The Story of My Assassins (10 page)
Within five minutes of entering the stately iron gates of the Patiala House courts I’d become aware that I was entering a zone of experience that would forever change the way I looked at the wonder that was India. Before the day was out I would know that no middle-class Indian, from any old st mary-john-mark school with trilling nuns and caning fathers, who twittered in the queen’s English and held forth on freedom and democracy, had any real idea of this country if he had not wandered through the frozen glaciers of its legal system. If he had not befriended a frisky penguin and been shown some chilling X-rays of the grand body of Indian law and order and justice.
Outside the gates of the courts ran the wide stately roads of Lutyens’ Delhi, curving with an imperial assurance around the imposing edifices of the National Stadium, the National Gallery of Modern Art and the India Gate, then taking the high road to Raisina Hill where the monoliths of North and South Block continued
to be metaphors for the imperiousness and inscrutability of the state, before finishing up inside the excessive sprawl of the presidential palace, an appropriate metaphor of shallow decorativeness. Patrolled by police jeeps, these were ceremonial roads, cocooning a space where the state could continually convince itself of its power and purpose. Any dwarf wearing the ensemble of the state could bring the tallest citizen of the country to his knees.
But inside the high gates of the courts, the splendour of the state was in disarray. From the moment you entered the grounds you battled your way though parked scooters and bikes and cars, weaving through thick clusters of petitioners, penguins, policemen—weirdly, holding hands with their criminal wards as lovers would, since the Supreme Court had banned the handcuffing of small-time offenders. Everywhere was dirt and offal and loud voices, and random chain-link fences you had to hop over. The hum all around was of transactions. A brisk bazaar, where you could strike any deal you wanted as long as your attitude was unburdened and your wallet thick. Going around to the back of the building to meet my lawyer, I saw advocates’ kiosks that looked more like they dealt in minor merchandise—cigarettes, paan, biscuits, candy—than in the sombre questions of law.
Inside the once opulent building built during the Raj to serve as the Delhi outpost of the royal house of Patiala, the state’s glory was equally in tatters. The sweeping staircases, the marble floors, the teak balustrades, the carved windows, the fluted ceilings, all were in distress. Everything was soiled, dirty, peeling. Every corner had a chiaroscuro of blood-red paan stains. Despite their grand scale, the corridors were dark and musty and poorly lit, with the illumination from the windows and ventilators truncated by dirt and furniture. The windows were further obscured by human bodies—sitting, standing, trying to wedge their way through. Many of these were clearly peasants, their faces unshaven and gaunt, their thick blankets and bodies giving off the rank odour of animals and sweat. I had to put out my hands and literally push people aside to make way for
us. My shadows did the same, their elbows jutting out. At one point, just when I was beginning to enjoy shoving the idiots around, Sara poked me in my ass, warning me angrily to take it easy. When I went to take a leak in the makeshift urinal under the staircase, I had to pay a rupee for the privilege and survive such a stench of fresh piss as could have deterred the stoutest litigant.
The fear of the law clearly unloosed the bladder.
In this hellhole, we were led by my penguin into a high-ceilinged room that was no less nondescript and soiled. It was bursting with a silent clamour, as routine mayhem tried to rein itself in, in deference to the setting. The milling bodies moved around the ugly wooden cupboards littered all over, in random array, filled to oozing with dusty files. These were all tied in strings of different colours, and had dirty ears of paper peeping out. Each time an attendant opened a cupboard the files began to topple out, and had to be desperately held in check with one hand even as the right one was located and extracted. As at the dera on the night of the metamorphosis, there was only one point of calm in this melee: the elevated platform at the end of the room where, behind a wide wooden desk, sat a clerky-looking man in black-rimmed spectacles.
The guruji of this equally surreal realm.
Unlike my guruji, this one needed help with his appearance. He was young, with a weak pasty face and a collapsed jaw. He didn’t look like he could adjudicate a spat between his own children. Someone should have given him a curly white wig and fastened a false beard to his chin. A couple of real clerks sat around him taking notes, one punching away into a grimy cream-coloured computer, and a wastrel at his side rudely shouted out case numbers and names as another, even lower down the food chain, near the door, immediately took up the call. On the three rows of ramshackle wooden chairs in front of the pasty boy sat an assortment of penguins and litigants.
