Pretty Vile Girl

by Rickie Khosla

  ‘Have the authorities been able to identify who the gunman is? The nation wants to know!’ screamed the hysterical news anchor on one of the news channels. A panel of guests—in the studio and on satellite uplinks from the Defence Ministry, the Army HQ, the CBI and the Home Ministry—looked on. ‘BREAKING NEWS’ in big, bold letters scrolled from right to left incessantly.

  ‘I have been informed that the premises have been surrounded by the NSG,’ huffed one of the field reporters.

  Elsewhere, on IndiAction!, Ruby Verghese was continuing her exclusive reporting too. ‘There are now at least four helicopters hovering above Siri Fort!’

  Her boss, anchoring the news back at the studio, was hurling questions at her at the speed of light. ‘What about all the attendees of the National Film Awards function? Can you confirm whether everyone has been safely evacuated?’

  ‘Yes, that is correct. Everyone is out. The complex is swarming with the Prime Minister’s SPG and a full battalion of the NSG choppered in from Manesar.’

  ‘Why can’t they just break into the small room and extract the Prime Minister, Ruby? Have you heard anything about their rescue strategy?’

  ‘That’s not advisable, Mohit. That will be extremely risky. Remember, the room can’t be more than 10-feet-by-15. There are no windows. If they shoot through the door, who knows who they might end up hitting!’

  ‘Yes, that is a risk indeed… Have we been able to find out anything about the gunman’s demands? The audio from the room is not clear.’

  ‘I am afraid there is a technical hitch with the audio. We only hear an occasional snippet from the man. As you know, the last thing we heard was the gunman yelling at PM Saran and…’

  Just then, there was the boom of the gunshot that Manjrekar had fired to the ceiling.

  ‘Holy f…!’ the news anchor said, biting his tongue at the very last second. ‘Was that a gunshot?’

  All eyes were on the spycam footage immediately.

  ‘Looks like no one was hurt,’ Ruby confirmed breathlessly.

  ‘But it also looks like this man means business, Ruby!’ the anchor concluded wisely, as if Ruby—and the nation—wasn’t already aware of that.

  The furious knocking on the door had mercifully stopped, giving Manjrekar a chance to calm his mind down slightly. He was mindful that the authorities outside had to be planning a big strike soon. He knew that the endgame was near.

  ‘It will be over soon,’ he told himself—‘and then everything will be fine.’

  After a few minutes of silence, it was Jazmeen’s turn to speak with the invader.

  ‘You must have a very compelling reason that is making you do this,’ she said in a voice that was kind and compassionate. Her encouraging tone made both Saran and Karan turn and look at her.

  Manjrekar gave Jazmeen a smile that was as flat as a still lake. ‘Madam,’ he said, ‘what is a compelling reason? Isn’t it all relative? I mean, a reason as important as life-or-death for a commoner like me might be of absolutely no worth to people like you. Reasons are compelling only when they belong to fancy people,’ he added, pointing the index finger of his free hand at his audience.

  ‘You are quick to judge people, aren’t you?’ Jazmeen admonished, her voice quickly dropping the soft tone it had just moments ago. ‘Does that come as part of your police training?’

  ‘But you people don’t even understand the trials and tribulations of a small man like me,’ he insisted.

  ‘Try us. I know we have all been put in this room for a bigger purpose.’

  Jazmeen’s conciliatory tone made Saran shake his head in disbelief—though, in a way, he was glad that Jazmeen was engaging with the guy and keeping him distracted. ‘Those security buggers had better be putting a plan together to storm this place quickly,’ he thought angrily.

  Meanwhile, Manjrekar moved away from the closet door and perched himself atop a table by the wall. He wanted to make himself comfortable before launching into the story of his life—his parents, his home, his job, his wife.

  And most importantly, his daughter.

  Jazmeen, of course, had heard the man’s sad autobiography only weeks ago.

  The chill of the air-conditioning was now starting to gnaw at Jazmeen’s bones. Her usually homey drawing room felt frigid. Like a morgue.

  And yet, she had cold sweat on her brow.

