Special 26

by Gabriel Khan

  I was feeling calm too. All was going according to plan. Sharma was working for us, and we knew he hadn’t told Ajay about being a double for us.

  The bus would be here soon. Any minute now. I’ve got you, Ajay.

  21

  The Sting

  Opera House, Friday, 3 p.m.

  The four snipers were in place, armed and ready, nothing would escape them.

  So were the men down in the street. And those inside the barber’s shop. And those waiting at the bus stop. And the ones near the run-down theatre. Hell, the bootblack was a cop too, and yes, he too was ready.

  I stood on the terrace of the four-storey building, my foot resting lightly on the edge as I surveyed my surroundings for the hundredth time.

  I looked at the building directly opposite. It looked like a giant mirror and some cement had mated, and the result was one of the most sparkling, immaculate jewellery storerooms in the city, complete with bright lights, tasteful neon sign, brilliantly polished glass windows and doors — even the security guard’s belt buckle was a bronze mirror. This was one jeweller who had struck gold, I thought, smirking at my own pun. Well, the jeweller in the shop had some company — there were cops in there with him too. Today they were jewellery connoisseurs.

  Down on the street, everything looked exactly as it should. Except that none of it was as it should be. The man at the corner, getting his shoes polished, had too round a bulge in his jacket to be carrying a book. A holster, maybe. Shailesh.

  The bootblack polishing the shoe kept an eye on everything around him too. Occasionally, he sneaked a hand inside his kit, and checked on the gun hidden there. Ravi. And across the street, Nair, the coconut man.

  I looked at all the officers one by one. The man on the bench reading the paper. The seemingly unemployed duo chatting on the pavement near the signal. The men at the garage repairing some auto parts. And of course, the men sprinkled inside the building opposite and those inside the shop itself. The place was swarming with police. A lone constable paced the area; if he hadn’t been present, anyone staking out the site would have been instantly warned away.

  Suddenly, I saw a flash of light. The man at the traffic lights had just given me the signal, flashing the sun off his steel-encased watch right in my eyes. Showtime.

  As I craned my neck and waited to see what was coming up the road, there was a subtle change in the atmosphere on the street too. People suddenly became preoccupied and hyper-attentive.

  Then I saw the bus. It seemed to be full of people who were barely moving as it lumbered slowly along the road, inching closer as the driver navigated the narrow, dingy path. Why the hell wasn’t it stopping? Was it the bus we were waiting for?

  The next moment, the bus stopped.

  This was it. They were all here. It all begins now.

  Except that it didn’t. Nothing began. The bus just sat there, doing nothing.

  Nobody moved in the street. Well, no, everyone was moving, going about their chores, though in their minds they were all standing absolutely still, waiting to see what would happen next. Who would act first?

  Nothing happened. The bus was still exactly where it had stopped.

  I was too far away, high up on the terrace, and couldn’t see what was happening inside the bus. I looked at the sniper on the next roof, and he slowly drew his walkie-talkie out with his left hand, the right hand holding the gun still. My radio crackled. ‘No visual. The glass is tinted.’

  Shit. Whatever the hell they had been planning, it surely couldn’t be this.

  I spoke into my radio, broadcasting to all officers. ‘Nobody move. Repeat, nobody move.’

  I needed a moment. I had to figure out what they were doing before ordering any move. Except that, however furiously I thought, I could come up with no explanation.

  My radio crackled. It was Ravi, the bootblack. He was leaning forward, as if he’d dozed off, and hiding the radio under his clothes as he spoke. ‘Sir, I can see the driver. He’s not moving. Just sitting there.’

  Nair broke in, hunched down behind the coconut stall. ‘I can take him. I’m nearest the door, I can take it out, get in, neutralize—’

  ‘No, you idiot!’ I said through gritted teeth. ‘Stand down, repeat stand down.’

  ‘Sir,’ Nair continued doggedly. ‘It might be a bomb.’

  Fuck. He could be right. For a moment, I thought he was. And if it was a bomb, delaying would be the worst thing we could do. If it exploded, it would take out the entire street, and before local cops and fire brigade arrived, the gang could have come, grabbed the loot and fled. Of course, they would get fake stuff, but they would have escaped!

