(IN): Best friend, on robber-infested highways, too

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Best friend, on robber-infested highways, too

G.C. SHEKHAR *

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1090810/jsp/nation/story_11341838.jsp***

 

*Chennai, Aug. 9: *When you are 78, have enemies eyeing a prime property and

are driving alone on a dark highway, you better have a loaded pistol for

protection. Or a pair of devoted dogs.

 

A septuagenarian lawyer’s German Shepherd and mongrel barked furiously to

scare away attackers who waylaid him as he drove home to Chennai on July 8,

causing one of their vehicles to careen off the highway and the other to

back off.

 

W.S. Seetharaman was coming from Kodaikanal when the attackers, travelling

in two mini-trucks, chased and caught up with his Maruti Alto near Dindigul,

around 420km from Chennai.

 

“Suddenly, the two big vehicles sandwiched my car and menacing-looking men

were angrily gesticulating at me. For a moment, I thought I had caused an

accident but when I lowered my window, one of the guys, brandishing a

sickle, ordered me to stop. I suspected highway dacoity,” said Seetharaman,

78.

 

Still sprightly for his age, the lawyer, once a junior to A.K. Sen, law

minister in the Indira Gandhi cabinet in the late 1960s, said one of the men

grabbed his rear-view mirror while another tried to prise open the rear door

with a sickle.

 

“Then, for a moment, as the two vehicles slid back a little, I lowered the

rear windows. I shouted ‘busko’, a code for my two dogs to attack.

Immediately, they leaned out of the window and started barking furiously,”

he recalled.

 

The attackers were taken by surprise by the sight of the two dogs snarling

at them. “The driver of the vehicle on the left lost control and went off

the highway. The other vehicle kept banging into the side of my car but the

relentless barking forced it to back off as well,” said Seetharaman, who was

alone because a junior colleague who normally accompanies him to Kodaikanal

couldn’t come this time.

 

Out of danger, the lawyer accelerated, stopping only two hours later to take

a break. There, he hugged his pets, mongrel Picasso and German Shepherd

Carmen Miranda, both 5 years old.

 

The lawyer, who lives alone in Chennai, said the attackers could have been

engaged by a group of people trying to usurp a Kodaikanal bungalow he

jointly holds with his sisters-in-law.

 

“They had tried to foist a false case earlier. It is possible they decided

to threaten me physically,” he said. His car still bears the marks of that

night attack.

 

Dindigul police chief K. Chinnasamy sent a sub- inspector to Chennai to take

a complaint from Seetharaman.

 

“Since I had fleetingly seen a signboard that read Vadamadurai, I told the

police that the attack occurred somewhere in that vicinity,” he said.

 

“We are investigating the incident and also looking at the possible property

angle,” the SP said.

 

Asked if it was not risky to drive alone at his age, Seetharaman laughed,

saying he had always been a sportsperson and played polo regularly. “Even

now, I swim at least thrice a week.”

 

But some of the confidence also comes from the pets, he said, proudly

pointing to his furry companions.

 

 

 

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