by Aabid Surti
Taking a sip from the sherbet, Iqbal started looking at the photographs. There were years of difference between Salma in bridal costume and the Salma standing before him wearing a plain dress. There cannot be any comparison between the slim and smiling young bride and the tired woman standing before him.
As of now, he only wanted to familiarize himself with Hamid's physical features and that too of the present-day middle-aged Hamid's, not of a youthful Hamid of thirty years ago.
Lifting the glass and taking one more sip, he asked Salma who was standing at a distance, “Don't you have any recent photographs of Hamid?”
“There are some in an envelope kept at the end of the album.”
He put down the glass, turned the pages of the album on his lap, opened the envelope and started looking at Hamid's recent photographs. The fourth snap, in which Hamid was standing in a garden wearing a T-shirt and pants, met his requirement.
He assessed Hamid's height by looking at the snap closely. He had a slender body with a thin face and high cheekbones. Though he had crossed forty, not a strand of his hair had turned gray.
Replacing the snaps in the envelope, he closed the album. Salma was still standing before him maintaining a dignified distance. “Iqbalbhai!” She asked, “will you really save my husband?”
“It's Allah who saves or sinks,” he said, picking up the glass. “Man’s duty is to strive .”
“I can't believe it.”
“What?”
“Singh Saab said over the phone that if anyone can deliver me from becoming a widow, it’s you. You are a redeemer, you can give a new life…”
A child wailed from inside the second room. Iqbal took another sip of the sherbet and got up. “My work is done. I’ll now take your leave.”
“At least finish the sherbet.”
As he was about to move towards the door, a year-old infant on all fours appeared between the door-curtains separating the two rooms. “Abba! Abba!” the child started crying again.
Iqbal felt as if Hamid had mounted the gallows and the child was shedding tears seeing his father's body hanging by the rope. Unable to bear the sight, Iqbal walked out of the room.
He arrived at the municipal hospital. The child's wailing was still ringing in his ears. At the same time, the old question also pricked him like a piece of glass stuck in his feet: Should a murderer not be given capital punishment?
He was thinking seriously about it while heading towards the hospital's morgue. He started arguing by himself – Only God has power over life and death. If death was written in Hamid's fate, even the messiah cannot save him. In case Iqbal succeeded in his mission, he had no right to claim to have gifted Hamid his life.
Sufi's argument, though logically correct, could not convince me. I had to interrupt again. “If I agree with your views then it would mean that the government has no right to punish a criminal.”
He shot back, “What are your views on capital punishment?”
“I’m not in its favour. Many intellectuals are also of my view. But there are scholars who favour the death penalty.”
“Why are you against it?” he asked again.
“The murderer has committed a crime. If the law gives him capital punishment, it commits another crime. So what is the difference between the two?”
Sufi listened silently.
“Secondly, sometimes even an innocent person gets trapped in a murder case. There have been a few cases, if not more, in which an innocent person was hanged.”
“That means to save someone from the gallows isn’t wrong!”
“But Hamid was not innocent,” I said.
“The law doesn’t say so.”
“Even after the murder?”
“Murder is a charge. Any charge can be framed against anyone. But until it’s proved, even the law holds the person innocent. That's why the government gives him the right to defend himself.”
“That right is within the law. But you would be defending him going beyond the law,” I said excitedly.
“Aabidbhai, you don’t approve of the State killing somebody. If I break the law to stop that killing, you don’t appreciate that either. After all, what do you want? Should I also sit silently watching the tamasha of legally executed murders?”
He was replying coolly to my questions. “Besides, you know that I have total faith in God. You don’t offer namaaz, don’t observe fast during Ramadan, don’t read the holy Quran and yet you believe in God or some super power.”
“That's right.”
“Then tell me, if even a leaf of a tree doesn’t move without His will, who am I to save Hamid?”
I was rendered speechless. Sufi's arguments were impressive. Yet, why did they fail to convince me?
The constable standing guard at the morgue gate stopped him.
“One of my neighbours is missing.” He fabricated an excuse. “We had lodged a complaint with the police a week ago. So far, there has been no news. I thought, maybe he met with an accident and brought here dead.”
“Have you got the permission letter?”
“Whose?”
“The superintendent's. You see that office across? You will get a stamped slip from there on producing the copy of the police complaint. Bring that slip...”
Iqbal took out a hundred-rupee note and slipped it in his shirt pocket. He smiled and said, “The employee of the morgue has gone out for tea. He should be back in a few minutes.”
“I don't need him.”
The gate opened for him.
As soon as Iqbal entered, he felt as if he had stepped into a huge refrigerator. The temperature here was extremely low to prevent the bodies from rotting. There was a pungent smell of disinfectants in the air as well.
Recovering from the initial revulsion, he started examining the unclaimed bodies in this large hall. Most of the bodies were kept in rectangular boxes. One could pull out these boxes like drawers and inspect them.
