‘Don’t go to him.’ Leo puts a restraining hand on Tinka’s arm. ‘He’ll come to us, never fear – he can’t resist the international press. He’s like a moth to our flame.’
‘Wonder what pearls of wisdom he’ll let fall today,’ Julian murmurs. ‘My favourite so far has been “East Pakistan gets flooded in the monsoon because it’s a low-lying land full of low, lying people”. Haha.’
Meanwhile, the general has scooped up a glass of whiskey-paani and is conversing with the crowd around him. Somebody cracks a joke and he throws back his head and laughs, a semi-neigh semi-bray of a laugh. Everybody chimes in dutifully.
‘Sycophancy at its peak,’ Julian sighs, suddenly looking every one of his rumoured eighty-three years. ‘How many many times I’ve seen scenes like this! They always end badly.’
And Tinka, looking at him, is suddenly rocked by a very bad feeling, a premonition of horrors to come. She isn’t at all surprised when the air raid siren kicks in.
WooooOOOooooOOOoooo!
It is a keening, see-sawing wail, rising and falling in pitch like an animal in pain, and it never fails to fill her with dread.
‘Clear the lawns please!’ Nikka’s security detail barks out. ‘Take cover! Everybody, take cover!’
The posh, perfumed people scurry to the nearby clubhouse, two of the bearers carefully carrying the Tumbola numbers and drum. The three journalists move in the opposite direction, making for the hotel.
‘Hurry hurry hurry!’ Tinka urges the doddering Julian in an agony of impatience. ‘Faster!’
‘Run ahead then, girl,’ he replies crankily. ‘No need for you to dawdle with me!’
Leo and Tinka exchange frustrated glances, then the Russian mutters under his breath, slings the old man under one arm and runs with him all the way to the hotel lobby.
Tinka laughs and runs too, her shoes in her hands.
The regal, moustachioed doorman doesn’t bat an eyelid when he sees them, merely opening the massive bevelled glass doors without comment.
In the lobby, Leo sets Julian down and eyes him apprehensively.
‘Sorry for, um, mishandling you,’ he says.
‘Get the lift door!’ grunts the old man ungratefully, adjusting his rumpled clothes. ‘The best view is from the terrace.’
Leo grins and rushes to press the elevator button. A minute later, the three of them are shooting up to the top floor.
‘A live show.’ Julian practically licks his chops as the doors slide open smoothly. ‘Have you two got reel in your cameras?’
‘Yup.’ Leo nods, his mouth full of shammi kebab. He has stuffed them into his pockets without even wrapping them in paper napkins. He proffers them to the others. ‘Tinka?’
‘No, thanks.’ She shakes her head, getting her camera ready. ‘Did you even pay for those, Leo?’
‘How could I?’ He grins. ‘The waiter ran away.’
‘Disgusting.’
The other journos are already clustered around the terrace wall when the three of them arrive at the rooftop, all of them oohing and aahing like they’re at a fireworks display.
Tinka immediately wants to slap them.
Leo clambers onto the water tank with practised ease and quickly adjusts his camera to zoom in on the action.
‘MiGs!’ he shouts. ‘Indian.’
Tinka’s heart slams into her ribs in relief.
Thank God.
It can’t be Ishaan.
‘See how proud our Ivan sounds.’ Julian nudges Tinka. ‘Just because they’re made in Russia.’
‘Well, the Gnat’s almost a British plane,’ she tells him, her fingers trembling a little as she tracks the jets through her viewfinder. ‘And it has the best record against the Pakistanis, better than anything Mikoyan Gurevich’s come up with. Tell him that.’
‘Hmmm, how come you’re so jet-savvy?’ Julian raises one desiccated old eyebrow.
‘I’m generally savvy,’ she shoots back and lowers her camera with a sigh. ‘Damn, they’re too far away. I’ll get nothing with my crappy zoom feature.’
‘They’re aiming for the airfield!’ shouts a German cameraman, who is positioned on top of the air-conditioning shafts. ‘They’re trying to crater it again! Whoa, hark the ack-ack guns!’
• • •
The moment the gunners hear the unmistakable roar of the Tumansky engines, the ack-acks start to fire, causing the MiGs to bounce and check. The puffs of smoke exploding around them are bigger than last time, clearly the Pakistanis have brought bigger guns into the game. The MiGs rise to higher altitudes, cursing colourfully, until they are level with the circling Gnats.
