ANTI-SOCIAL NETWORK (2 page)

By now, chaos had completely taken over the street as the plainclothes men had pulled out their revolvers to clear the irate crowd that had gathered around them. In response to their guns, the crowd was now running helter-skelter, fearing that the police were staging an encounter. Their screams and cries rang in Virkar’s ears, and he suddenly realized that he had created an incident that had spun out of control. He took one last look around him and saw that there was no chance of him spotting Usman Teacher in the crowd. Turning around, he quickly made his way back to his harried team. He sighed to himself; instead of catching a wanted criminal, he would now be facing a departmental inquiry instead.

The street ditty, ‘
Ataa maajhi vaat laagli…laagli re, laagli re!
’, kept playing on loop in his mind.

T
he knife was incredibly sharp.

She had intended to only take a trial swipe, but the blade sliced through the flesh with surprising ease. The organ that she had been holding on to came free in her hand. The realization hit her only when she looked down and saw it still throbbing, flooding her palm with blood.

She could see that he was equally shocked at being quite literally dismembered, so much so that his brain was still undecided on whether to express his pain or his confusion. Instead of screaming, he was more interested in stopping the blood flow from the wound left behind in his crotch.

Lying spread-eagled on the bed; he had been expecting her to join him after stripping off her clothes. But she had asked him to close his eyes and he had indulged her. Then, a couple of minutes later, she had straddled him, wearing a full-length, waterproof raincoat made of heavy rubber. He was surprised and had wondered why she was dressed that way. But before he could open his mouth to ask her, he had seen the gleaming hunting knife in her hand.

Her eyes were cold as she reached for his crotch with her free hand, her fingers wrapping themselves around his shock-stiffened member. The blade slashed down at him and, in a searing, heat-filled moment, it passed through his flesh, leaving behind an oozing fountain of his precious life fluid. As drops of his blood splashed and slid off her raincoat, he finally realized why she was wearing it.

As he stared at the organ that was slowly shrivelling in her hand, realization finally penetrated his fuzzy brain. With a jolt, the dormant synapses in his brain came alive, making him fully aware of the repercussions of her actions. His mouth opened to scream his fear, but no sound came out of his dry throat other than a helpless gurgle.

He tried to push her off him with one hand, clawing at her shoulders. She flung his hand away. The knife in her hand struck down on his naked chest.

The blade slid between his ribs till she tugged it away from his chest. It exited his chest with a sickening squelch. He was already in so much agony that his brain could not feel the increased pain. He was expecting it to be over then. But she brought down the blade again and again and again till the dull grey walls around her were splashed red with blood.

After nearly five minutes had passed, she stopped the bloody mayhem that she had unleashed—not because life had finally taken leave of his body, not because she realized the horror of her deeds, but because a mobile phone suddenly began to ring from the heap of clothes that he had discarded on the floor by the bathroom door.

She was pulled out of her trance. It was then that she realized she was still holding something in her left hand. It was the organ she had detached from his body.

She shuddered involuntarily at the sight of it lying useless in her palm. She let the phone ring to a stop. Leaving the knife still stuck in his chest, she dismounted from his body and peeled off the blood-drenched raincoat. She was naked underneath. Taking utmost care to not get any blood on her, she turned the raincoat inside out and folded it in such a manner that it was spotless and dry on the outside. Jumping off the bed, her feet landed softly a few feet away from the bed. Making sure she wasn’t stepping on any blood droplets, she padded barefoot across the floor to the backpack lying beside the door where she had left it when they had arrived that afternoon. She extricated two strong plastic bags from the backpack. In the smaller one, she deposited the dismembered penis, in the other she slid in the folded raincoat. She pushed both bags into the backpack, away from sight.

Then she turned her attention to the heap of his clothes. She rummaged in the pocket of his jeans and fished out the phone, extricating his wallet along with it. Her own clothes and shoes lay in the far corner where she had flung them before she put on the raincoat. She slipped into them and walked back to the bed. With one hand, she pulled out the knife from his chest and, wiping it clean on a dry portion of the bedsheet, she slipped it into the secret compartment in the backpack where she had kept it hidden during their long motorbike ride to the resort. She then slung the backpack on to her shoulder. Opening the front door, she stepped out into the small veranda in front of the shack they had rented at the Blue Nile Resort.

