He muttered, ‘Ok, the next time you meet Razak tell him that I said hello.’
I looked at him quizzically.
‘I know that Karachi and Bengaluru are in different countries, but the world is round. And take my word—Razak will definitely be back in America after living in Pakistan for a couple of years.’
I came back home. I thought it may well be impossible for me to understand if this man was an innocent Midwesterner or a shrewd guy beyond my intuition.
A week after Razak and Zeba’s departure to Karachi, Radhika had said that she will be moving out of the house. I did not ask her the reason. She had firmly believed that had I spoken to the hospital’s executives or had I put in some extra effort, I could have saved Zeba from all these troubles. In fact, she had openly said that my irresponsibility had led to Razak and Zeba’s departure.
Barely two weeks after Radhika moved to her new house, Saanvi also arrived in Amoka and settled down with her. I assumed that she, being alone in her new house, had called Saanvi over to stay with her for some time. When Saanvi showed no signs of leaving Amoka even after two months, I suspected something was brewing, but I could not guess what it was.
21. Asset Recruitment
It was a beautiful August afternoon. Habiba Ahmed was working in her farm. Her farm is located about eight miles from Amoka, off Highway 35. This year she had a rich harvest of organic tomatoes, potatoes, watermelons, kale, corn and other vegetables. In a farm full of shoulder length corn plants, she was walking slowly in a pair of ill-fitting sneakers. She must be about four feet six inches tall. Her husband, Aden Ahmed, worked in one of Amoka’s local mills. She was pregnant with her seventh baby and was due for delivery any day. The Hijab on her head was wet with her sweat from the afternoon heat. Holding four bunches of carrots and corn in her hand she was walking towards the fence.
Radhika, Saanvi and another pregnant Sanghaali woman, whom I had never seen before, were waiting there in front of the farm for Habiba’s arrival. I was torn between feeling sorry and being scared for these two Sanghaali pregnant women struggling to walk in the punishing sun. Srikantha and I sat in my car parked about thirty feet away. We were cautioned by Radhika not to let Habiba see us. Srikantha was watching all the activities unfolding before us through his binoculars.
Citizens providing their country’s secrets to the CIA are referred to as ‘assets’. Our work on that day looked like a clandestine operation of a CIA asset recruitment. When I asked Srikantha for more information on what was going on and why we were there, he hushed me, held his finger against his lips and shrugged his shoulders.
Habiba farmed in that place for at least ten years. Apparently, all of Habiba’s resources—the place, the seeds, the water supply, the equipment and an old Ford Van—came from an NGO working for the resettlement of Sanghaali refugees. These vegetables found their way to organic food stores and restaurants in Amoka and small towns around. In the restaurants, the same vegetables were chopped, mixed with cooked quinoa and sold as home-grown organic salads!
‘Shall we leave?’ Radhika asked Habiba.
Habiba was fairly conversant in English. ‘I’ve to deliver some vegetables to the Caleb’s wholefood store and restaurant. Is it alright if we talk there?’
Radhika said, ‘Sure.’
Caleb’s is Amoka’s only organic grocery store and restaurant. Habiba was driving her Ford truck very slowly. I got a message on my mobile from Radhika asking us to join them. Srikantha and I reached there well ahead of them and parked our car about eighty feet from the store, as instructed. We went in, ordered sweet lime juice, and settled down at a corner table. There was a sign in front of Caleb’s, proudly proclaiming that they only used locally grown vegetables. Even amid that tension, Srikantha being Srikantha, couldn’t help asking the restaurant owner why the sign did not emphasize the word ‘Sanghaali’, when majority of the local farms belonged to Sanghaalis. ‘We could get in trouble with the law if we tried to do something like that. The vegetables are sourced from different farms. And these farm owners are from different countries like Guatemala, Haiti, Mexico, Ecuador and many more. Yes, there are more Sanghaalis than the rest of them, but, it is practically impossible to tag these vegetables as coming from whom and where.’
