No matter how seasoned a professional you are or how objectively you feel you can view content, watching shows or films that involve crimes against children is a deeply unsettling experience, especially for a parent. Stories where children are victims of assault and murder force you to confront your fears of not being able to protect them from the monsters around you. Over the past month, I watched two films and one web series (Sector 36 on Netflix, The Buckingham Murders and Manvat Murders on SonyLIV), that tell horrifying tales of crimes committed against children. What struck me though is that in trying to understand the motive behind such brutality and finding the person or people responsible, a larger and more complex web of problems emerged. While the actual crime is committed by one or two individuals, poverty, patriarchy and people in power abet these horrifying acts of crime.

(Spoilers ahead) In The Buckingham Murders, starring Kareena Kapoor Khan, director Hansal Mehta paints a tragic picture of how being emotionally suffocated for years drives a woman to commit a gruesome crime. The investigationforces the police to confront multiple issues in his home and the immigrant community he was a part of. Sectarian tensions, business struggles, drug addiction within the community and gender discrimination, all have a part to play in a young boy being killed.

Also Read | The Buckingham Murders movie review: No-nonsense Kareena Kapoor Khan revels in her Kate Winslet era, but Hansal Mehta’s film succumbs to obviousness

Individual psychosis and fractured social systems share a symbiotic relationship in both Manvat Murders and Sector 36 as well. Unlike Preeti in The Buckingham Murders, who is reluctant about being a mother, Rukmini (Sonali Kulkarni) in Manvat Murders is so desperate to be a mother that she doesn’t mind killing young children to have a child of her own. Rukmini has had premature menopause, but she refuses to accept that reality, resorting to black magic, witchcraft and dubious rituals to reverse a medical reality. The story is set in rural Maharashtra in the 1970s where poverty, illiteracy, caste divides, financial disparity and blind faith in religious rituals created the perfect breeding ground for exploitation and crime. When a shaman tells Rukmini that her menstrual cycle will resume, provided they kill a prepubescent girl and offer the blood from her private parts to appease an angry spirit, she and her partner Uttamrao get their trusted manservants to murder the first young girl. Over the next 18 months, four young girls, three women and a young boy all lose their lives to the shaman’s fake rituals and the couple’s attempts to derail the police investigation. Such is the abject poverty in the area, that fifteen rupees and a bottle of alcohol is all the hitmen need to murder little children. While it is no justification, the shame and insecurity of not being able to have a child seemingly fracture Rukmini’s mind and leave her incapable of feeling remorse or guilt for her actions.

Also Read | Sector 36: Does Vikrant Massey’s exploitative Netflix movie really expect us to nod in agreement with a serial killer?

Manvat’s Murder’s exploration of larger social evils being the root cause of inhuman crimes against children is a theme echoed by Sector 36 as well. The children who are sexually assaulted and murdered by Prem Singh (Vikrant Massey) in Sector 36 are from the lowest rungs of society. Living in slums occupied by migrant workers, these children and their families are invisible to politicians, police, media and judiciary. Early on in the film, police officer Ram Charan Pandey (Deepak Dobriyal), crushes a cockroach at the police station under his boot and callously says that no matter how hard an insect tries, being squashed by a boot is its destiny. His words take on a horrifying meaning at the climax of the film when Prem confesses his crimes and compares the children he has murdered to insects. He tells Ram that if a few kids living under bridges and in shanties go missing, it doesn’t make a difference to anyone. Prem sounds cruel and insane, but as Ram shockingly realises, his attitude as a police officer has been just as callous for years. Though the police station has multiple posters of missing children, to him, they have never mattered or been worth saving. His negligence and that of the police force, have allowed a man like Prem to claim almost 24 innocent lives in the most horrifying manner.

What makes these stories even harder to stomach is that both Sector 36 and Manvat Murders are based on real-life crimes where multiple children lost their lives. Though both the films and the web series play out in large parts as police procedurals, they are essentially horror stories where the most vulnerable members of our society are preyed on by those who are meant to protect them. The sad truth is that children are always at the mercy of the adults around them. Watching Sector 36, Manvat Murders and The Buckingham Murders makes you realise how dangerous it is to bring children into the world if you aren’t physically well, financially capable and emotionally stable enough to look after them. They shouldn’t have to live in dysfunctional homes, suffer economic deprivation or be exposed to real-world monsters who are far more dangerous than the imaginary ones under their beds.

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