Murder in Bollywood by Shadaab Amjad Khan

everyone around the commissioner turned uncomfortable because of his boorishness, Hoshiyar remained unmoved, for he was too busy examining the body to pay attention to anything else, after which he walked out of the bathroom and began examining the bedroom and walk-in closet in great detail.
    ‘Arre o, Mister! What are you doing looking around the bedroom for? The body is here, not over there,’ Ghankar called out.
    ‘Just making sure we haven’t overlooked anything,’ Hoshiyar calmly replied as he continued with what he was doing.
    ‘Explain to your officer, Meeta, that when the accident happened in the bathroom, there is no need to look anywhere else. And it is undoubtedly an accident, because when it happened last night between one and three o’clock, Tiwari was all alone at home, the servants had left for the day and the house was locked from the inside. We even questioned the bungalow’s nightwatchman, who said that Tiwari returned home at around one, parked his car in the driveway and went straight into the house. Nobody came to meet him that night and there were no suspicious persons lurking about the neighbourhood either. Now, I know that Hoshiyar Khan is your most brilliant officer, who has solved many difficult cases,
lekin hum ne bhi kachchi goliyan nahin kheli hain
.’ Ghankar smirked, driving home his point.
    ‘I think you are brilliant, Commissioner saheb, and you’ve solved this case expertly,’ Hoshiyar spoke just then. ‘But since Mr Tiwari’s employers, Nikhil and Mallika Kapoor, were also killed in accidents, the press might consider this too much of a coincidence and accuse us of sloppy investigation, or maybe even a cover-up. So, if you permit it, Commissioner saheb, I’d like us to investigate Mr Tiwari’s death for about a week or so, just to make sure that we have tied up all the loose ends. The press then cannot undo the great work you, Commissioner saheb, have done on this case,’ Hoshiyar told Ghankar, who was visibly flattered by those word of praise.
    ‘You know, Meeta, I like the way your officer thinks. He reminds me a lot of myself, when I was a brilliant young inspector, making my way to the top. That’s why I have decided to give your squad one week to investigate this obvious accident and wrap it up nice and neat,’ Ghankar replied magnanimously, then looked at his watch and said, ‘And now, I must be running along, as I have to join the honourable mayor saheb’s son-in-law in a game of golf. I trust you and your Special Case Squad can handle this matter from here on, since I have already done all the work.’
    With these words directed at Meeta, Commissioner Ghankar turned around and left the room, followed by his posse of policemen, leaving behind the body of the deceased and a handful of officers from the SCS to do as they pleased.
    ‘Do you mind telling me what that was all about?’ Meeta turned to Hoshiyar and asked.
    ‘It’s fairly obvious that Mr Tiwari is a victim of foul play. But if I had pointed this out to the commissioner in front of everybody, it would have hurt his ego and he might have taken us off the case. That’s why I praised him for his bogus accident theory. It bought us one full week to investigate,’ Hoshiyar explained.
    ‘And how can you be so sure that this man was murdered?’ Meeta asked.
    ‘Take a look at the back of his neck,’ Hoshiyar said, turning the body over and bringing to Meeta’s attention a couple of dark bruises that were no more than an inch long, running parallel to each other a few inches apart, just a little below the base of the skull. ‘When a stun gun is held against a man’s skin and more than eighty thousand volts of electricity is passed through his body, such burn marks are common. I reckon, someone who followed Mr Tiwari from where he was last night sneaked into his home, rendered him unconscious with a stun gun, then put him in a bathrobe and dragged him over to the bathtub where he or she banged his head