I hurriedly pushed the double door
open with both hands and entered the news room, scrambled for the switch board
and turned on the lights. I was trembling, sweating uncharacteristically in a
centralized air conditioned room on a chilly winter evening. Although I had
entered this newsroom for the last 14 years and broadcasted ‘News-hour’ for the
longest time in the channel’s and even the nation’s history in broadcasting, I
never felt this level of anxiety before. It was difficult to assess what was overwhelming
in the current situation, the nerves or the emotion.
Tonight was different, since
the breaking news to be presented in news-hour would send shockwaves across
political classes and the commoners across the nation. The truth has to be told to the world, I told myself as I mustered
courage and went through the copy once again, making mental notes on key words
and key messages I had to cover. I wished Prosenjit was here today. He would
have been proud that his student had done everything in his might to let truth
prevail. As I sat back into the uncomfortable ‘hot-seat’, the events of last week
flashed in front of my eyes. The physical and psychological struggle to obtain
information and evidence around this news was a gigantic effort which
Prosenjit, Norman and I put in, despite threatening phone calls, politically-driven
sabotage at the Channel office and destruction of information, evidences and
the witnesses. This horrible journey over
the last week had claimed the life of Prosenjit, while Norman seemed to have disappeared
from the face of the earth. I have to do
it for them, there’s no way I could turn back now. I sat up on my news desk
chair, looked up at the camera that I had setup and at then at my wristwatch. The sound of the double door opening in
distracted me, as Mr. Sharma, our CEO and majority shareholder, stormed into
the newsroom without warning. I tried not to raise an eyebrow. “You should not
be making this information public; you have seen the consequences already. Your
friends are dead. My channel could be forced shut too! You know I have the
right contacts to keep this business going, but I just had to warn you!” The cold, harsh voice said.
“Thank you for your kind
advice, Mr. Sharma. I go on-air in the next twenty seconds, so unless you wish
to co-host the show tonight, please leave.” Mr. Sharma gave a long hard stare.
He then looked over my head, nodded and left the room silently.
I looked back into my watch, ten seconds to go live..nine..eight. My
heart was pounding, this was the most sensational news I would ever broadcast. Nothing can stop this now..four..three..two…
..Thump! I felt my skull crack
with the blow of what felt like an iron rod crashing into the back of my head. I could feel my body losing
connection with my brain as I slumped down from my newsreader chair. I felt my hair
and clothes soak in the warmth of my own blood within seconds. I could sense someone
behind me leaving the room. Then, darkness.
Deathbed
I woke up as if I had slept
for years together. I felt pain in every part of my body. The sutures on
my head throbbed in sync with the
metronome-like beeps of the ECG machine. Seemed
like the doctors had done their best trying to keep me alive. I slowly
started to feel my limbs, my face and my eyes.
I struggled to gather my
thoughts - So he nodded to someone behind
me, approving the hit!. The bed side calendar denoted that I was here for at
least two days. I looked up at the clock on the wall, it was almost 7 pm. I wondered
who would do the news-hour today, which would be going live about an hour from
now.
What a week it was! -
breathless, tiring, exhilarating and deadly. It all started with an informal
discussion with leading producer, news writer and my mentor, Prosenjit over
coffee. We were talking about the powerful saffron party (which he detested) ruling
at the centre, their alliance with right-wing extremist groups and its
influence on the ruling government, and of course the globetrotting prime
minister. Prosenjit mentioned that one of the closest extremist groups had
started a massive cadet recruitment drive on the eve of Republic Day. “I want
to get into their skin and understand what they teach, how they think and what
they want to really achieve through these drives”. “Let’s send one of our
trainees as a cadet with a microphone and a camera. Trust me, there’d be some
revelation for sure!” I said. Prosenjit liked the idea and asked one of his
trainees, Norman to attend the drive.
Norman, armed with a pen
camera and a small microphone, was excited as he set out for his first sting
operation, and needless to say, cleared the selection process smoothly.
Norman informed Prosenjit that
there were hundreds of cadets being assessed for a week of extensive training,
which included defense and endurance training. A week passed by and Prosenjit
was disappointed that the sting was not going as per plan. “There is no masala
in it at all!” he said. Norman then placed a bug into the chief selection
officer’s room and the results were instant. Norman understood that out of the
hundred and fifty candidates assessed, fifty candidates will be selected and
then taken to a training camp (the whereabouts of which were never disclosed),
where they would be trained for another month.
He also realized that his group was one of the many groups being trained
across India. Norman joined forty nine other candidates for the camp. None of
them knew what was about to happen to them.
A day later, I was sitting in
my office, taking large puffs of my cigarette as I stared through the window
into the seemingly tiny world outside. Prosenjit ran into my room and said, “Call
for two large Espressos. We’ve struck GOLD!” Over the next fifteen minutes, Prosenjit
explained how those fifty candidates, now cadets were given extensive training
on handling and mastering weapons, and making bombs!
“If you thought this was
breaking news, you’ve gotta hear this. While these cadets were selected here in
Mumbai, similar drives were held in Malegaon, Meerut, Ahmedabad, Muzaffarnagar,
Jamshedpur, Faridabad, all of which are places with a history of communal
violence. These cadets are lectured for two hours every day on the importance
of Hinduism, the concept and the history of Hindu rashtra and why it’s
important to put the Hindu back into ‘Hindusthan’. They convince them of the
wrong Hindus have been done through historical subjugation of India by Muslims,
how Muslim conquerors had raped Hindu women and destroyed places of worship. These
‘cadets’ are trainee suicide bombers who’re expected to blow up ‘anti-Hindu’
landmarks - mosques, churches, minority schools, colleges and community centres.