  I almost panicked. I couldn’t let that happen. Not when so many people’s lives were at stake.

  But then, a thought struck me. Not once, in all the case files I’d read about these guys, had I noticed such violence. True, they had slapped around a few people, but never had they resorted to violence. Hell, I didn’t even remember seeing a single mention of a gun being brandished.

  Plus, a bomb like that wasn’t really the gang’s MO. Not if I’d read Sharma correctly, and what he thought of Ajay. No, it couldn’t be a bomb.

  I spoke into the radio. ‘It’s not a bomb, repeat, not a bomb. Don’t worry about that.’

  But it could be a thousand other things. And right now, it didn’t seem like the bus was going to move. All right. We’d wait half an hour. It had already been five minutes since the bus arrived, so another twenty-five minutes to go. ‘We wait for half an hour. Everyone on high alert,’ I said.

  Half an hour later, there was still no sign of anyone emerging from the bus. This was going nowhere.

  Fuck it. Something had to be done.

  ‘Ravi, Nair, you’re up. Approach the bus. Exercise extreme caution. Eyes on the driver at all times, watch him for any sudden moves. Snipers, I want all eyes on the bus. Full backup to Ravi and Nair. Respond to any hostile activity with extreme force.’

  That’s it. We were committed.

  Both men slipped their weapons under their clothes, got up and approached the bus casually, as if they were just stretching their legs. I had to hand it to Ravi, especially. He was cool as ice.

  Both of them sauntered in the general direction of the bus, and finally, Ravi was in line with the door. He was waiting for my command. I didn’t hesitate. ‘Move in.’

  Swiftly, without a word, Ravi pulled out his gun, yanked open the door and threw himself to one side to avoid any retaliatory fire. ‘Police!’ he yelled. ‘Nobody move!’

  Behind him, five more officers had materialized, all with guns aimed at the windows. On the other side of the door, Nair was covering. Shailesh had sprinted across the road and was now covering the driver’s door to make sure he didn’t make a run for it.

  But there was no retaliation. Slowly, Ravi moved in front of the door, and lowered his gun. Then he spoke into the radio. ‘I don’t get it! These people look scared shitless! Hold up!’ he cocked his gun again and aimed at the door. ‘There’s movement. Someone coming forward… What the hell! It’s More!’

  What the hell! Why would they just sit there? And why would More and Gupta also be quiet as a mouse in there? This didn’t make any sense. Unless…

  Oh fuck ! Please no. Please let it not be so…

  I ran down the flight of stairs to the makeshift PCR there, and dialled Rahul’s number. ‘What’s going on there?’

  Rahul sounded surprised. ‘What do you mean? The action is at your end!’

  ‘Anything happening there at all?’

  ‘No, nothing. The bus left, our men followed, that’s it! Why?’

  I hung up. No no no NO! This couldn’t be happening!

  I ran down the rest of the way to the street, where one by one, the ‘CBI trainees’ were filing out, looking scared to death. It was as I’d feared. Ajay and his gang weren’t among them.

  A bewildered Solanki appeared behind me. ‘Sir, what happened?’

  It was all comi
ng back to me.

  ‘Well, I have to hand it to you. Just the four of you fellows have created enough trouble for more than a lifetime!’

  Sharmaji seemed offended. ‘Yeah?’ he sneered. ‘Well, it wasn’t just the four of us. People like him helped too!’ He nodded at Ranveer.

  Of course.

  More flashbacks.

  The AD sighed. ‘I want to show you something, Khan. Come here.’ He got up and went to the window to his right. I went with him.

  ‘See that man there? He’s the one those bastards took for a ride.’

  I peered through the glass, interested. The man I saw was sitting hunched on a chair, the picture of dejection, twirling his cap nervously in his hands. He was talking to my man Rahul.

  The AD went back to his chair and sat down. ‘He’s a promising kid,’ he said.

  The AD’s words kept echoing back at me. ‘That kid went on the hunt, started sniffing around all by himself. He dug up all that dirt on his own.’