Fifteen minutes had passed and there was no sign of Radhika, Saanvi, Habiba and the anonymous Sanghaali woman. Srikantha messaged Radhika to check where they were. The dots on Srikantha’s phone started to dance. Radhika was typing her reply. She took a long time and her message came back after about five minutes with a smiley emoji. ‘It looks like our job got easier than we expected. Habiba’s husband Aden has gone to Sanghaala a couple of months back to visit his family. After we first spoke to Habiba, she too had tried to contact Aden but with no luck. There was no news from the other side. It looks like he may not come back soon.’
Srikantha and I looked at each other. He messaged his reply with a dumb emoji, ‘Meaning?’
‘I don’t know. I don’t want to know.’
Srikantha messaged back: ‘Is Aden going to be a problem?’
‘Going forward, Aden may not be a problem for anybody. I believe he has a second family in Sanghaala. Habiba is not being completely upfront.’
As the message flashed to life, Habiba, along with Radhika, Saanvi and the other Sanghaali woman, walked into the store. I did not know the name of the other woman. Possibly Srikantha did not know it either. It was apparent she was close to full term. She wore a hijab too, but unlike Habiba’s, it was not soaked in sweat. Her face that had seen regular facials, glowed with thick makeup. A waitress at the restaurant looked at Habiba and asked, ‘When are you due?’
Habiba responded, ‘It’s due now. It can happen anytime. Can I get a cup of water?’
‘We have bottled water here. Three dollars per bottle.’
Habiba turned around not wanting to part with three dollars for a bottle of water. It was not clear what ran through the waitress’ mind. She fetched a cup of iced water and gave it to Habiba and said, ‘Is it a baby boy or girl?’
Habiba did not respond. The waitress looked at the other pregnant Sanghaali woman and laughed, ‘Oh, double trouble! Two Sanghaali pregnant women in the store.’ The Sanghaali woman wearing the makeup reacted, ‘Why don’t you leave us alone!’ She had a perfect American accent.
The chastised waitress scooted from there. It was a small restaurant. Ever since Habiba and her entourage walked in, half the patrons stopped talking and were staring at these four women. After the outburst of the other Sanghaali woman with the thick makeup, the tapping sounds of the cutlery—the cling-clang of the forks and spoons—came to an immediate stop. The untouched salad plates and the glasses of kale juice stayed on the tables. Srikantha and I could clearly see the waitress say ‘What the fuck’ by reading her lip movement. I hoped that this was not visible from Radhika’s table.
Someone muttered, ‘How did these people end up here? Who gave them the permission to come to Amoka?’ It was loud enough to be heard by others. Or maybe it was intended to be so. Then the woman with the heavy make-up got up and addressed everyone. ‘I was raised here. I was in the Amoka High School band. This dress came in the way of my pursuing activities like cheerleading and dancing.’ And she laughed loudly so everyone could hear.
Silence settled in again. I messaged Radhika: ‘Shall we leave? Let us not create a big scene here.’
She didn’t reply. They were whispering among themselves.
I sent her another message. ‘What’s her name?’
She replied, ‘I’ll tell you later.’
‘Let us get out of here as soon as possible.’ I messaged her again.
Radhika responded with another message. ‘Amina was supposed to come. She did not make it.’
It was not clear if she was ignoring my message or if this was an answer to my message.
Later, Saanvi took out a form from her backpack and both the pregnant Sanghaali women signed the form at all the places that Saanvi
seemed to indicate. Radhika looked at us and gestured with both thumbs up, implying that the job was accomplished. Radhika had not shared the other Sanghaali girl’s name yet. When I checked with Srikantha, he dodged the question and suggested that we talk later. Everything happened in a feverish surreal manner.
Ever since Razak left, Saanvi had moved to Amoka and started living with Radhika. They would eat their lunch in the hospital cafeteria together. When I checked with her a couple of times, Saanvi had evasively replied that she was too bored to cook and was taking a break. She had given some flippant answers when I asked her if she had left New York for good, what was she doing at Amoka or what was going on with her store. She would say things like Kristina was looking after the store, since Radhika felt lonely and asked to join her, she had come to Amoka. Upon my asking her if they had made any plans for the Live Cesarean section, she had given a vague answer. ‘You are the boss. Can we do anything without keeping you in the loop?’
