by R. SREERAM
‘They would need a lot of money,’ I said, thinking that the hole I was punching into his hypothesis was big enough to shut him up. I needed to think, to find a way out of this predicament without getting myself arrested or, worse, shot. ‘We’ve got enough billionaires in the country who can outbid everyone else. Ambani. Tata. Mittal. Premji. They would give your cartel a tough run for their money, and they’d probably prevail too. Unless, of course, they are a part of the cartel.’
‘Money alone would be an unequal battlefield,’ he agreed. ‘But what if this cartel had so much more to bargain with? Scandalous information on family members. Influence with foreign governments. Labour unions. The ability to make or break the lives of you and your descendants . . . and the wealth of an Ambani or a Tata or a Mittal . . .’
‘As unlikely as that seems,’ I said, sighing, ‘I’ll bite. What would you call this cartel of yours?’
‘We call it the Powerhouse.’
23rd March, 2012. New Delhi.
The mobile studio was like an oven, slowly baking its occupants as it waited in the uncovered parking lot of Fortune Mall. Despite the attack less than twenty-four hours ago, the neighbourhood was bustling with visitors, secure in their faith that the assailants would not return to the scene of their crime. The lot was largely empty, with visitors preferring to park underground to avoid their vehicles heating up. NDNN’s van had no choice – going underground would cut off its satellite access and so it remained under the hot sun, roasting silently.
Richa Naik jabbed her finger at the screen, shouting excitedly, ‘That’s it. Pause it there . . . pause it!’
‘Jeez, Richa,’ muttered the cameraman. ‘I’m doing it. Don’t touch my screen!’
‘Sorry, Vinod,’ said the young woman without the slightest sign of sincerity. ‘But look at this. The first victim to be shot is this lady here – the one talking on the phone.’
‘Yeah, so?’ The CCTV grab was grainy and hardly fit for broadcast television, especially in these days of HDTVs and digital cable, but on the small screen inside the studio, it was saved from the pixellation that would have distorted the image at higher resolutions.
‘That would be Mrs Iqbal Qureshi – the wife of the major-general we tried to get an interview with last night? Look at her hair – she’s got it covered with a hijab. And . . . can you zoom in?’
Vinod grunted. He could not understand her excitement, but then, that was not his job anyway. Besides, he liked her. She was so much nicer – and far less condescending – than that jerk who was the news anchor these days. Holding the joystick gingerly, he pushed it upwards, zooming in smoothly on the image of the victim. For the umpteenth time, as the picture started to break down into pixels, he objected silently to the amount she had paid the security guard to sneak out a copy of the CCTV footage before it was sealed by the authorities.
‘There!’ Richa screamed triumphantly. ‘Around her wrist. That bracelet she is wearing. It says 786.’
This time, Vinod just glared at her.
Exasperated, she pressed the play button. The video moved forward a few seconds before she pressed the pause button.
On the screen, the attacker and his victim were both visible. They were very close to each other, perhaps just a few feet. Certainly close enough to be able to read the digits off her bracelet.
‘That’s the clue,’ Richa stated emphatically. ‘He could see her bracelet, he would have known she was a Muslim. He wouldn’t have shot her if he was one too, right?’
‘I don’t know, Richa,’ said the cameraman thoughtfully. ‘I mean, they are all Muslims in Pakistan – and that doesn’t stop them from killing each other, right? Maybe the guy just didn’t care.’
He could see by the resolute stubbornness in her eyes that she refused to be discouraged. ‘Or,’ she said, ‘he might not be a Muslim. It could be one of these Hindu terror groups we keep hearing about. Maybe they want us to think it was the LeT or SIMI, but –’
Vinod’s phone buzzed. Recognizing the number, he held up a hand to ask her to be quiet. He mumbled a few affirmatives while she kept shifting her weight from one foot to another, impatiently waiting for him to hang up so that he could clean up the video and she could make her finding public.
