Race Course Road: A Novel

by Goswami, Seema

  ‘Well, to be honest, sir, I didn’t really think about it. I just assumed that your father would have taken you into confidence on a matter as important as this. And also, as you know, I was otherwise occupied.’

  Dholakia then looked pointedly at his watch, as if to indicate that they had kept him away from his wife long enough.

  ‘Do you have the papers with you?’ asked Karan, preparing to let him go.

  ‘No, sir. The Prime Minister kept the papers with himself. Maybe the new private secretary would know about it.’

  Karan shook his head. If the papers had been in PMO, they would have been presented to him by now. Clearly, his father had decided to keep the papers to himself. The question now was whether he had confronted Madan Mohan with this incriminating evidence. And if he had, how had Madan Mohan taken it?

  The brothers walked Dholakia out to his car, asked him to keep in touch and let them know if they could do anything for his wife, and then retreated to the den to confer with one another.

  Dholakia’s information was important. But was it enough to explain what came after? Could this evidence of an illegal bank account be motivation enough for Madan Mohan to assassinate Baba? Sure, Baba was a stickler when it came to clamping down on corruption but he had also been a pragmatist. And even if he had threatened to expose Madan Mohan, was this enough of a threat to a man who had brazened his way through worse? Madan Mohan could just have denied the charges till the media lost interest and moved on to another story. And that would have been that.

  Why would he want to kill the Prime Minister of India over this?

  And what should be their next move? Should they summon Madan Mohan over to RCR and confront him with this new information? Or would they lose the element of surprise if they did that?

  Of course, to do that, they had to first see the information for themselves and assess how serious it was. But they had no idea how to access it.

  Where could Baba have stashed these papers? If they weren’t in the office, he had probably tucked them away at home. That meant that they would have to go through his stuff in 3, Race Course Road to try and find it. And there was no guarantee that they actually would.

  They could always escalate matters and ask the Americans to share the information all over again. But could they really afford that kind of distraction in the crucial days leading up to the final phase of the elections? The LJP needed all hands on deck as it tried to recover after the setback of Asha’s photo scandal. And with Asha herself barricaded in RCR as a consequence, Karan, Arjun and the rest of the party leadership needed to pick up the slack.

  Where was the time to enter into a dialogue with the Americans or initiate back-channel communications with the US State Department?

  Surely, Karan argued, they could afford to wait another week or so before they moved on this? Arjun was disinclined to agree. But in the end, he went along with Karan’s judgement on this issue.

  But there was one thing that both brothers were clear about. They were not going to share this development with Asha. Not right now, at any rate. She was already in such a bad way dealing with the fallout of the photos; there was no need to burden her further. She would take it very hard when she found out that the man she had so readily adopted as a mentor, Madan Mohan Prajapati, was also the man behind the death of their father.

  The longer they could shield her from that information, the better the chances of her recovering from the depression she had fallen into.

  ▪

  Asha was still fuming at Sunny’s little performance when there was a soft knock on the door. She ignored it. Then, she heard two childish voices excitedly call out her name. ‘Asha bua, can we please come in?’

  ‘Please Asha bua, we haven’t seen you in ages!’

  Kavya and Karina. Radhika had been sending her notes over the past two days saying that they wanted to see her. Surely, she could make time for them? They knew nothing of what was going on. They were just confused as to why Asha bua was excluding them from her room.

  Asha had ignored the messages. So, now Radhika had chosen to take a direct approach. She had sent the girls over to try and inveigle their way into Asha’s room. Typical. Radhika really didn’t know how to take no for an answer. Well, she was not going to be manipulated by her sister-in-law. She was simply going to pretend that she couldn’t hear the plaintive voices outside her door.

  But then she heard Karina burst into loud tears. ‘I’m so sorry, Asha bua. I’m sorry if I was naughty. Please forgive me. Please. I want to see you.’ Clearly, she believed that she had done something terrible for which Asha was punishing her.

