A Curious Indian Cadaver

by Shamini Flint

  “Has there been any trouble at the factory?”

  “Why in the world are we talking about that factory?”

  “Just wondering if Ashu had ever complained about anything.”

  “Why should she?” he asked. “No one would give the granddaughter of Tara Singh anything to complain about.”

  “She was investigating a pattern of illness in the slums next door.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I found a file,” said Inspector Singh. “She’d been recording the symptoms of patients at the slum. You’re aware she did some medical work there?”

  He nodded. “I didn’t approve – I thought it was too dangerous.”

  “Her findings are interesting – there’s been an increase in a core group of symptoms in the last few months – shivers, redness in the extremities, elevated heart-rate – that sort of thing.”

  “Why are you telling me this?”

  “There was a scribbled note at the end of the file. It suggested that Ashu thought the factory might be the source of the outbreak – that the factory was poisoning the slum dwellers.”

  “That’s nonsense!”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Of course. Have you seen those slums? The squalor – hardly any running water, raw sewage. There are a thousand reasons why those people might fall ill.”

  Singh eyed the other man. Was he justifiably offended or unreasonably defensive? It was hard to tell. It was a serious allegation. But it wasn’t being made by Singh but by this man’s granddaughter. He remembered the piece of paper with the question – “Factory??” In his considered opinion, Tara Singh was too quick to dismiss the possibility. If they’d been in Singapore, he’d have thrown an army of investigators at the place, established once and for all whether there was a nexus between the factory and the illness at the slum. He didn’t have that option in India.

  “Would Tyler have picked up on any leaks or spills or anything like that?”

  “Of course.”

  “I thought you said he was an ‘incompetent old fool’?”

  Tara Singh’s nostrils flared at having his words flung back at him but he didn’t respond.

  “So you’re dismissing Ashu’s suspicions out of hand?” demanded Singh.

  The other man’s turban bobbed up and down in agreement but he wasn’t the sort to leave the initiative with anyone else. “But enough of this sideshow,” snapped Tara. “Do I need to remind you that you’re supposed to find out what happened to my Ashu?” He closed his eyes. “She was the best of them.”

  “Your grandchildren have been fortunate to have you as their benefactor.”

  “What choice did I have once their father had died?”

  “I heard about what happened to him – it must have been a terrible time for your family.”

  The response was unexpected. “Do you think of yourself as an Indian, Inspector?”

  “I suppose so. In Singapore, with so many different races living cheek to cheek, it’s hard to forget your roots.”

  “Outsiders think that all Indians are one big happy family. But within the country we know better.”

  “What do you mean?” Tara Singh had the air of someone who was about to ride a hobby horse to death.

  “Take the Moslems. Those that stayed after partition. Hindus call them ‘Pakistanis’ even though they were born and bred here.”

  “There are always tensions in societies with different religions,” agreed Singh.

  Tara Singh continued as if he hadn’t heard him. “And the Dalits, the untouchables, the scheduled castes, whatever you want to call them. You think they’re being invited to dinner by Brahmin families?”

  Tara Singh’s face had reddened and there was spittle on his bottom lip. He was clearly working himself into a passion.

  “And we’ve got the Maoists, the Kashmiris, the Assamese, the communists and the Naxalites.”

  “I guess, despite Indian economic success, some are still marginalised,” suggested Singh but he was wasting his breath. This was not a conversation, it was a monologue.

  “And what about the Sikhs?”

  The policeman from Singapore had been waiting for the gripes to get personal. He had noticed over the years that people with strong political views on what appeared to be a wide range of subjects usually had a single grievance at the root.

  “Sikhs seem to have done quite well in India,” said the inspector provocatively, looking around the gleaming office with its panoramic views of the brown smog hanging over the city.

  “Don’t be fooled,” said Tara. “This is just window dressing. There are Sikh figureheads everywhere including that Manmohan Singh. But if you look deeper, you will see the truth!”

