Bihar IPS officer investigating SSR case: I enjoyed the quarantine

Vinay Tiwari has been writing since 2008. He started with short stories and eventually moved to poetry

It's often believed that creative ideas come to you when you are unprepared. Let's say while you are zoning out in the shower or working up a sweat on the treadmill. Which is why Bihar IPS officer Vinay Tiwari makes it a point to keep his phone handy. "Sometimes, when you get that sudden surge of inspiration, you need to jot it down because thoughts easily slip through the cracks of memory." His digital notepad is full of hurriedly typed, "random" thoughts.

Earlier this month, the police officer got an unexpected chance to sit back and revisit these musings. On August 2, he arrived in Mumbai to probe the case of Bollywood actor Sushant Singh Rajput's alleged suicide as head of the Bihar Police's Special Investigation Team after the actor's father registered an FIR in Patna. But Tiwari was forced into quarantine by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation in accordance with the guidelines that govern travellers arriving into the city. In response, the Bihar Police wrote to the BMC arguing that Tiwari should be exempt from home quarantine to facilitate his return to his home state to resume duty. After much controversy in the press, and the CBI taking over the investigation on August 7, Tiwari and his team of four policemen returned to Patna.

Back home, he seems unfazed by the ruckus. "To be honest, I enjoyed that phase [quarantine]. I could speak to my family, listen to music on my phone and focus on writing," he says in a telephonic interview. In fact, Tiwari admits to have been most productive while he was lodged at the officers' quarters at the Maharashtra State Reserve Police Force campus in Goregaon East. Videos of him reciting self-composed poems on social media have garnered recent attention. In a video posted on August , Tiwari is seen reciting a poem about Lord Ram, whose journey he says, is not just characterised by his war with Ravana, but is also an invaluable lesson on what it means to be a king. The post had received 7.9k likes, 305 shares and 481 reactions. Tiwari has 41,100 followers on Twitter and 39,449 on Facebook, a fanbase that he says has grown organically. "The feedback has been encouraging. Some, however, think that my Hindi is a bit too shuddh for public consumption. But, if I tweak it, the verse will lose its essence."

The 2015-batch IPS officer is a native of Lalitpur in Uttar Pradesh, but has lived across the state as a student and later as a young officer. "I've been writing since 2008. While studying engineering at IIT (BHU) Varanasi, I wrote for myself, but later when I got into the police service, I began writing occasional columns for local dailies." Although there are no writers in his family, Tiwari says his father encouraged him to explore his interests. He started out with short stories, many of which he misplaced along the way. "Sadly, I never bothered to collect or file them. But when I would read them out to friends, they would egg me on. In fact, I began filing these videos because one of them felt I had a natural intonation and style of delivery." One of his most memorable published articles is about how rivers, including Betwa and Ganga, have shaped his life. Poetry, he says, is the creative crutch to cope with a demanding profession. "It may not be apparent, but whatever you learn, always comes handy. For instance, what I learnt in math class as a student is now helping me in case analysis. Equations and statistics are being used progressively in law enforcement agencies." Similarly, dabbling in verse has enabled him to "read people's emotions". "I'd call it emotional intelligence. As a police officer, I need to be able to read the vibe of an individual, because my profession is all about people management, controlling frustrations and reducing crime."

But, he ensures that the intersectionality does not seep into social media. Under his poems, he writes, "All of you are requested to please not comment on the facts related to the investigation [Rajput's]. It is not fair or in public interest to do so." Tiwari says he doesn't want to give fodder to "media investigations". "There may be just one or two instances, where I've posted something about a solved case on social media. In retrospect, I think it's wise not to. After all, I am only doing my job."

Thirty minutes have gone by and Tiwari thinks it's one of the longest interviews he has given. He laughs, "When it comes to writing and poetry, it's hard for me to stop talking."

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