  Kavya began murmuring consoling words to her sister. Suddenly swamped by overwhelming guilt—how could she repulse her nieces, who loved her so much, in this manner?—Asha ran to the door and opened it.

  Kavya and Karina, their tears drying miraculously, ran into her arms, smelling of shampoo and talc after their evening bath. And following closely behind, Radhika slipped into the room in their wake.

  Damn, thought Asha. All she had wanted was to spend some time with the kids. Now she was stuck with the mother as well. And there would be no getting rid of her.

  Sure enough, after the girls had had their quota of hugs and kisses, Radhika dispatched them firmly to bed. They protested loudly, they begged Asha to intervene. But, as always, their mother’s will prevailed. And with very bad grace, Kavya and Karina departed, slamming the door behind them to signal their displeasure at this summary eviction.

  Asha couldn’t help but smile at that display of temper. She looked up to see an answering smile on Radhika’s face.

  ‘They really are a handful, aren’t they?’ she asked Asha. ‘I’m sorry for forcing them on you but they were getting so upset. They love you very much, you know.’

  ‘I know,’ said Asha, swallowing that lump in her throat. ‘And I love them too. I just didn’t think I was up to seeing them.’

  ‘And how do you feel now?’

  ‘I’m glad I saw them, Bhabhi. They made me feel much better. It was a good way of reminding myself that life goes on…’

  Yes, Radhika agreed, there was nothing quite like spending time with children to get things back into perspective. They always reminded you that no matter hard life got there was joy and hope in the world.

  ‘You know, Asha,’ Radhika went on. ‘I still remember when you were the same age as Kavya is now. And how you made me feel the same way that Kavya makes you feel now.’

  Asha looked as startled as she felt. ‘I did?’ she asked, incredulously. ‘How did I do that?’

  Radhika smiled. ‘Do you remember the first time I came to Bharatnagar to be introduced to Baba and Amma? I was all of twenty years old, and you were just ten.’

  As Radhika spoke, the glimmerings of a lost memory began resurfacing in Asha’s mind. It was a scorching summer afternoon, with the sun blazing down mercilessly. The entire Pratap Singh clan was waiting in the relative cool of their porch to greet Radhika and her parents as they got out of the vintage car that Karan had driven to the railway station to fetch them in.

  In a vivid flash, Asha remembered seeing the young Radhika alight from the car, her shapely legs encased in jeans that looked as if they had been spray-painted on to her. Radhika had slipped off her sunglasses and given all of them a dazzling smile, which had died on her lips as she saw the open-mouthed horror with which the reception committee was looking at her.

  ‘Oh my God! I do remember!’ laughed Asha. ‘You came wearing jeans, and I think all of Bharatnagar went into shock at the sight.’

  Radhika was giggling helplessly by now. ‘I don’t know what I was thinking! But despite my mom insisting that I should wear a sari, I insisted on those bloody jeans. They’ll be so convenient on the train, I said.’

  Radhika paused for a moment to catch her breath. ‘You should have seen Baba’s face when he caught sight of me. For one horrible moment I thought he would send me right back to the station.’

&n
bsp; By now, Asha was chuckling along as well. ‘Ah yes, rookie mistake,’ she mock-commiserated with Radhika. ‘You know how the slogan goes. When in Bharatnagar, dress like a Bharatiya nari.’

  ‘Well, clearly I hadn’t heard that one yet. But I learned my lesson soon enough, didn’t I?’

  ‘Oh yes,’ laughed Asha. ‘You most certainly did.’

  Radhika suddenly turned serious. ‘But that’s not why I remembered that day, Asha. I remembered it because on that day you were the first person from my prospective in-laws side to reach out to me at a time when all I wanted was for the earth to open up and swallow me.’

  ‘How did I do that? I don’t remember doing anything at all,’ said Asha.

  ‘Well, you were just a kid yourself. But you could probably tell from the embarrassed silence that something was wrong. So you came running down the steps and threw your arms around me. “Hi, I am Asha”, you proclaimed loudly. “And I just got a new puppy. He’s called Boxer. Would you like to meet him?”’