A few bodies were also lying on the floor. Perhaps because of lack of space. There was a card on each body for identification. Each card bore a number and a brief description.
Iqbal was looking for a body with Hamid's height. It would be still better if the complexion resembled his. But among the corpses kept here, some were crushed beyond recognition, some were without limbs. One had just the torso and no head. Words couldn’t adequately describe the bizarre scene unfolding before him.
Some of the faces of the corpses were so horrifying they appeared to be characters from Hollywood’s horror films. So far he had not come across a single body that came close to Hamid's appearance.
He would not be able to execute his plan if he did not get the dead body that met his requirements. He was opening the long boxes one after the other like the drawers of a table. When he opened the last box and closed it, he realized that he had not yet inspected the cadavers lying on the floor.
Bending forward, he lifted the sheet from the first corpse that lay near his feet. He was chilled to the bone. His eyes widened in wonderment. He simply kept staring for a few seconds. There was the naked body of Bali in front of him. How did it happen?
Bali, whom he had detested at very first sight, was Bhesadia's informer. Had someone bumped him off? Had some gang taken revenge on him? Was DK responsible for his death?
Lastly, it was Bali who had alerted Bhesadia about DK's smuggled gold worth two and a half crore rupees. However, no one knew about this secret. Iqbal had guessed that this could have happened. It was possible that DK too might have thought similarly and decided to remove him for good.
Bali had no particular enemy. He was a professional informer. No matter which gang his eyes sat on, he would see to it that it was ensnared. Whenever he saw the chance to make some money, he would inform the police.
It would have been different if he had been only DK's enemy. He had kept a watch on many gangs of Bombay. He had tipped off the cops on innumerable crooks and gotten them arrested.
What surprised Iqbal was the fa
ct that the body had just one mark besides the mark of the post-mortem. His skull was cracked. Whoever had killed this stool pigeon had done a neat job in a single stroke.
Bali's corpse wasn’t what he was searching for. But, the body of a Muslim lying next to Bali's did fit the bill, because its height was five and half feet, which was practically the same as Hamid's. Besides, his complexion also matched.
Iqbal came out and told the constable, “It's here.”
“Who?”
“The neighbour I was looking for.”
“Are you certain?”
“Of course.”
“You will have to fill up a form to take possession of the body.”
Iqbal took out another hundred-rupee note and slipping it in his pocket asked, “Can I get a blank card?”
By this time, the man working at the morgue had returned and was smoking a bidi. The constable sent him to the administration department of the hospital to fetch a card. The formality of filling up the form was easily ignored.
Iqbal wrote Hamid's name and address on the card. He replaced this card with the nameless card kept on the unclaimed body. The main task was over. The rigmarole that followed was a bit cumbersome, but not difficult. Now that he had possession of the body, the next job was to bury it. He completed this work by the evening taking the help of Altaf and a few other colleagues.
The next day he went to the office of the municipality in a taxi. He filled up a form here to get Hamid's death certificate. The first copy cost three rupees. The duplicate cost one rupee each. He took the original and its two copies, went out and made a call to DK from a public telephone booth.
“ Iqbal here...” he told the big chief. “Your work has been done.”
“Hmm!”
“Hamid's verdict is to be delivered on Monday, right?”
There were three days left for Monday.
“I need to meet you once before that.”
“What are you doing right now?”
“Nothing.”
“I’ll be at the Taj Hotel poolside after an hour.”
Iqbal's taxi stopped near the Taj hotel at two in the afternoon. After paying the fare, he gave a cursory glance at the swaying sea across. It was high tide. The waves were breaking on the walls of the Gateway of India and splashing on the pavement.
Iqbal entered the hotel, crossed the art gallery and walked through the lobby. There was a huge glass door between the lobby and the swimming pool. He could glimpse the poolside from here.
As he opened the door and entered, his eyes started looking for DK. There was the swimming pool filled with crystal clear water in front of him. Lawn chairs and tables were placed around it.
It being lunchtime, there were very few people here. One could see only about a dozen foreign tourists lazing around or swimming. Three white-skinned women, in bikinis, were lying on towels spread on the lush green lawn, sunbathing.
Before Iqbal could spot DK, the latter had seen him. Hearing his name, he turned in bewilderment. DK, who had had a swim and changed into clean kurta-pyjamas, was standing before him. He was wearing a pair of Kolhapuri chappals and a thin gold chain in his neck. However, that was not the reason for Iqbal's astonishment.
Next to DK was Kiran wearing a pistachio churidar suit. It was evident from her face that she too had just returned after a dip with DK. She looked a bit perplexed. Perhaps, she too didn’t expect to see Iqbal here.
“Do you know this girl?” DK asked.
