by R. SREERAM
She was looking off to the left of the elevator bank, ignoring the right as she knew that there was just a closed-off alcove there, when Raghav Menon stepped out from this space and laid a hand on her shoulder. With a yelp, she jumped away, startled, turning around as she moved. Her back slammed against the wall and sent a shot of pain through her spine. She winced.
His hand covered her mouth immediately. ‘Shh!’ he said, pressing her against the wall, moving closer and glancing at the stairs himself. There was a faint noise – an irregular clickety-clack – growing louder with every passing second. Cursing, he moved his hand from her mouth to her wrist and gripped it roughly. ‘Come on!’
The next few minutes were a blur for Richa. She was pulled forward and had no choice but to run to keep from falling down. The basement was well-lit but also deserted, for the security guards usually stuck to a small circuit around the guardhouse at the egress points, and she saw no one else but the man in front of her. Even in the summer heat, he wore a suit, the flaps of the jacket rustling around him noisily. He was, she saw, leading her to an unassuming red hatchback parked all by itself at one end of the visitors’ bay.
‘Raghav?’ she managed to gasp out. ‘Are you Raghav Menon?’
Without turning around or slowing down, he grunted a ‘Yes’. They were almost at the hatchback now, just a few steps away, and Menon pulled the key fob out of his pocket and pressed the silent-unlock button in one smooth motion. He swerved abruptly near the grille, moving to his left while her momentum caused her to stumble awkwardly to the right. ‘Get in,’ he said, already opening the door on his side.
Dazed and a little disoriented, her fingers reached for the handle . . . and then she hesitated. Who was this man, after all? Someone who had just called her up and introduced himself, someone she had never heard of, and if he hadn’t used Qureshi’s name, she would never even have given his call a second thought. By the time Menon had slid into the driver’s seat, she was already shaking her head. Her hand started to move away from the handle.
One look at her and Raghav knew what she was thinking. Automatically, moving more out of instinct than anything else, he reached across and pulled the lever on her door, pushing it away as soon as he heard the click of the lock releasing. The door swung quickly towards Richa, who reacted by taking a step backward. The edge of the door still caught her left elbow with a dull thud that was felt by the chassis and Raghav winced despite himself. But there was no time to lose!
‘Get in,’ he repeated, holding out his hand. ‘Trust me.’
Richa stared back distrustfully, her right palm absently massaging her elbow, her mind starting to slow down despite the adrenalin rush that was screaming for action. ‘No,’ she said, ‘I’m not coming with you until you show me some proof. That Major-General Qureshi sent you.’
‘For God’s sake,’ he began, the irritation in his voice as evident as his urgency. ‘The cops will be in the basement in seconds! It’s you they want, so I’m not sticking my neck out if you want to stay – but if you want to find out the truth about the ViFite suit and the Fortune Mall attack, you have to be on the outside. Believe me, the moment those cops grab you, even your editor up above is going to swear he’s never even heard of you.’
Still looking at her, he turned the ignition. The engine started with a surprisingly low purr, the vibrations barely noticeable, and a corner of her mind instinctively assumed that he had deliberately tuned his vehicle for silent getaways like this. She clutched her handbag harder as she considered her options.
Her fingers felt the shape of a smooth, round cylinder inside the outer compartment of her bag and she had a sudden rush of confidence. The can of pepper spray that Rakesh had gifted her for her birthday – only a younger brother, she had told her mother later, would consider a weapon an appropriate gift – was still lying unused in her bag, an equalizer against Menon if she ever needed any. Her contemplation of her options was further simplified by a shout from the elevator.
She got in without further comment, the decision made for her by the angry tone of her pursuers. Even as she was closing her door, Menon stepped on the accelerator and the vehicle started to move towards the exit, away from the elevator well and the policemen after her. As the vehicle picked up speed, he reached across her torso and pulled the lever to adjust the angle of the backrest. Richa, whose reflex at his sudden movement had been to move her fingers to the zip of the compartment holding the spray, felt the backrest give away. She fell back and was almost lying horizontally on her seat as the first cop entered the garage and focused on the fleeing car.
His eyes narrowed as he tried to make out if was Richa driving – or a passenger – and his attention was lost the moment he realized the driver was a male. By the time his colleagues swamped the area around him, only the taillights were visible. A few of the cops started to chase after the fleeing car, only to stop short when he shouted out, ‘Vo koi bandha tha. Usme nahin thi.’ Not wanting to waste their energies after the assertion from a colleague that Richa was not in the car, the cops split up and moved towards the other vehicles parked in the garage.
By the time they had driven up the ramp, out of sight of the pursuers, Richa was struggling to sit upright. Her left hand grabbed the lever that operated the backrest and she gave it a sharp tug, feeling the spring push the seat back into an upright position. The guard manning the gate gave a cursory glance at the passengers inside and the empty back seat, and waved them off. His job was to ensure that the costly equipment that the studio owned was not taken out without the proper approvals – the people who operated the equipment, however, could come and go as they pleased.