  Baba had laughed delightedly at that. And suddenly the tension was broken, there were smiles all around, and Radhika felt as if she had been accepted into the family.

  As the women smiled at one another, an unspoken question hung between them. How had things got so wrong? How had they allowed that initial spark of affection to wither away? Why hadn’t they been better friends to one another?

  Finally, It was Radhika who broke the silence. ‘You know as well as I do Asha, step-families are hard work. And I failed to put any into our relationship. I’m sorry about that.’

  Asha held up a hand in protest. ‘No, Bhabhi. It’s okay. You came into a difficult situation that was not of your own making. And you did the best that you could.’

  ‘No, I didn’t,’ said Radhika firmly. ‘I really didn’t. I see you now with Kavya and Karina. I see the love you have for them. I see how you shower them with affection. I could have done the same for you. But I didn’t. And I am truly sorry for that.’

  Asha was beginning to get a bit teary again. ‘It’s okay, Bhabhi, don’t worry,’ she said. ‘It’s water under the bridge. Life goes on…’

  ‘That’s exactly what I wanted to speak to you about,’ said Radhika. ‘Life goes on. And you can’t give up and sit in a darkened room for the rest of it.’

  ‘Bhabhi, have you seen those pictures? Have you heard what they are saying about me? How can I possibly face the world after this?’

  ‘Well, you can and you will.’ With that, Radhika poured herself a measure of vodka and settled down more comfortably on the sofa. ‘Let me tell you a little story,’ she told Asha.

  Radhika’s story began around the time she had first arrived on the Delhi social scene as the young, glamorous wife of a fledgling politician, Karan Pratap Singh. Having grown up in Bombay, Radhika had not been familiar with the rules governing the behaviour of political wives in Delhi. So, when she was invited for a dinner party hosted by another politician and his wife, she thought nothing of slipping on her go-to little black dress. Karan had looked a bit dubious when she emerged from the bedroom but—still in recovery from honeymoon-stage bliss—had said nothing.

  But the moment she walked into that Lutyens’ drawing room, Radhika knew that she had screwed up. Every other woman in attendance was dressed in a sari, accessorized with a modest blouse and a nice red bindi. It was as if a memo had gone out along with the invitation, clearly laying out the dress code. The only one who hadn’t got it was Radhika.

  All the women turned around and stared disapprovingly, looking askance at her bare legs and the generous display of cleavage. Even worse, all the men turned around and stared approvingly, running lascivious eyes along her bare legs and, yes, that generous display of cleavage.

  For a second, recalled Radhika, she had been tempted to turn tail and head straight back home. But that cowardly impulse lasted only until Karan took her hand in his and propelled her inside. With that one gesture, he indicated that he was not prepared to be ashamed of his wife. And in that moment, he gave her the strength to be her own woman, to live life the way she wanted and to not give a damn about what the rest of the world thought—or said—about her.

  Ever since then, said Radhika, she had done just that. ‘I made that decision very early on. I may not be able to change the world in which I now live. But there was no way I was going to allow that world to change how I lived.’

  So, Radhika kept an ear out for all the stories circulating about her but paid scant attention to them (‘in one ear, my dear, out the other!’). She knew exactly what those nasty old gossips said about her. She had heard all the tales about her promiscuity (‘such a laugh,’ she said, ‘given that I have only ever slept with one man in my life!’). But she refused to let the rumours prevent her from enjoying a night out, drinking in public, flirting with her male friends or dressing exactly as she pleased.

  ‘And you’ve heard the latest, haven’t you,’ she asked Asha, who shook her head in demurral.

  ‘Well, the new rumour is that I suffer from bipolar disorder. That when I am in my manic phase I have screaming matches with Karan in front of our SPG guards. And on one occasion I was so annoyed with him that I actually stopped the car in the middle of Aurangzeb Road and made him get off and make his own way home.’

  ‘But, but, but,’ Asha spluttered. ‘That is such nonsense. Surely everyone knows that the SPG would never allow such a thing to happen!’

  ‘Of course they do. But you know what they say: why let the facts get in the way of a good story?’

