Bihar IPS officer Vinay Tiwari. (PTI)
Forced into quarantine by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation and with no investigation to conduct, Bihar IPS officer Vinay Tiwari has spent the last five days of self-isolation posting his own poetry on his Facebook and Twitter pages, though his current environs – a police accommodation in Goregaon – have prevented him from composing more.
“The location is very important for me to think, write and record my poetry,” said Tiwari, SP, Patna City (Central). A native of Lalitpur town in Uttar Pradesh, Tiwari had recorded the three poems he posted online this week at the Ranchod Dham Temple on the banks of Betwa river.
In contrast, he said, the officers’ quarters at the Maharashtra State Reserve Police Force campus in Goregaon East are less than ideal conditions for him to compose or even record his poems.
The 2015-batch IPS officer has been confined to his room since he arrived in Mumbai Sunday to head the Bihar Police’s Special Investigation Team probing the death of actor Sushant Singh Rajput.
The BMC only put a home quarantine stamp on his wrist after he reached his accommodation, several hours after leaving the airport — a move Tiwari termed “selective” and which Bihar DGP Gupteshwar Pandey condemned. The other four members of the SIT, who had arrived in Mumbai on July 27, were never contacted by the BMC.
On Thursday, a day after CBI took over the investigation, the four policemen returned to Patna. “I am a government officer and will not violate quarantine rules,” Tiwari said. Grounded, Tiwari has amused his 27,900 followers on Twitter and 20,451 followers on Facebook with videos in which he is reciting his compositions.
He first gained appreciation for his Hindi verses dedicated to workers on Labour Day. He was also invited by Zee News Bihar on May 1 to recite his poem. His poem on the Covid-19 pandemic, which he recorded by the river-side and posted online on July 26, gained him a bigger audience. On June 15, a day after Rajput’s death, Tiwari had posted a four-line tribute titled ‘Gloomy Sunday’.
“I have been writing poetry since 2017 and recording videos since 2019. I only get time once every two to three months to record these videos,” he said.Tiwari has recorded 12 of his 25 poems so far. Each of the three poems he has posted online this week come with a request at the bottom – “All of you are requested to please not comment on the facts related to the investigation. It is not fair or in public interest to do so.”
On Wednesday, as PM Narendra Modi laid the foundation stone of the Ram temple in Ayodhya, Tiwari posted a poem about the life lessons he had gained from the deity. The first of the three poems he tweeted on August 4 has been viewed by more than 11,400 people. “It is good to be appreciated,” he said.
On Thursday, as DGP Pandey urged the BMC to free Tiwari and contemplated moving the Supreme Court against the “illegal detention”, Tiwari posted a poem urging viewers “to light a fire inside and burn in the flames”.
“This is not the reason I had come here. I had come to Mumbai to conduct an investigation,” he said.