  Jazmeen was horrified at the way Manjrekar had managed to pull out every single skeleton in her closet and laid them exposed on her Armani coffee table. The file-photos of the dead were disturbing; they looked like they had been freshly dug up from their graves. These were people who had lost their lives in front of her eyes, yet, in death they looked chillingly different.

  It was pointless to ask the cop how he had managed to stitch together the disparate pieces of her life’s biggest secret. The evidence was bright as day in front of her eyes.

  ‘So, is this how you found out?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes. Killing these people just wasn’t enough for you. You felt that you needed to do more to them in order to shame them. You wanted to humiliate their souls! You wanted to shear off even their last cloak of dignity. Send them—mutilated to their Maker. That is why you shaved the heads of each of your victims, right?’

  Jazmeen kept silent. She shivered slightly.

  ‘I guess what you did to Jasmine Bhatia was a fitting revenge for what the system had done to your brother. After all, wasn’t that how Ujjwal had been returned to the orphanage by the police after his arrest? Not just beaten and raped, but also with his head shaved? As if he was some wretched village idiot being punished by his panchayat for stealing a roti. I mean, the only thing they had spared Ujjwal was painting his face black and parade him around naked, tied to a donkey.’

  This time, Jazmeen winced. Her eyes watered instantly. It had been years since that day at Innocent Dreams, but the wretched face of her once-sweet brother was something she was never going to forget for several lifetimes.

  ‘Each time you faced adversity in life, you took revenge in exactly the same way you had finished off Jasmine Bhatia. Mohile, Master Brandy, even Amrit Yadav, who you seem to have killed as some kind of a favour to your boyfriend Karan Rathore. And God knows how many countless others whose bodies I haven’t found yet.’

  ‘Toby, Rubina, Leena—each worse than the worst scum on earth. They all deserved what they got.’

  ‘By the way,’ Manjrekar continued, ‘what kind of rich, power-hungry bastards are these politicians? Is nothing sacrosanct for these monsters? Not even their own family?’

  Jazmeen merely looked on, not comprehending what he was implying.

  ‘Imagine that! Killing his own brother? Chhehh!’ He was shaking his head in disgust. ‘Anyway, Madam, so now you see why I had asked for a meeting with you? You thought I was just calling to harass you!’

  ‘What did he just say?’ Jazmeen’s disturbed mind was having trouble processing the bombshell that her visitor had just dropped. Her forehead had furrowed deeply. She started to shake her head sub-consciously. ‘No, no, but that can’t be what he said!’

  ‘What did you just say?’

  ‘I said that the reason I wanted to meet you was not because I wanted to harass you…’

  ‘No, no, before that! You said something about my politician boyfriend and his brother.’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ Manjrekar said, his face again contorting in disgust. ‘That kameena Karan Rathore. He didn’t even spare his own brother!’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Jazmeen asked, her voice now quivering slightly.

  ‘He didn’t tell you that he hired a local assassin called Chhota Mushtaq to finish off Arjun Rathore?’

  By now, the blood had completely drained from Jazmeen’s face, even though her heart was galloping faster than a Derby winner.

  ‘How do you know that?’

  ‘Madam, mee Mumbai Police aahe. Do you know how many informers we keep on our payroll? More than all the spies that America’s CIA has! If we didn
’t, do you think this city would last even a single day? These crooks from the slums would overrun you fancy people in your posh Bandra flats in no time!’

  Jazmeen kept blinking uncomprehendingly.

  ‘Look, whenever there is a supaari out on an important person, someone, somewhere is bound to know about it. When I was investigating Karan Singh Rathore, I discovered that his brother had died recently. You see, to a man like me, born with a suspicious policewala mind, that didn’t gel. So I investigated Arjun Singh Rathore’s death too. It took me a whole week of asking the right questions to the right people, but in the end I traced Karan’s connection to Chhota Mushtaq.’

  ‘Are you certain about that?’

  ‘Arre Madam, I even know how much the deal was worth. Do you want to know?’

  Jazmeen shook her head.