  “And what is that?” asked the inspector.

  “We’re second-class citizens. They deny us our rights in Punjab. What about water rights? What about Chandigarh? What about our language? They attack our places of worship and massacre our citizens.”

  “The Golden Temple was housing separatists,” interjected Singh.

  “They had legitimate political goals. Anyway, there was a slaughter of innocents as well. Later, the army stood by and let us be murdered – including my son – after Indira Gandhi was killed.”

  “Do many Sikhs feel this way?”

  “Some of the Sikhs are blind to our plight,” Tara admitted reluctantly. “But we have to look out for our people – otherwise, who will do it?”

  The policeman almost smiled. Tara Singh was echoing Mrs. Singh – just before they’d been fleeced by that taxi driver.

  “It’s not your passport that matters, Inspector, it’s your blood.”

  Singh felt sorry for Sameer Khan. It didn’t seem likely that he would ever have been welcome into the bosom of the family. No cushy jobs within the Tara Singh empire for him, that was for sure.

  He eyed the old man pensively, remembering Sameer Khan’s insistence that Ashu had climbed into a car with a Sikh man after their rendezvous. He’d been certain it was a young man. Could he have been mistaken? Could it have been an elderly Sikh gentleman – one who was a package of prejudices like this one?

  “Did you see Ashu after she left the house that day?” asked the policeman.

  “See Ashu? What do you mean?”

  “You know – out and about? Around Marine Drive maybe.”

  “If I had, do you think I would have left her out there when she was supposed to be confined to the house?” He smacked the table with the palm of his hand. “Don’t you understand our traditions? It was after the choora ceremony!”

  “I wasn’t the one who crept out of the house,” pointed out the inspector.

  Tara Singh subsided like a cake that had been taken out of the oven too early. “Just remember your responsibilities as a Sikh,” he muttered. “Our people come first.”

  Singh remembered the family on the pavement outside and the bright-eyed boy, Mahesh, in his orange shirt, who had hero-worshipped this man’s granddaughter. He was suddenly angry. “Perhaps there should be less talk in India about the plight of our people and more concern for the plight of the people – quite a few of them are still sleeping on the streets outside your office.”

  Tara Singh was a man who preferred to have the last word. “You foreigners,” he said. “You don’t understand India.”

  ♦

  Inspector Singh was quite convinced that only a good meal could cheer him up after such a tiresome encounter with Tara Singh. He debated going back to the Taj and then decided that he needed to be slightly more adventurous in his pursuit of a late lunch. Kuldeep was now going in circles, patiently negotiating the erratic traffic, waiting for the fat man to decide on his destination. Singh absent-mindedly noted the beautiful colonial-era buildings although the vast majority looked like they could use some work on the crumbling façades.

  “Where are we?” he asked.

  “Fort area, saar. Commercial district.”

  “Where’s a good place to eat?” />
  The car pulled up immediately and Singh stared at the various food vendors suspiciously. A hunchback in a white dhoti was crouched by a drain washing dirty dishes in a large steel basin. The water in it was the same colour as that in the drain. Although crowds of office workers were eating out of packets using their fingers, he didn’t think his stomach was ready for any food from roadside stalls.

  “No, no,” he said to the driver. “I cannot eat in stalls.” He patted his stomach. “I will get sick.”

  Kuldeep looked horrified. “Of course not, Sardarji. I mean Jimmy Boys’!”

  “But I want Indian food.”

  “Very good Parsi food, saar. Even Tara Singh is eating there sometimes.”

  Singh followed the direction of his gaze and was comforted by the sight of a small café with awnings tucked into the corner of one of the lots.

  He climbed out of the car. A group of wiry men in white Nehru caps were sorting individual tiffins onto a handcart. He could smell food. His salivary glands went into maximum production.

  “What are they doing?”

  “It is lunch for the office workers,” explained Kuldeep. “They are collecting from the home and delivering to the offices.”

