by Kota Neelima
From the windows of the study, Mira saw the rain lessen. Or at least, it rained less than it did in her mind. The recording had fallen silent a long time ago. Her memories often left her weak, without the will to even breathe. That’s why she kept them securely locked, so that they didn’t hunt her down like this in the middle of the day. Forcing herself to move, she opened the envelope Mahesh Bansi had sent her. It contained some handwritten notes, newspaper clippings, educational qualifications, shopping lists, restaurant bills, friends’ profiles and other stuff that belonged to Sikander. In a separate cover, there was a photograph of an attractive man, 32–35 years of age, with dark hair, large dark eyes and a smile of someone who knew how to appear good for the camera. He seemed to care, but as she looked closer, she found that his eyes ridiculed the camera for trusting the façade. She quickly dropped the photo back in the cover; that’s what her eyes would say if she had ever been photographed. Mira decided that no amount of going over his belongings would reveal the truth about Sikander. Everything was a manufactured reality, built exactly the way she expected it to be.
The news that day was all about the first Parliament tape. The Opposition demanded the resignation of the government and a public apology to the people of the nation for misleading them. A memorandum was submitted to the President that sought immediate dismissal of the government on grounds that it had abused people’s mandate. The government retaliated by leaking to the media documents that proved the innocence of the PP leadership. The official spokesperson revisited the scandal briefly to remind the nation that action had been taken against the guilty and that the then agriculture minister was now in jail. The Opposition declared that argument futile in view of the tape’s revelations. Then the PP’s powerful media department swung into action to contain the damage. Munshi’s newspaper was blamed for being politically motivated ahead of elections, and old scandals against the Opposition were raked up. There was chaos all around, but not the kind that promised change.
The excitement in the newsroom that evening was electric, and it got further charged as the deadline drew near. Munshi had been down to the second floor twice already to check the assembly line personally. This was the norm with him whenever something big happened, and he couldn’t feel its heat in his air-conditioned third floor office. He loved the stress, the tension, the lack of time and the close calls. At 8 o’clock, someone increased the volume of the television on the wall. Mira was in the middle of the newsroom, cutting her story on the computer to fit the space on the page. She turned with the rest to see the news. Kim Sharma was a beautiful woman and as her large eyes flashed in anger, they lit up the screen. The media was camping outside her office in Mumbai and caught up with her that evening. She refused to answer questions, but that didn’t stop the journalists from asking them.
‘Why were you part of the discussions on government formation?’
‘How much does each ministry portfolio pay?’
‘Who received the commissions? How much was paid to the PP for . . .’
‘No comment!’ she turned away indignantly, and the diamonds in her earrings caught the camera lights.
‘What is your relationship with Nalan Malik, and did it have something to do . . .’
‘I said, no comment,’ she glared at the questioner and tried to move through the crowd to her waiting car.
‘Which other portfolios did you decide?’
‘Let me go!’ Kim was losing patience.
She made a good picture, Mira thought. The questions will soon get softer, just to engage Kim and keep her on the screen longer.
‘Will you travel to Delhi, ma’am?’
She was perturbed by the polite inquiry. ‘I may, yes.’
‘Do you travel to Delhi often?’
‘No.’
‘Is this an attempt to malign your good name?’
That was designed to help Kim Sharma discover the importance of live television. ‘Yes,’ her voice softened. ‘Yes, it is.’
‘Which other good names are involved . . .?’ There were murmured reprimands from other journalists, and the question was quickly reworked. ‘Were you saddened to read the story?’
‘Of course . . .,’ she stopped speaking, aggrieved, and lowered her eyes; the camera got a high-resolution feed of the perfect lashes, darkened with mascara applied by a habitual hand. ‘I have never faced anything like this . . .’
‘Is this the first time your deals have been made public?’ The question was deliberately tactless.
She glanced around at the cameras, her lovely face emotional. ‘I was doing my job, just like anyone of you. Please don’t harass me like this.’
Kim was nearing the end of her thirty-second honeymoon with the press. That was the wrong answer.
‘Our job is to collect news for television news channels. What was your job ma’am, and who were you doing it for?’
Kim, unwisely, continued with her routine. ‘Please, I know nothing.’
‘Why were your deals never investigated?’
She desperately searched for her staff, which had been pushed to the fringe by the circle of media people.
‘Would you now reveal the details before the nation . . .?’
There was general commotion as her staff jostled with journalists and managed to usher her towards the car. The door of the car shut, and the driver honked a few times to make the crowd move. The cameras caught Kim in the back seat as she reached for her cell phone, her pretty face no longer vulnerable.
There was a brief debate in the newsroom on whether the interview merited mention in the newspaper. Dubey pointed out that some things were best seen on live television and ended the discussion. After an hour, Mira was preparing to leave office when her cell phone rang.
She answered it.
‘Good evening. This is Nalan,’ the voice said.
Taken aback, she wished him. His voice sounded different on the phone.
‘I’m calling about a matter of ethics.’
‘So you finally discovered them,’ she remarked dryly.
He chuckled. ‘They discovered me.’
‘How can I help?’
