LASHKAR

by Mukul Deva

  ‘What is that, doc?’ As he spoke Dhankar transferred his pistol to his right hand and turned towards the doctor who was peering around anxiously. The doctor was turning to see what Dhankar was pointing at when Dhankar’s hand rose and then with a rapid downward arc he slammed the butt of his pistol on the doctor’s head. The hit was nicely placed and professionally executed. The doctor slumped neatly to the ground. He was out cold. Sorry, doc, but I’m sure you’d rather wake up with a headache than not wake up at all with a hole in the head.

  Dhankar hoisted the unconscious doctor on to his shoulders and jogged about two hundred metres into the fields that bordered both sides of the dirt track.

  He stopped when he came to a bushy outgrowth in an uncultivated patch. Putting the doctor down he tied him securely with his own belt and strips of cloth cut from the doctor’s pants. He was pretty sure the doctor would be out for at least an hour. Even when he came around he would not be able to free himself easily. That would give them enough time to get clear.

  Being the professional that he was Dhankar had no desire to kill any more than strictly necessary. Not that he would have hesitated to do so had the situation demanded it.

  Having taken care of the doctor Dhankar jogged back to the stranded car. Throwing a quick look around to check if there was anything on the horizon he leaned into the car and pulled Deopa out carefully. Deopa groaned; more asleep than awake. ‘Easy, pal, easy does it,’ Dhankar whispered. Carefully taking him on to his shoulders in a fireman’s hoist he began to skirt round the village as he headed for the ocean at a slow but steady pace.

  The sun was on its way down when he finally managed to reach the shore. Putting down the semi-conscious Deopa in a clump of bushes he made him as comfortable as he could. Then he shook him awake. The wounded man stirred with a groan. ‘Open your eyes. I need you to stay alert for a while.’ Dhankar took out Deopa’s pistol and removing the safety catch put it in his hands. ‘Stay awake for a while, buddy, and keep this handy…just in case. I’m going to go and requisition a boat for us.’

  His words registered. ‘Prop me up a bit,’ Deopa whispered as he firmed his grip on the pistol. ‘Where are you going to get the boat from?’

  ‘A fishing village back there,’ Dhankar pointed. ‘I’ll be back ASAP.’

  ‘Do that. And listen…’

  ‘Yes?’ Dhankar turned back.

  ‘Don’t forget to give the owner a receipt when you requisition his boat.’ The joke was lame, but it cheered Dhankar no end to find his buddy in good spirits.

  Dhankar found a boat almost as soon as he hit the beach. In fact he found a whole lot of them. There was a cluster of boats pulled on to the beach and lined in an uneven row. Several fishermen hung around the boats, talking and laughing as they wound their nets after returning from the sea. Despite the sense of urgency, Dhankar found the sight oddly comforting.

  Forcing himself to be patient he lay hidden and waited as the small knot of men standing around and talking on the beach slowly started to drift towards the village. Dhankar’s patience was severely tried as they took their own sweet time about it. Finally, the sun went down and with it all signs of humanity vanished from the beach. Darkness engulfed the area.

  Dhankar watched for a few more minutes to make sure there was no one around then he moved back swiftly to the spot where he had left Deopa. Deopa’s breathing was ragged and his face pale with exhaustion. Nonetheless he was awake and fighting gamely to keep the pistol steady in his hand.

  ‘Come on, pal. Time to get going.’ Dhankar again hoisted Deopa on his shoulders and made his way back to the boats. He could feel the heat of the fever that had started raging through Deopa.

  Reaching the beach Dhankar went to the group of boats and checked them out. ‘Crap! None of them are powered.’ With that option gone Dhankar settled for the nearest, lightest and sturdiest looking boat he could spot. Gently laying Deopa down into it he cut the boat loose and pushed it into the water.

  As the shoreline receded Dhankar felt the familiar rhythm of the water calm his nerves. The sailor in him took comfort at being back in the element he was most comfortable with.

