NEW DELHI: “Mahatma Gandhi mein aag lag rahi hai bhai” (Mahatma Gandhi is catching fire) – the frantic exclamation of a fireman, captured on video, became the focal point of a probe into the fire that broke out at the official bungalow of Justice Yashwant Varma in the capital last year. It was around 11.35pm on March 14 that police and fire personnel had rushed to 30 Tughlak Crescent (Varma’s residence) in central Delhi. Two fire tenders were sent to the spot, and these, along with police personnel, doused the flames in a storeroom within 15 minutes. It was supposed to be the end of an emergency response, but as first responders walked through a thin veil of smoke, they were left startled – lying in the storeroom, among other things, were wads of partially burnt high-denomination Indian currency notes. The remark caught on video – a direct reference to the image of Gandhi on burnt Rs 500 notes – turned what was just an emergency call into a scandal that reached the highest levels of the judiciary, besides putting on a young officer – who swiftly sensed the gravity of what his men had chanced upon and alerted his seniors – the label of a “whistleblower” just because of the presence of mind he showed. By March 15 noon, as Justice Varma was returning to the capital, cutting short his trip to the Satpura Tiger Reserve in Madhya Pradesh, Delhi police commissioner Sanjay Arora was already briefing Delhi high court Chief Justice DK Upadhaya about the incident. A formal report, backed by incriminating WhatsApp videos of the cash-filled debris, had been sent to the Union home ministry.