Arguments were being made and heard in conspiratorial consultations. Not orated, not declaimed, not stated. A number and name would be barked out and one clutch of penguins—trailed by their glassy-eyed clients—would wriggle through the throng and present themselves right under the high chair. Some sort of urgent whispering would ensue to and fro, left and right, strung out on a chorus of milords and yoronours. Then, absurdly quickly, a consensus would be arrived at—simply, the next date of hearing—and yoronour, guruji of the high chair, would say something to the computer man on his right, close the file, pick it and fling it at the other clerk. Instantly the wastrel—busy all the while cutting side deals with penguins who sidled up to him; speaking to them through the corner of his mouth with his eyes on the high chair—instantly the wastrel would bark a name and a number, junior wastrel would echo it, and the throng would begin to undulate, pushing forward the next clutch of players. It was barely noon, but going by the shouted number, yoronour was cleaning up society lickety-split and had already delivered justice in twenty-eight cases.
Curiously, all the penguins seemed to be friends, even if their clients were trying to kill each other. Before they showed up under the chair of yoronour, they appeared to be jointly working out their opposing strategies. My penguin, Sethiji, was fat and middle-aged, with the jocular, can-do manner of a middleman. He was some distant relative of Jai’s, and in his smooth ability to work people, a sort of cruder, more down-market version of him. In our passage through the sweeping staircases and jammed corridors everyone seemed to know him. When I had emerged from the pissoir, barely breathing, he was upset that I had paid, asserting that the attendant should have known who I was with. He wanted to go right back in to retrieve the rupee.
In the high-ceilinged room, the clerks half raised their hands to salaam him, while the wastrel gave a full salute. He said, with a happy smile, ‘I pay them to do this each time there’s a new client.
It boosts the confidence of the client. I am telling you this because you are family.’
The happy smile never left Sethiji’s face, and he shook a hand after every sentence. Hustling, everywhere in Delhi, is a desperately tactile affair: slapping flesh, pressing flesh, rubbing flesh. In disgust I put my hands in my pockets, and so he began to grab one of the shadows. He called Sara ‘bhabhiji’, assuming she was my wife, and bowed to her courteously every few minutes, making her glower. In the room, he had a chair cleared for her but she declined to sit.
Sethiji’s belly was so spectacular he needed suspenders to keep his pants up. The black coat and trousers were worn to a shine, the white shirt’s collar was frayed, the leather shoes battered. He said, ‘Lady Justice, you know, is blindfold. Only weight on her balance matters. More weight better chances.’ His thumbs were hooked into his suspenders; they came out fleetingly after every sentence to reach for someone.
He had three very young penguins with him, a son and two nephews, who circled him watchfully, awaiting orders. Sethiji was a true king penguin, a master of his game. He never spoke loudly or rudely, just whispered his instructions with that bemused smile; a look of comic wonderment. The boys—in sharp black attire, with gym muscles, shining skin and gelled hair—darted off to comply. At one point he shepherded us out to a cordoned-off corner of the corridor and his boys served up hot tea, cold lassi, and crisp samosas. The shadows attacked everything; I downed the lassi; Sara said, ‘What a bloody racketeer!’; Sethiji said, with his smile, ‘You can survive the law, but you cannot survive hunger,’ and reached for the hand of a shadow.
The corner had a huge window—built for princely eyes—but it was grimy and closed. It looked out over lush green trees, and Sara stood there gazing out, an arty charcoal sketch, her unequal body a sudden invitation. I knew she was simmering, raging at all the kind of stuff she liked to rage at. This place was a rager’s paradise. By
bringing her here I had already given her fuel for weeks of ranting. And we were not done yet. Poverty, justice, class, democracy. Some spectacular nailing on the wall was in the offing.