I was convinced that something was afoot but had no knowledge of any details. I was the blind man from the parable here, feeling the elephant. Amina’s visit had engendered a great deal of optimism in Radhika. It had made her aware that what she had dismissed as impossible was quite feasible. The series of events—Amina’s willingness to get the Cesarean section done, her brother breaking down with the mortal fear of the consequences had she had the Cesarean section—had substantially reinforced Radhika’s conviction that these Sanghaalis were victims of coercion and emotional blackmail.
The previous week Rick Jackson had called for another meeting. It was in that meeting that Rick had spoken about the live Cesarean section for the first time since Razak’s departure. He had exhorted that this live Cesarean section initiative was still very much in play and needed to be executed soon. I had asked Radhika, that with Zeba no longer here, who would she be doing the Cesarean section on? She had told me, ‘Next week, why don’t you and Srikantha come with us? There’s one woman already willing to get it done. With luck we might get another one along with her.’ Looking at all these developments of Radhika moving into her new home and Saanvi living with her in Amoka, it became apparent that Rick and Powell, along with Radhika and Saanvi, were planning something big.
These were the details that I could uncover: two friends of Amina were due for delivery the following month. Those two were none other than Habiba and the other woman who had sat with Radhika and Saanvi at Caleb’s. They were not sure if Habiba had agreed one hundred per cent for the surgery and hence the ‘asset recruitment’. They had invited Srikantha and me for assistance.
Once I became aware of all the details, it was apparent to me that Rick and the hospital management had kept me out of these developments on purpose. I thought of asking Rick or Radhika about it. Then I realized that it was not my domain of expertise. My role as chief of medical staff was to sign and approve the decisions made by all the ‘higher-ups’. Nobody was answerable to me and my opinions didn’t matter. The job was a sinecure and it felt like a spineless title with neither any authority nor much influence worth writing home about!
Regardless of what other people thought of me, I had tried to dig a little deeper and asked Radhika if she could provide additional information. She had replied, ‘I’ve told you everything I know. Trust me, I’m also not privy to all the details. It is true that we had invited only a few for preliminary meetings in view of patient privacy. I too do not know much. I was present in only one meeting to introduce Amina to the hospital board. Once everything was in place, I was planning on taking Rick’s permission for telling everything to you.’ Then she had tried to console me by adding, ‘We had taken you to Habiba’s farm, hadn’t we? You will be in all future meetings. Don’t worry.’ The question of since when did Saanvi turn into medical staff, almost popped out of my mouth but knowing that there would be an evasive response waiting for that too, I refrained from asking.
There was no dearth of pregnant Sanghaali women in Amoka. The fact that we suddenly got hold of two such women did not surprise me in the least. However, it made me a little suspicious that both these women had agreed to get the Cesarean sections simultaneously. Getting Habiba on board was done like an intelligence operation by Saanvi and Radhika. I did not know even the name of the other Sanghaali woman. Radhika, excited like a baby bunny, had disclosed that three more expectant mothers from Seattle, Columbus and Portland had shown interest to get their Cesarean sections done next month but their Health Insurance Companies refused to cover the surgeries if done at Amoka. Those women were ready to get their surgeries done at Amoka if done for free.
Did we bite more than what we could chew? Doing simultaneous Cesarean sections on five expectant mothers and broadcasting them live on television! Who would assist Radhika in these surgeries? The one person who could, Razak, was not there anymore. Smith wouldn’t even get to a sniffing distance from them. But then, when we can bring patients from elsewhere, how difficult was it to get doctors? Saanvi was on a mission to turn what was hitherto a local news into a headline news. To magnify a spark in a small Midwestern town that needed legitimate attention into a flame that engaged the world. To set in motion things that were directly contrarian to what we thought Dr Mohammad Mohammad was planning on doing, much before any action that he might take. I thought Saanvi and Radhika were planning on a preemptive strike: countering the YouTube videos of Sanghaali women suicides, with a live broadcast of successful Cesarean sections on primetime television. These still begged the questions: can three or four doctors accomplish this? The stuff that we were doing here—did they really come under a physician’s purview of work? What kind of medical practice was it for Srikantha and me to accompany Radhika to Habiba’s farm? I still had no idea why we had gone there. When asked, Rick’s response was that it would be disclosed on a need-to-know basis. Radhika’s explanation was that Amina had said that a Sanghaali woman by the name of Habiba had agreed for a Cesarean section and it was imperative that Radhika met her as soon as possible. She had asked Srikantha and me to accompany them just to have some men around. She had laughed at my barrage of questions—‘Do you suppose someone would have attacked you? Even if it were so, what kind of protection could we have provided? Does the hospital’s insurance cover any of this? What if something had gone wrong…?’