  Singh looked around and noted that there were dozens of these carts, each tiffin labelled with some bizarre and incomprehensible code, being pushed around the area at high speed by the men. Home-cooked meals served fresh in the office at lunchtime, eh? These Indians definitely had some good ideas. He would drop a hint to the wife.

  He made his way over to the restaurant, was shown to a table, sat down heavily and was pleased to spot a review taped to the wall that assured him this was the best place in Mumbai to try Parsi food, whatever that might be. He ordered the set lunch. He was hungry and it seemed to have a variety of dishes, all of which, in his hungry state, caused his mouth to water. Halfway through the meal, it was his eyes that were watering. All things being equal, the chef was not stinting on the chili. A whole fish, carefully wrapped in banana leaf, was particularly pungent.

  Are you enjoying your meal, saar? asked a waiter.

  He nodded and gulped down some water from a bottle, wishing he dared ask for ice.

  A fried drumstick in eggy batter, spicy onion-filled salad and pulao rice with large chunks of mutton later, he was ready to sip his tea and consider his case.

  In many ways it seemed cut and dried. There was the Moslem boyfriend, the arranged marriage and the strongly held political views of the patriarch. It all pointed to a young girl driven to despair and then extreme measures. The grandson, Ranjit, had been right. The old man was unlikely to have looked favourably on a relationship between his beloved granddaughter and Sameer Khan. But how did that square with the testimony of Sameer and Tara that Ashu was not the sort to kill herself, whatever the provocation? It tied in with his perception of the girl’s character as well. Did someone who took her responsibilities in life so seriously, whether to her family or the underprivileged, just chuck it all in on a whim? And in such a terrible way?

  His phone rang and he saw that it was his wife. His hand hovered over the device uncertainly. Did he really want to speak – well, listen – to his wife?

  He held the receiver to his ear with his left hand. His right was still immersed in his food.

  “What is it?”

  “I’m with the family,” she whispered.

  “I know – you said you were going there.”

  “I’m hiding in the bathroom.”

  Singh ears pricked up. What in the world was his wife up to?

  “Harjeet, one of the aunties, just told me about a trust fond.”

  “What?”

  “We were talking about Ashu. Harjeet said that Ashu had a trust fund.”

  “That’s nice for her,” said Singh ironically.

  “From the grandfather – only gets the money when she is thirty-five or when she gets married.”

  “How much?”

  “Three crore rupees.”

  “In real money,” he demanded.

  “Thirty million rupees.”

  Wasn’t that almost a million dollars? “Lucky girl,” said Singh and then remembered the last time he’d seen her and winced.

  “They say that’s why the MBA was so keen. He’s from a good family but I’ve heard from Harjeet that they’re short of money because of business troubles.”

  “Doesn’t really help explain why Ashu killed herself,” said the inspector. “Although it’s very useful background information,” he added hastily. He didn’t want to pour cold water on his wife’s investigative efforts. After all, she was his spy in the family home.

  “Might be a motive for murder?” she asked.

  “Not for the MBA as he needed to marry her first to get his hands on the pot of gold.”

  “Who inherits?” suggested Mrs. Singh.

  “Well, the money had not passed to Ashu at the time of death so killing her wouldn’t have left anyone rolling in it.” Singh was thinking hard, trying to see if there were any other angles but he was at a loss. Mostly, it seemed a good reason for a number of people to have wanted her alive not dead.

  “I met Kirpal,” said his wife.

  “Eh?”

  “The MBA,” she snapped.

  “Oh, what’s he like?”

  “Didn’t like him.”

  “Why not?”

  There was a hesitation. “I’m not sure. He said that he would never have gone through with the marriage if Ashu had been unwilling.”

  “And you believed him?”

  “He didn’t deny that his family needed money…”

  “But it does suggest that his fiancé was more valuable to him alive than dead,” remarked Singh. “Tara Singh was going to offer him a good job at the factory where Ashu worked as well.”