Sethiji was, of course, stoking the embers continually. At one point his mobile rang. Leaving his left thumb in the striped elastic, he pulled out his clunky phone with his right hand and placed it two inches from his ear. ‘Hello, my dear,’ he said, slowly with his wide bemused smile. ‘No madam, I need no loan. Not for home, or marriage, or car, or carriage. I would marry again, but my wife eats two spoons of Chyawanprash every day and does not look like she’ll die for another hundred years. Education? Madam, it is better to burn the money than spend it on my sons’ studies. Their principal says, Sethiji take them home and you will better serve the cause of education. Madam, that’s why I am thinking I will make them both lawyers. Only the rejected can understand the pain of the dejected! My car, madam, is a Maruti, a red one. Do you really think I should buy another? And just stop the medical treatment of my father? He’s dying of cancer you know. Of the bowels. You know, the bowels? Of course you do, everyone knows the bowels! But he’s old, no problem if he dies now. Maybe I can take him to the cremation ground in the new big car. That would please him! No, no madam, don’t go yet! Wait I have something to tell you too! Is there anyone in your family who has been raped or murdered or has committed suicide? Madam, my law firm specializes in handling cases of rape and murder. No, no madam, you cannot just go now—you called me, you must listen to me now. Okay, okay, not your family, any of your friends who have been raped or murdered? No? No. Very lucky you are, madam! But in future if anyone you know is raped or murdered you know whom to call! You have the number—you just called it! Advocate Sethi and Sons—one son actually and two nephews—specialists in rape and murder. Hello? Hello! Madam! Madam? You called me, madam, you must listen to me!’
With the phone still inches away from his ear, he swivelled around slowly and gave us all his smile of bemused wonderment. Son and nephews were grinning, and so were the shadows. I was too, but I had turned away from Sara. She was thunderous. I could sense the fury radiating from her clenched body. For a moment I was anxious she’d say something needlessly unpleasant to the fat lawyer and I’d be forced to step in; and it would lead to weeks of simmering rancour between us. He was just a fat man making light of his sad life. There was no need to throw
The Female Eunuch
and the Constitution at him.
She peeled away from the window and stalked off, back into the high-ceilinged room.
Sethiji said with his bemused smile, ‘Bhabhiji’s not feeling well? Or is she upset with our phuddugiri?’ I smiled and he said, ‘I don’t blame her. We are just such crude scum of the earth. Not fit to be in the presence of any woman! Leave alone a high-class one. The problem is we know nothing about women. Only two women have I known in my life. First there was my mother, who beat me and loved me. Then there is my wife, whom I beat and I love. Men like me don’t know what to do with a woman if we can’t love her or beat her. We are full phuddus from an outdated factory. I keep telling these young boys, don’t end up like us. Don’t just keep combing your hair, also clean your tongues. When you meet a woman and open your mouth, flowers should fall out, not drool!’
The three boys grinned as he gave them each a clip on the ears. ‘But they are determined to be full phuddus! Not their fault. Just third-rate genes.’
The next time we went in I saw them right away.
Sara, leaning against a wooden cupboard, was looking at them intently. They were standing at the far corner under the platform,
five of them, in a row, at an angle, facing yoronour. Flanking them were two policemen in uniform, holding on to the wrists of the ones next to them. Behind them stood five more policemen with clunky Enfield rifles—the infamous threenoughtthrees—slung on their shoulders. This was hardware from the Second World War, standard issue for the Indian police in most states, seconded by the Indian army, and so heavy and unwieldy that it was reckoned a fleeing man could run clean out of Delhi before it could be taken off the shoulder, loaded and fired. The 303’s only virtues were its range and power—so if your aim was true, you’d get your man even if he’d crossed over the border into the next state.
In that swirling room, the five of them stood out because they were handcuffed, and loosely roped together. One—just one—on the extreme right, had his ankles shackled in iron. The shoes under the iron were trendy red Nikes. His body was fleshy, filling out the blue jeans and mauve shirt, and where the policeman held him the arm was thick and full of muscle. He looked young, not thirty perhaps, and was unusually fair. He had the moustaches of a brigand, the ends twisted to a rapier’s tip, standing clean away from his cheeks. Every few minutes he reached for them—taking along handcuffs, policeman’s hand, everything—and gave them a slow hard twirl. He stood legs apart, on powerful sprinter’s thighs, his big shoulders squared. Nothing in his eyes or stance suggested fear or contrition. When he spotted me, he displayed a flicker of recognition before unblinking contempt filled his eyes once more.