There are around five hundred potential suicide bombers getting brain washed as
we speak. We must do something about it, Subodh!”
Recovering from the shock, I
asked, “How much footage do we have so far?” “The boy has shared a lot of audio
clippings but he’s not able to get clear video footage with the pen camera. I
have asked him to try through his cell phone. He should be able to send something
by tonight”, Prosenjit explained. “Norman has done more than he could. We
should get him out now, before he gets into trouble.” I said. Prosenjit ignored my plea. The same evening,
Norman sent us video footage, which captured glimpses of the hate lectures,
bomb-making sessions and rifle shooting practice. “This is going to shock the
whole of India. Although these bloody asses deserve much more than a press
expose!” I said, unable to suppress my anger.
The next day, Norman informed
us that they had named this radical movement ‘Hindu Rajya Sthapana Andolan’. The
attacks were being planned immediately after the Bihar election results and
that this movement had a huge financial backing from the centre. Norman
informed us how the trainers gloated about the scale of this movement and the
ruling party’s blessings for this operation. Prosenjit analyzed that the timing
made sense because after these elections, most of the Indian states as well as
the centre would be under the control of the ruling party, making them powerful
enough to suppress, oppress and marginalize the minorities.
“We need to get Norman out of
there, Prosenjit!” I demanded. “I had given him a choice to come back, but he
insisted on staying. The training will be over soon, they’ll all be asked to disperse
and would be given further instructions.” Prosenjit consoled.
On the last day of Norman’s
training, a fellow trainee overheard him speaking to Prosenjit and promptly
informed the chief trainer. Within two hours, Prosenjit was threatened that if
he makes public any news in relation to the right wing organization, he will be
a dead man. An hour later, our channel office was vandalized by the workers of an
aggressive ally of the ruling party, lead by a local corporator. The party
cited the reason for the attack as an offensive anti-Hindu post on social media
by the channel. The media covered this round-the-clock but treated this as an
isolated incident.
Meanwhile, Norman was
untraceable. We couldn’t get through to his phone for more than 24 hours, after
which Prosenjit decided to lodge a missing person’s complaint with the Police. He
explained the background of the case to the Police officer, including how it
was supposed to be a sting operation, which turned out to be much more than
that. He also showed some of the videos taken by Norman to help the police identify
the approximate location. However, most of the videos were taken indoors or on
open grounds, which made it difficult to provide any substantial evidence. The
officer, Vivek Bhosle, shocked by what he saw, assured Prosenjit of preliminary
investigation and that they’d try to trace his phone. Prosenjit called me from
his car as he drove home to give me an update. I could sense the guilt in his
voice. He told me that he had emailed
something to me and wanted me to start working on writing the content around it.
Prosenjit got home, switched
on the lights and poured himself a large whiskey. He heard the glass on his
living room window crack with the impact of stones. People were attacking him!
Just then, there were impatient and angry knocks at his door. Prosenjit
hurriedly opened it and found the same goons who had earlier vandalized the
channel office at the door. The head goon thundered, “Where are the videos?”, as
he pushed Prosenjit, entered the room, snatched his mobile and pointed a gun
between his eyebrows. The other goons ransacked the house as they frantically
searched for any media devices and took his laptop, pen drives, portable hard
disks, and the CPU of his PC. “You have
one minute to tell me where the evidence is stored, if you want to live.”
Prosenjit was sweating profusely and was unable to speak for a few moments.
“All the data is stored in the red pen drive”, he managed when the voice
supported him. The head goon handed over Prosenjit’s mobile phone to his
accomplice and asked Prosenjit, “Who else knew about this operation?”
The next morning, the police
carried out an investigation of the death scene. The police, after a
post-mortem of Prosenjit’s body announced that it was a case of ‘accidental
death’ and quickly closed the file.
As I drove to work the next
morning, I knew I was going to be next. I knew if there was something to be
done about this, it had to be today. Mr.
Sharma asked me into his office immediately as I walked in, to probe about the
sting operation. I knew he was extremely well connected and had deep political
relationships, especially with the ruling party. Hence getting information was
not a problem for him. He jumped straight to the point, “You are dealing with
extremely dangerous people. I am running a business here, not a detective
agency. Prosenjit is dead, Norman is
missing. Let us end this over here; I cannot take any more damage”. “Sir, there’s no evidence left. They’ve
destroyed everything, including the man himself. There is nothing that I can
do, even if I want to”, I explained plainly. Mr. Sharma did not appear
convinced, but allowed me to get back to work.
Countdown
My train of thought was
brought to a sudden halt as I saw Mr. Sharma in my hospital room. He was still dressed
in his office suit and the black dial of his Rolex Oyster displayed seven fifty
eight. He did not seem pleased to see me alive, but still managed to fake concern.
“You’re very lucky to be alive, the doctors tell me, but the question is ‘Are
you going to survive’?” As he spoke, he moved to the side of my bed, removed
the IV tube and took off my oxygen mask. “See you in hell!” he muttered as he stepped back. I observed
him carefully as he walked to the door. I knew that time was running out but
suppressed the urge to check my watch. I took a deep breath and started
counting in reverse under my breath. "Ten, nine, eight, seven...one, zero."
It was eight o’clock. I smiled for the first time in weeks, feeling relieved,
happy and victorious. An auto email to all news channels, PTI, newspapers as
well as the President of India, which I had set three days ago for tonight had just
left my inbox,. This email contained a detailed report of the sting and the
revelation of the secret operation of the right wing organization, I had
packaged the entire content together from the email that Prosenjit had shared and
recorded a video with my narration to reveal the full story. As always, my
obsession with creating a Plan B had worked!
I smiled, elated with my final
victory, before the ECG graph turned into a straight line.
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