  ‘Anyway, I still haven’t figured out how Karan managed to get the killing done in Gorakhpur of all places! As far as I know, Mushtaq doesn’t operate outside Mumbai. If we ever catch that haraamkhor Mushtaq, I’ll ask him for sure.’

  ‘You will never catch him. He’s dead. I saw his brain oozing out of his skull on my bedroom floor.’

  Jazmeen realised quite suddenly that her head was spinning. She wanted this meeting to end. It was time to confront why Manjrekar was telling her all this. She sighed volubly, as much from fatigue as to brace herself for what was coming next.

  ‘So what do you want to do now? Arrest me?’

  ‘Arrest you? If I had wanted that, would I have come alone?’ the cop looked genuinely surprised.

  ‘Then?’

  ‘Madam, I have no intention of arresting you! But I do have a request…’ Manjrekar paused for a few seconds. He looked strangely tentative all of a sudden, as if debating for one last time whether to proceed with what he had on his mind.

  ‘What is it?’ Jazmeen prodded, slightly impatiently.

  ‘Madam,’ he began slowly, ‘I wanted to talk to you about my daughter.’ He spent the next ten minutes talking about Roshni, her sickness, her treatment needs, and the trials and tribulations that his family was going through to manage the illness. Finally, he mentioned the cost of what it would take to give the poor child a fighting chance for a reasonable life.

  Jazmeen heard Manjrekar’s story in rapt attention. By the end of it—and despite the heartless impunity with which the dreadful man had wrung out tragic memories from her past—her feelings had turned to pity and concern for his debilitated daughter. But she wasn’t prepared to concede her softening heart so easily.

  ‘So you came here to blackmail me?’ she asked, sounding angrier than she had intended to.

  ‘Well…’ Manjrekar hemmed and hawed. ‘Well, you could say that,’ he said finally.

  ‘It all boils down to money with you guys, doesn’t it? At the end, that is what you policewalas want—money.’ Jazmeen was shaking her head.

  ‘It seems that more than prayers, that is what I need to save my child… so, yes.’

  Manjrekar’s dispassionate response broke Jazmeen’s heart.

  ‘How much cash do you want?’ she asked.

  ‘Cash? From you? Oh, no, Madam, I haven’t come to you begging for money!’ he said, horrified, his eyes wide with concern at her misinterpretation.

  ‘Then?’ Jazmeen was genuinely surprised now.

  ‘I have come to you for death.’

  Jazmeen stared at Manjrekar, unable to understand what he meant.

  ‘It’s quite simple, Madam. I want you to do what you have been doing for years. I want you to—to kill me.’

  Satyendra Saran was getting restless. ‘Where are the fuckers from the Army? How long does it take to rescue the bloody Prime Minister!’

  The whiny man in front of him had been going on with his sob-fest for almost fifteen minutes now. His story might have sounded poignant, but only to a listener who didn’t have a gun pointed to his head. To Saran, it felt overblown, sappy and contemptible. The crippled little girl he was going on and on about already seemed too far gone to be saved by money, medicine or miracle. So how could this idiot even think that holding the PM hostage was going to make any difference?

  Yes, Saran was boiling with rage beneath his tranquil exterior.

  Suddenly, the intruder stopped speaking. Not because his story was finished, but because there had been a noisy electronic crackle in the room—something that sounded like a bolt of digital thunder. All eyes in the confined space automatically looked up at the ceiling, trying to search for the source of the noise. The sound repeated itself a few times. It appeared to be spewing out of a dozen tiny holes in a circular pattern on the ceiling, directly above the main door. A concealed loudspeaker. Someone had just activated the Siri Fort Public Address System.

  Presently, a booming voice filled the room. It was a man’s and, given its brusque tonality, it meant business.

  ‘This is Major-General Vishukant Narayan of the Indian Army,’ the voice announced in mildly-accented Hindi. It was deep, every word enunciated and measured. ‘To the man holding Prime Minister Saran and three others against their wishes, we want to make a one-time request. Give up the siege at once. The mindless step that you have taken has not only jeopardised the lives of four innocent people, it has also imperilled the safety and security of your country. Whatever your personal compulsions may be, your actions are tantamount to terrorism and completely unacceptable in civilised society.’

