by Mukul Deva
The young terrorist heard himself being called and glanced back involuntarily. It must have been something in his face that gave him away.
‘Oye! You! Bhaisahib, you have forgotten your bag. Stop. Come back and take your bag.’
A better trained and more hardened man would possibly have just gone back and brazened his way out of the mess by pretending he had forgotten his bag. The tactic might have worked and he would have lived to fight another day. However the young terror merchant was new to the game. He lacked the mental mobility that comes with experience and his sleep-deprived brain was not coping well with the stress. He panicked. That is when he made his second and fatal mistake. ‘Move! Move! Let me off!’
Frantically pushing his way through the last two or three people who stood in the aisle between him and the door the man jumped off the bus and began to run through the crowds towards the nearest exit. Some stupid, knee-jerk instinct in him made him pull out his pistol from under his jacket.
The man who had been worried about his glassware saw him jump off the bus in a rush and his panic deepened. He did not see the pistol but by now he knew for sure that something was seriously wrong. That is when, somewhere in the recesses of his mind, the hundreds of advertisements released by a terror-sensitized Delhi Police kicked in and he raised the alarm: ‘Oye! That man has left a bag in the bus. Stop the bus! He has abandoned his bag in the bus!’ He was pointing bug-eyed at the bag under the seat imagining all kinds of things jumping out from it. He suddenly unfroze and leaping up began scrambling towards the door, his gift items long forgotten.
The sound of the man shouting inside the bus attracted the attention of his fellow passengers, the conductor and the bus driver. The bus driver heard the words ‘abandoned bag’ and brought the bus to a screeching halt right in the middle of the busy terminus. The passengers vacated the bus faster than rats abandoning a sinking ship. There were quite a few cuts and bruises as people literally jumped over each other in their hurry to get off. But the injuries were nothing compared to the catastrophe that would have occurred had the bomb gone off inside a bus full of passengers.
Seeing a bus come to a screeching halt right in the middle of the terminus and a horde of screaming people beginning to jump out of it, the two policemen on duty at the bus station were intrigued. They automatically altered course to head for the bus to investigate. At this point they were more annoyed at having their peaceful routine disturbed than unduly alarmed. They were still a few metres away from the bus when they saw a young man rushing straight at them brandishing a firearm. Alarm replaced annoyance in the blink of an eye. ‘Shit on a stick!’ the younger cop swore. He was new on the beat and had never experienced anything like this before. ‘He’s got a bloody gun!’
‘I can see that, you idiot.’ The senior cop, a blue-blooded product of the Jat hinterland, was a man of action, not much given to fancy things like thinking. He saw a man running towards him with a lethal weapon. Behind him he saw a bunch of people yelling and screaming as they tried to jump off a bus. Deciding the scenario could prove potentially injurious to his health he pulled out his pistol and without much ado fired at the man running towards him.
The running terrorist saw the two cops suddenly appear right in front of him. He saw the older cop draw his weapon. He should just have taken aim with the weapon in his hand and fired. At that range it was unlikely he would have missed. However he had never fired at anything other than paper targets and shooting a man did not come naturally to him. By the time he primed his mind and started bringing up the weapon his body had instinctively begun to duck in a reflexive survival act and he was also starting to veer away from the cops. This coincided with the cop pulling the trigger of his pistol.
The cop may not have been much of a thinker, but he was an excellent shot. The terrorist was just ducking and beginning to turn away when the bullet completed its short journey and reached him. Because he was ducking, the bullet caught him high on his left cheekbone instead of the upper torso at which it had been aimed.
The .38 calibre slug passed almost clean through his face and exited the other side leaving a huge gaping hole that spewed blood, bone and bits of teeth onto the people he was running past. The shattered jaw stifled the shrill shriek of pain that erupted as he was thrown backwards by the impact of the bullet. Even if he had screamed it would have been lost in the cacophony of screams that erupted from the terrified crowd around. The terrorist was still clutching the pistol in his wildly flailing hand as he fell. The younger cop ducked and weaved, desperately trying to stay out of the line of the constantly moving gun.
