by Mainak Dhar
‘Twelve of us crossed the Line of Control, with me in charge. I still remember it like it was yesterday. The smell of the damp earth. It had rained just the previous night and the ground was still slushy. It was like dragging your feet through mud but it meant the Pakistanis would have a tough time coming after us in vehicles. We didn’t smell much better. We had smeared mud all over ourselves to make ourselves harder to see and also so that any guard dogs wouldn’t smell us. Only the sound of the occasional bird and not much else, other than the shallow breathing of the man next to you could be heard.’
I paused for a moment, lost in those times gone by, old memories flooding back. Memories I had tried so hard to repress. Zoya was just looking at me, her eyes locked on mine as I continued.
‘The Army began mortar shelling and machine gunfire in other sectors to keep the Pakis busy while we reached the Ranger base under the cover of darkness. We took out the two sentries and entered the base to find to our shock six teenagers sitting around, watching a video of the raid on our base. They never had a chance to get their weapons. We lined them up. Then we just stood there, taking in what they had been watching. We were all veterans, had all taken part in combat, but something snapped in us when we took in the sheer evil we saw before us on the screen. These so-called children had videotaped themselves raping, mutilating and killing women at the base and were now watching it as if they were watching a sports event.’
I felt Zoya’s grip tighten on my hand and her eyes widen. This is why I had not shared my past. I had feared how she would react. But I had to finish what I had started.
‘We had left a couple of our men as sentries to watch for any retaliatory attacks. Word came in soon that a group of Pakistani SSG commandos was on its way in. That should have been our first warning sign that everything wasn’t as it seemed. The Pakis took care of their jihadis, but wouldn’t send in the SSG to rescue a group of teenage jihadis. Then a tall, well-built boy of about eighteen – their leader, judging by his swagger – told me that we could not touch a hair on their heads. That he was the nephew of a Pakistani general, one who was close to many bigshots in India, and had been to Delhi to participate in peace talks and cultural exchanges. If we hurt him, his uncle would ensure that our careers were over.
‘I looked at the young man in front of me, saw his face on the video still playing behind him as he slit a woman’s throat in front of her kids, grinning at the camera, and knew I could not let him go unpunished. His friends were standing around, paralysed with fear, but this youngster was smiling at me, confident that his connections put him beyond the reach of an ordinary Indian Army officer. I put my gun aside and told him I’d give him one chance to escape if he could get past me. He charged me with all the desperation that comes from being young and feeling you’re invincible. Well, he wasn’t. I broke his neck, cut off his head and placed it on the TV so that his protectors would know who had been there. We killed the others as well and left just before the SSG got there.’
I paused and looked at Zoya. Her mouth was open. She seemed to be in shock. I held her hand gently.
‘Zoya, when most people think of the Army, they think it’s about parades and patriotic songs. If they contemplate war, it’s movie-style, full of bombastic dialogue and heroic charges. War is actually about messy and bloody deaths, about grown men crying like babies when their guts are cut out, about the battle rage that makes you keep stabbing an enemy even after he’s long dead, about nightmares of those dead haunting you long after the fight is over. They never show that on the news because if people realised just how awful war is, they would stop asking for it so often.’
‘What happened next, Aadi?’
Zoya’s voice was even. I was impressed at how well she was taking this, at how strong she was, or at least was pretending to be, for my benefit. Somehow that made it even more special.
‘We had thought the boy’s uncle would complain to our politicians and we would catch some flak, but it didn’t worry us. Our CO was a good man. He was used to giving the politicians the slip when we needed cover for the stuff we did to the Pakis. But the boy’s uncle came at us from a new and unexpected direction. He used the media, our Indian media, as his weapon. Seems he was incredibly well connected to ICTV. He came from an old aristocratic family and was in with the elite of India – from Bollywood celebrities to journalists to politicians. An Oxbridge degree, a fancy accent, but a bloodthirsty jihadi all the same. His nephew was a chip off the old block, even more so. It seems he had gone rogue during the attack on the army camp with his jihadi buddies without his uncle’s knowledge.
‘Still, his death was hard for the general to take lying down. He came after us with a vengeance. ICTV soon had a scoop with our photos, perhaps leaked or bought from someone in the government. Teenaged rapists and murderers were portrayed as innocent children and we were suddenly the villains. Our CO took the fall and resigned. While many in the government wanted to go after us, he tried to save us. I was disgusted by it all – at how our own leaders were willing to sacrifice us to please the enemy, at how the public was baying for our blood based on some incorrect media reports, at how nobody was willing to speak up on our behalf. We were sworn to secrecy, so that any inconvenient details which could have caused embarrassment to the politicians didn’t come out. I had no option but to resign. Seems like the jokers in the government had planned investigations against me and my men. But in 2014, the government changed and those files were quietly shelved as the new government took a less rose-tinted view of our neighbour. The rest you know. I had tried so hard to make a fresh start and to put my past behind me, until now.’
I stopped, drained.
At one level, it felt like a physical load had been lifted off me. The burden I had been carrying for so many years felt lighter because I had been able to share it with someone. At another level, reliving those memories was much harder than I had expected. I hadn’t realised it, but when Zoya reached out to dab my cheeks, I realised I was crying.