He hung up and then, just as she was about to open her mouth, he said, ‘Told you it was one of the crazies. They’ve caught a couple of these guys. And guess what?’ He didn’t want to be sadistic, so he told her straightaway. ‘He says they are with the Islamic Jihad. And he’s sorry that a Muslim woman was killed, but feels that it was probably punishment from God for her husband siding with the quote-infidels-unquote.’
16th September, 2012. New Delhi. Rashtrapati Bhavan.
I was shown into an antechamber which was already occupied by three people. I recognized the president immediately, but the other two were complete strangers. All of them turned towards me as soon as I entered. Not for the first time, I rued the fact that Menon had refused to accompany me to this meeting. From the looks of it, I had interrupted a very important discussion – not really the right setting for finding out that you are at the butt-end of a very bad joke.
‘Who are you?’ barked the president.
‘He’s Balamurali Selvam,’ said the man next to him after a perfunctory nod at me. Menon had briefed me on my contacts inside. I presumed the speaker, correctly as it turned out, to be Nelson Katara. There was hardly a wrinkle on his suit as he stood up to shake hands with me. ‘You must remember him – he demolished you during a debate on national television – I believe it was NDNN – when his book was banned.’
‘What’s he doing here?’
Relieved that I was expected – and therefore, finally some proof that Raghav Menon had not been talking through his hat since the time I met him – I ignored the lack of warmth in the question. I was not particularly fond of the president. He and his ilk were responsible for my persecution two years ago and the nightmares I still woke up to – whatever satisfaction I had gleamed from the victory the man had alluded to had soon turned to ash, for it was the very next evening when I had been arrested.
I glanced at the other man and he smiled back at me. But there was something disconcerting about his expression, as if he was looking through me. Six feet tall and visibly fit, clean-shaven and erect, his suit quite obviously well-worn with a shirt that did not go with it, I almost pegged him for one of the presidential bodyguards before I remembered that I was also supposed to meet with Katara’s deputy, a Jagannath Mitra. Was this him?
‘He’s the historian who’s going to document everything that happens,’ Nelson Katara said. ‘One day, when this is all over and people ask, “What happened?”, we are going to have an accurate account. Proof that we didn’t rouse you up from your bathtub.’
The president opened his mouth to speak before checking his impulse. I had this sudden feeling that he was choosing his battles. Should he insist on my leaving or . . . whatever else they had been discussing before I showed up?
Eventually, he made his decision. ‘So what do you want me to do?’
Oh, good. That’s what I would like to know too.
‘We want you to announce a coup, Your Excellency.’
‘A what?’
This should be interesting.
‘A coup. In exactly half an hour from now, you are going on national television and announcing the dismissal of the Kuldip Razdan government.’
‘You’re crazy!’
Amen to that.
Continuing to speak as if no one else had, Nelson Katara concluded his demands with a flourish. ‘And we want you to announce that, for the next five years, you shall head the new government.’
5
26th March, 2012. New Delhi.
‘Thank you for agreeing to see me, Major-General,’ Richa said as she took the chair opposite him.
Major-General Iqbal Qureshi responded with a shrug, setting his cup back on the small table in front of him. Without asking, he poured her a cup of t
ea as well. They were alone on the lawn of his ancestral home in Nilotpalganj, an hour’s drive away from his official residence. A meeting decided on after a lot of thought, a venue after much more.
Throughout the morning, the closer she got to her appointment, Richa had been finding it increasingly difficult to justify her doubts. What had seemed like a brilliant breakthrough the day after the attack had started to break down under the questions from everyone she had pitched it to – she knew that the more seasoned journalists in the office had already heard about the dressing down she had gotten from her producer for her theory and were openly pleased about it. The hundred times she had practised her pitch suddenly seemed insufficient; faced with the prospect of questioning a grieving national hero, she found that her words had already deserted her.
