Dieser Beitrag enthält Werbung – advertising.
It was called the Perfect Murder right from the start. First the Bombay papers plastered it all the way across their pages. And then it was taken up by papers all over India.
The Perfect Murder: Police at House.
The Perfect Murder: new Police Moves.
The Perfect Murder: Police baffled.
Every time Inspector Ghote saw the words he felt the sweat spring up all along the top of his shoulders. It was as if every one of India’s four hundred million people were looking at him, challenging him to break it. The Perfect Murder.
Each time he had to pull himself together and remind himself of the cold facts. It was nothing like four hundred million people. Most of them would never hear of the Perfect Muder however many times it made the headlines in Bombay or elsewhere. Many of them were unable to read; some of them had never even heard of Bombay.
But still people kept calling it the Perfect Murder. And, though Inspector Ghote repeated to himself again and again that all that the case required was the proper procedure tireless applied, each time he heard the words the long patch of sweat came up right across his skinny shoulders.
Arun Varde himself had called it the Perfect Murder the night he had sent for the police with such urgency.
‘The Perfect Murder,’ he stormed, ‘and in my house, the house of Lala Arun Varde. It must not be allowerd. It shall not be allowed.’
Inspector Ghote knew what he meant. Arun Varde was a man of immense wealth, a lala, a man with vast influence in the highest quarters. …
The inspector swallowed nervously. He had a feeling that he ought not to let such a person tread all over him, otherwise his chances of ever applying the proper procedure would be slight.
from: The Perfect Murder
An Honest Man
Starting with the first novel at the first chapter … Ghote is amid trouble. There is The Perfect Murder made for headlines and public interest, a topic for endless discussion, propelling Ghote into the centre of attention. On the one hand it’s a case for helping career management … on the other hand there is this business man of immense wealth and influence involved somehow in the case because The Perfect Murder happened in his residency. It is obvious that he isn’t amused which may cause trouble for Ghote when he decides to pull strings on higher police establishment or even at a ministry … (which will happen, of course!).
Ghote lives in Bombay in the 60s during the first novel and so there is the police and the agenda of the police as well as the agendas of superiors at the police administration. There are also various influences outside the police which effect the work of the police especially the duties of an inspector at CID.
All these entanglements are known to Ghote who wants to fulfill his duty absolutely without getting involved in political scheming or bribery affairs. He is honest and he wants … well, there is also his wife and his son he has to care for … so it’s a narrow path, sometimes intertwined which is left for him.
India in the 60s when the series starts is a colorful nation where the rigid caste system is still in full bloom and … rich people are very rich as well as poor people are really poor. There are some Brits having survived the independence troubles leading a more or less comfortable life also handled with kids gloves as it seems. Ghote belongs to a privileged class because he is a member of the police with a respectable house in a special district reserved for administration people – although he is not rich. Nevertheless he is unimpressed by the chance of bribery.
When looking at the cases, mostly murder cases, it’s obvious that Ghote is dealing with complex, intricate cases where all people seem to lie in order to bury any kinds of failures or whatever. At the end there is an evildoer who is unmasked by Ghote and his classic procedure of investigation. It’s this inventory taking, asking any people around, creating jigsaw pieces and merging them, analyzing some evidence with technical means if possible … finally reasoning what has happened and who is responsible.
If Ghote wasn’t active in Bombay and the enigmatic India the cases might also happen in England or Scotland … where aristocracy and nouveau riches as well as servants and working class clash in a mysterious murder case (remember Agatha Christie – in a modern way!). However, we are in India and simply the location presents a background creating an exotic ambiance with its own actors and rules and intricacies giving an inspector a hard time.
The Perfect Murder … I won’t give away the plot, but: the victim is called Mr. Perfect and he isn’t murdered, but during the investigation…