by Deva, Mukul
That's that. The Old Man must have been waiting for this.
Rehmat saw Sami return the phone to his pocket and immediately picked up the pace. Wordlessly, the three men raced through the night towards the safety of the Indian border.
ATTF OPS ROOM, NEW DELHI
ANKITA LOOKED UP FROM HER LAPTOP AS THE TEXT MESSAGE alert chimed on her phone. Snatching the phone off the table, she clicked open the new, unread message.
‘The party is over. The chief guest has departed. Rehmat is dropping us home in a few hours.’
She felt a wave of relief go through her.
‘What is it?’ Anbu asked, looking at her expectantly, trying to keep the concern off his face, but not quite succeeding. Seated beside him, Rao and Khare looked equally anxious.
‘It's done!’ Ankita couldn't keep the triumph out of her voice, or the smile off her face. ‘They've taken Salim down and are on their way back. They have already linked up with Rehmat at the Extraction Point.’
‘Yes!’ Khare punched the air with his fist. The infinitely more composed Anbu and Rao exchanged smiles, though neither could mask his delight.
‘I think you should let the PM know. I am sure he is….’
‘No, Colonel,’ Rao intervened firmly. ‘This is a call that only you can make. It's your boys who have done it… again.’
Anbu gave a brief nod, acknowledging the praise. He reached out and picked up the phone.
‘I am sorry for calling you at this late hour, sir, but I thought you would like to know,’ he said when the PM finally came on the line.’
‘Salim?’
‘Salim is dead, sir.’
‘And your men?’
‘They're on their way out now, sir.’
‘Excellent!’ The PM's voice rang with pleasure. ‘Congratulations, Colonel. Your team has done it again. India is proud of you.’
‘We're just doing our job, sir,’ Anbu murmured.
‘You're very modest, Colonel,’ the PM replied. ‘But the fact remains that this country owes all of you a huge debt of honour. As long as there are people like you to guard our borders, India's enemies will need to beware.’
‘We will always be there, sir.’
There was no doubting the resolve or the quiet assurance in the voice of the Colonel.
Acknowledgements
THIS BOOK WOULD NOT HAVE BEEN POSSIBLE WITHOUT THE tremendous support that I have received from my family over the years.
I must thank my comrades-in-arms in the Indian Armed Forces who were kind enough to ensure that I did not make any major blunders while writing about tactics, weapons and weapon systems. However, I must stress that all technical data used in this book is freely and easily available on the internet and has not been provided to me by any person or persons.
A very special vote of thanks to Karthika V.K. and Nandita Aggarwal for believing in me, keeping me on track, and for giving final shape to this book. And to Neelini Sarkar, Shuka Jain, Amit Sharma and the others at Harper Collins India who helped to make this book possible.
I would also like to thank Dr Chitralekha Khatti and Dr Rajni Saxena for helping me find my way through the jungle of medical jargon and for ensuring that I did not stray too far from the truth in matters medical.
Any errors, factual or technical, that still exist in this book are solely my fault or have been deliberately left in there by me to prevent any misuse of a technology or an idea.
About the Author
An alumnus of La Martiniere College, Lucknow, the National Defence Academy, Pune and the Indian Military Academy, Dehradun, Mukul Deva was commissioned in December 1981 into the Sikh Light Infantry of the Indian Army. He took premature retirement after fifteen years of service, including a decade of active combat duty/ operations in India and overseas. He is now an entrepreneur settled in New Delhi, India. Other books written by him are:
Time After Time…It All Happened;
S.T.R.I.P.T.E.A.S.E: The Art of Corporate Warfare;
M.O.D.E.L.: The Return of the Employee; and
Lashkar.
‘Uncannily prescient. Unputdownable. Salim Must Die enthrones Deva as the undisputed Master of Thrills’
– Sarthak Dasgupta, film-maker
Praise for Lashkar
‘An edge-of-the-seat-thriller’
– The Hindustan Times
‘Exciting… with some action, some introspection, some retrospection… A racy read’
– The Times of India
‘For the first time, an Indian thriller set in contemporary times… a gripping tale’
– The Pioneer
‘Lashkar tries to make sense of the terror that surrounds our lives’
– The Hindu
‘Ludlumesque’
– The Tribune
‘A glance is enough to discover… this is a Tom Clancy on the LOC’
– Time Out
‘A real page-turner… a riveting read’
– Business Standard
‘Written with style and panache’
– Sahara Time
‘A real-life take on how the so-called jehadis are picked up from anonymous Indian streets… Lashkar tells many tales with great ease’
– MetroPlus
‘Lashkar is gripping… racy and visually captivating’
– Indo Asian News Service
‘Magnificently paced, rich and real in imagery… Deva is a visionary’
– Sarthak Dasgupta, film-maker
First published in India in 2009 by
HarperCollins Publishers India
Copyright © Mukul Deva 2009
ISBN: 978-81-7223-819-3
Epub Edition © JULY 2012 ISBN: 9789350294581
2 4 6 8 10 9 7 5 3 1
Mukul Deva asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
This is a work of fiction and all characters and incidents described in this book are the product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved under The Copyright Act, 1957. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins Publishers India.
Cover design: Riti Jain Dhar
For sale in the Indian subcontinent only
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