‘Shoot, sir…shoot. He’s still alive. Shoot him again! Look…’
The senior cop, who had his eye fixed firmly on the pistol as it wavered in all directions, decided his younger colleague was right for a change. He also concluded that there still was a clear and present threat to the people in general and his precious self in particular.
‘Behenchod!’ Yelling loudly he rushed forward and fired again. At point-blank range the second shot smashed through the terrorist’s breastplate. It hammered into his heart killing him instantaneously.
This was the first tragic mistake that occurred that evening. Had the terrorist lived to tell the details of the plot so many others would not have died.
The second tragedy took place almost at the same time as life left the hapless young terrorist’s body. Having brought the bus to a halt the over-zealous driver, a diehard Rajnikant fan, decided to take matters in his own hands. ‘Call the cops!’ he ordered the conductor. ‘Let me have a look at what is going on back there.’ Before anyone could react he darted to the rear of the bus and picked up the abandoned bag.
‘You idiot! What are you doing with the bag? Leave the fucking thing alone!’ a frantic passenger who was still trying to get off the bus yelled as he saw the driver pull out the bag from below the seat and place it on top. ‘It might be a bomb. Leave the damn thing alone.’ He literally threw himself off the bus, gibbering in panic.
The driver was not to be deterred. In any case he knew he led a charmed life. ‘Don’t worry. Main hoon na…’ He unzipped the bag to see what it contained. As the zipper slid open it activated the crude but effective booby trap that bypassed the timer device and set off the detonator embedded snugly in the RDX. In the confined space the bomb exploded with incredible ferocity. Small unrecognizable parts of the driver’s body merged with a hailstorm of shredded metal. One moment, he was alive. Then Boom! He had ceased to exist.
Luckily the bomb was on the seat when it exploded. The seat absorbed a part of the impact and saved the CNG tanks from blowing up. Had they exploded simultaneously it would have added to the mayhem and carnage. Even so the bomb wreaked a terrible toll. No one would ever be sure how many people died in the explosion. The official body count that evening was twenty-nine dead and scores wounded, some of whom succumbed to their injuries later.
In the confusion that reigned at the bus terminus it was a while before anyone thought of the possibility of another bomb on another bus. Then all hell broke loose as people rushed out of the bus terminus and frantic transport supervisors ran for their phones. ‘Which buses have left the station in the last ten or fifteen minutes? Get them on the phone and warn them immediately,’ the Duty Officer commanded the supervisors maintaining the vehicle logs.
A series of phones came into play and airwaves burned as calls went out to the drivers or conductors of the buses that had left the terminus. Anyone and everyone who had a mobile phone was called. Amongst the ones not carrying phones were the driver and conductor of the bus running on route 505.
The bus plying on route 505 had just reached the end of Tughlak Road and slowed down at the crowded traffic roundabout when, at 1735 hours, the 2558 Sapt Kranti Express pulled out of the New Delhi Railway station, seventeen minutes behind its scheduled time.
The older man of Team One of the Lashkar was on board the train when it pulled out from platform No. 7. He was in a second-class sleeper co
mpartment, lying in the uppermost berth that he had deliberately chosen when he had booked the ticket a few days back. He had no desire to interact with the other passengers. In any case he had every intention of catching up on the sleep that he had missed the previous night.
The leader of Team One of the Lashkar had no way of knowing that his team-mate was neither on the train nor in this world. Even if he had lived and boarded the train he would still not have been aware of this since both their tickets had deliberately been booked at different times for different compartments.
By about 1800 hours the train had cleared the city and was gathering speed when the ill-fated bus running on route 505 started going down the flyover spanning the small run way of the Safdarjung Airport. It was on the slightly deserted patch just before the densely-populated INA Market area that the bomb exploded.