The way he seemed to be studying her did not help her retain her composure. She felt like an interloper on his grief, a joke that he was going to dismiss with contempt and disdain. Yet, there was still one final vestige of self-respect that prevented her from excusing herself and making a quick exit. She had called in all the favours she was owed in an effort to get these few minutes with the General – and if it was all to be for nothing, so be it. At least, she would have tried.
On his part, Major-General Qureshi was wondering if the young woman in front of him belonged to the same despicable organization as Raghav Menon. She was clearly nervous, but he had already been taken in by a similar performance earlier – and he had no intention of being made a fool once again. He had not heard from Menon or anybody else since the attack and was expecting a fresh contact soon. When he had heard from a close friend that there was a reporter who wished to talk to him about his wife, he had put off giving his approval by twenty-four hours, a period he had used to investigate her identity.
A Pune girl. Father retired from government service the previous year, mother still teaching at the same high school that she had joined two decades ago. A younger brother who had just joined one of the numerous engineering colleges that dotted the geography around the city. The typical Indian middle-class family of the Nineties, safe, secure, uncontroversial. Richa’s three years at NDNN had been characterized by mediocrity, spectacular in how uneventful it had been so far, given the sensational nature of the channel – yet, his contacts had also spoken highly of her unwillingness to jump into a story without verifying facts. In this day and age of news tickers and TRPs, that sense of discretion probably explained why no one treated her seriously.
She seemed to be genuine. Then again, she could be a ‘sleeper’ who worked for the criminals, killing the stories by cutting off the feed from the sources on the street.
He glanced back once towards the empty house, finding himself missing his wife’s intuition when it came to people. She had had an uncanny knack for judging people accurately, a skill that he had – knowingly, for it irritated her and amused him – dismissed more than once, claiming that his environment had no place for human emotions and understanding.
‘Thank you for agreeing to see me, Major-General Qureshi,’ she repeated a little more loudly. She bit her tongue as soon as she spoke, scolding herself for sounding like a broken record.
‘You said you were doing a feature on my wife’s life?’ he said, his question devoid of any emotion. Yet, seeing the intelligence in his eyes, she knew right then that he did not believe her story. Instantly, she decided that it was better to be up front with him rather than try and trick him into any startling revelation.
‘It is about your wife,’ she said, taking her mobile out of her bag and passing it to him after pressing a button. As the video started playing, she added, ‘But not for an obit. I have reason to believe that your wife was not just an unintended victim of the attack – I think she was the reason for the attack.’ She held her breath, waiting for his reaction.
Major-General Qureshi watched the video without comment. The angle indicated that it was a CCTV grab, probably cropped to show only the relevant parts of the video. He saw his wife, recognized her instantly; he saw one of the gunmen walk up to her and open fire with just a moment’s hesitation. It confirmed for him what he had known the moment her final call had been cut short.
16th September, 2012. Mumbai.
Excesses.
Gyandeep Sharma stared morosely out of his window. Excesses, he thought bitterly, were the privilege of the strong. The right to act as you pleased was a powerful drug. Unquestioned, unquestionable. When you were on the right side of excesses, as he had been until now, you started to forget how the victims on the other side felt.
Now he remembered. He had been reminded. In a way that he would never again forget, he had been given a powerful message by INSAF.
From his office high above the streets, the vehicles were little more than specks of colour against a splash of gray, brown and black. One of those vehicles, he supposed – he hoped – was carrying his niece and some of his trusted majors under armed guard. To where, he did not know; he only knew there was no point in trying to guess. Mumbai was a rabbit warren of safe-houses for those who wanted to hide or be hidden.
His own fate was a more pressing concern, particularly because he hoped he could control it himself – to some extent, anyway. When the commandos had burst into his office, a sea of overpowering khaki and fatigues, they had all – with the exception of his niece, who had tried to fight and had been restrained rather roughly – surrendered without protest, knowing that it would have been suicide to argue or fight. Every corner of the office had been raided and ruined beyond repair. At the time, Gyandeep had wondered why the destruction had been so senseless and wanton.