They did not speak to each other until they were back on the main road, coasting along, taking advantage of a lull in the traffic. Raghav weaved left and right as he overtook other vehicles in their path, his eyes both on the road and on the rear-view mirrors to ensure that there was no one following them.
Richa pulled her mobile phone out of the purse and unlocked the screen. To her relief, four bars were lit up in the signal icon, and she quickly navigated to her call history. Major-General Qureshi’s personal number had been one of the last calls the previous night and she found it after just one scroll downwards. She tapped the number and the dialler opened up, the call being put through.
‘Major-General Qureshi?’ she said as soon as he answered. Out of the corner of her eyes, she saw Menon do a double-take. The vehicle swerved slightly, an unnecessary and out-of-character movement not in keeping with the rest of his calculated moves on the road, and her sixth sense was instantly on high alert. Her intuition told him that he hadn’t wanted her to call the major-general, and this realization fuelled her sense of urgency. She moved her handset to her left ear, away from him, suddenly afraid that he might try to pry it from her and cut the call.
Without waiting for the Qureshi to say anything, she continued. ‘The police were looking for me. I’ve managed to run away from them, but the guy who helped me escape says you sent him. A Raghav Menon.’
For an instant, there was only silence from the other end. Richa felt a sense of panic growing within her as she considered the possibility that someone else had answered . . . which meant that the major-general was no longer able to do it himself, which, in turn, indicated the possibility that he had not been able to get out in time.
She was about to hang up when his voice, as calm and steady as ever, came through the earpiece. ‘Where are you right now?’
Richa looked outside, trying to get her bearings. She did not recognize the area they were in, which meant that she was probably north of her office – the only direction she had not had occasion to travel in. She peered hard at the store signs as they sped by, eventually managing to read the area off one of them. ‘Ashok Marg, heading north towards Sunshine Square,’ she told him. ‘We’ll be at the signal in a few seconds.’
A short pause as Qureshi computed the time and the distances. Then he said, ‘Okay. Now listen carefully.
I have not sent Menon, but I do need to talk to him. Can you get him to Fortune Mall?’
As Richa hesitated, the implications of the major-general’s statement still sinking in, he added, ‘If not, I suggest you jump out at the next signal, get an auto and go some place no one will find you.’
Their vehicle started to slow down. Richa wondered if Menon would try to grab the phone – for he must have known the instant he heard the major-general’s name that his bluff had been called – and clutched her instrument even tighter. For a brief instant, she considered the option of running away – but where would she go? For how long?
So running away was not really an option, which meant she would have to trust the major-general to get her to safety once she delivered Raghav Menon to him.
‘We’ll meet you at Fortune,’ she said resolutely.
‘Good,’ he replied immediately, as if he had expected nothing else. ‘I’ll meet you in front of the Big Bazaar supermarket on the first floor. And Richa?’
At that instant, they braked to a complete halt. Menon started to reach for her with his left hand, even as his right hand flicked the switch that would over-ride all the other locks, ensuring that she would not be able to unlock her door. Richa held up a hand, more out of reflex than of conscious thought, and to her surprise, his hand stopped in mid-air.
‘Be very careful,’ continued the major-general, dropping his voice. Richa had to strain to hear the last few words before he hung up. ‘Raghav Menon is not to be trusted. He’s part of Powerhouse.’
9
16th September, 2012. New Delhi.
‘Good afternoon, my dear friends.’
On the huge screen, on each of the nine squares that transmitted pictures of nine different areas inside the convention centre in Ghaziabad, people turned towards the cameras. Some of them seemed to look straight through the camera at us; others looked a little to the right, or a little to the left, which meant that their cameras were probably placed off-centre, perhaps along the walls or on tripods set up specifically for this purpose. Politicians, well-known and obscure alike, nudged and shoved themselves as they fought for better views of the screen on which, I was told, GK would be visible to them.
Along the edges of some of the screens, I could also see a solid line of commandos, automatic weapons held diagonally across the chest and pointing towards the ground, their right hands on the stock and the left under the barrel, a picture of readiness to fire.
The vague murmur of voices that came to us over the speakers died out quickly as the president appeared on the screens. On most faces, I saw a mixture of puzzlement and relief; only a few appeared to be belligerent, as if they had already convinced themselves that GK was the cause of their predicament. Come to think of it, in some weird way, he probably was.
‘I apologize for the inconvenience that has been caused to you,’ began the president, and immediately there was a shout from someone at the back which was muted as quickly as it had been uttered. GK appeared to be flustered momentarily, but he quickly regained his composure. ‘It is not our intention to harm you, or to hold you there for longer than necessary.’
The script that Nelson had prepared for him called for a pause. I knew, because for some vague reason, I had been given a copy of the same before being relegated to an invisible corner of the room. From where I sat, I could see all the three conspirators quite clearly – and for the first time, it struck me that there were too few people in here.
For one, there should have been someone managing the AV equipment. Audio-visual setups are extremely complicated and there should have been at least a couple of technicians at our end, standing by, to ensure that things went off smoothly. Of course, given that this was a room in which top-secret video conferences were probably held every week, it was likely that the system was foolproof and the need for security overrode any technical concerns.
