A genuine fake Thana that almost got away

Jugaad, like Justice and Dhritarashtra, is blind. So, every time we celebrate DIY ingenuity of the desi kind – which usually involves cutting corners, making do with not just what’s available but making available what can be ‘made done’ without worrying about quality – there is a flip side we tend to forget. Take the case of the police station in Banka, Bihar, which last week was found to be not a police station after all. For eight months, a gang of fraudsters essentially dressed up as police ran a thana from a guest house, in the process extorting money from locals. In fact, it’s a surprise that we have just got to hear about one fake police station in a country where many thanas regularly ‘charge a fee’ for registering FIRs, without anyone finding that odd.

The fact that the fake thana was about 500 m from a real police station makes matters even more tantalising – and, ironically, more believable. The conmen and women wore excellent replicas of Bihar Police uniforms – what in the fashion and luxury industry is called a ‘genuine fake’ – and carried themselves about as the Real McBhais-McBehns. They got busted only when a (real) cop spotted that instead of the standard-issue rifle, two (fake) cops were carrying guns made in local workshops. Well, one lives by jugaad, one gets busted by jugaad – and one gets hoodwinked by jugaad.