The explosion triggered off not just the CNG tanks directly below the bomb but also, seconds later, the ones on the opposite side of the bus. Coming hard on the heels of each other the three successive explosions not only decimated the bus but also sent a couple of cars driving past flying into the air. The out-of-control bus slammed into the crash barrier on the outer side of the flyover. It smashed through the barrier and toppled over the edge landing on the concrete ten metres below with a horrific thump.
In Delhi, in fact in most of this part of the world, no one ever keeps track of how many people get on to a bus. That is why it will never be known for sure how many people died on that bus or what religion or belief they belonged to. What is certain is that no one on board survived.
The news of the bomb blasts spread like wildfire. All over the city hundreds of buses ground to a halt and panic-stricken passengers rushed out as the buses were scanned for abandoned packages. The speed with which the terrified passengers fled the crowded buses ensured there were plenty of abandoned packages. Each had to be carefully checked and declared safe before any bus could move again. Almost all over the city traffic ground to a halt.
The terror was escalating.
TEAM TWO
1605 hours, 29 October 2005, Malviya Nagar, New Delhi.
The two men of Team Two drove the dark blue Maruti Esteem carefully through the heavy late afternoon traffic. Always maintain a safe and constant speed. Leave well in time to ensure you don’t have to rush. It would be absolutely disastrous to get stopped for a dumb thing like jumping a traffic light or speeding. The words of the ISI agent who had given them basic field craft training ensured that the car was driven at normal speed.
It would not do to get pulled over by the cops. They will check everything thoroughly. There is no way your documents or that of any stolen vehicle will stand up to a close scrutiny.
At about the time when Team One was arriving at the Shivaji Stadium Bus Stop, Team Two drove into the M4K multiplex in the stolen Maruti Esteem. By now there was heavy traffic. It took them a while to drive the car down to the basement parking. The man driving the car collected the parking token and then drove straight to the parking slot where the Tata Indica had been parked by his team-mate earlier that morning. He stopped a couple of cars short of the Indica and gestured to the other man. ‘Get it out fast! There will be a traffic pile-up behind us otherwise.’
‘Give me a second.’
The man moved rapidly and getting into the Indica started it. The engine caught once and then died away. By now there were already three cars lining up behind the Esteem halted in the middle. One or two horns tooted impatiently. The security guard started walking towards them. It was his job to keep the traffic flowing.
‘Hurry up, godammit.’ The man driving the Esteem cursed under his breath as he watched the guard approach in his rear-view mirror.
‘Shit! Not now!’ The man breathed in panic as he turned the ignition key again. This time the Indica engine fired and settled down to a regular rhythm. He reversed it out of the parking slot and drove off a little ahead.
Seeing the Indica finally pull out, the man driving the Esteem quickly drove into the now vacant slot. The cars behind him began to move past. The security guard saw the line of cars begin to move again and lost interest in the situation. His job was to ensure that the flow of traffic was not impeded. As long it flowed smoothly he was fine. He began to amble back towards the entrance where he normally positioned himself. The man driving the Esteem waited till there was a slight break in the cars moving out. Then he quickly drove the Esteem out a bit, drove it forward a little and reversed it back into the vacant slot. He needed to ensure that the boot of the car was as close to the transformer as possible.
Retrieving another of the trademark canvas bags from the rear seat of the Esteem, he threw the timer switch arming the bomb in the boot, carefully locked up the car and moved to the Indica that had pulled over to one side a little ahead. It was drawing some angry stares from people driving past, but there still was adequate space for vehicles to get through. Squeezing himself into the passenger seat he said, ‘Let’s get out of here.’
The security guard who now stood some distance away did not notice them leave. There was nothing amiss to be seen anyway since there was no way he could have noticed the bomb placed inside the boot of the Esteem. Packed tightly between two newly-filled LPG cylinders lay seventy kilograms of RDX.
Team Two came out of the multiplex in the Indica and drove swiftly but still very carefully to the Inter State Bus Terminus. They left the Indica in a paid parking slot in the Kashmiri Gate car parking. Just before he got out the terrorist who had earlier been driving the Esteem activated the timer of the device kept in the bag on the floor mat below the rear seat. While he was doing so the other man paid the parking fees and collected the parking token. Exiting the parking lot the two men walked across the road.