‘Zoya, I never wanted you to get mixed up in my past. That’s why I tried to stay aloof, to not commit. I was so afraid I would lose you. Believe me, I have not lied to you about anything, except by omission. Everything else I told you… about my childhood, my family, about who I am as a person, is all true…’
‘No.’
I was stunned into silence, fearing the worst, when I saw the teasing smile playing on her lips.
‘You have told me one more lie. I am assuming that all those scars on your body that I saw are not from a motorcycle accident as you claimed but from your job in the army?’
She had me there. I could do nothing but nod. I was about to say something about there being absolutely no more lies, big or small, between us, when she leaned forward and kissed me. I felt my defences crumble at her gentle touch.
‘Aadi, I’ve been with you almost every single day for the last three months. We have shared so much together. I know you’re not lying. I know that much.’
I began to wipe away the tears that were now flowing freely down my face. Zoya held my hand and looked me in the eye.
‘You don’t have to be strong all the time. Perhaps that’s what love is, knowing that you can show your worst to someone and know that you won’t be judged.’
I kissed her back and we sat there for some time, content to just hold each other. I felt a sense of peace wash over me. When she looked at me, I could see that look of determination in her eyes, which I had come to recognise and to love.
‘You should get your story out. Tell the media what actually happened.’
‘Zoya, I was an officer in the Indian Army. We didn’t earn a whole lot of money, but what we earned was the people’s trust and respect. Divulging details of an operation that never officially happened would lose me that, not to mention probably land me in jail.’
‘You yourself said the new government isn’t like the old one. Hell, they went public with the surgical strikes across the Line of Control.’
<
br /> I shook my head, wanting Zoya to realise just how impossible my situation was. ‘That would be difficult for even the current government to go public with, unless they want to provoke a major confrontation with the Pakis. And, as much I respect the current prime minister, I doubt even he’d do that over someone like me.’
‘Why?’
‘That general. The one whose nephew I killed… He led the recent coup in Pakistan and is now the president of Pakistan.’
Zoya just looked at me in stunned silence. The pain in her eyes mirroring what I felt deep inside.
We were interrupted by the phone ringing. It was Phadke, and he sounded worried.
‘Aaditya, where are you?’
‘Home. What’s up?’
‘They’ve released an updated kill list.’
I didn’t see why that should concern me, so I asked Phadke what he wanted with me. His words sent a jolt through me and I sat up straight on the sofa.
‘Your name is on the kill list.’
The media was all over the updated kill list, which included mostly retired Armed Forces officers and an even more strident call for lone-wolf attacks. In their own words, ‘Rise up, oh youth, and slay these oppressors in their cities, their homes, their workplaces. Just as they deny us a life of safety and dignity, rob them of theirs.’
If there was one silver lining to it all, it was that ICTV seemed to forget about my past for the moment and had instead started focusing on the new kill list. As Varsha Singh droned on about some names on the list, I wondered if she thought this was also the handiwork of “disillusioned and victimised schoolchildren”.
Zoya was gripping my hand hard as we sat together in front of the TV. I had put myself in harm’s way many a times when I had served in uniform, but my parents had passed away by then. I’d had no wife or girlfriend at the time, so while being in danger was not a new sensation, having someone worry over me was. In a way, it was comforting, but also made me worry for Zoya and her safety.
‘Maybe we shouldn’t meet for a while. I don’t want you to get into any trouble because of me, Zoya.’
She dismissed the suggestion, and instead kissed me into silence when I began to protest. As far as ways of getting me to shut up went, she had figured out the most effective and the most pleasant one.
The bell rang and I opened it to find Ravi, grinning.
‘So, my boy, seems like old friends still have love left for you. Enjoying the attention?’
He stopped when he saw Zoya. I told him that she knew everything. His eyebrows arched up in surprise and he sat down on the sofa, looking at Zoya.
‘If he’s told you everything, you must be someone very special. I’m Ravi. I used to train this boy when he didn’t know a Dragunov from a dragon, and now I look out for him once in a while. But with you there, I may find myself out of that job soon.’
She smiled, accepting his outstretched hand, shaking it warmly. I had not had a family for a long time, but now seeing the two most important people in my life together, in my house, brought back a feeling of what having a family felt like, and also brought back my fears regarding those close to me.
‘Ravi, I tried telling her but she wouldn’t listen. Maybe you can convince her to stay away from me for a few days. That kill list has my address, phone number and details of where I work.’
Ravi looked at me, his trademark mischievous smile playing at the corners of his mouth.
‘Falling in love making you cautious, my boy?’
Seeing the look of irritation flash across my face, he quickly added with a conciliatory gesture, ‘What you two do is your choice, but I’ve been married thirty years and was in the Army for almost as long. Rekha knew I was going out in harm’s way all the time. While we were posted in Kashmir, we knew she was sharing the risk. For an army family, risks are to be shared, at least that’s what we believe. For all you know, this list is just media theatrics, nothing anyone will actually act on. Nowadays, anyone can post anything up on social media. It may not end up meaning much at all.'