  ‘Yes, Bhabhi. But there’s just one problem with that. In my case, the facts are right. And the story is true.’

  ‘Yes, there is that,’ said Radhika, allowing herself a small, ironic smile. ‘But if there is one thing that I have learnt Asha, it is that nobody can hurt you, embarrass you or humiliate you without your consent. If you choose to withdraw that, then nobody can touch you.’

  ‘That sounds all nice and lovely, Bhabhi. But it doesn’t work like that in the real world. How can I not feel humiliated and shamed when every single person with a smartphone has now seen me naked? How can anyone come back from that? In a country like India? In Indian politics?’

  ‘I’m not saying it’s going to be easy, Asha. It’s going to be very tough coming back from something like this. But you can’t just give up and lock yourself away from the world. That’s no way of dealing with the situation.’

  ‘So, what do you suggest I do?’

  ‘Well, you know what they say on all those American TV shows: if you don’t like the narrative, change it.’

  ‘Again, that’s easy to say but impossible to accomplish. The story is out there. The pictures are all over the place. There’s nothing I can do to change that.’

  ‘Yes, agreed. The story is out there, as are the pictures. But that doesn’t mean you can’t take back control of the story. It was your life that was violated. It was your image that was besmirched. It was your privacy that was infringed. But we have heard from everyone in this story except you.’

  Asha looked horrified. ‘Are you seriously suggesting that I own this story? That I go out and explain my point of view? How can I possibly do that? I would rather die.’

  ‘That’s all very good and melodramatic,’ said Radhika drily. ‘But you are far too strong a woman to just curl up and die. And I thought that you had enough pride to not allow yourself to be slut-shamed.’

  ‘To be honest with you, Bhabhi, I feel like a bit of a slut. What was I thinking? How could I have allowed myself to be photographed in such a way? I should have known that nothing ever stays private in this world.’

  Radhika shrugged. ‘So, you posed for some pictures for a man you trusted. That was a mistake. The pictures are now out in the open. There is no way to put that genie back in the bottle. But you are not the Bad Girl here, Asha. You are the victim. You have to make people realize that.’

  With that, Radhika drank up the rest of the vodka and bid Asha goodnight. ‘Think about
what I said,’ she said to Asha, as she bent forward to kiss her good night.

  And for the next half hour or so that is exactly what Asha did. The exchange had left her with a grudging respect for her sister-in-law, whom she had otherwise dismissed as a glamorous airhead. Clearly there was more to Radhika than met the eye. And she could finally understand why Karan depended on her counsel as much as he did.

  But while Radhika’s advice to ‘change the narrative’ made sense, how could Asha achieve that? How could she take control of her story?

  Finally after an hour or so of quiet reflection, Asha came to a decision. She picked up her mobile and scrolled through the list of missed calls. Ah yes, there it was: Manisha Patel’s mobile number.

  Asha clicked on the ‘call’ button immediately without giving herself time to change her mind. Manisha picked up on the second ring.

  ‘Asha?’ she gasped disbelievingly. ‘Is that really you?’

  Yes, indeed it was. And she had a proposition for Manisha. Asha would sit down with her at Race Course Road for an exclusive interview, so long as Manisha ran it live and without any cuts.

  Did that work for Manisha?

  Yes, of course it did.

  SIXTEEN

  Madan Mohan Prajapati was in a foul mood. He had been summoned to Race Course Road by Karan Pratap yet again, and in as peremptory a style as before. The only reason he had agreed to come was because he had thought there was a possibility he was being invited back into the fold; that he was being called for some sort of grand council to decide on how to deal with the fallout of Asha’s naked-photos scandal. The brothers knew that he was close to Asha, so they probably wanted his help in dealing with their sister.

  But it all started going wrong the moment his car drove into the main gate of the RCR complex. First, the SPG guards at reception insisted that he go through the mandatory security checks. Madan Mohan complied, though with very bad grace. But when he was asked to hand his mobile phone over before he could be allowed in, he lost his temper.