For the first time, she became aware that darkness had fallen outside and the moon was hiding behind a large clump of clouds. She looked up and down the lawn, making sure none of the hotel guests were out taking an early evening stroll. But since it was a weekday, the resort’s occupancy was at its minimal. Satisfied that no one was around, she hurried across the veranda and made her way to the wooden door in the fence directly across the shack. Unlatching the door, she stepped on to the Manori beach.

N
aina Rai, Assistant Professor of Counselling Psychology, was in a cab and on her way to her first lecture of the morning at the Willingdon College when she received the call. She didn’t recognize the number but she took the call anyway. A harsh voice spoke in her ear, ‘Naina Rai?’

‘Yes,’ she replied. For a few seconds, she listened to what the person on the other end said to her and then hung up with a cursory ‘okay’. A frown crinkled the large, round vermilion teeka on her forehead. Her velvet brown eyes had a determined expression in them, and her full lips—usually adorned with a broad welcoming smile—were pressed tightly together, making them seem almost bloodless. She tapped the cab driver on his shoulder and said, ‘Bhai saheb, please turn the taxi towards Ballard Estate.’

‘But, madam, you said that you wanted to go near the museum!’

‘Yes, I know, but the plan has changed. Don’t worry, I’ll pay you the full fare.’

Reassured, the taxi driver turned on to P.M. Road and made his way towards Ballard Estate. Under instructions from Naina, he drove to a small chai shop on Kumtha Street at the back of Ballard Estate. Naina got off the taxi and the proprietor of the chai shop, who was sitting at the counter near the entrance, looked up to see the upmarket lady enter his humble establishment. He was even more surprised to see Naina walk directly to the back of the shop, towards the kitchen. Before he could say anything, she had walked into the small open space behind the kitchen where a scrawny young boy was scrubbing large copper utensils. Naina walked up to the boy and threw the utensils aside with a loud crash. The boy looked at her, shocked. ‘Madam, I’ll lose my entire month’s salary!’ he squealed.

Naina replied, ‘Raju, my name is Naina. I’m going to get you out of here, don’t worry.’ She held his arm and signalled him to follow her into the kitchen. The chai shop owner and a cook had gathered their wits by now and blocked Naina’s path to the front door. The incredulous owner enquired, ‘Madam, where are you taking him?’

Naina fixed him with a steely stare and said coldly, ‘Under the Child Labour Prohibition and Regulation Act, Raju is not supposed to be working here. You are committing a crime.’

The chai shop owner didn’t back down. Instead, he got into a heated argument with Naina. Inside the chai shop, two men sipping their chai at a table shook their heads in disgust. The older one of the two said, ‘These NGO people, tsk, tsk…’ The younger man nodded and said, ‘The young boy was earning his keep. Now he’ll rot in a remand home.’ A little while later, when they realized that tempers had really flared to an unmanageable degree, the two men got up from their table and went towards the kitchen. They tapped the chai shop owner on the shoulder and introduced themselves as police constables. Naina turned her ire towards the policemen. Scolding them, she said, ‘Why do you people always arrive late?’

The two policemen looked apologetic. ‘Madam, we were just finishing our tea. This is our first cup since morning.’ The older cop handcuffed the indignant chai shop owner and began to lead him out of the shop. But as the owner passed him, the younger policeman whispered in his ear, ‘You will be back by the evening. Don’t worry.’ Naina, however, didn’t hear what he said as she was busy escorting the bewildered Raju out of the shop.

Out on the street, a small crowd had gathered hearing the commotion in the chai shop. Naina ignored the crowd but she turned to Raju when he managed to gather courage and ask a meek question, ‘Madam, what am I going to do now?’

Just as he asked this, a matronly woman in a white and blue starched cotton sari stepped out of a van, the side of which read ‘Child Protective Organization (CPO)’. ‘Don’t worry, Raju. Mrs Malthi here will make sure that you have a bright future. You will be in good hands with her team.’

Mrs Malthi gave Raju a beaming smile and Raju smiled back. ‘Go with her, Raju. I’ll look in on you from time to time. Call me if you need anything.’ Raju reached out and gave her a tight hug. ‘Thank you so much, Naina didi. I hope I can pay you back some day.’

Raju got into the van with Mrs Malthi and left. Naina hailed a cab with a proud smile that lit up her face.

V
irkar had seen dismemberment before.

The Maoists in Gadchiroli were ruthless in the retribution they meted out to those who refused to toe their line. Virkar had seen his share of detached digits, cut-off limbs and even a decapitated head. But he had never seen a body that was missing a penis. And he had never seen the amount of blood that had been shed in that one shack at the Blue Nile Resort.