‘I want you to tell me your address.’
Mira was perplexed. ‘My address? Why?’
‘That’s not important. I wanted the address from you so that I don’t have to find out the wrong way. Like, for instance by following you home tonight, or from your bills, your taxes, your bank details . . .’
‘All right, I see you can easily find my address.’ She frowned, unable to discern his thoughts. ‘But I can’t give you the address unless you tell me why you want it,’ she said decisively.
‘I could lie; that I want to send you an important invitation, a subscription to the People’s Party magazine, a media pass for a party convention or . . .’
‘That’s enough,’ she said impatiently. ‘What’s the truth?’
‘You won’t like it,’ he warned.
‘Try me.’
‘I want to make sure you are safe.’
Mira’s frown deepened.
‘Told you,’ he pointed out, ‘you won’t like it.’
She didn’t speak at once. She could feel his worry, he wasn’t making that up. Her safety shouldn’t have been his concern, but perhaps he also wanted to keep an eye on her to trace Sikander. Yet, he was asking for her address when he could have got it through any means. After some thought, she told him.
He thanked her. ‘This is my personal cell phone number,’ he said, referring to the number he was calling from. ‘You can ring me anytime, and especially when you feel you may be in any danger. Please save the number.’
‘I’m grateful for this honour,’ she mentioned acidly, ‘but I never save numbers on my cell phone.’
He was amused. ‘Didn’t I tell you before? You shouldn’t say such things.’
‘I don’t,’ Mira said, incensed. ‘You make me.’
‘That’s the trouble with ethics,’ he said regretfully. ‘Drive home s
afe, Mira. Good night.’
When the call ended, she stared at her cell phone, stumped. That was the first time anyone had asked her to drive anywhere safe.
Six
The second tape from Sikander was in Mira’s mail at office next morning on Saturday, proving that Sikander had seen the published story in the newspaper. Gearing up for the Sunday edition, Bhaskar called a meeting to listen to the recording; Munshi was absent that day.
Once again, Sikander’s familiar voice announced the time and date:
‘Today is December 7, Parliament building. The time is 1.25 p.m. I am walking towards Mr Sunil Patel, who is about to leave Parliament. I should catch up with him in less than a minute.’
He moved through the crowded corridor inside Parliament amid conversations, beeping security apparatus and paging announcements for MPs’ vehicles at the exit door.
‘Hi, good afternoon!’ Sikander said in a greeting. ‘Are you Mr Sunil Patel, the station house officer?’
‘Yes,’ Patel answered.
‘I am Sikander Bansi, an MP from the People’s Party.’
There was a pause. Voices in the background were momentarily louder as a group of people walked past.
‘Can we speak alone for a moment?’
‘Actually, I was leaving, Mr Bansi. I have to reach somewhere in half an hour.’
‘Won’t take any time at all,’ Sikander invited, then added gently, ‘Besides, it may be good for you to be seen with a PP politician. It will build pressure on Nuri to give you whatever you demanded from him.’
There was a long pause. ‘What do you want?’ Patel asked tersely.
‘The real story, of course,’ Sikander laughed, ‘off the record.’
‘And you think, sir, that I go about telling the real story in busy corridors like this?’
‘Fair enough,’ Sikander said amiably. ‘The lounge then.’
After some time, there was a sudden silence as they entered the lounge. They settled down and refused the tea that the attendant offered.
‘I will get to the point,’ Sikander began. ‘Over 200 people were butchered in communal riots exactly one year ago. You were in charge of the area where the clashes started. I would like to know what had really happened.’
‘What is the point?’ Patel sneered. ‘You seem too young to understand, even if I explained.’
‘By “young” you mean ignorant. I get that.’ Sikander laughed. ‘Let me see if I can impress you with my grasp of communal politics. There had been peace for long, and people of the state expected development; they wanted better roads, better power supply and better drinking water. The NP leader who represented the state wasn’t interested in development; it would have meant the end of the illegitimate businesses of his funders. And God knows elections require funds,’ Sikander sighed. ‘The campaigning, the media and the advertising, these cost money. The NP leader knew he would lose the election on the development issue unless he changed the agenda . . .
‘No disrespect, but is this how all the young MPs here speak?’ Patel inquired.
Sikander did not reply for an instant. All right,’ he said finally. ‘How would you put it?’
‘It was always the agenda of the NP to exclude some communities from its plan for growth and development. Far too much money has been spent on the minorities and the underprivileged, and that money would now be spent on the general prosperity of the entire country. That was the promise!’ Patel explained. ‘The NP had to deliver on this promise. People wanted a better life for themselves and did not care if it came at the expense of someone else’s better life.’
‘So,’ Sikander said, ‘you are saying it was a planned riot. And you were part of the plan.’
‘I resent that, sir,’ he objected. ‘I stopped the riot and without me, the toll would have certainly crossed 500.’
‘My apologies. As you can see, I am most ill-informed about everything.’
‘You are,’ Patel confirmed, flatly.
‘So why were you suspended if you stopped the riot?’
‘I just told you, because I stopped the riot! What’s the matter with you?’