I was waiting for Rick’s next move. He didn’t want to get into any trouble with insurance companies and had asked that preparations be done for the surgeries on only these two Amoka women.
Radhika had studied thoroughly the case summaries of these two friends of Amina. According to her, Habiba was full term pregnant and showed no signs of having a normal delivery. The other woman’s baby apparently was huge and weighed about four and a half kilograms. Their babies were due a week apart. Therefore, she was convinced that she could do C-sections on them any day next week. The earlier the better. Godspeed.
Saanvi had already obtained permission from NBC. Rick and Powell had paid another visit to Washington to get the nod from the higher-ups. Neither of them had ever spoken with me about these higher-ups. They were clearly the phantoms of this opera. Radhika did not speak more about any of these. According to Srikantha, she had planned on doing both the C-sections one after the other in close succession, but the hospital and the ‘higher-ups’ were not willing to take the risk. They were apparently trying to get O’Reilly on board as an additional surgeon. O’Reilly was expected to agree.
Radhika had shared with me a few days ago, ‘Guru, had we got women like Habiba and Amina sooner, we would not have pulled Zeba and Razak into this mess. Poor guys, they left America for Karachi for no good reason. In fact, I had hinted to Razak the other day when Amina came to the hospital, but then things were not clear. Timing is everything, I guess.’
‘Radhika, whatever was bound to happen has happened. True, now we have Amina, Habiba and the other woman. Still, there is not much clarity yet on why we are doing this. You and Saanvi seem to be very excited. Live Cesarean sections on TV and what
not…and not just one, but two. I’m happy for you guys. Have you spoken with Giri? What does he have to say?’
‘Leave that to me. I’ll handle it.’ She said half-heartedly.
Something didn’t seem right. ‘What does that mean, Radhika? Is everything alright?’
‘Guru, if you really want to help me, please leave me alone.’
I ignored the remark, went over and sat across from her and said to her, ‘What do you mean? How long has it been since you spoke with Giri? Trust me, this job is not worth more than a guy like Giri. Please don’t mess up your life.’
She got up and said, ‘Guru, there is absolutely no need for you to feel guilty. It was not working anyway. I have thought a lot about it.’
‘Please, tell me. Did you break up with him?’
‘Guru, nothing like that has happened yet, but I can assure you one thing. Giri will not be a stumbling block in my professional life going forward. To tell you the truth, Giri as a factor will be totally irrelevant to my work. Only time can decide what happens to our relationship. Please, let us not discuss this anymore. We have lots of other things to do now.’ She brought the conversation to a hard stop.
22. The Curtain Raiser
The ‘Sanghaali Cesarean—Live’ had received enough publicity. All the newspapers carried lead articles on it. There was a big billboard right next to the town’s highway. On it, there was a picture of a pregnant Sanghaali woman with huge letters next to it saying, ‘Cesarean section saves both the mother and the baby. Let us keep it that way.’ Right next to it was an NBC logo and the announcement: ‘Watch Live Cesarean section this Sunday morning at 10’.
Apparently, the PR section had decided that Sunday morning was the best time for a ‘Live Cesarean’ after consulting with a focus group. On weekdays, the primetime slot of nine in the evening would be the ideal time but not a good time for performing elective surgeries. That leaves just the weekend. Fridays were ruled out. Saturdays and Sundays seemed to be good alternatives. Finally, the focus group had decided that between those two days, Sunday morning is the right time. The TV channels had not revealed the names of the patients undergoing the surgery. And even in YouTube teasers, the faces of these two Sanghaali women were blurred.
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