‘Too hot for you down there, brother?’
Yeah,’ comes the terse reply.
‘Can we try my idea now?’
‘No. We’re gonna try out Dillu’s missiles first. We’re going in again. You stay, scan and report, okay?’
‘But Raka, yaar…’
The MiGs drop height, vanishing below the thin cloud cover. Shaanu curses but stays put.
Hearing the roar of the MiGs returning, the Pakistani gunners up their attack. The MiGs barrel through grimly, taking the only route they can – right down the length of the runway, wide open to gunfire.
At Shaanu’s altitude, all that can be heard is an eerie silence.
The Gnats circle…
The silence stretches out…
The sky stays empty….
‘Fuck this.’ Shaanu’s voice is brisk. ‘C’mon, Gana.’
• • •
Peering through his zoom lens from his vantage point atop the water tank of the Intercontinental, Leo Stepanov gives a sudden exclamation.
‘Gnats!’
His cry is followed by a chorus of others.
‘Shit, yes, Gnats! They’re Indian.’
‘Where? Where?’
‘Look! Those little flashing ones swooping around close to the ground! Hooly-doolies, that was close!’
With a sinking heart, Tinka watches the three diminutive jets dive in perfect synchrony towards the airfield. Though there is no logical way she can tell from this distance, she is sure one of them – probably the cocky one that’s flying the lowest – is being piloted by Ishaan. Shakily, she turns her back to the scene, leans against the parapet wall and swallows hard.
Julian chuckles. Resting one hip comfortably against a water tank, he is watching the action with one wrinkly hand shading his eyes.
‘Cheeky bugger! Fancy some gum, Tinka?’
He proffers a pack of Wrigley’s Spearmint. Tinka pulls out a stick with unsteady hands.
‘Aren’t you watching?’ he asks her.
‘The sun hurts my eyes,’ she replies, popping the gum into her mouth.
Julian glances at her.
‘Man up, young woman!’ he says rallyingly. ‘Hey, maybe a small bet would spice things up for you. How about you wager a small sum on either the PAF or the IAF coming up tops today?’
‘I’m not going to pick sides,’ she replies tightly. ‘War is stupid.’
‘Agreed,’ he replies. ‘But vastly entertaining and good for selling newspapers.’ He draws in a sharp breath. ‘Phew, that was close, too close for comfort!’
• • •
At this lower altitude, the air is thick with puffs of gunfire. Shaanu can see the MiGs – two smoking, one limping and one flying higher than the others, divested of its missiles. Down below, the airfield looks intact, except for the massive crater created by Dilsher Singh on his first and last sortie.
‘Missed!’ Shaanu says savagely. ‘Damnit!’
‘Here we come, boyssss,’ Gana shouts over the R/T as he dives even lower, right above the area where the ack-ack fire is the thickest, to a height where they can practically see the whites of the gunners’ eyes. Thach-weaving now, they criss-cross each other, confusing and distracting the gunners, strafing them mercilessly. The air around them explodes with AA fire, but not a single ack-ack touches the tiny, weaving Gnats.
�
�Coast clear, Raka, go!’ Shaanu yells over the R/T, but he needn’t have bothered, the MiGs are already swooping in, engines screaming, dropping their deadly cargo.
‘Dishoom,’ mutters Raka, his MiG mushing madly as he drops the first FAB500 slap-bang in the middle of the airfield. ‘Annnnddd … dishooom again!’
As he watches, pulse throbbing, muscles clenched, the missiles plummet straight down towards the tarmac, straight as stones.
‘No drift!’ Raka mutters triumphantly. ‘Oh, well done, Dillu, no drift at all!’
And land smack in the middle of the runway.
There is an odd little pause.
Raka scans the ground in his buffeting MiG, his heart as heavy as his ’craft is light…
It’s a dud, he thinks, devastated, his mouth as dry as cotton wool. Shit, so much risk and effort, and the damn thing went phuss … God alone knows how long it had been rotting in the depot…
• • •
‘It’s a different sort of missile,’ Julian reports, shading his eyes with his hand. ‘No parachute attached.’
