Punk Band Gets Wrongly Arrested

by KASHISH DAS SHERSTHA

FROM ISSUE # 112 (April 2005) | IN THIS ISSUE
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Sushil has been warned about his goatee beard.

Kathmandu based punk band Inside 2 Stoopid Triangles were arrested on Thursday evening, 24 March from their practise room and kept in the slammer for an entire night— for no official or legal offence.

Inside 2 Stoopid Triangles, currently working on recording their new album, had been regularly practising at their drummer Anil's home in Pako, New Road for a month. On 24 March, at around 6:30PM, the band's practise was interrupted by a knock on the door. Two policemen, one in uniform and the other in civil, entered the practice room and told the band that they would like to talk to them at the Janasewa Police Station in the Bishal Bazaar Complex premises. Upon reaching the station, instead of "talking" as the officers had first said, the band, along with two friends were locked up.

The police told the boys that the state owned Gorkhapatra press nearby had logged a complaint about the noise level. The band has been practising in this location for 1.5 years. And it was after the neighbouring bank complained about the volume that the band started practising strictly after 5 PM, so as to not disturb offices in the area. In any case, any law expert will agree that noise level isn't something to get arrested about, especially without even a first warning. Leave alone arrest, the band was in this case held in custody over night.

Vishal has been warned about his Mohawk.

In the Janasewa Police Station, the band and its friends were locked up in a room with almost 18 other people, although it seemed to have been designed to accommodate only about 12 people. The cell was also infested with insects and everyone had to use this room to sleep in as well as urinate.

There, the officer in charge went on to give the innocent civilians a lecture on the situation of the country and how it is wrong to be involved in a band or have any sort of fashion statement. "They don't realise how important it is for the youth to find something worthwhile to do. It's better to make some harmless noise than get into crime, do drugs and rot away in some corner," Vishal, the band's front man and WAVE's editorial staff says.

Many of the people in prison on Thursday night were arrested for either having long hair or being with people who had long hair. "They kept on picking up people randomly until the van was full," one of them confessed to the band. An innocent "madhesi" who had come out to buy kerosene and was carrying a jerry can was also arrested.

Anil, from whose house the band was wrongly arrested.

It is ironic that the police officer managed to give speeches about things he thought were right when members of his force wrongly arrested innocent people and kept them in custody over night, just 'because they could.'

The band members and their friends were freed on Friday, 25 March, at 11AM, only after their guardians came to demand their release. The police warned Vishal that if he did not cut his hair and if Sushil, the bassist, did not cut his long goatee beard, they would be arrested and held in custody again.

Holding somebody innocent in custody over night[s] is not a joke or a favour that officers may perform for others or themselves. While this seems like a simple case to many, even funny or amusing to some, it must be realised that it is this sort of behaviour–ignorant, arrogant and abusive of their authority–by police officers that creates general distrust towards the very institution which is supposed to be responsible for the safety and protection of the public and uphold the law.