One of them hailed a three-wheeler passing nearby. ‘Old Delhi Railway Station?’ he asked when the autorickshaw driver brought the vehicle to a stop near them. The driver nodded and clanged down the meter with a flourish. ‘Get in, sahib.’
About thirty minutes later they entered the railway station separately. Both handed in their tokens and collected a suitcase each from the left-luggage counter at an interval of about ten minutes. They used the second-class restrooms and changed into the casual attire of typical small town businessmen taking a trip. The restrooms were crowded as usual. No one paid much attention to the two men who came and went their separate ways.
The two men did not know it of course but they had been driving out of M4K complex when the bus driver had probed the first bomb at the Shivaji Bus Terminus causing it to explode. Of course they were generally able to time the other explosions since those went off precisely as planned. In fact one of them had been looking at his watch when the bomb on board the second bus exploded. A few seconds after that the bomb in the boot of the Esteem parked in the M4K multiplex ripped through the parking lot.
Luckily the transformer at M4K survived the blast reasonably well. Even so, the effect of seventy kilograms of RDX and the two LPG cylinders that exploded with it was absolutely devastating in the close confines of the basement parking lot. The effect was compounded when the fuel tanks of a couple of other cars also exploded due to the fire that broke out after the primary explosion.
A lot of the people who had come to the M4K multiplex that evening to watch the antics of Saif Ali Khan and Preity Zinta in Salaam Namaste, the latest Bollywood pot-boiler, did not live to enjoy the movie. 93 died and over 280 were injured when the car bomb took out half the densely-crowded basement parking lot.
The people flowing through the Kashmiri Gate car parking were a lot luckier. The bomb inside the Indica was a much smaller one and did not have any thing else that exploded with it. It had been planted more to add to the terror and confusion than to the death toll.
This bomb went off just a couple of minutes after the one at the M4K multiplex. Around a dozen people died along with the hapless parking lot attendant who happened to be leaning against the Indica when the bomb detonated.
&n
bsp; Both men of Team Two watched the carnage on television screens in different parts of the railway station some time later.
They were the first to come to know that one of the Lashkar had fallen. A twinge of alarm ran through them until they saw the detailed coverage of the episode and knew for sure that he had gone to Allah before he could open his mouth and spill the beans.
Even so, as planned, they did not approach each other. Neither did they join in any of the several heated and panicky debates that erupted all over the platforms.
All trains departed a bit late that night since the police swept through the railway station and checked every compartment. However the 4001 Attari Express was one of the luckier ones. It left the platform at 2115 hours and was soon hurtling through the night across the plains of Haryana and Punjab, on its way to Attari in Pakistan. The two men of Team Two of the Lashkar were in different compartments. They wolfed down the hot, but plastic-smelling dinner handed over to them by the enthusiastic coach attendant and then slept through the night.
The stress of the past few days had finally caught up with them.
TEAM THREE
1625 hours, 29 October 2005, Khirki Gaon, New Delhi.
When the bus carrying Team One was turning right on the road going under the IIT (Indian Institute of Technology) flyover and the Maruti Esteem with Team Two was going over it, the Bajaj Caliber motorcycle carrying the two men of Team Three left Aftab Cyber Café.
Team Three had the shortest distance to cover to their target and so was the last to leave. The man on the pillion of the motorcycle carried another cardboard-lined, dirty-looking canvas bag with its lethal cargo.
Twenty-five minutes later, the two men of Team Three reached Sarojini Nagar and parked their motorcycle about fifty metres away, in one of the numerous lanes that radiated into the colony surrounding the market. The man riding the motorcycle remained seated as the pillion rider got off and handed the canvas bag to him. ‘Hold it carefully,’ he told the rider who remained seated on the parked motorcycle. Then he walked into the market.
