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'Kiran Bedi speaking...'

Playing Kiran Bedi, former supercop, is a dangerous game. As Manjit Kaur, aka Bholi (simple), found out the hard way.

Our heroine, a telephone operator in Hoshiarpur, Punjab, decided the best way to help a friend, a head constable who had been transferred out, was to impersonate Bedi. She picked up the phone, dialled Senior Superintendent of Police R P Mittal and, introducing herself as 'Delhi DGP Kiran', asked him to cancel the transfer order.

The SSP feigned ignorance and told her he would look into the matter. And may he have her number so that he could call her right back?

Simple in name she may be, but Bholi wasn't thatsimple. She hung up. But not before the SSP could get a 'fix' on her number.

Mittal said something was amiss from the very beginning of Bholi's conversation: ''The way she talked didn't sound like a police officer, leave alone the fact that Delhi does not have a DGP,'' he said.

Bholi, a resident of Dasuya town, it now appears, used to frequent the police station, posing as a relative of the famous IPS officer and Magsaysay Award winner.

UNI

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