‘I’m so sorry. So, how did you stop the riot?’
Patel sighed impatiently. ‘The houses on a street caught fire, and about thirty families from one community were trapped. They could not escape because the rioters waited outside, and were burnt to death. Everyone was shocked by this gruesome “accident” and that ended the riot. Always remember: in a riot, the cruelest side wins.’
‘I will remember that,’ Sikandar promised. ‘So you saved many lives by sacrificing a few. Did they understand that here at the NP chief’s office?’
‘What do you mean?’ he demanded. ‘Are you saying I supervised that riot for my own pleasure? Of course they understood. The entire NP monitored the events that day. They would all have been suspects in the inquiry if I had not signed an affidavit stating there was not enough evidence against them. They know that.’
‘Then why did the NP government suspend you?’ Sikander was intrigued. ‘Is that not bound to upset you and make you expose everyone?’
‘I was in charge,’ Patel said reasonably. ‘They had to take some action.’
‘That’s what they told you.’
‘Yes,’ Patel said quietly, ‘and I believed them.’
‘Why not? You are from the same state as Nuri, and you must be his supporter.’
‘Who wasn’t?’ Patel was earnest. ‘That is what I told him today. I worshipped him; he was like a god to me. And I have been waiting, convinced that he will do justice. But I am still on suspension, and there is no hope. I told him this too, that he has lost one of his best devotees.’
They were silent for an instant. Then Sikander asked, ‘But what can you do? Who will believe your story?’
‘I have proof, Mr Bansi,’ Patel said triumphantly. ‘That is the reason why I am here today. I played him the tapes of the telephone calls from that night when the riot started. As a rule, I recorded all calls in my police station. There was a call, one of the many made by Nuri, in which he asked me to pull out my men from a locality. Four families were killed hours after we withdrew protection.’ He paused and added discreetly, ‘I also have log records of the other calls we received that night. My men were all over the area, and did their best to control the angry mobs. Someone complained to the headquarters that the police had succeeded in keeping the peace. So, I got a call from the NP chief’s office, from one of his lieutenants who monitored the riots. He was dismayed that I had not grasped the idea and asked me to call back my men immediately. He also stressed that reinforcements were on their way and to await them before taking further action.’
‘By NP chief, you mean Nuri’s office?’
‘Who else? Good god!’
Sikander apologized again.
‘Anyway,’ Patel continued tolerantly, ‘now they know I have the records, but what they don’t know is whether I have shared the facts with anyone else. That is the only reason why I am still alive.’
‘You mean you may be killed?’
‘It’s a possibility.’
‘I don’t understand this,’ Sikander said, sounding perplexed. ‘Your life is in danger, and your name is tarnished. Why did you do it then?’
‘I believed in Nuri’s politics,’ Patel said repentantly, ‘his promise of a golden future for everyone. I too wanted to be a part of that dream. I am not the villain; I am just another supporter of Nuri.’
‘But is this all you have? Call logs from a police station?’
‘Of course not, sir! You think Nuri would have met me if this was all?’
He fell silent, indecisively, and then said, ‘I often carry a hidden recorder, a small thing that we use for undercover operations. I took it with me to an informal meeting with two senior police officials a month before the riots. They guided me about communal tensions and how to “handle” them, and recruited me for the plan.’ Patel’s voice was forlorn. ‘I told them I was
ready; this was not my first riot.’
‘That’s fascinating! Tell me, how does one go about it?’
‘Well, it’s a delicate thing and has to be thought out well beforehand. I am old school and like to use the traditional trick. Drop a butchered pig outside a mosque and a severed cow’s head outside a temple. They race out with weapons, screaming, puppets on strings ready to kill each other. I am actually tired of how easy it can be.’
‘Surely, you make it sound easy!’
‘Perhaps.’ He chuckled briefly. ‘Anyway, talking of evidence, I also have a record of the conversation I had with the headquarters, requesting additional forces. They clearly mentioned that it would take two hours for them to reach from a neighbouring district. It took them two days. By that time, 202 people had been killed in communal riots. Job done!’
‘You must be proud of such excellent execution . . . of the plan, I mean,’ Sikander corrected himself. ‘Why are you still suspended from duty, sir?’
‘Nuri thinks I wouldn’t care. His men take care of my expenses, and I get a monthly payment from the NP. But it’s not just about that anymore. It’s a matter of my family . . . people call me a butcher. And while cases are pending against me, the real culprits have gone and won Parliament elections’
‘Doesn’t Nuri realize you might use the information you have?’
‘Well, Nuri got to know about it only today,’ Patel explained. ‘I threatened to go to the People’s Party with the information if he does not get my suspension revoked. That is the reason I agreed to speak with you.’ Patel added sarcastically, ‘I’m sure you didn’t know how right you were; it will do me good to be seen with the rival party.’
‘You’re right, I didn’t know,’ Sikander admitted coolly. ‘So, what’s the way out for you then?’
‘I return to my state tonight and will soon address the first press conference after my suspension from duty. Activists will ask me questions about the riots, and I will say that I simply followed orders of NP’s top leadership.’