  For almost an hour the man rowed steadily and evenly. By now even his sturdy SEAL’s body had started to give up on him. He had to fight to keep the waves of tiredness at bay. He wanted to rest his aching muscles but his mind called up reserves from deep within and drove his body on relentlessly. Dhankar knew he was in the final stretch. Safety was within reach. He just had to keep going for a little more time now.

  ‘What is it that dude used to tell us?’ Dhankar forced his mind back to the commando instructor who had trained them during his induction into the SEALS. Your body can do what your mind wills it to. ‘Deopa! Do you think we are far enough from the coast? How long do you think I have been rowing?’

  There was no answer. Deopa had passed out. Reaching out, Dhankar felt his pulse. ‘Shit! It’s definitely weaker than before.’

  That decided him. Shelving the oars he retrieved his radio set. ‘Dolphin this is Golf Nine One One. I have major trouble with the starboard engine and require assistance on priority.’

  On board the Indian Navy warship cruising just outside Pakistan’s maritime limit Sunil Jaggi picked up the signal. So did Anbu sitting in the Kasauli Command Centre.

  Both were already aware that something had gone majorly wrong to make Deopa and Dhankar abort the overland escape route and return via sea. The 911 suffixed to the call sign used by Dhankar confirmed this. It let them know that the situation was critical and hostile pursuit was imminent or already underway.

  This was serious enough without the added complication that Dhankar had brought up. The reference to the starboard engine told him that Deopa had been injured. He knew Dhankar well enough to know that the situation must be really serious for him to invoke emergency procedures.

  ‘Thank God the old man had told me to stay put in this part,’ Jaggi thought as he blessed Anbu’s extensive contingency planning.

  ‘I read you Dolphin. Stand by,’ Jaggi responded more calmly than he felt. ‘Golf for Tiger. Do you read? Over.’

  ‘Tiger for Golf. Go and get Dolphin. Required tech support is on the way.’

  ‘Roger Tiger. Stand by Dolphin I am on my way.’ Jaggi waved at the two Naval personnel who had been detailed to assist him. ‘Let’s go!’ The three men raced for the speedboat.

  Jaggi was getting into the speedboat when the fisherman’s wife came out of her house to throw out the garbage. She saw a half naked man staggering towards her and screamed.

  ‘No…no…it’s all right. I am a doctor.’ The semi-nude apparition ran towards her speaking in what he thought was a calming manner. The fisherman’s wife was anything but reassured and in no mood to wait around and get medically examined. She screamed louder and ran for her life. A few minutes later the semi-nude scion of the medical sciences found himself on the ground surrounded by a mob of very irate people brandishing an assortment of wicked-looking weapons.

  The poor doctor had made a superhuman effort to free himself when consciousness returned and he found himself freezing in the cold damp field with most of his clothes gone. At this last onslaught on his senses he snapped and began gibbering. That did not go well with the mob.

  ‘Do you think he is the maniac who has been killing all those women in Karachi?’

  ‘Let’s read out the kalma for him.’ One of the more aggressive types leaned forward brandishing a huge fish-cleaning knife. Luckily for the doctor one of the saner village elders was also present.

  ‘Wait…let us at least hear him out.’ He waved back the others and turned to the doctor. ‘Who are you? What are you doing here like this?’

  The tone was kindly and the doctor responded to it. It took him ten minutes to spill out the whole sordid tale, beginning from the time he had opened the door to a pistol-wielding villain that morning.

  ‘I think he is telling the truth.’ One of the villagers piped up. ‘I saw a car b
locking the old road. In fact it is still there.’

  ‘Let’s get him to the police station.’

  ‘Better still, why don’t we take him to the phone and let him talk to Karachi?’

  That is how another ten minutes later the freaked-out doctor was talking to a sleepy inspector of the Karachi police department.

  ‘There were two of them. One was badly wounded. He had been shot in the chest,’ the doctor told him on the phone. ‘They seemed to be soldiers, or something like that. Very fit looking guys.’

  ‘What time did you say this happened?’

  ‘Pretty early in the morning. Around six thirty or seven…I’m not sure.’

  ‘And where do you live?’

  The doctor told him.

  ‘Hmm…that is like seven or eight kilometres from the Clifton area…isn’t it?’

