THE JAIGARH GOLD: PREFACE, CIRCA 1970S

Rana spat at the hot, dry, lusterless night. The loo had passed late afternoon and a pale yellow chaddar of fine sand hung in a stifling blanket. Far below the headlights of a convoy of trucks laboured its way up the narrow hill cut road to the Jaigarh Fort. It would be an hour, maybe more, before they would reach.

Rana trudged back to the big canon that stood silent sentinel over Jaigarh. Locals told him that the canon was fired just once and the half-ton canon ball landed 22 miles away, creating a crater which today has become a lake.

Rana rubbed khaini in the cup of his palm, massaging with his thumb the wad of tobacco into fine dust. He grimaced as his teeth registered the grit that had mixed with the khaini with a nerve tingling crunch. Rana thought about the family name of Topewalle, given by the Maharaja of Patiala to his great grandfather for his dexterous handling of canons. The name had passed on from generation to generation, long after the canons had been replaced by the awesome power of the snub nosed, lightweight howitzers.

The clank of a falling lathi broke his reverie, announcing company that he wasn't too eager for.

"Sali Haramzadi… she will fix each one of these purple maharajas," Nathuram frantically scratched his crotch, itching with the sand that had found their way up the floppy khaki half pants that was standard issue for the local Amber police.

Rana nodded, spat to get rid of yet another layer of dust that had coated his respiratory tract, "Her behenchod son is no, better. Sala, madarchod, he is cutting off everyone's balls in the name of family planning."

Nathuram flopped down, "Betichod is taking our biwi and behen to bloody clinics and tying their womb up, bastard. The other day, the fuckers came to my village. We were ready. Beat the shit out of the madarchods."

Rana studied Nathuram. He wondered what Nathuram was doing here. The only local, and that too a local policeman in the entire contingent which had taken over Jaigarh Fort in the wee hours of the morning. Throwing out the Maharajas retainers and retinue at gun point. For that matter, he wondered what his regiment was doing here, overnight flown all the way from their current posting in Secunderabad.

But this was the Emergency. Nobody asked questions. Not even in the Indian Armed Forces.

"Behenchod, when shall we get out of here? What are we waiting for?"

Nathuram crouched next to Rana, "They are making a mistake though. You don’t treat our Maharaja like a common criminal. There will be hell to pay."

Rana shrugged. He had seen the Maharaja Sawai Madho Singh drive up to the Fort in his jeep along with his sister-in-law a little after the battalion had taken complete control of the Fort and thrown out the last of the Maharaja's employees. Sawai meant one and a quarter, a sobriquet that the otherwise cruel Emperor Aurangzeb had bestowed on the princeling Jai Singh, the Maharaja who went on to build Jaipur. Rana had thought that the title of adha was more apt as the Maharja was away by the CBI men. As the Maharaja's jeeps left, three desert camouflaged jeeps raced to the front and formed the lead while two olive green jongas and two jeeps took up the rear.

For many of those watching, it was not unfamiliar a sight. The Emergency had made many of the country's leading lights guests of the Government of India. Two more, blue blooded or not, made no difference.

"Stay here. Watch the road. I'll be back," Rana shifted the weight of his SLR, a new acquisition for the battalion after the 1971 Bangladesh War which had finally seen the army surrender for good the World War vintage rifles.

He dragged tired feet across the hard, dry ground. Far below, he could see the lights of Amber twinkling in the sandy haze. Amber Palace, a pale yellow, stood dark, silent, sullen as if protesting the sacrilege of its guardian fort perched.

There was a strange hush, made all the more suffocating by the weight of the sand that hung in the air.

Rana shuffled down the ramp and reached the quadrangle where men in uniform stood together in little groups. Pressure lanterns hissed at the far corner, the glow of the expanded cloth bulbs throwing tall shadows on the pink walls.

A small group of men clothed in black moved around purposefully near the entrance of the huge water tank that sat squarely in the middle of the quadrangle. The sunken water tank was said to be about a 100 feet deep and stored the rain water captured by the mesh of open drains and catchement waterworks around the fort.

"There is a huge khazana under the water. The navy divers have located it and are bringing it up," his roommate at Secunderabad, Hyder Ali, whispered as he sidled up to Rana.

"I saw the first box when they opened it. Gold coins. Diamonds. Jewels." Hyder Ali's voice trembled. Rana studiously massaged the khaini, patted it and handed over to Hyder.

