“Are you lost?” Diya clicked her fingers. “I wanted to know if you’re working on a story.”
“Oh…sorry…I was following up on a lead in the Nitin Tomar case.”
“The child killer? Good that the son-of-a-bitch is dead. What was the name of the group, which killed him? Some Mujahideen or something…”
“Mujahid-e-Bashariat.”
“Yeah… where do they find names like those?” she said. “This outfit was a one man shop. Right?”
“That’s what everyone is saying. I don’t agree, however. Mohammed Afroz, the sniper who killed Nitin is dead within 72 hours of that incident. That too of drug overdose. Something doesn’t fit here.”
“Hmm…” Diya said with a doubtful face. “Our local correspondent is covering the story at Ambala. You aren’t planning to go to there by any means. Are you?”
“Not as of now. I’m looking at a new angle. There might be a huge conspiracy behind all this.”
“What kind of conspiracy?”
“I can’t get into details now,” Seema said. “I myself am not sure of what to believe and what not to. But I think things will get clearer in a few days.”
“So you want to say there might be an explosive story in whatever you are doing?”
“I think so.”
“Keep working then. In case, you face any bureaucratic or political hurdles, just let me know.”
Seema nodded. She knew what Diya meant. She was hinting at her brother’s power. Anwar Shah had a deep say in national politics and policy making.
Seema came to her cubicle and opened the envelope Dr Kalyan Ghosh had handed to her. She took out eight pages of black and white printouts containing news articles from Times of India, Navbharat Times and a couple of unknown news sites.
She read and reread each of the articles. When she was done, she had a frown on her face.
Time to visit Bandhavgarh.
21
Chelmsford Road New Delhi
The rush on the New Delhi roads reached its peak as soon as dusk began to shroud the city. Intimacy of a crowd madly running after public transport and the milieu of vehicles honking in traffic jams often gives people a sense of security. A feel that no one can do them any harm in such a public place.
Dr Kalyan Ghosh was also guilty of putting his guard down with such a false sense of security. A lot of things were going on in his mind, as he plodded on the footpath trying to locate the place where his bus would stop. He had been hiding in the city for almost three months, rarely moving out from his one room house he had rented in Paharganj. He had no friends. He seldom called his family living in Durgapur, not to put them in danger. They might be sniffing into our phones.
But there were a lot of things he wanted to talk to somebody, but had not been able to summon courage to do so. It was years since somebody had approached him. He just couldn’t avoid meeting Seema, even though he was scared of coming out in the open.
Now, after talking to her, he somehow felt reassured that the truth will eventually come out. He had taken care to keep the meeting at a secure place. And he had given her a major clue just to see what she comes out with. At the end of the meeting, he had made up his mind to tell her the complete story when they meet next.
He stopped and looked around. By mistake, he had moved half a kilometre ahead of his bus stop. As soon as he turned around and started walking back, his eyes fell over a group of 2-3 people. They were all looking at him, but turned their gazes abruptly. That was a troubling sign.
He looked at the men again. In the evening light, their faces were not visible clearly. One of them was a tall, bearded man who seemed vaguely familiar to him. Bangalore! I had seen him in Bangalore. He could sense danger. His heart started beating faster and his body began trembling.
He reversed his direction, took a few steps slowly and then darted down the footpath. The men chased him. He looked back. Three guys. Help me, God.
He ran as fast as he could. But the crowd, moving in the opposite direction, was impeding his sprint. He looked behind again. There were now only two guys on his trail. The bearded man was gone. Where’s the third one? There was no time to think.
A traffic policeman was standing nearby. For once, he thought of going to him and asking for help. But then, he saw one of his pursuers pull out something from his trousers. A pistol. A sudden chill passed through Dr. Kalyan’s body. Next second, the bearded man came out of nowhere and stabbed him below the rib cage using a small knife. Pain shot through his body. Like a cornered animal, Dr Kalyan shoved his opponent with a huge force. The bearded man fell on the ground.
Dr Kalyan looked behind. One of his pursuers had aimed his pistol at him.
His last chance was now. He jumped on the busy street and tried to cross the road. A couple of cars soared past him, narrowly missing. He could hear a few vehicles behind himself, pushing their brakes and screeching. He kept on running. Only a few meters more.
A car finally hit him from behind. He was flung away a few meters, landing on the road again. He knew it was all over. He saw his last moments. He saw his family, his two sweet daughters and then he saw himself – smiling, in an idyllic land.
But he came back to reality in a second. He was not dead yet. He saw the three men standing at one far end of the road, staring at him, but not able to gather the courage to cross a busy road. He felt dizzy, but still managed to stand up. He could feel the salty taste of blood in his mouth.
A bus moved past him, honking its horn loudly. He used all his energy to latch onto its door handle and clamber on to it. He was pulled in by the people standing on the bus door. The bus kept running at its speed.
Before passing out, Dr Kalyan became aware of one thing. That he was alive.
But, for how long?