  And he’d got me, hook, line and bloody well sinker.

  ‘I know fully what I’ve done, sir,’ he said in a low voice. ‘You don’t have to insult me for me to know that. I need your help, which is why I came here. If you help me, we can sort this out quickly. But even if you refuse to help me, don’t make the mistake of assuming I’m giving up. I won’t rest, sir. On my own, it’ll take me much, much longer, but I’ll get them in the end, sir. One way or another, I’ll get them, I promise you that.’

  The mole.

  A wan smile was all I could manage. ‘Solanki, how many men do we have?’

  ‘You mean, in this operation? Let’s see.’ he paused as he did a quick headcount.

  ‘We’ve got twenty-seven men, sir.’

  I shook my head. ‘You should count again,’ I said bitterly. ‘Ranveer isn’t here. He isn’t one of us.’

  A great laugh churned inside me. I fought it back down, and turned to him. ‘Remember Special 26, Solanki? Ajay’s name for the fake recruits?’

  Solanki glanced at the scared men now milling around us. Then he looked back at me.

  I started laughing. This was completely beyond my control. I shook my head. ‘I didn’t think Ajay was so unimaginative that this Special 26 was all he could come up with. And he isn’t.’

  I was laughing hysterically now. Nothing about the situation or the people who were looking at me strangely was funny, but that only made it madder, more hilarious. ‘We’re the Special 26, Solanki! WE’RE the bloody idiots he’s been playing from the beginning.’

  Solanki frowned. ‘But then, that means…’

  I nodded, tears streaming down my eyes while the others tried to calm me down. ‘Yes. Call Magandas’s factory. They must have got there by now.’

  22

  The Hit

  MIDC, Andheri, Friday, 3 p.m.

  A minibus bearing four stern-looking officers dressed in safari suits and a police car containing several uniformed men (including a lady police officer) halted outside Magandas’s factory at MIDC, Andheri. The sight of the vehicles and the officers alighting from them was enough to cause palpable tension in the air.

  While the police officers cordoned off the area and began manning the entry and exit points of the jewellery unit, the four officers walked swiftly inside and demanded to see the manager.

  A bespectacled man dressed in a starched kurta and dhoti came towards them, hands folded in a namaste. He was trembling like a leaf. These men seemed imposing, and having the police visit a jewellery-making unit spelt trouble with a very big T. ‘Sir, I am Shantilal Jain, what is this about?’ He was so nervous, he could barely speak.

  Sub-inspector Ranveer, who led the police team, told Jain, ‘These are CBI officers. They have come directly from Delhi, and have information about malpractices in your unit. We’ve been told that you are conning people.’

  Ranveer looked efficient, and spoke in his most professional tone. The coldness of his voice and his uncompromising demeanour would have rattled anybody. It was said of the Delhi police that they were experts in terrorizing people, while their Bombay counterparts were good at framing innocents. Ranveer looked every inch the Delhi cop, though no one noticed the anomaly of his uniform, which was that of the Bombay police.

  Interrupting his harangue, Ajay stepped in as if in a reconciliatory manner, ‘Enough, officer, let me talk to him.’ Dressed in a safari suit and wearing glares, Ajay looked every inch the CBI officer.

  He flashed his ID and said, ‘We are CBI. We have information that your gold is not pure 24 carat and that you pass off 22 carat gold as 24 carat. We hear that you are fooling unsuspecting customers. We could arrest all of you and put you behind bars for an entire lifetime.’

  Jain seemed to have lost his composure. First of all, anything to do with the police terrified him. The word ‘prison’ made him nauseous. He was pale, yet managed to stutter, ‘S-sir, I s-swear by God this is all genuine jewellery.’

  Now it was Sharmaji’s turn to take over. ‘Okay, Mr Jain, we would like to believe that your jewellery is genuine. You have the option of letting us examine the entire lot of jewellery in our CBI unit in Colaba. If we find them to be genuine, we will return the jewellery and withdraw the case.’

  Jain heaved a sigh of relief. ‘Sir, please do so. Our jewellery has passed the highest scrutiny.’