Virkar had been roused early that morning by an urgent call from ACP Wagh. He had been ordered to rush to Manori as the local Senior Police Inspector had asked for an immediate intervention by the Crime Branch. With his usual diligence, Virkar had made it to Manori in an hour’s time. Now, as he looked upon the mangled body lying on the bloodstained sheets, he thanked his stars that in his rush he had had no time to stop and eat anything.

It required guts of steel and a stomach lined with cast iron to be able to look at the body lying on the bed. Most of the local policemen had either stepped out for air after the first cursory glance or were vomiting out their breakfasts in the hedge lining the small lawn outside the shack. The rest were huddled together in the lawn muttering among themselves, casting furtive glances at Virkar. Judging by their expressions, Virkar knew that they had already given up their role in the investigation and wanted him to finish up quickly so that they could wrap up and get out of there fast.

The government doctor who had been summoned from Uttan, had managed to only conduct a cursory examination before his stomach, too, began to churn. The doctor had fled unceremoniously, leaving Virkar with a sub-inspector from the local police station to gather any further information that he might require.

Now Virkar calmed his nerves and gestured to the sub-inspector to begin reading out his notes. The sub-inspector hesitated for a few seconds before resigning himself to his fate and pulled out a small notepad. He opened to a section with a small ‘Shri Ganesh’ inscription at the top of the page and began to rattle out the information he had entered below: ‘Male. Approximate age: 20-21. Arrived at the incident spot yesterday afternoon at approximately 4-4.30 p.m. on a Bajaj Pulsar motorcycle, number MH 02 FX 1385. A young good-looking girl with long hair, aged approximately nineteen or twenty years, accompanied him. The couple was allotted Shack No. 12 on payment of 1,500 rupees in cash. They entered the room at approximately 4.45 p.m. and hung the Do Not Disturb sign on the door handle. This morning, at approximately 6 a.m., the gardener noticed that the door was open. He summoned the night attendant who opened the door to enquire if the couple required any assistance. He noticed the dead body and raised the alarm. The resort manager immediately telephoned the Manori police station and informed the on-duty constable of the incident.’

The sub-inspector paused to catch his breath. ‘What is your reading of the incident?’ Virkar asked him.

‘Retaliation,’ he answered at once.

‘For what?’ Virkar raised an eyebrow.

‘For rape, saheb. The boy raped the girl, and she somehow got hold of the knife and stabbed him.’ The sub-inspector’s voice was laden with repressed irritation at Virkar’s apparent naivety. Virkar was about to say something in return when he heard the siren of the ambulance that had arrived to take away the dead body. Knowing that he had very little time left before the crime scene was disturbed, he walked closer to the bed to examine the body while trying his best not to step in the puddles of blood congealed on the ground. He leaned in as close as possible over the victim’s chest and examined each stab wound in detail. The dead young man had been stabbed seventeen times and the wounds were clean and deep, indicating that a lot of force had been used during each stabbing, and that the weapon used was extremely sharp.
Perhaps it was a hunting knife or a butcher’s knife
, Virkar thought to himself. He looked towards the sub-inspector who was lingering at the door. ‘Do you have a foot-ruler by any chance?’ The sub-inspector shrugged in obvious confusion. Virkar’s voice rose a decibel in irritation. ‘Do you have anything flat and hard?’ The sub-inspector shoved his hands in his pockets to look for something that could be of help. Suddenly, a brainwave seemed to strike him and he reached into his back pocket and produced a flat plastic comb.

Virkar didn’t waste any time. ‘This will do,’ he said, grabbing the comb out of the sub-inspector’s hand. He positioned the flat comb over one of the wounds on the chest and inserted it into the wound, pushing it inside till it wouldn’t go any further. Aghast, the sub-inspector called out, ‘Saheb, that comb cost me ten rupees!’ Virkar ignored him. He pulled the comb out as gently as he had inserted it and examined it closely. The bloodline on the comb indicated that the wound was at least five inches deep. He quickly repeated the action on a few other wounds and came to the conclusion that most of them were as deep as the first, if not deeper. After inserting it in about five or six wounds, Virkar was finally satisfied and handed the comb back to the sub-inspector, who took one look at the bloody comb and refused to accept it. Virkar shrugged and tossed it a corner of the room.