22
Though small, Bandhavgarh National Park is one of the most popular national parks in India. Located in Madhya Pradesh, it is famous for Bengal tigers, having their highest density in the world.
Two years ago, a group of wildlife documentary makers from National Geographic stayed in Bandhavgarh for about one week. It had been one of the most prolific visits for them that year. They had had ample sightings of Bengal tigers and rare species like the Malabar hornbills and the Four-horned Antelope.
But there was something else for which that trip would haunt them forever. During one of their filming sessions for Indian hyenas, they had accidentally stumbled into what later turned out to be a mass grave of humans. One of the hyenas had dug up a hole in the ground, from which a skeleton hand was protruding.
By the time the police and crime scene investigators reached the spot, the local media had created a sensation. After a four feet deep excavation, the police found three headless skeletons with their skulls lying alongside. Not a shred of clothing was present on the skeletons to allow for any identification.
The post-autopsy report termed their deaths as “cold-blooded murder”, having taken place about six to seven years ago from then. The victims were estimated to be in their early twenties. While the cleanly dismembered neck bone indicated a single hit from a sharp edged weapon like an axe or a heavy sword, a deep gash on one of the skulls pointed definitively to an axe.
The question was – Who were these victims?
The police came out with a list of fifteen people who had disappeared and hence had been presumed dead in the nearby districts about 6-7 years ago. Only six of them fit the age and height criteria. Four of them belonged to the same engineering college and had disappeared on the same day. Their names were Vikram Pandey, Kunal Chaubey, Anil Jaiswal and Ratan Pathak. It was rumoured that these kids had gone into the jungle to party, but had never returned.
A series of investigations, which involved collecting DNA samples from their family members and matching them with the DNA found on the skeletons, finally confirmed the identities of the victims. The deceased were –Vikram, Anil and Ratan, brutally murdered about six years ago. No trace though could be found of the f
ourth person – Kunal Chaubey.
Seema’s mind kept juggling between numerous questions as her flight took off for Jabalpur.
Was Kunal Chaubey the killer or was he also dead? Why were the youngsters killed? But the biggest question of them all was – What has it got to do with the Nitin Tomar case?
She closed her eyes. A much needed sleep before the goose hunt.
23
Prakash had never seen Mrinal work in front of him. He really wanted to know what his ‘trade secret’ was. He knocked on the door of Mrinal’s hotel room. The door opened and Prakash peeped in curiously. He saw Mrinal talking to someone on the phone.
The state of the room killed much of Prakash’s enthusiasm. It gave him the feel of a call-center, with multiple mobile phones ringing and many weird user interfaces open on Mrinal’s laptop. A thick cloud of cigarette smoke enveloped the room. The bed was a complete mess with all of Ambala’s gadgets lying there with their crisscrossing wires.
Even with his limited knowledge of electronic gadgetry, Prakash was able to figure out that a few devices were card readers, the ones used to access the data on smart cards and magnetic swipes. He noticed a SIM card inserted into one of the card readers, which was connected to Mrinal’s laptop.
“Hey, I told you I’ll come to you. Not the other way round,” Mrinal said, seeing Prakash trying to peek into the laptop screen. “You aren’t authorized to see how I work.” He was done with his phone call.
“Now I know how the great Mrinal works,” Prakash said.
“No sir, you still don’t know a lot of things about me.”
“What’s so secretive about you? Are you a spy?” Prakash asked. “By the way, seeing the amount of heat and smoke your room generates, I would suggest, you keep the fire brigade’s number on speed dial.”
Mrinal smiled.
“Any luck with Afroz’s mobile?” Prakash changed the topic.
“Not much luck. He has barely used this SIM card. I could find only one man named Ramesh Puri, who he had called from his mobile. The call was made in the vicinity of a warehouse near Grand Trunk Road. I have an address of this man, but as usual it’s fake. Which means we might be on the right track.”
Prakash’s eyes lighted up on hearing what Mrinal just said. “When was this call made? Was it before Nitin Tomar’s killing?” he asked.
Mrinal pulled up a post-it note stuck on his table and said looking into it, “It was made about two weeks before his killing. Is that significant?”
“Yes. Because the video created by MeB denouncing and threatening Nitin Tomar also started circulating around that time only. You know, there’s something that has been bothering me since we checked out Afroz’s house.”
“And what’s that?”
“We didn’t come across any video recording instrument in his house. And neither did the police. So the question that begs an answer now is – Where was this threat video recorded? I have studied that video so many times trying to figure out where exactly it has been shot. The only thing I could infer is that the place looked like a large shop floor in a factory or….”
“A warehouse,” Mrinal said.
24
Forest Institute of Science and Technology, Jabalpur
It was after a long time that Seema was inside an educational institution. As she passed through the teachers’ corridor, she felt good to see young boys and girls moving around. A few of them stared at her, curiously eyeing the new visitor in their campus. She asked around to locate the dean’s office and approached the peon sitting outside. He was an old and frail looking man, who ideally should have retired decades ago.