  ‘Officers, please collect the jewellery in a bag and make a panchnama and receipt for Mr Jain. Please do it quickly as we have to cover ten more jewellery-making units today,’ Ajay told his men.

  Iqbal and Joginder began collecting the jewellery even as they made out receipts. The goldsmiths helped them fill in the details.

  In less than twenty minutes, the raid was over and the bags, stuffed with jewellery, were placed in the minibus.

  The panchnama and receipt were handed over to Jain. There was a CBI stamp on it, signed by Ajay. The officers trooped back into the police van and left the premises, leaving behind them a whole assembly in a state of shock. Everybody in the industrial estate was now talking about the raid at Magandas’s unit. If officers from the CBI, from Delhi, had to fly down for this raid, surely the Magandas jewellers were crooks, they conjectured.

  Jain was left shell-shocked by the raid. What a day! Never in his fifty years of existence had anything as eventful happened to him. He had never lost his mind the way he had today. All his cognitive abilities had simply deserted him. His heart was still pounding wildly and he was covered in sweat. Was he having a heart attack? But it wasn’t the state of his heart that was bothering him. It was that of his personal fortunes. He calculated that the CBI officers had carted away jewellery worth over Rs 1.15 crore.

  Jain wondered whether Sethji had any inkling about the raid. Why else had he shifted the jewellery from the showroom to the factory only this morning? Jain had not been very happy. What a burden to bear – and how horribly he had been relieved of it!

  Well, now he needed to call Sethji and brief him about the raid. It was not a pleasant task. As he went to the table to dial Singhania’s direct line, he saw the phone wires were cut. He was surprised and went to the other phone. Those wires were also neatly clipped. Jain was flummoxed. It crossed his mind that perhaps it was a routine procedure carried out by CBI raiding officers, to cut the phone lines as a precautionary measure.

  He was about to proceed to the neighbouring unit, to make a call, when he saw a peon coming towards him. ‘Jain sahib, how come both your phones are not working? There is a call from the showroom.’

  Jain stumbled as he rushed towards the phone and blurted out in haste, ‘Malik, this is Jain.’

  Rahul, who had been trying the factory number for a long time, had finally had to call at the neighbour’s.

  ‘Jain, why are your phones not working?’

  ‘Sir, those CBI officers had come. They raided our factory and took away all the jewellery for examination. They also cut our lines.’

  Rahul turned towards Singhania, who clutched at his chest and collapsed
on the nearest chair.

  23

  Meltdown

  Opera House, Friday, 4.30 p.m.

  I’d been right. Ranveer was nowhere to be found. His walkie-talkie had been left inside the store. The arrogance of the fucker, he’d even left a note for me with it. It read, ‘Sorry, Waseem saab. But I won’t need this any more.’

  The factory had been raided, just as I’d suspected. Ranveer must have taken some hired help with him; that jewellery-making unit could not have been tackled by four or five men.

  That was where I needed to head now. I had to hope that the gang had left behind some kind of trail. Though, of course, I was being optimistic. They had never left anything to sniff after during any of their earlier heists.

  Rahul arrived just as the clock struck five. He took one look at me, and I realized that he was concerned. He had good cause. I would have been concerned about myself too, except that right now, I didn’t give a damn.

  Rahul and I, along with Solanki, got into a jeep and headed towards the factory. Two more jeeps filled with policemen followed us. Nobody spoke.

  Through the haze, my subconscious was trying to tell me something, but I wasn’t ready. I wasn’t willing to listen to it. Not before I’d drowned myself in alcohol and smoke. I was looking out of the window, numbed with failure, when I saw something my brain recognized, but I didn’t consciously process the information. Mildly surprised as I was, yes, I let it go.

  The traffic was maddening, as has always been the case with any part of central Bombay, no surprise. But things were particularly worse today, with all the wedding cars and—. Wedding! Of course, that’s what I had seen a second ago. I asked the driver to stop.

  The jeep screeched to a halt, as did the two other jeeps behind us. I got out and started walking back. Rahul ran after me, and caught me by my arm. ‘What’re you doing, sir?’ he said, genuinely concerned.