Even discounting the technical aspects, there should have been other people buzzing around the president. Secretaries. Attendants. At the very least, doormen. It was a Sunday, but it was still the Rashtrapati Bhavan, and for the amount that we spend on it, I would have expected to see more people earning their salaries.
I started to move towards Jagannath. He must have sensed my motion and looked at me, shaking his head and indicating that he would join me where I stood. He whispered something to Nelson, who nodded, and then jogged over silently to where I stood.
‘What is it now?’ he asked, his tone clearly indicating that I was wearing out my welcome. I ignored it – in fact, I am not too sure I didn’t welcome it.
‘Where are the others?’ I asked him.
‘What others?’
‘The staff. I mean, I’m sure the president must have an army of secretaries and under-secretaries to take care of his . . . stuff. And others like escorts and security . . .’
‘That’s been taken care of,’ Jagannath said, a hint of patronization in the way he said it. ‘You don’t think we would have walked in here and discussed what we did with the president without evaluating the risk of leaks, do you? As of this moment, two hundred and seven staff members – of various designations and responsibilities – are being refreshed on the protocols and regulations of operating here. Thanks to a bureaucratic screw-up, it just so happened that the entire Sunday crew has been summoned without leaving a skeletal crew behind.’
He smiled at me, though it did not seem to reach his eyes. ‘You are afraid that we screwed up somewhere, Selvam, but let me assure you, we haven’t.’
16th September, 2012. Ghaziabad.
As the president’s words sunk in, the murmurs of indignation started up again. He had confirmed what many of them had not even suspected, and his tacit confession of the threat of force that they faced was insulting to their sense of self-entitlement. For many of the delegates, the first reaction was similar – how dare they? – followed by, ‘They can’t do this to me!’ As a result, the protests amped up very rapidly, until most of the delegates, caught up in the rush of emotion, were waving their fists at the president.
After letting the protests hit a crescendo, GK suddenly roared, ‘Silence. Khamosh!’
Inside the convention centre, the effect was electric. The technicians, referring to their own manual for the occasion, had observed the cue – the utterance of ‘silence’ – and turned up the volume on all the speakers, with the result that the repetition of the command – in Hindi this time – hit the delegates with all the subtlety of a sonic boom. Many flinched; one of the oldest kingmakers in attendance actually clutched his chest. Unseen, the technicians reset the volume back to normal levels.
They fell silent at once.
‘Thank you,’ said the president, smiling. ‘Now, if there are no more interruptions, I would like to explain to you why you are where you are.’
He stared at the camera in front of him, appearing to the delegates as if he was staring at each and every one of them individually. GK had their undivided attention. He seemed to bask in it.
‘For many years, we have paid lip-service to the demands for good governance. We’ve held so-called seminars – like the one you are at today – with nothing more than horse-trading and boozing on our agenda, and we think we’ve successfully fooled the public into thinking that there is a better future for them.
‘Yet, the truth is that we have not fooled anyone. In fact, even worse, we’ve gone from disappointing them to disgusting them. Look at all the scams that have come out in the last few months. CWG. Spectrum. Gas. Coal. Land. And every time, as if it is a birth-right, we’ve instituted a toothless commission, compromised the investigators and side-stepped the issues with spins and counter-allegations.
‘That is the legacy we are leaving for our next generation. The burden of corruption that has eroded our moral right to pat ourselves on the back.’
Joseph Karpov Thevaraparambil, the young politician who had confronted the commandos earlier, stifled a yawn theatrically, drawing a few sniggers from the others aro
und him. As someone who had seen GK over the years – and more importantly, heard his father speak of him – Joseph did not have a very high opinion of him. Except for the outright mention of the scams, it was a speech that was recycled at the annual conventions across the country every year. Legacy, moral right, et cetera, et cetera. He was the next generation, and he had no problem with what he was being ‘burdened’ with.
Suddenly, the mellow voice turned thunderous. ‘It has to stop now. We have to stop passing the blame and start becoming responsible leaders, working for the nation, then the state, then the constituency, then the community and only after that, our own personal demands – instead of the other way around.’
Oh, please, thought Joseph. This, from the same guy who had coerced his father into naming a candidate for Rajya Sabha on the basis of the community sub-sect that the person belonged to.
‘And the first thing that we have to do is to revamp the system. There are inefficiencies and loopholes everywhere. Where there aren’t, we – and I mean not just us, but everyone else who follows our example – ignore the laws with impunity.’
With sudden clarity, Joseph realized that whatever the president was up to, he was talking to the gallery and not to the audience gathered before him. Every word that he had spoken so far was a reflection of the populist sentiment, often trotted out during election campaigns – the rare occasions that the public got to meet their elected representatives in person – or during televised debates whenever the other side was on the back foot. To Joseph, it was evident that the president expected his speech to be shared with the public, officially or otherwise, and his bet was on the latter.