“Tell Amar Mani Singhji that Seema from Century News is here.”
“Please go ahead,” said the old man with a shaky voice. “He’s expecting you.”
On entering the Dean’s room, Seema came across a balding man with a moustache, who got up to greet her. He was possibly in his early fifties. His desk was loaded with files and documents. She also saw a couple of dog-eared books on Indian history. An ashtray was loaded to the brim, suggestive of a heavy smoker.
He asked Seema for tea or coffee, which she politely declined. Her cab was waiting outside and she wanted to get it over with quickly.
“As I’d told you, we’re covering the Bandhavgarh skeletons story. Considering the fact that the four kids were from your college, I thought you might be able to give us a backstory.”
“Why so much interest in the story now?” the Dean asked. “I’m curious about this ever since you called me.”
“We are making a documentary on some of the unsolved and most baffling cases of India,” Seema replied. “And this mystery easily qualifies as one.”
“Well, if you ask me, there’s nothing baffling about this case. It’s unsolved till now only because the police have not done their bit. There have been no arrests till date.”
“Why don’t you tell me a bit from the beginning?”
The man took out a cigarette from his pocket and asked Seema if she minded if he smoked. She shook her head. It’s your cabin. Do as you like.
“It was eight years ago. The final exams of the third year batch had just ended,” he said, taking a puff from the cigarette. “As usual, every kid wanted to party. But these four pricks went overboard. The Bandhavgarh jungles are nearby. So, they decided to party there.”
“Partying in a jungle full of wild animals… Isn’t that prohibited?”
“Well, even smoking is prohibited inside our college campus,” he said with a grin. “We have all kinds of rules here. Only nobody bothers to follow them. And to tell you the truth, I was fed up of shepherding these buggers. One beats up a junior, one molests a girl, one comes drunk to the class. If I keep getting into every such issue, I’ll lose my sleep.”
“How did they get away from your campus?”
“Two of the kids had their own bikes. So, escaping from the campus was easy for them. These guys left our campus after lunch and that was the last time anybody saw them. Their plan was outrageous. They wanted to have a bonfire in the jungle, can you imagine? Little bastards! They even stole an axe from the hostel tool room to cut firewood.”
“Was it the same axe which was used to kill them?”
“I’m not sure. These are the stories I have come to hear only in the subsequent years.”
“Tell me more about these kids.”
“Well, these guys were not bad at studies. Ratan was even one of the toppers. Kunal used to be good at sports.”
“Kunal Chaubey is the same guy who is still missing. Isn’t he?”
“Yes. Poor chap. You know, he had lost his parents in a car accident a year ago. I’ve heard that he used to be really low and depressed since then.”
“Was he used to getting angry? Or of the kind who may harm others?”
“I know where you’re going with this. It seems to be an easy conclusion that Kunal Chaubey might have killed his friends and then run away. The only thing missing is a motive. I’ve asked other students. No one ever believed that Kunal is capable of such a thing. In fact, he was trying to recover from his depression. I’ve heard that he was even seeing a psychiatrist.”
“Which psychiatrist?”
“I don’t know the name. As I’ve have told you already. I know most of these stories through hearsay only.”
“Did they have any enemies? Sometimes, small fights at their age could take a violent turn.”
“We’ve explored that option as well. Our college is a peaceful place. Without much disturbance. Students here get along well with the locals. So, no, I don’t think these kids had any enemies.”
“In other words, it was a complete surprise to find these kids dead in the jungle.”
“That’s true. I’ve tried many times to uncover this mystery on my own. But with the police not helping, I have failed.”
“What makes me curious Singhji is that their skeletons were found so many years later. Weren’t people searching for them at the right pla
ces?”
“We searched for them like mad dogs. We knew they had gone into the jungle. But madam, Bandhavgarh is a huge national park. It is practically impossible to search the whole forest.”
“What about their bikes?”
“Their bikes were never found.”
“And, why were there no clothes on their skeletons?
“I don’t know. You can ask the police,” the Dean said, with a hint of frustration on his face. He closed his eyes for a few seconds and then opened them again.
“You want to know what I believe?” he spat. “I think they came across some really fiendish people in the jungle. They were mercilessly killed and then buried to prevent the discovery of their bodies. Their clothes and belongings were removed and burnt. Their bikes were also taken away. I’m telling you, some day we are going to find Kunal Chaubey’s skeleton also, buried somewhere else in the jungle. I believe they’re all dead. Killed by the devil himself.”
Seema did not ask any more questions. She was done.
25
2:30 Pm, AJK Umaria Police Station
AJK Umaria was the third police station she visited today. The first two were Chandia and Indwar police stations, from which she had to return empty handed. People there had very little idea about the skeletons case. A head-constable in Indwar police station had told her to visit AJK Umaria for more information. They were the ones who had worked in the skeletons case two years ago.
This was the last police station she intended to visit. It had been a tiring journey for her on this wild goose chase. She had made up her mind to contact Dr Kalyan once she was back in Delhi. He will have to answer me this time.
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