‘What are you allergic to?’ said Laila, smirking.
‘Fish. But—’
‘You’re allergic to fish?’ laughed Kang. ‘A Bengali allergic to fish? Now, that’s funny!’
‘Not at all. There are many Bengalis who are allergic to fish. Well, not fish but a certain secretion from—’
‘Ray,’ thundered Waris. ‘Get to the point, please!’
‘Sorry, sir,’ Ray said, without any sign of contrition. ‘As I was saying, DNA mapping can give an idea of the substance the individual is allergic to. Administer that same substance to the target, he’ll fall dead. Autopsy will reveal death by severe allergic reaction. Simple! Nobody will imagine for a second that it could have been an assassination!’
‘What is he allergic to?’
‘I analysed the DNA from all possible angles and it was only by a piece of luck that I did the test.’
‘Control your excitement, Ray. What’s he allergic to?’
‘Hazelnuts, sir!’
‘Hazelnuts?’ said Kang incredulously. ‘That’s not uncommon! Surely he knows?’
Ray shook his head vigorously. ‘I had full access to everything we know about Umavi. We have his medical records too.’
‘How?’ said Vikrant, surprised.
‘I hacked into his doctor’s computer,’ said Laila. ‘I got details of quite a few men before they discovered my attack. And before you ask, no, they don’t know who hacked into their system. All they know was that it was an attack from Moscow.’
‘Impressive, Ms Borges,’ said Waris.
‘Yes, well,’ Ray butted in. ‘The doctor mentioned his allergy to pineapple, but nothing else. So we can safely assume the man’s never had hazelnuts in his life, otherwise he’d have known. All we have to do is take him some place where there are hazelnuts, administer a small but lethal dose, and we’re done.’
Brijesh looked at Waris. ‘So what now, sir?’
Waris stood up. His fierce eyes blazed at them. ‘I think Iran, Afghanistan, Turkmenistan and Turkey are the countries which use hazelnuts in almost everything.’
‘We can’t just invite him to Iran or Afghanistan,’ said Vikrant.
‘Turkmenistan is too difficult to operate in,’ Brijesh said.
‘Istanbul is the best place,’ concluded Waris.
‘Then let’s arrange a meeting between Umavi and his maker in Istanbul,’ said Borges, her excitement evident on her face.
7
Umavi had just finished his prayers and was folding his prayer rug when he heard a respectful knock on his door. His assistant entered. He wore the same elated expression as Umavi, but wasn’t able to control his emotions as well as his superior.
This quality was the one flaw that Umavi perceived in his loyal assistant, Abdul Qadir Qandahari. Maybe it wasn’t even his fault; it wasn’t as if he wore his heart on his sleeve, the fellow just had a very expressive face. But there was no one Umavi would rather have by his side than Qandahari. The man was indispensable. Also, he assisted Umavi in a special way that nobody else knew about.
In a world of constantly progressing technology, Umavi was an uncomfortable fit. He didn’t like the new age fad of complete digitization and still preferred a letter delivered by the hand of his personal messenger over an email.
Few knew about Umavi’s discomfort with technology; it would be foolish to expose the fact that a senior Lashkar-e-Toiba member had a weakness. Qandahari was, however, the most tech savvy recruit Umavi had trained. So, as Umavi took Qandahari under his wing, in addition to guarding Umavi, brainstorming with him and advising him, Qandahari also provided the digital touch to Umavi’s analogue brain.
Given his immense usefulness, an expressive face was something Umavi gladly overlooked.
Umavi was a disciplined, fastidious man and Qandahari knew it. He watched as Umavi folded his prayer rug and neatly deposited it in its bag before walking forward and kissing his right hand.
Umavi smiled and embraced his assistant. When they’d disengaged, Qandahari looked at his senior with shining eyes and asked, ‘So are we going through with it?’
Umavi’s smile was answer enough and his reply confirmed it. ‘They have asked for a numbered account. The money will be transferred to us next Friday, after namaz-e-jummah.’