Left to his thoughts, alone in the room but for the two commandos posted beside the exits, he realized it had not been as aimless as he had imagined. Every laptop in the premises had been smashed, but the desktops had been spared. The plate-glass windows had not been smashed – they had been expertly cut, exposing parts of the office to the elements, ensuring that shards did not fall on the streets below. The server room had been decimated completely, its innards of steel, silicon, copper and insulation incinerated in minutes with blowtorches. A few feet away, separated only by a thin wall, the visitors’ area still retained its air of pristine opulence.
The excesses were not uncontrolled, he realized with a wan smile. They had been orchestrated to disorganize and disorient the opposition, to ensure that Powerhouse responded in a weaker – and perhaps an anticipated – manner. He reflected matter-of-factly that though Powerhouse was still functional, still capable of rallying its forces to provide a fitting reply to INSAF when the time came, the attacks on the Infinity offices would undoubtedly slow down its reflexes.
His thoughts returned, for the briefest of moments, to his niece. She was his heir, the successor who would inherit the rights and duties that Powerhouse offered and demanded, and he had been looking forward to a day when he could trust her to run the daily operations herself. Her role in scuttling Operation Kalyug had been the final test. Until a few hours ago, he had been so sure that Kalyug would be the start that she needed to prove herself to him, and to the others who commanded Powerhouse.
Everyone must be aware that Infinity has been taken off the grid, he thought. Even as INSAF kept him incommunicado, probably believing that Powerhouse had been rendered leaderless, he was sure that the others within the cartel were already scrambling all their resources to find out what had happened to Infinity. After all, his was just one of the arms of Powerhouse.
16th September, 2012. Ghaziabad.
Jack peeled himself away from the windows long enough to open the door. An elegantly dressed steward, dressed in unbelievably starched whites, stepped in, pulling a cart filled with trays of plastic-sheet-covered food, smiling brightly.
‘Good afternoon, sirs!’ he chirped as he moved towards a corner and started to unload some of the trays. ‘We are having a small trouble in our restaurant, so we are feeding the guests in the rooms. Compliments of the hotel! You are American,
yes? We have Corn Manchurian and Bread Pakodas, but if you want more spicy food –’
‘But we haven’t ordered anything from room service,’ protested John, shooting a warning glance at his compatriot.
‘Yes, sir, yes, sir, I know, sir. Like I said, trouble in restaurant. Somebody saw a cockroach, sir. I don’t believe it, but management says we have to close until some terminators arrive.’ The steward moved towards the door. ‘If you need anything else . . .’ He paused, looking expectantly at the two Americans. John waved a hand busily, turning back to the window, still trying to understand what was happening inside the convention hall. Jack pulled out a ten-dollar note from his wallet and thrust it into the hands of the grateful attendant. The man was still bent obsequiously as he closed the door behind him.
A few seconds later, he was startled when the American guest flung the door open and joined him in the corridor. Gesturing furtively that he wanted silence, the American made his way towards him and grabbed him by the elbow, quietly but surely ushering him down the hallway.
‘Sir . . . ?’ whispered the steward hesitatingly. A foreign madam seeking an assignation would have been encouraged enthusiastically, but a foreign man – irrespective of the fact that he had just tipped him six hundred rupees – showing such an interest in him was just the kind of thing his friends had warned him about.
‘Shhh!’ said Jack. Once he was sure he was a safe distance away from the rooms, he stopped and placed his arm around the steward’s shoulders, unaware of how uncomfortable the latter was feeling. ‘Now, then, buddy,’ he said, pulling a crisp tenner from his pocket and stuffing it into the other’s. ‘You gotta do me a favour. Can you find out what’s happening at the convention centre?’
‘Oh, that?’ said the relieved steward. ‘That’s easy. Meeting. Lots of politicians.’ Too many of them anyway, his tone implied.