1. Publication: Mumbai Mirror ;Date: Jul 11, 2010;Section: The Sunday Read;Page: 10
Telling the bane from the bone
Forensic archeologist Roma Khan's job isn’t only
figuring the crime from the bones she inspects. We
take a closer look at the closures she provides
Anand Holla @timesgroup.com
Many a decade ago, criminologist Dr Edmond Locard, better known as the Sherlock Holmes of
France, propounded the thumb rule of forensic science — every contact leaves a trace. Having
dealt with heaps and piles of bones and body parts extricated from the pits of earth that tell tales
of the dead and those behind it, Ghatkopar-based forensic archaeologist Roma Khan swears by
this dictum and hails it to be the sole motivation for her to keep going even when the road ahead
appears to be bleak.
Being in the business of digging the truth out of a crime scene using techniques those bearded
archeologists from Discovery Channel do, Khan’s routine is far from mundane. The 35-year-old is
currently seeking closure to a December 2009 case in Borivili where a three-year-old Shreya
Rai’s body was found at a construction site. “To me, the evidence indicates this was a case of
child sacrifice,” she tells us, sounding gratified. She has reason to be so, for on Thursday, the
Bombay High Court ordered the senior inspector of the Borivli police to file his report after due
investigation.
Six years ago, Khan wouldn’t have foreseen herself working on the case though. Long after a
graduation from Sophia college with a degree in Life Sciences, it was on a muggy March
afternoon that she was brooding over the formulaic rudimentaries that she without much reflection
had done with. “I had rounded off a checklist of to-dos — engaging in social work, taking time off
for myself, getting married and settling down. I was inching 30 and knew I was missing out on
learning something new. On a whim, I Googled for options after life sciences — and the answer,
as if chosen by destiny popped on my screen. Forensic Sciences it said, with a link to UK’s
esteemed Bournemouth University. That was my moment of clarity.” Khan wrapped up her
twoyear course with a Masters degree in Forensic Archaeology: Crime Scene and International
Investigations, a niche expertise only a handful of Indians have attained. She mastered crime
scene management and forensic archaeology mostly by working on simulated graves and
simulated crime scenes organised by the international official agencies. “Truth and hope more or
less disappears here. Which is when we forensic archaeologists come in. We locate anything that
is buried and forgotten, recover it, identify it and repatriate it,” Khan said, adding, “I believe bones
speak. You just have to keep an ear out for them.”
Her self-assured, breezy persona belies the shrewd detective that she comfortably co-exists
with. Deriving notions of her being the archetypal sleuth as featured in CSI or the homebred CID,
she is subjected to many an assumption. Khan lights up, “When somebody asks me — Beta yeh
sab toh theek hai, par tum kaam kya karti ho? I flash my standard response with a smile — Jee,
main gadey murdey ukhaadti hoon.” Khan’s week-long research on avian scavenging of a buffalo
carcass and its forensic implications, at UP’s Katerniaghat wildlife sanctuary, has been widely
published in Indian and international journals.
In India, Khan believes forensic science is mostly restricted to fingerprint, DNA and ballistic
tests. One of the pioneering fingerprint classification systems, the Henry system, was discovered

2. and developed in India in 1897 at Kolkata’s Fingerprint Bureau by experts Hemchandra Bose and
Azizul Haque. Ironic then that more than a century later, Khan rues over how substantially we are
lagging in research and implementation of forensic techniques. “Forensic archaeology is direly
needed for investigations but few know of its existence. Here, the police get bodies hastily
excavated through labourers. But the process itself is a treasure trove of evidence; from
examining each layer of soil to how the bones are carefully handled while removing to yield
maximum answers to the mystery.”
Amidst counseling harrowed relatives seeking advice on dealing with body remains and
helping out desperate dead-end-hit cops to nail the culprit, Khan often helps achieve both justice
and closure, like in the Borivli case. Following Shreya’s grisly murder, Khan had conducted her
own investigation by visiting the site; her report is a part of the petition before the HC. She
stresses on the closure that a family needs as an aspect as critical as finding the criminal.
“Repatriation provides a muchneeded closure to families. It is the first step to healing.”
Perhaps the shocking travesty of Nithari Killings held the most ideal ground for Khan’s exploits.
“Though not directly, but I had helped the investigators by submitting my research findings to the
scientists who were unknotting the gore that lay buried.” As the CEO of her NGO ‘INSAAF’ or
Investigative Scientific And Anthropological Facility, Khan aspires to build a research
establishment and a body farm so as to assist investigators and provide closure to families of the
dead. For a living, Khan as a senior manager handles the corporate social responsibilities section
at WNS, where she gets to still tap her altruistic side to help the needy. “Earlier, I wanted to do
something for the living; and then something for the dead. Now I do both, as and when it comes.”

3. Learning the trade at a simulation grave
Khan at a sanctuary in Katerniaghat, UP, researching on scavengers of buffaloes