NEW DELHI: “Mahatma Gandhi mein aag lag rahi hai bhai” (Mahatma Gandhi is on fire) – the frantic shouting of a fireman captured on video has become the focus of an investigation into the fire that broke out at Justice Yashwant Varma’s residence in the capital last year.At around 11:35 pm on March 14, police and fire personnel rushed to 30 Tughlaq Crescent (Varma’s residence) in central Delhi.
Two fire engines were dispatched to the scene and, together with police, the flames in the storage room were extinguished within 15 minutes. That should have been the end of the emergency response, but as first responders walked through a thin layer of smoke they were in for a surprise – a stack of partially burnt high-denomination Indian currency notes lay in the storeroom.The quote in the video, a direct reference to Gandhi’s image on the burned 500-rupee note, turned what started as an emergency call into a scandal that reached the highest echelons of the judiciary and branded a young police officer a “whistleblower” because he quickly realized the seriousness of what was happening to his men and alerted his superiors because he showed composure.Delhi Police Commissioner Sanjay Arora informed Delhi High Court Chief Justice DK Upadhaya about the incident at noon on March 15 when Justice Varma cut short his trip to the Satpura Tiger Reserve in Madhya Pradesh and returned to the capital.An official report has been sent to the Union Home Ministry, based on a WhatsApp video of the debris filled with cash.
