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Abstract
Nigel Akkara is a businessman and actor in Kolkata, India. But as a teenager he went astray reaching the abyss of crime and then underwent an extra-ordinary transformation. He was arrested in 2000 and charged with crimes ranging from murder, extortion, and kidnapping. While confined at the Presidency Correctional Home in Kolkata, India, he redefined his life with a positive goal and vision through culture therapy under the tutelage of noted Indian classical dancer Ms. Alokananda Roy. The present article aims to analyze the socio-criminological factors that lead him to deviate from the conventional path. The article is based on both primary and secondary data.
Keywords
Underworld, Gangster, Culture Therapy.
Abbreviations
B.Ed. : Bachelor of Education
IPS : Indian Police Service
TADA : Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act.
Introduction
The underworld, like the undergarment, is hidden, but stinks when brought out in the open. The performance of criminals in underworld are both revolting and riveting. While their acts provoke extreme feelings of hostility and horror among all of us, we are at the same time invariably drawn to the representation of the same acts in the media and the arts-the blow-by-blow account of their murderous operations in press reports, the extravagant fictionalization of their actions in thrillers and detective fiction, the graphic re-enactment of their gory deeds in films and other forms of entertainment. It is these which make the stuff of newspaper scoops, best sellers, and box office hits in the movie world. We derive a vicarious excitement from their consumption in the cloister of our safe homes or theater halls. What makes crime occupy this peculiar space in the public mind, where both revulsion and fascination co-exist? It may have its origin in our collective sub-conscious of childhood memories which were nurtured by fairytales about demonical witches and sorcerers, ghost stories of spooks and ghouls, myths about rakshasas and asuras (demons)- who were depicted as both evil and mighty, who roused fears but also some sort of awe-inspiring respect for their magical powers. We have inherited from our collective childhood this legacy of engrossment with the mysterious spheres of evil and have sub-consciously passed it on to our adulthood, where it has taken the form of morbid obsession with...