Qandahari still couldn’t believe it. It was a gift from Allah and had come quite out of the blue. The email had arrived on his smartphone only a couple of weeks ago, from Rabeta Bank. He knew of the bank, of course; he had a few friends in Saudi Arabia who held accounts there. He had on occasion received promotional emails from many such banks and usually deleted them almost immediately. No point in letting spam clog up your inbox. But a few words in the email had caught his eye and he decided to read through it. Before he’d finished, he realized this was no ordinary email. He would have to take it to Umavi.
His senior had reacted exactly as he’d thought he would – with scepticism and disbelief, but hopeful nevertheless.
‘And they just want to give it to us?’ he said, squinting at the printout of the email Qandahari had brought him.
‘That’s what they’re saying.’
‘Who are they?’
Qandahari cleared his throat. Naturally, he’d done his homework before bringing it to Umavi.
‘They call themselves Ansar-ul-Ikhwan-ul-Muslimeen.’
‘Hmm. Helpers of the Muslim Brethren. Interesting, but there are dozens of groups like that, which are actually composed of CIA spies.’
‘I know, Ameer. According to the email, they represent a wing of the Saudi government. I did some digging around on the internet, but I couldn’t find anything. So I wrote back to them.’
‘You sent them a letter? By whose hand did you send it?’
‘Not a letter, Ameer. I replied to their email.’
Umavi clicked his tongue in exasperation. ‘How many times have I told you not to expose yourself like that? How do you know your mail won’t be intercepted?’
‘No, Ameer, my email is safe. I sent it using our 128-bit encryption protocol, they won’t be able to break it.’
‘Sir, I’ve broken the encryption.’
Brijesh looked calmly at Laila, who was standing in front of him. ‘Are you sure?’
‘Positive, sir.’ Normally it would be impossible to break a 128-bit encryption, but Ray had designed the programme well.
They were at a safe house in Delhi, in a small apartment in Chittaranjan Park. It would be their temporary command centre, as setting up base in Lt Gen. Waris’s house was unsafe. He was known to live alone and only his daughter visited him at times, so the constant coming and going of five others would certainly arouse curiosity, if not suspicion. They had decided that for every mission, they would set up their command centre in a different place, so that there were minimum chances of being flagged.
Once they had established the means by which Umavi could be eliminated, they had to figure out how to get him to go to Istanbul.
A number of theories were discussed and rejected, before a chance reaction by Vikrant gave Ray an inspiration; Vikrant had jabbed at his phone’s touchscreen irritably before jamming it back into his pocket.
‘What happened?’ Brijesh asked Vikrant.
‘Nothing, just these blasted promo emails. I keep getting them.’
‘Why don’t you just—’
Whatever Laila was going to say was lost as Ray suddenly stood up, his eyes alight. ‘That’s it! That’s how we can do it!’
Waris narrowed his eyes. ‘Explain, Ray.’
‘Well, sir, we can use the phishing trick, only this time, we’ll introduce a covert software in the email. Have any of you heard of XSS?’
Everyone except Laila shook their heads.
‘XSS means cross-site scripting. It’s a type of computer security vulnerability through which we can bypass access controls on websites. We can use non-persistent XSS to automatically render a malicious script and—’
Kang put up his hand. ‘Stop
, stop! Speak normally, will you? I can’t understand anything you’re saying!’
Ray looked around at the pained expressions on everyone’s faces and shifted gears. ‘All right, forget what it is. I’ll tell you what we can do. I’m sure you know that we have entire lists of email addresses these terrorists use. Can we get those lists?’
Laila nodded. ‘That can be arranged.’
‘Perfect. We’ll scan for Umavi’s email address. Then we’ll send them an email, which will have a URL in it. Once they click that URL, they’ll be taken to a page that will contain my hidden script, which will immediately start running. Alternatively, if they reply to the email, my code will start running. Now this code will introduce a software, a kind of Trojan horse, into their system. You can think of it as a kind of malware, one that collects all the data and sends it to us covertly.’
‘That’s all very good, Ray,’ said Waris. ‘But how does that get them to Istanbul?’
‘Well, you said Brijesh and Vikrant will promise a donation, right?’
‘Yes. They’ll pose as Bangladeshis sending money to help the Lashkar’s cause.’
‘And how will that money be transmitted?’
‘We won’t actually be sending any money, Ray,’ said Waris frostily.
‘I understand, sir, but it will appear to be through a bank, right?’
