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NEW DELHI - Like any young groom, Ajay Mann was looking forward to his wedding. But the night before the nuptials he was shot dead, another victim in a spate of bizarre and random killings that has sent the murder rate in India's capital spiralling at a disturbing
rate.
Mann, 22, had thrown a party on the eve of the big day at a north New Delhi hotel. It was in full swing when two of his friends stepped up to the DJ booth and demanded he play their choice of music.
When he refused, the pair left, only to return a couple of hours later to shoot him dead.
Mann's murder was one of 518 in the city last year - up 11 per cent from 467 the year before. Police say most of the killings took place for "absolutely ridiculous" reasons.
The authorities have not offered an explanation for the sharp rise, but psychologists believe it stems from the stresses and strains of living in one of the world's largest and most chaotic cities, where tens of thousands of migrants have arrived seeking to profit from India's economic boom.
In the space of one year, a boy was battered to death with his own cricket bat because he would not admit he had been bowled out; a man was beaten to death with iron rods for complaining about the goat his neighbours had tethered outside his house; and a chef was fatally stabbed for refusing to serve poppadoms to diners in his restaurant.
Dr Rajat Mitra, a clinical psychologist who has worked with the police in New Delhi, said some people simply did not know how to behave in a city.
"Compared with Western society, India is still very tribal. We don't hold back our emotions and we escalate very fast," he said.
"In the village you are supposed to go to the elders to resolve a dispute, but you don't have a system like that in the city.
"What you do instead is resolve it on your own. You are carrying a village mentality into the cities and there is no introduction to people to how to live in a city."
Mitra said the problem was magnified because Indians did not trust the police to settle disputes.
It seems that the more trivial the dispute, the more likely it was to end in violence.
Police commissioner Y.S. Dadwal said more people were killed in minor squabbles than died as a result of planned crimes. The list included a man who killed his sister-in-law for not washing his clothes; a security guard who murdered a colleague for failing to turn up on time to take over from him; and the owner of a roadside food stall who was murdered by a customer for accidentally splashing water on his clothes.
"Most of those who committed the crime had neither a criminal motive nor were criminals. They happened due to absolutely ridiculous reasons."
Psychologists believe it is all a result of people struggling to cope with the rapid transition from life in a traditional agrarian society to a high-pressure urban lifestyle.
New Delhi's murder rate comfortably outstrips that of London, where there were 167 murders last year in a population of 7.5 million, a rate of one in 44,910 people. In New Delhi, with a population of about 14 million, the rate was one in 27,027.
Delhi police claimed an 82 per cent clear-up rate for murders last year, but the most notorious murder remained unsolved.
In May Aarushi Talwar, 14, was found dead in her bedroom, her throat cut. Police pointed the finger at a missing servant, only to discover his body also in the house.
The girl's father, Rajesh Talwar, a dentist, was then arrested and injected with a "truth serum" in the hope of getting him to confess. When this failed, he was released. Police have identified three suspects, but eight months on are no closer to filing charges.
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