I wanted to tell Ravi that I was no longer in the Army and that Zoya and I were not married, but with both of them looking at me, I realised I was outnumbered and outgunned. And, he was right. The list had got media attention but nothing had happened so far. If anything, the Islamic State had a history of issuing grand kill lists. At one point, as the newsanchor was pointing out, more than fifteen thousand Americans had been on their kill list, and it was widely viewed as being a tool of psychological warfare more than anything else. There was no talk yet of any security being extended to those on the kill list, though some retired generals on the list were beginning to demand it. The government had issued a statement that it was considering these requests. Where that left a disgraced former soldier, who knew too many inconvenient truths, was not known or said, and certainly, nobody had reached out to me so far. I suspected that if anyone got around to arranging security for the hundreds on the list, I would be one of his or her last priorities.
Realising that watching the news any longer would drive us all crazy, we decided to inject some normalcy into our lives. Ravi called his wife over and the four of us went out to lunch. That one hour spent at Indigo Deli in Powai almost made me forget the events of the last few days. We chatted about the old days, Rekha good-naturedly teased Zoya about how someone had finally made me see the errors of my single ways, and from time to time, I just watched them talk and smile together. After my parents had died, I would often dream of them, of us together. Not doing anything special, but just having a meal together. Of me being woken up by my mother, being told I would be late for college. Of my father, an English professor and writer, joking over dinner about how he had never dreamed his son would want to join the Army. A poet’s son becoming a soldier, he’d say. Now we can find out which is really mightier – the pen or the sword. He’d challenge me to an arm-wrestling bout. I’d wake up, tears in my eyes, realising that those simple dreams were perhaps the ones which hurt the most, as those were things I could never experience again.
Now, seeing Ravi, Rekha and Zoya together, I felt my eyes well up and blinked away the tears as Zoya looked at me. She held my hand under the table and I smiled back. This was as good as it got, far better than I’d thought I’d ever have it. Far better than I thought I deserved. I ordered a glass of wine for everyone and raised a toast.
‘To friends…and family.’
I dropped Zoya off at her place when we were done. At the door, as I began to turn away, she stopped me.
‘Would you want to stay… I mean…’
She hesitated, and this time I silenced her by kissing her. She smiled.
‘I guess that answers the question.’
I went in with her, feeling as if my little world was in some way cocooned from the chaos that was erupting around us. As if in our little world, we could forget about the media reports and kill lists – a world where we only had each other.
I couldn’t have been more wrong.
Morning dawned with the sunlight streaming in through the bedroom window. I stretched as I sat up, seeing Zoya walk into the room, dressed for work.
‘Much as I’m tempted to take the day off, I have a meeting with Tony, so I can’t just skip it and spend the day in bed with you.’
She smiled as she walked closer and kissed me, running her hand over my bare shoulders. ‘I meant to ask you about that tattoo. What does it mean? Looks like a winged knife and there’s text in Hindi below it saying balidaan. That means sacrifice, right?’
I told her that was the logo of the Paras and that I had gotten it tattooed just before I had left the Army. I also told her that it covered a nasty scar where I had picked up a shrapnel wound from a landmine explosion during extraction from the mission which had caused me so much turmoil.
She left for office, promising to get back early from work. I took a shower and when I dressed and gathered my things, I saw three missed calls from Phadke. I called him back. Thirty minutes later I wa
s at the police station, sitting with him in his office.
‘Four killings last night.’
I hadn’t checked the news and had no idea things were so bad.
‘All sniper shootings again?’
Phadke shook his head and I could tell that he had bad news.
‘One shooting. Of a retired air chief marshal as he left a restaurant in Colaba where they were celebrating his seventieth birthday. Shooter got away and the video was up on social media and jihadi sites minutes later. Same modus operandi as before – long-range shot, the target killed in front of loved ones, and the uploaded video.’
‘What about the other three?’
Phadke was fidgeting with a paperweight on his table and spun it as he answered. He was an experienced officer, one who had done a stint in the ATS. Yet I could see that he was spooked.
‘Nasty business, Aaditya. Not snipers, looks like the lone wolves they were appealing to. One victim was a retired Army major general in Gurgaon, one a serving police officer in the Ministry of Home Affairs in Delhi and the third a retired Air Force air commodore living in Bangalore. All attacked at home at night. All stabbed or slashed to death, and their family also killed or wounded badly. The total casualties in the three incidents are six dead and one critically wounded. The bastards took videos of the dead bodies and uploaded them. One of them taped the torture and killing of the officer before uploading it.’
He was talking faster than he normally did, as if trying to blow off steam or hide the stress he felt, and I just listened, processing everything.
‘Not something new for these bastards. Jihadis have done stuff like this. In June 2016, a lone-wolf in France attacked a police officer outside his home and killed him and then livestreamed the torture and killing of his wife online, while their three-year-old son sat nearby. Two more attacked a church in France and stabbed the priest to death, taping it and uploading the video. They do stuff like this, but it has never happened in India and three attacks in a single night means that there’s co-ordination, not just one deranged guy going off to meet his seventy-two virgins in the afterlife. Also, the snipers haven’t hit anyone other than the targets on the list. These were massacres, as if they were consciously targeting the families.’