  There was a pause in the announcement, possibly to allow the gunman to mull over what he had just heard. Manjrekar chuckled softly and shook his head. His hostages turned to look at him—one face expectant, others expressionless. Saran found the intruder’s countenance bewildering. He was now certain that the man was completely bonkers. ‘The asshole is sniggering at a warning from the military!’ he thought, starting to panic at what the lunatic’s next step might be. He was now certain that the crazy man had a death wish.

  ‘He has come here ready to get killed. But before that happens, he is going to kill us!’ Saran concluded.

  The madman needed to be confronted before it was too late.

  ‘Look,’ Saran tried valiantly one more time, his voice sounding as compassionate as his angry mind would allow, ‘it is really sad to hear about your disabled daughter. May no parent have to go through your kind of suffering. But, sadly, these things sometimes happen in life, unfair as it is. Our fate is pre-ordained. I may not approve of the violent path you have chosen, but I am still going to look into the matter of your child’s rehabilitation as soon as I leave this room. You will have to trust me!’

  Manjrekar had still not stopped shaking his head, the movement slightly manic now. He did not respond.

  ‘You have to trust me on what I am saying,’ Saran reiterated. ‘I am the Prime Minister. I can make things happen.’ With that, he attempted to get up from the sofa again. He noticed that the intruder had stopped shaking his head. He also saw that he had now closed his eyes.

  ‘He senses that the endgame is near,’ Saran thought. He looked at Karan and then Jazmeen fleetingly, as if visually confirming to them that he was going to get up and engage with the man—and consequently try to end the stand-off.

  Saran stood up without triggering a response from the gunman whose eyes were still closed. He was about six feet away from him.

  ‘My brother, sometimes, circumstances make us turn into devils. We end up doing terrible things under their influence. But that doesn’t mean that our heart has gone bad. No, not at all! It’s just the temporary craziness of our head that makes us do those things,’ cooed Saran in a voice dripping with rapprochement. He took one careful step after another to get closer to the stranger.

  Manjrekar opened his eyes suddenly. He had no reaction to the fact that the PM was now standing merely three feet from him. His face was blank, which made Saran bolder.

  ‘You look like an honest police officer,’ the PM continued. ‘That’s a man who is duty-bound to do the right thing.’ He took another step forward.


  ‘Does anyone even know who is doing the right thing?’ the gunman finally spoke.

  Right that instant, the loudspeaker crackled back to life. ‘This is Major-General Vishukant Narayan again. The officers of the Indian Army will now be knocking at the door. Their only interest is in resolving this matter peacefully. Your grievances will be heard, but only after you have laid down your gun and exited the room with your hands raised. No harm must come to anyone in the room. Any resistance from you is futile, so please don’t attempt it. If you do, it will be responded to with force.’

  As soon as the announcement ended, there were three loud raps on the door. Despite the warning, the sound caused each of the hostages to jump. The intruder remained unruffled. He had started to smile again. Saran found the reaction demented. Dangerous.

  ‘You heard the man. As a man of uniform yourself, you would know that the Indian Army would not be surrounding us like this if you were doing the right thing,’ the PM said. He took one more step forward. He was close enough to smell the sweat soaking the intruder’s khaki, despite the air-conditioning.

  There were three more raps at the door. They were louder this time. The gunman was unfazed. In fact, he chuckled.

  ‘You really have no idea about the righteousness of what I am doing today, Prime Minister Saahab!’

  Boom! This time, the sound from the door was no rap. The barrier between the occupants of the room and the world outside was being bashed into pulp. A battering ram had just pounded against the wooden door—but bizarrely, it still held.

  Just like the stoicism of the intruder, who simply ignored the fuss at the door.

  ‘I will be answerable to the Maker above, but what makes you folk think that you will get away with what you have done?’ he said, his eyes darting at each of the occupants in the room. As he did so, he started to raise his hand that was holding the gun.