The old soldier tucked the khaini at the back of his jaws, "This is not good. Something is not right."

"Why?" Rana asked.

"None of our men are really in charge. Tell me why we are here. Sala, we are EME, not fucking infantry. And they have got the bloody divers from the Navy here. Look like commandos to me. And some of those civys look like the IB or CBI types. The bastards are watching us. We can't even go for a fucking moot without one of those bastards poking their head around."

Hyder, Rana knew, had an active imagination. But it was common knowledge that the khazana was located under the water tank. Indeed, the few in the battalion who from these parts had spun a tale about the nine openings on the far side of the tank being meant for depositing collections and booty of the Maharaja. The lance naik who lived in Amber had come up with a fairly intriguing tale of coins that settled at the bottom of the water which was then recovered by treasury workers who used shovels to scoop up the coins and deposit them.

But Rana doubted that the Maharajas were naïve enough in the mid-1970s to park all their wealth under a water tank. Rana personally favoured the reports of huge sums having been funnelled off to Swiss banks which the government was trying to trace in yet another effort to convince the people that the Emergency was needed to save the country from the leeches who were bleeding the country. In the India of mid-70s, the Swiss banks had become a much favoured yardstick to judge moral and material corruption. It had become an integral part of the political discourse, with every opponent being damned with broad hints about the clutch of Swiss bank accounts where they had squirreled away the loot.

"What goes of my father? Let them be" Rana shrugged. "I just want to get out of this behenchod sand dune. Its fucking raining sand."

A sharp honk broke the quiet hubbub that pervaded the quadrangle. The laboured whine of India's national car, the ambassador, could be heard making its way towards the quadrangle. The heaving behemoth came to a panting halt, the engine wheezing from the effort of climbing the six kilometres up. The front door of the Ambassador creaked open and out came a young man in white kurta and pyjama.

"Betichod, sala, that's the Son." Hyder swore. "Behen ki! Let's kill the bastard. What is he doing here? I told you! There is something fucking wrong going on here."

Rana could feel Hyder's venom as much as his terror. Perennial travelling that came with being in the Indian Army had made Rana see 'larger' issues more clearly than his brethren back home. Few of these 'national' issues really touched home but the Son had managed to make himself loathed in every part of the country. The man who had unleashed a strange terror on a country where terror of the cultural kind had become alien for the past few centuries.

Rana had once chanced upon a rare street meeting (in these days of MISA everywhere) where a firebrand Opposition leader from one of the Hindu parties was in full flow declaring, "Bhaiyon, the British had come but without crusading zeal, without a mission to convert the heathen. They had come for power, glory and commerce. The Angrez were dukandaars, they were a nation of dukandaars. The few missionaries who made their way in their trail had success in pockets and never the patronage of the state. The Islamic zealots who had last unleashed cultural terror had subsided in the all consuming embrace of the Hindu civilisation. They had defaced temples, with a vengeance; buried centuries-old monuments under Islamic tombs; dismantled defaced and reused as ordinary supports glorious sculptures that would have shamed the better known brethren of Florence. But even they had not managed to spread the kind of terror this young man had unleashed as he went after young and old, men and women with a single intent to sterilise the country in the name of controlling a burgeoning population."

It was a stirring speech but Rana thought the shakha youth was exaggerating a wee too much. The Indian Army was witness time and again to the animal hatred that consumed the nation centuries after the Islamic rape of Hinduism had come to a halt and not a few decades after both sides had spilt each others' blood and guts on the streets of the subcontinent.

But, yes, the Son had achieved what few after Independence had managed to. Political rivals had been summarily locked up, some of them branded traitors, the rest saboteurs and anti-national. The graying leaders from the era before Independence once again found themselves in familiar company and behind bars. Political paths that had diverged in the lust for power since Independence started coming together once again as the extreme right embraced the extreme left in jail kitchens, canteens and courtyards.

Still, there was some good, after all, Rana mused. At least, government officials reached office on time and looked over their shoulders for the ever-present man in mufti. Bribes and corruption suddenly disappeared from the face of Indian bureaucracy as if -- they liked to say in Rana's village chaupal -- the village randi had become virgin again. Trains ran on time and babus started doing the work they were paid for. On the other hand, newspapers began carrying blank spaces as censors moved in to remove innocuous and, yet not so innocent, references to the Mughals and maharajas of yore. Rana did think that the media was carrying the righteous indignation bit a little too far. After all, there was little righteousness in much of the filth that was inked before Emergency.