‘Certainly not. These kinds of transactions are always done in person first, before any money exchanges hands.’
‘Let me suggest something, sir. Let’s use Rabeta Bank as an example. I’ll clone the bank’s website. Then, when Umavi replies to my email, we can send him pages of transactions that we have apparently made, using the bank’s web pages that I’ve cloned. I’ll keep my script hidden in these pages, and we can give them access to view several of these transactions—’
‘To show them that we’ve done it before?’ asked Vikrant, who was following Ray’s words intently.
‘Exactly! That will give them confidence that you are genuine. Once that is done, you can ask them to come to Istanbul for a meeting.’
‘It won’t be that easy,’ Brijesh said thoughtfully. ‘We’ll have to get him to choose Istanbul himself.’
Umavi scanned through the documents Qandahari had given him. He could scarcely believe what he was reading.
‘And this is everything they’ve donated?’ he said incredulously.
‘No, Ameer,’ said Qandahari. ‘This is only what they’ve donated in the last two years.’
That was even more surprising. The group that called itself Ansar-ul-Ikhwan-ul-Muslimeen was apparently very generous, but more importantly, it seemed to believe in the same things Umavi did. The documents showed millions of dollars donated to charities that cared for orphans in Iraq, provided aid to the Palestine Liberation Organization, and helped displaced Afghani children. There were transaction records, receipts and documents validating every single donation. And it had all been done without anyone’s knowledge.
According to the email that Qandahari had replied to, the Ansar-ul-Ikhwan-ul-Muslimeen didn’t want their name to be displayed anywhere for several reasons. For one, it would immediately put them on the CIA’s radar and would adversely affect international politics and diplomacy. Umavi understood and agreed with this, because if there was a breakdown in current diplomatic relations, Lashkar would be the first outfit the Americans would target.
Secondly, the Ansar-ul-Ikhwan-ul-Muslimeen believed that nobody else needed to know who was donating and to whom. Again, this touched a chord in Umavi.
‘Qadir, I like these fellows and the secrecy they seem to believe in. If they really are who they say they are, I think they might actually want to do something for ummah. After all, that is what Islamic charity and zakat is all about; when you give with the right hand, the left should not know.’
‘I agree, Ameer. And they’ve said they believe in our cause, in jihad. They too want to see India crushed, the arrogant West brought down from its throne. I think they’re quite sincere.’
‘Well, if you’re right, Allah has just made a provision for the next two years of jihad. We needn’t worry about how to sustain ourselves and our boys.’
‘Al-ham-du lillah!’ cried Qandahari, his epiglottis constricting as the words tumbled out from the depths of his throat.
‘And you must consider what they want to give us. People give us fifty thousand rupees, one lakh or two lakhs, but these people are willing to give us two million dollars! Half a million every six months.’
Qandahari grew sober. ‘That is something I’ve been wondering about, Ameer. They want us to furnish them with details of how we would spend that money. Why should we do that?’
Umavi got up slowly and walked to the window. The sun was just setting over Lahore, and his window offered a beautiful view of the city. It had been over six decades since Partition but Lahore still retained its rustic charm, unspoilt and uncorrupted by the vertical development and real estate rush. The skyline of the city remained pristinely authentic. Umavi had chosen the flat specifically for the view, saying that it calmed him and helped him think.
Without turning around, he said, ‘I was worried about that too, when you came to me with their proposal yesterday. But I’ve thought about it and I think it’s only fair. After all, since they’re giving us so much money, it stands to reason that they want to see the results, don’t you think?’
‘But do you believe them?’
‘Yes,’ said Umavi, turning around and walking back to the table. ‘But only after I saw these documents. And you’ve shown me their transactions. The records of the money they sent to the PLO’s Yatama organization, the Mujahideen-Iraq and Madrasatul Muslimeen in Afghanistan. We went through them indirectly, through the bank’s website, which means that they must be genuine.’
‘So now, shall we meet them?’
‘I’m not going to meet them, Qadir. You are.’
Kang was frowning. ‘Who the hell is this Qandahari fellow? I thought we were dealing with Umavi.’
‘We are,’ said Ray. ‘Qandahari is Umavi’s assistant. Umavi won’t meet us himself, he’s sending his crony instead. He’s obviously a smart man.’