  The doctor was about to hang up when one of the fishermen shouted, ‘Tell him that one of our boats is also missing. It was there till just before sunset.’

  The doctor dutifully complied.

  ‘Really? Boat is also missing? What kind of boat?’ The inspector’s sleep vanished within seconds of the story sinking in. Even though he was not noted for his intellectual prowess it did not take him and his superiors long to link the two men and the missing boat with the multiple deaths at Clifton and the three dead cops that morning.

  The minute Jaggi was off the air, Anbu made a series of urgent calls as he activated the operational backups and support that could be required to extricate his team. The PM had literally given him carte blanche on this one. He intended to use it to the fullest and do whatever it took to get his men back.

  ‘I need to speak to the Base Commander…right now,’ he told the Duty Officer of Air Force Station Bhuj after introducing himself. As luck would have it the Base Commander was an NDA batch-mate.

  ‘Dhillon, I have a problem.’ He rapidly explained the situation to him. ‘This is what I want you to do.’

  ‘The first part is no problem, Anbu, but for the fighters you need to get me clearance from on high.’

  ‘Just go ahead and activate both things,’ Anbu replied quietly. ‘The clearance is on the way. You will get a call within the next few minutes. Thanks, buddy.’

  A few minutes later a helicopter took off from the Bhuj Air Force Base. With two medics and extensive medical equipment and supplies on board.

  ‘Golf for Dolphin. I have you on my scope now. Stay put we’re almost there.’ Pause. ‘I also have three other crafts heading your way. They are almost as close as we are. Keep your eyes peeled.’

  The Indian Navy warship heard the radio exchange and altered course slightly. The two missile boats floating around the warship also moved cautiously forward, but ensured they stayed out of Pakistani waters.

  ‘Don’t worry Golf,’ the warship chipped in. ‘We have the scenario mapped out. We’re watching your back.’

  Miles away in Kasauli Anbu felt the coil of stress get tighter. He was about to get up and start pacing again when the phone rang.

  ‘Anbu? Dhillon here. I have the sanction. The chopper should be landing on the warship anytime now. The fighters also are on the go. They can be over your target within minutes.’

  ‘Great!’ Anbu felt his muscles relax. ‘Just hold them over the horizon unless they are required. We don’t want to spook the Pakis needlessly.’

  Seconds later a flight of Indian Air Force fighter-interceptors hit their afterburners and thundered away towards the designated area.

  All at once a very lethal arsenal was moving into play. Each one of the players involved knew that if either the fighters or the warships came into action the fight would escalate and it would escalate fast.

  So be it. This time there was deadly resolve in Indian minds. They would definitely not be the ones to blink first if push came to shove.

  The rowboat carrying Deopa and Dhankar and the speedboat rushing towards them were too small to register, but the Pakistanis had had all three Indian Naval ships on their radars since the afternoon. However at that point in time this was just one meaningless bit of information for them. Though all the relevant information relating to the killings in Karachi was already with them, the bits and pieces were with different people in different departments and organizations. That is why no one in authority had been able to put the larger picture together.

  The Pakistan Navy Monitoring Station in Karachi also picked up the signal transmitted by Dhankar. The signal was scrambled and they did not know what it signified, but they knew that it was something out of the ordinary and so needed to be investigated. The message was recorded by the Signalman on watch and passed on to the Duty Officer.

  ‘What the hell is this?’ the Duty Officer asked irritably.

  ‘I have no clue, but there seems to be a lot of chatter out there tonight.’

  ‘Isn’t there always? The bloody ocean is full of old women these days,’ the Duty Officer grumbled. He was not one of those high-initiative types.

  ‘Not this kind, sir…that’s the Indian Navy frequency and they are chattering like crazy. I have a feeling something is up, sir.’

  ‘Feeling? You have feelings, sonny?’ The Duty Officer gave him a contemptuous look; he turned away and putting his feet back up on the table returned to The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. The Duty Officer was convinced that he was a poet who had missed his true calling when he had joined the Pakistan Navy.

  ‘I feel we should call up the Commanding Officer and brief him, sir,’ the Signalman persisted.

  ‘At this time of the night? Are you crazy?’