He had met Kiran several times. Perhaps DK knew it! On the other hand, maybe, he did not know. It would not do him any good to open the pages of a girl's private life. On the other hand, that would hurt her feelings.
Kiran could guess why he was tight lipped. She had always had a soft corner for Iqbal. Now it became softer. She replied to DK's question. “He doesn’t know me, but I’m familiar with him.”
DK was surprised. “How can that be?”
“I’ve seen him in Singh's room.”
“And…he has not seen you?”
“Right.”
DK said mischievously, “You think I’ll buy that?”
“You will have to,” she underlined. “Iqbal doesn’t lock eyes with women.”
DK laughed. “My dear Kiran, your beauty won’t be appreciated here. Please go to our room. I’ll follow you soon,” he said.
Iqbal appreciated the wit DK used to remove Kiran from the scene. After she left, both sat on the lawn chairs across each other. There was a table between them.
“What will you have?” DK asked, signaling the bearer passing by.
“I had my lunch a few minutes back.”
“Sure? I’m not good at entertaining guests.”
“I can imagine how hungry you must be feeling after swimming. Please go ahead and order, I’ll have fresh lime juice.”
Perhaps he was planning to lunch with Kiran, because he only ordered a beer. “What do you want to say?” He asked, glancing around after the bearer left.
Iqbal placed three papers before him on the table. “This is Hamid's death certificate. The other two are copies.”
At first, he could not follow. Hamid is alive, the court is to deliver the verdict in the murder case on Monday and Iqbal was saying that...
He picked up a copy and gave it a cursory look. It clearly bore the date and the seal of the municipality. Now, he read the form carefully. The death certificate was genuine. “What do we do with this?” DK asked again in earnest.
“When the court opens on Monday we need to make Hamid's son appear with the death certificate.”
He simply stared at Iqbal's face in bewilderment. In a flash, he understood the game plan. His brain became numb for a while. All these days, he had been getting news from Singh about Iqbal's adventures and intelligence. Today, Iqbal had performed a miracle before him.
It was clear that a person declared dead cannot be awarded a death sentence. As soon as the death certificate was produced before the judge, the case would automatically be closed. The case files would gather dust in the cellars of the court. After going underground for a couple of months, Hamid could surface and start working once again.
It was only when the bearer placed a beer mug and a glass of lime juice on the table that DK suddenly realized that he had remained silent for quite some time. “How did you manage to get this death certificate?” He started afresh, taking a sip of beer.
“I’d been to the morgue.” Iqbal replied briefly. “There I found a corpse resembling Hamid. I placed a card on it filling all the necessary details.” He did not consider it necessary to give further information. “Now we only need to make the file disappear.”
“What file?”
“After the case is closed, the government will retain Hamid's file in its godown. So long as the file is there, the sword will be hanging over Hamid's neck.”
Iqbal was sipping limejuice, taking small breaks in his narrative. “If that file is destroyed, there would be no chance of reopening Hamid's case in future, because all the evidence would also be destroyed along with it.”
“That's not difficult,” DK said emptying his beer mug. “You offer a hundred rupee note to the court's peon, he will be too glad to set fire to the entire godown, not just a file.”
The mention of money reminded Iqbal that he had not given the account of the five hundred rupees he had taken from DK for the assignment. He finished the lime juice, took out some currency notes from his pocket and said, “Two hundred rupees to the constable at the morgue; two hundred and fifty rupees for the burial; four rupees for the taxi fare from home to the municipality office; five rupees for the original death certificate and its two copies for which the receipt is enclosed. Please check the balance.”
This time, DK burst out laughing so loud that the three foreign ladies lying on the lawn in their bikinis turned and looked at him. DK was not bothered.
After a hearty laugh he declared, “Iqbal! You don't have to give accounts for this petty sum. From today, you are
my partner.”
“But...”
“Forget these scraps of paper,” he said, indicating the balance that Iqbal held in his hand.
“Like me, you are born to play in millions.”
At the end of our interview today, I asked Sufi a couple of questions that were haunting me: “The face of the corpse you had chosen in the morgue did not resemble Hamid's. Nobody noticed such a big difference?”
“There would have been questions, if only there had been an inquiry,” he said adding, “But, who the hell in the bureaucracy has the time for such inquiries?”
I wondered what would happen if the government, instead of importing expensive computers, employed live computers like Iqbal for positive use.
Chapter 25
Iqbal had planned to live in the two-bedroom flat gifted by DK for only a couple of days. Thereafter, he had firmly resolved to return the key on some pretext or another. However, a minor event at the home front blew apart his resolution like a cannonball making a hole in the wall.
He had pulled out Razzak from school and placed him in his neighbour's footwear shop. This had automatically put an end to the mischief. It had brought about a complete and unexpected change in him. He used to get ready happily on his own every morning to leave with the neighbour Noor Mohammed. He returned home with him late in the evening after closing the shop.