Published: 05 August 2010
by JOSH LOEB

ON the wall of Roy Moxham’s flat in Neal Street near Covent Garden, one picture stands out among the old family photos. 

It shows the author with his arm around a small, smiling woman swathed in textiles. She is Phoolan Devi, Moxham’s friend, the mention of whose name still sparks anger in some parts of India and admiration in others – even now, nine years after her life was ended by an assassin’s bullet.

Popularly known as “The Bandit Queen”, Phoolan fought for the rights of women and the poor during her time as an MP in India’s parliament.

She came from a poor family and her early life informed her politics. As a youngster she was married off to a man in a distant village who beat and abused her – and when she returned to her family, one of her relatives arranged for her to be kidnapped.

For years she marauded the countryside with a gang of bandits – until she was captured by a group of landowners, who confined her to their village, Behmai, and continuously raped her. She escaped and carried out Robin Hood-style raids that earned her folk hero status. The police offered a reward to anyone who could bring her in, dead or alive.

In 1983 she surrendered and was imprisoned for 11 years while she awaited trial. 

A 70-year-old former book conservator at UCL’s Senate House Library, Moxham read about Phoolan in 1992, while she was still in jail. He began a correspondence with her, and after she was released in 1994 she invited him to visit her – which he did every year until her murder.

Outlaw: India’s Bandit Queen and Me is an engrossing book written partly, Moxham says, to put the record straight about the kind of person she was.

Phoolan was killed in 2001 as she got out of her car in front of her New Delhi residence. The trial of her killer has been running for nine years.

“They caught her assassin almost straight away,” says Moxham. “He was reported by Indian newspapers as admitting he did it and saying he was proud to have done it. But here we are in 2010 and we have still not finished the prosecution giving their evidence. This is typical of Indian trials – they make Dickens look like he’s speeding things along.”

The wheels of justice move slowly, but in the arena of politics and social equality at least, Phoolan helped make them move that bit faster.

• Outlaw: India’s Bandit Queen and Me. By Roy Moxham. Rider, £14.99.