But the terror that gripped the countryside was not fear of being on the wrong side either in politics or in religion, Rana agreed with the shakha youth. It was the fear of the state that had intruded into everyone's home. Worse, it was the fear of being naked before unnamed faceless people who wanted, in the name of the State, to reach out, molest and outrage their women and themselves. A rape that was sanctioned by the State. The mai baap sarkar had become the destroyer, the father-protector had become the rapist.

Ghanshayam could see Lt Colonel Asirwatham walking across to meet the young man. Lt Col Asirwatham, AVSM, PVSM, much decorated but seen to be commanding more out of lineage than valour. Few of his men could recount any particular tale of bravery of the man who lead them. Like many in the days of personalised rule by Emergency, Asirwatham was chosen to lead, not one who had earned his spurs.

A weak chin made more pronounced a bulbous nose and a whisper thin moustache, the Emergency had made men like Asirwatham the darlings of the establishment. Men of integrity but little character in the face of authority. Asirwatham escorted Sanjay, the Son of India as he was being referred to by his many sycophants, towards where the divers in their wet suits were standing.

Rana watched as the Son went to the boxes and jerked open the lid. Quickly he slammed down the lid, almost as if he knew what was inside but was just checking to ensure that it was all there. Methodically, he moved from box to box. Rana kept count as the Son opened and shut boxes. Impatiently, pulling up his sleeve, he would put his hand into the odd box to turn over an artifact or weigh a palm-full of coins.

Twenty three boxes, Rana counted. All roughly the same size: a largish trunk, the kind that was regulation issue in the army, strapped down by fine leather and gleaming buckles.

Sanjay turned to the half colonel and said something. The colonel flinched. From where he stood, Rana could see Asirwatham swallowing hard -- a habit, Rana had noticed, which the colonel had when trying to rustle up the nerve to take a stand. Rana quietly worked his way in the shadows to hearing distance. The colonel was nervously flapping his hands in a remonstration that was stopped short by a curt gesture from the young man.

Rana could see him better now. The famous Son of India. A boyish face with a faint stubble. Thick, black frames sitting on a handsome nose. Hair thinning at the top . "My mother wants it that way, colonel".

The voice was respectful but there was no mistaking the command. Rana saw the Lt Colonel Asirwatham hesitate.

Before the colonel could reply, a commotion erupted at the mouth of the tunnel that went into the water tank.

Fifteen jawans were trying to haul up a large wooden chest that seemed to be winning the battle of obstinacy.

"Jawan!" Aswirtham barked at Rana, "Lend a hand here".

Rana slipped off his SLR and ran into the tunnel. The wooden chest was a good four feet in height and six feet across. The sides bore the Maharaja's Crest of Arms while fine inlay ivory work covered the front of the chest. Rana found a place to wedge his shoulder in while around him other shoulders began to muscle in.

Amidst shuffling of feet, more soldiers, more shoulders and yells directing the procession, the Royal Chest was carried to the open ground and put down with a heavy thud.

The sweating jawans collapsed on the ground only to be moved out of the way by a preemptory "Hato, hato".

The young man in pyjama kurta patted the chest.

"Open it", he said, oblivious for the moment of the men around him.

Two army locksmiths moved in with iron prongs. The lock gave way after ten minutes of heaving and hammering.

The soldiers lying on the ground began to scramble to their feet to see what was inside.

"Wait!" the young man held up his hand.

"I think your men need a break, Colonel".

Asirwatham nodded, turned to his men "15 minutes. Reassemble at 0100 hours".

The soldiers backed off, muttering.

Rana quietly moved to pick up his SLR. He had been lucky so far. If anyone saw him with the SLR, they would know that he was supposed to be on guard duty, not heaving boxes around.

"Jawan!"

Rana turned around.

The Son was looking at him. "Come here. Open this".

Rana pushed at the heavy lid with Sanjay tugging at the other end of the lid. It sprang open, throwing Rana off balance.

He got off the ground, wiping the wet sand off his khakis. From behind the young man, he could see a velvet cover which the Son almost reverentially pulled aside. Bricks of gold, four inches thick, six inches across were packed neatly from the top. The young man caressed the bricks, weighing them in his hands, a beatific smile lighting up his face.

He turned to see Rana looking over his shoulder. Rana froze as the smile on the young man's face was wiped out.

