught up with the author at the launch of her book at SodaBottleOpenerWala recently.
What kind of research went into writing the book?
A great deal, as I hope is evident. I needed to first understand, and then present two broad narratives. One, the legal heft of a case which began in mundane adultery but turned into a landmark chapter in Indian jurisprudence - and needed the intervention of Prime Minister Nehru. Two, the human quotient which gave the Nanavati saga such a permanent niche in our collective imagination. So, I mined the archives of the tabloids, magazines and English dailies, all of which also helped reconstruct the social setting and brought alive the pleasure dome that Bombay was.
I researched the very different milieus of the two communities bound unhappily in this case: the Parsis, with staggering economic, cultural , legal and political influence, and the arriviste Sindhis still struggling to rebuild their Partition-seared lives. Then there was the Navy, its hothouse British traditions and Commander Nanavati’s promising career, which also gave him such an inflated sense of entitlement. But most of all, the book depended on the warm-blooded interviews. With legal luminaries, yes.
But the real challenge, and adrenalin charge came from tracking down every one possible with any connection with the dramatis personae still with a reliable memory and willing to let a stranger in beyond the wall of privacy raised by the Nanavatis after they emigrated to Canada, post his pardon in 1964. Then this vast and dense material had to be translated into readable prose. No less a constitutional eminence than Fali Nariman has called the book ‘unputdownable’.
The book traces the journey of what was possibly modern India’s first trial by media. ‘Trial by media’ is now a common terminology. How does one combat such journalism?
It’s a lost battle. Sensationalism feeds the beast of 24x7 media, especially television, and seems impossible to tame. But, the Nanavati case was quite the opposite of what defines ‘trial by media’ as we know it. There the accused wasn’t savaged; he was turned into a larger than life hero. And, Prem Ahuja. the victim was totally demonized. Sylvia was projected as the helpless woman drawn into his sinister manipulations. The judgments pronounced quite a different verdict, and my book dismantles all those cliches of that enduring urban legend.
Blitz used headlines and visuals to captivate and sway readers in the case. Would you call them the pioneers of click bait journalism in India?
Yes, absolutely. It would have also gone ‘viral’ on social media
One detail about the Nanavati murder case was capitalised upon even by street vendors. ‘Ahuja ka towliya. Marenga toh bhi nahin girenga! was a tag line to sell towels. Why do you think the case connected with the public so much back then?
Yes, the ‘Nanavati ka pistol’ and the ‘Ahuja ka towliya’ being flogged on Bombay pavements was perhaps the first instance of ‘merchandising’ an event. Hawkers always have their ear to the ground and their eye on the main chance. And this was a clear indication of how firmly the case had grabbed public attention. No surprise in that. It was independent India’s first upper class crime of passion. It had a riveting cast.
The tragic, and cuckolded naval officer, Commander Kawas Nanavati, who always appeared in court in his dazzling white uniform, medals glinting and with a roaring naval escort; Sylvia, the repentant wife who happened to be a beautiful English memsaheb; Prem Ahuja, her slain Sindhi businessman lover who was adroitly turned into an irredeemable villain by the defence team led by Karl Khandalavala, himself a flamboyant Renaissance man as steeped in art as in law, and masterfully eloquent on both. The tabloid Blitz pumped up the case and the hype on the street. Then there was the context. The Bombay of 1959-’61, then even more than now the epitome of glamour. It intensified the titillation of an India straitjacketed in socialism.
If the case had unfolded today, how differently do you see it play out?
Today, we have a more cynical, less exalted attitude to established hierarchies. The way-out- of-line privileges extended to an accused would be seriously questioned. Nanavati remained in easier naval custody right up to the dismissal of his appeal even though it was a totally civil crime; the Governor suspended the life sentence handed by the Bombay High Court in 1961; and he was pardoned in 1964, when he was sequestered on parole in a bungalow in salubrious Lonavala. But the influential still use every ploy to subvert the system.
As the book points out, some headlines would scream ‘Is a man who cracked under domestic pressure fit to defend the country?’ But even today an otherwise upright defence officer serving the country would win hands down against a rich, playboy businessman with no patriotism on his sleeve. We’re still suckers for image.