Tinka isn’t interested in the missiles. She’s on her feet too, all pretence of disinterest gone, trying to spot what the Gnats are up to. They’re flying at a lower height, below the MiGs, zig-zagging merrily. The cocky one makes a particularly audacious dive, and, as the terrace full of spectators gasp in awe, she gives a choked laugh.
Mad, she thinks to herself, torn between pride and despair. Quite, quite mad.
‘That’s a remarkably well-thought-out strategy,’ Julian wheezes from beside her. ‘See, the Gnats are doing that sexy little shimmy to keep the AA gunners distracted while the MiGs drop their bombs.’
‘What bombs?’ somebody asks. ‘Nothing’s exploded yet.’
They stare at the airfield, eyes straining against the sun. As they watch, it seems to glow a dim but unmistakable orange and, a moment later, a dull booming sound reaches their ears.
Julian gives a dry chuckle.
‘There she blows.’
• • •
The force of the explosion rocks Shaanu’s Gnat. He goes higher, wincing at the deafening noise. Thick smoke has risen in a mushroom cloud from the tarmac, rendering him momentarily invisible to the gunners.
Above him the MiGGies are cheering on the R/T.
‘It wasn’t a dud!’
‘Yayyyyyyy!’
‘Rakaaaaa! Patakaaaa!’
Suspended in an envelope of heat and smoke, Shaanu shoots forward to clearer skies, then peels around and peers down gleefully to see what’s happening below.
The airfield is still obscured, but it seems to be aflame. There is no sign of Gana. Has he been hit?
Shaanu noses in, looking anxiously for his wingman.
‘Baaz, you idiot, get the fuck out of the area!’ Raka yells from above him. ‘They’ll kill you or we will, you crazy basta—’
His voice is abruptly drowned out by a new blast of AA fire. The gunners who, confused by the Gnats, had started to fire unevenly, have regained their savage rat-tat-tat precision.
• • •
‘One of the Gnats is hit,’ Julian murmurs. ‘See, he’s limping away from the fight, I hope he makes it home.’
Tinka finds that she suddenly cannot breathe.
‘The other one’s wreaking havoc though.’ Leo chuckles.
‘Clearly enjoying himself, the cocky little bastard.’
She draws a ragged breath and gets to her feet.
‘You’re right,’ she manages to say quite calmly even as she grips the parapet wall hard, so hard her knuckles turn white. ‘He’s definitely enjoying himself.’
• • •
‘All four sets of twins delivered, ladies?’ Shaanu enquires over the R/T, his voice steady but bubbling with adrenalin. ‘Or are any of you still waiting to drop your load?’
Two of the MiGs still are, and they now dive and drop their bombs with pinpoint accuracy. The impact of the missiles shakes the earth and sends up a new mushroom-shaped cloud of smoke and debris.
‘All done now,’ Raka says. ‘We could’ve managed without your little chin-chin-choo cabaret dance, but I admit it did help. Thanks, buddy.’
‘Save the ass-kissing for when we get home,’ replies Shaanu lazily. ‘Drinks are on the MiGGies tonight.’
Smoothly, the formation rises up, up and away. There is a hoarse cheer over the R/T when Gana limps in from the left, one wing hanging wonkily. As they begin their flight back to base, a pall of dust and smoke lifts from Tezgaon, and an incredible sight greets their eyes.
The FAB500s have lived up to their name. Circular craters, easily fifty feet in diameter, have opened up all along the tarmac – great gaping mouths with up-thrust, concrete lips. Deep, black cracks radiate out from the epicentre of each crater, like lightning bolts spread in a monstrous spider’s web.
The Sabres of Tezgaon are well and truly grounded.
ELEVEN
With the PAF rendered more or less toothless in the eastern theatre of the war, the IAF’s role changes somewhat. It now settles down to providing Close Air Support to the Army as it makes its way slowly through the countryside, avoiding the bigger towns, towards Dacca. Fighters from the MiG, Hunter, Sukhoi and Gnat squadrons circle over the fighting below, strafing with impunity, their Forward Air Controllers guiding them from the ground. Transport aircrafts paradrop soldiers and supplies. Sukhois carry out sorties by moonlight, and even the lumbering Caribou are enlisted to drop bombs in the pitch dark of night.
The strategy of the Indian generals is to harass and demoralize the Pakistani Army, keeping them jittery and off balance, constantly watching the skies, wondering where the IAF will hit them next.