  He could almost sense Mrs. Singh’s disappointment. For whatever reason, and notwithstanding his educational pedigree, his wife had not taken to the bridegroom. He’d have to interview Kirpal soon and decide if he agreed with his wife’s assessment.

  “Is that why you called?” Singh asked.

  “Yes – but also to tell you that the body is coming back day after tomorrow afternoon.”

  “Funeral next day?”

  “Yes.”

  “Impressive,” said Singh. “Tara must have pulled some strings to get the autopsy done so quickly. I think we can assume it was a half-baked job.” He winced internally at his choice of words but his wife wasn’t paying attention as usual. Besides, there was no question as to cause of death – or was there? – so what was the point in prolonging the process. He needed to speak to Patel and make sure there weren’t any doubts – that Ashu hadn’t been the victim of a premature funeral pyre to disguise some other cause of death.

  “Is Tanvir there?” he asked, contemplating his next move.

  “Yes.”

  “Tell him to meet me at the Taj in an hour.”

  “He won’t like that,” she warned. “He’s telling everyone that he doesn’t know why Tara asked you to look into this matter.”

  “Too bad,” said the inspector.

  There was an affirmative grunt from his wife. “Have you found out anything?”

  Singh debated his answer. Should he tell her about Sameer, let alone the file he’d found at the clinic? Maybe not – he wasn’t sure whether she’d be able to keep the information under her dupatta.

  “Nothing much.”

  “Where are you now?” He suspected that she’d picked up on the telltale sounds of cutlery and crockery.

  “Having lunch in Fort area.”

  As always, Mrs Singh had the last word. “How do you expect to find out anything if you only investigate in restaurants?”

  ♦

  Mrs. Singh exited the bathroom carefully and was disconcerted to find a young woman with a mass of curly hair standing directly outside the door. Had she been eavesdropping or was she merely in a hurry for the facilities?

  “Mrs. Inspector Singh?
”

  “Yes,” agreed the policeman’s wife although it was not a handle she’d heard previously.

  “I am Ashu’s friend, Farzana.”

  Mrs. Singh noticed that the girl’s eyes were red with crying and that her expression was anxious. She was restless and her gaze flickered up and down the narrow dark corridor that was lit only by a single lightbulb halfway down its length.

  “I am sorry for your loss,” said Mrs. Singh. It was always awkward meeting people at funerals who had known and cared about the deceased. The majority, like her, were there as a mark of respect to the family and wouldn’t have been able to pick the dead girl out of one of her husband’s line-ups.

  Farzana nodded acknowledgement but her mind was clearly on other things. “I have some important information,” she whispered.

  “What do you mean? What about?”

  “About Ashu…I need to tell someone but I’m afraid the family will be so angry. That Tanvir has a terrible temper. Even Ashu was afraid of him.”

  Mrs. Singh hesitated. Did she really want to hear what this girl had to say? It sounded like trouble and trouble between family members was always to be avoided. Her curiosity quickly and unsurprisingly overwhelmed her caution. “You can tell me,” she said. “I can advise you what to do.”

  Farzana nodded. “That’s why I thought I would ask you – because you’re a policeman’s wife. I heard you say it earlier.”

  Mrs. Singh realised that this was the young woman who had been staring at her in the living room after she’d made the announcement about Singh’s role. A buxom, fair-skinned girl with smile lines etched around her mouth, she might have had a bubbly personality in less fraught circumstances. Ashu’s friend looked the sort to be popular with matchmakers as well, assuming that she could cook and her family had deep pockets. Mrs. Singh warmed to her. “I assist my husband with his work all the time,” she said reassuringly but untruthfully, hoping she conveyed the impression of being the power behind the throne.

  “Ashu called me,” said Farzana abruptly. “She called me and asked me to meet her at Marine Drive. The day she disappeared…died.”

  “Why? Why was she leaving the house? She was not supposed to go out after the choora ceremony. Surely she knew that?”