‘I thought money always works with these bastards,’ grumbled Kang.
‘Apparently not. Umavi is clearly an idealist, he won’t be swayed by money, only by ideology,’ said Waris. ‘Vikrant, you’re well versed in Urdu, right?’
Vikrant nodded. ‘Indeed, sir.’
‘Good. Ray, we need Vikrant’s voice to sound different. Do you have anything?’
‘Of course. I have a voice changer.’
‘Good. I want Vikrant’s voice to be unrecognizable.’
‘Easily done, sir,’ said Ray, and started clicking away at his computer.
‘Vikrant, I want you to talk to this Qandahari fellow and convince him that you won’t do business with a faceless organization. Insist that you want to meet the man at the top. Don’t name Umavi. Tell them that your organization’s president and a high-ranking representative of Rabeta Bank will personally be present at the meeting, and they won’t meet just anyone. It has to be someone higher up. That should get Umavi out of his lair.’
‘He’s a cautious man, sir,’ said Vikrant.
‘I know. I believe he won’t meet you the first time. It’ll either be a no-show or he’ll give you the runaround. But he’ll come. I know he will. And once he decides on the location, Kang and Laila will be on recon. They’ll give you and Brijesh the layout.’
As it turned out, the Ansar-ul-Ikhwan-ul-Muslimeen refused to meet with Qandahari. They wanted someone higher up. Naturally, this made Umavi highly suspicious. At any other time, he would have immediately cut off all contact and gone into hiding for a few days just to be safe. But this was two million dollars! And the background check, the bank – everything looked solid. Maybe, just maybe, these guys were genuine. But Umavi wasn’t going to take a chance. He relayed his instructions to Qandahari, who then asked the Ansar-ul-Ikhwan-ul-M
uslimeen for a meeting via satellite phone or VoIP. But again, they refused. They wanted to meet in person.
‘Your leader’s reluctance is most confusing. We are beginning to assume he might not need our donation after all.’
Qandahari almost panicked when he read the two-line email. But it gave Umavi the encouragement he needed; finally, he agreed to a meeting.
According to the Ansar-ul-Ikhwan-ul-Muslimeen’s wishes, the meeting had to be held in a neutral location and not in Saudi Arabia, for obvious reasons. They left it to Umavi to decide, and after a lot of deliberation, he agreed to meet them at a private location in Istanbul, a neutral place where they could safely assume the CIA wouldn’t be watching them. The venue – a five-star hotel in Taksim Square, overlooking the Bosphorus, built on the highest of Istanbul’s seven hills, was called the Marmara Taksim.
Qandahari wanted to book a presidential suite, believing that it would go with Umavi’s stature. He was surprised when Umavi shook his head.
‘No. Think, Qadir, don’t be stupid. The best place to hide a tree is in the jungle. If I book a presidential suite, I’ll instantly attract a lot of attention. Everyone will want to find out who I am, it’s natural human instinct. I don’t want to stick out. Book me a normal room, I’d rather mix with the populace as a commoner.’
Umavi smiled at Qandahari’s doubtful look. ‘It’ll also serve another purpose. It will show our friends from the Ansar-ul-Ikhwan-ul-Muslimeen that our cause is jihad, not earthly pleasures: we have a spartan lifestyle and don’t splurge on ourselves. That will encourage them to donate more generously in the future.’
Impressed with his master’s reasoning, Qandahari thought to himself, not for the first time, that not for nothing was Umavi the head of the Lashkar-e-Toiba.
The man with whom Qandahari spoke was courteous – speaking chaste Urdu, but with a Bengali accent, as most of his Bangladeshi friends did – and quite firm. The top men in their organization were going to be present at the meeting, and they wanted the same from Lashkar. Initially, when Qandahari told them about Umavi, that he was the man behind the 26/11 attack in Mumbai, and that he was the brilliant mastermind of the Lashkar, they seemed suitably impressed, but they didn’t think that he was high enough in the outfit. Qandahari explained to them about Umavi’s role, his planning and strategizing capabilities, and that he was the one who had trained the ten 26/11 mujahideen in Pakistan and had personally overseen their departure for Mumbai. Finally, they agreed.
Mumbai Avengers Page 7