The Caribou squadron is mighty chuffed at this new development – it’s an exciting change from dropping food and ammunition. Only the best pilots are picked to drop the bombs – and Maddy is one of them! He tells Juhi this very proudly when he drops in to see her, in-between mouthfuls of the French toast and cold coffee she has prepared for him.
Her pretty face falls.
‘Oh, now I have to worry about you too. Here I was thinking that what you do is safe at least!’
Maddy checks, fork halfway to his face, then continues to eat. He is certainly grateful for the piping-hot French toast, but what she’s just said is mildly offensive. Flying the de Havilland Caribou is no easy task. It entails low-level flying through valleys and mountain passes in calamitous weather. Night flying in formation, the lights on each aircraft your only marker to prevent you from banging into each other! Inching through treacherous passes and ravines in the northeast, with the rain pelting down and cloud cover so thick it might as well be a brick wall.
‘Well, it’s less dangerous than the sort of stunts Raka and Shaanu are required to pull,’ he says lightly.
‘Raka told me you guys have a STOOL,’ Juhi says, producing the newly learnt technical term with evident pride. ‘It helps you get up and down easily, na?’
‘STOL,’ he corrects her gently. ‘Short take-off and landing. Basically, we don’t need runways. And we have a really tight turning radius too. So yeah, that does make life a bit easier for us.’
‘I’m so glad.’ She says it earnestly, and she really means it – but Maddy’s ego takes a denting nevertheless, because clearly she thinks the job he does is less glamorous than the stuff the other two pilots in her life do.
‘But I also want be a hero, Juhi,’ he says in an uncharacteristic burst of self-pity. ‘Save the day, win a medal. Gain the respect of all those crazy Kodavas back in Madikeri!’
The usually sympathetic Juhi snorts at this ambition.
‘Just stay alive,’ she says tartly as she picks up his empty glass. ‘We don’t need any more heroes – we need you to play the piano.’
Which, of course, makes Maddy feel even more deflated.
To make things worse, when he gets to the base the next morning, he finds his fellow pilots in the doldrums. News has come from across the border that
one of the bombs the newly co-opted Caribou pilots dropped a couple of days ago landed in the civilian quarter and hit an orphanage. Children were hurt, some died. And model-turned-journalist Tehmina Dadyseth has just written a brilliant, damaging piece about it for WWS.
Damn, Maddy thinks disheartened, as he enters the briefing room. I should’ve stuck to growing coffee. Embraced the civilian life, never tried to pull this macho shit. Because, let’s face it, I’m just not cut out for heroics.
He gets even gloomier when he discovers the mission for the day – dropping a small band of para-commandos close to Dacca. If anybody could be cooler than IAF Fighters like Raka and Shaanu, it is these guys with their dashing red berets and devil-may-care attitude. Hanging out with them will make him feel even more of a loser.
He is striding down the tarmac with his navigator when a hand lands heavily on his shoulder.
‘My man, Subbiah!’ a deep voice drawls into his ear. ‘Thanks for the lift. Appreciate it.’
‘Macho da!’ Maddy’s eyes widen as he turns around. He reddens at once. ‘Shoot, uh, sorry, I mean Major Maqhtoom, sir!’
The lean, dark face, sunglassed as always, cracks into a dazzling white smile. ‘I prefer Macho da,’ says Macho da heartily.
Maddy is confused. The Mukti’s all suited up and packing a parachute. His romantic curls have been pulled back into a no-nonsense ponytail.
‘You’re with the para-commandos?’ he asks.
‘Surrrre!’ nods the Mukti, rolling his r’s flamboyantly. ‘They’re landing in unfamiliar territory, so I’m going along to guide them. We’ll have a blast, won’t we, guys?’
The paras react to this question with expressionless faces. They’re a crack team, the most elite force in the Army, and notoriously clannish.
Maddy puts on his aviators.
‘Right, let’s do this, Macho … er, da. Load up, gentlemen!’
The paras board swiftly and noiselessly, like a well-oiled machine, and less than three minutes later the Caribou’s Pratt and Whitney Twin Wasp engines kick in, it lifts off and rumbles towards Dacca.
The paras get busy in the rear, their leader barking out instructions, while Macho da sits up front with Maddy and his navigator, a forty-three-year-old Tamilian who doesn’t talk much.
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