  It’s not my ass on the line. Turning away with a shrug the signalman filed the report. That simple action of his made sure it delayed the start of the Pakistani search by almost forty critical minutes.

  Two miles away, the Duty Officer at the Karachi Police Headquarters wore a perplexed look. ‘What do you mean a boat is also missing? What the hell does the rowboat have to do with those guys?’

  ‘I think those two guys stole the boat to make a getaway. My gut tells me they are the Clifton killers,’ said the Inspector who had spoken to the doctor from Gullamullah.

  The Duty Officer mulled over this; the whole thing was a bit bizarre. ‘Where the fuck do you think they’re going to go in a rowboat?’

  ‘Maybe there is someone waiting for them out there?’

  ‘Well, let me run this by the navy, the coastguard, port security and sigint. Let’s see what they have to say.’

  A few minutes later the big picture began to fall into place.

  Cops the world over have the same pathological hatred for cop-killers. The Karachi police were no different. A flurry of phone calls disturbed the sleep of many other people in the police, the Navy, the coastguard and a host of other departments. Even so, it took almost half an hour for someone to connect the whole thing to the signal that had been caught just off the shore.

  ‘You did what?’ The Sigint Commanding Officer asked.

  ‘I filed it, sir,’ the poetry-loving Duty Officer sheepishly replied. ‘I didn’t think it was that critical, sir.’

  ‘You didn’t think it was critical?’ The Commanding Officer’s tone was cold and caustic. ‘You have Indian Navy ships chattering around in your frontyard and you don’t think it is critical?’ Pause. ‘Just wait for me to come in tomorrow morning. Make sure you meet me before you go off duty. And tell the coastguard, the Fleet Duty Officer and Post security to move their butts now!’

  A little while later the first naval and coastguard boats left the harbour or were diverted from their patrol routes and began to scour the sea ahead of the fishing village for the missing boat and the two men. One of the smaller coastguard boats got lucky and actually spotted the rowboat. Immediately three of the search vessels altered course and started bearing down on it.

  The Pakistani coastguard boat was barely minutes away when the speedboat with Jaggi on it rendezvoused with the fishing boat stolen by Dhankar, who was by now absolutely at the end
of his tether. The GPS locators had helped Jaggi to swiftly home in on Dhankar.

  Dhankar helped the medic shift Deopa into the speedboat as Jaggi held the boats together. Then they were off. Jaggi handled the small craft as the medic went to work on Deopa. The speedboat raced away into the night.

  ‘Golf for Tiger. We have Dolphin. Two is in urgent need of evacuation.’

  ‘Cas evac is standing by Golf. Get back to Golf Base now.’

  The Pakistani Navy now took serious note of the Indian warship and missile boats that were patrolling sedately just outside their maritime limit. They were still trying to figure out what they could or should do when their coastguard took possession of the stolen rowboat and reported in.

  ‘It’s empty now but there is some blood in it.’

  ‘So they’ve moved out in another boat?’

  ‘I guess.’

  ‘Shit!’ There was long pause. ‘Do you think that’s why those Indian Naval ships are hanging around?’

  ‘How would I know?’

  ‘There is whole load of chatter out there. Any idea what’s up?’

  ‘Negative PortSec. They are out of our waters.’

  ‘What do you want us to do?’

  ‘Stand by till I check back from HQ. Nobody get trigger-happy.’

  ‘Roger Control. We are standing by.’

  A few minutes later he was back on the line:

  ‘This is control. No one is to do anything as long as they are outside our waters. HQ does not want an incident in international waters. Is that clear?’

  The Pakistani crafts moved into a holding pattern as they kept watch on the three Indian Naval crafts hanging around just outside Pakistani maritime limits.

  The helicopter was landing on the Indian warship as the speedboat zoomed in out of the darkness and pulled up alongside. Eager hands helped to get the men on board. Soon the helicopter took off again. Deopa was on board. The naval medic positioned on the warship accompanied the wounded man. So did Dhankar. The minute the chopper landed near the Air Force hospital at Bhuj they rushed him straight into the operation theatre. The operation lasted four-and-a-half hours.