THE JAIGARH GOLD: CHAPTER 2

That Chandan was a Bengali was only a third of his problem, his boss used to say. The other two thirds was his obnoxious self-righteousness and the fact that his father was a member of the very secret but not too dreaded RAW. His boss' conclusions had been drawn from an 'investigative' story that Chandan had gleaned from his father's files. The rather hysterical piece, so characterised his boss, about the activity of the Pakistani ISI in the socialist pink bastion of Jawaharlal Nehru University named two close friends of the Deputy News Editor. The two named gentlemen had decided to take their international politics studies into the realms of James Hadley Chase rather than John Le Carre. Over the months, they proceeded on their romantic belief about building bridges with Pakistan, a romance not too misplaced for a citizenry quite used to believing that no one is watching and the Big Brother was a figment of Orwellian imagination. The duo were duly visited by the RAW after their umpteenth visit for a cup of tea with a notorious Brigadier at the Pakistani High Commission. Years later, the hapless duo were named by Chandan, much to the wrath of his boss who had done his years in the same red bricked institution with the two RAW suspects as classmates.

As his colleagues would say, that was Chandan. There was a conspiracy everywhere and many were the stories that came gleaned from RAW files, part fact, much fiction like all intelligence reports anywhere in the world. But Chandan had lived on, championing causes like the eviction from Delhi of illegal immigrants from Bangladesh; total decimation of Kashmir militancy through a scorched earth policy, transmigration of populations around the borders to break border crossings. Dutifully doling out the latest intelligence leak, Chandan had more or less found a footing in the second oldest profession in the world, scribedom.

However, as he yet again faced the DNE with the cursor blinking rapidly along his 600-word story, Chandan felt the familiar dread and a choking rage at these liberal, quasi-fabian socialists who populated the media-dom in India and vitiated minds with namby-pamby secular tales and weak postures.

Chandan screwed up his courage as the DNE, a huge rotund man with a neck that threatened to swallow his face, turned to deliver judgement.

"This is tripe. Utter tripe. Next, you will tell me that Neil Armstrong did not land on the moon. Chandy, can we have less of this undiluted RAW claptrap. We are living in the 21^st century. Wake up! It suits some bokachodas to file such nonsense to save their bloody asses. Don’t tell me nonsense about Kargil being a quid pro quo between Pakistan and India until someone blew the whistle… I say, have your father's outfit lost their fucking marbles."

Chandan scowled, turned red, his infamous temper surfacing. "This has nothing to do with my father."

The DNE heaved his massive girth out of the rickety wheeled chairs and flapped his hands around, "Hear! Hear! Chandy's got a scoop, man! Kargil was a fiasco because we fought it. Our RAW man here says that the government wanted to give the Pakis the fucking Kargil heights"

Chandan retreated to his chair amidst hoots, howls of delight and shouts of "Attaboy Chandy", "Go, get em boy", "Booker for you this year my boy!" "Chandy, your dad is working overtime!" Chandy knew from experience that the newsroom would come alive with the catcalls continuing till the morons exhausted themselves and returned to worry about deadlines and pages that were getting delayed. Returning to his desk, he pored miserably though the reports, hoping that he would get that magic uncontestable 'proof' which he would throw on the face of these scoundrels and march out to work in a newspaper that was a little more 'balanced'.

SinhaRoy, the DNE, having done the damage came whistling merrily past. "Hi, Chandy. Any more scoops?" he giggled as he strolled towards the News Editor’s room. No doubt, Chandan fumed, to share the latest episode. And also save his backside in case the story did find its way to any other publication and was used, Chandan thought. That gave him some satisfaction. After all the DNE had seen too many of Chandan's stories that he had spiked appearing in other publications and often becoming a scandal. As SinhaRoy would say, "Why blame Chandy. The spooks are determined to plant. If not here, somewhere else." But to Chandy it was not plants but truth that ultimately prevailed.

All of a sudden, he felt very miserable. He did not want to hang around even a minute. Quietly he packed his papers and logged out. He picked up the phone and spoke to Jose, his one sympathiser. "I am going. This is the pits. Just take over Jose."

THE JAIGARH GOLD: CHAPTER 3

Chandan was no archaeologist but the sculptures lying strewn on the ground had his heart racing. A breathtaking montage of Mahisasura mardini etched with fluidity and grace on black granite was just another piece of some startling sculptural work that he had seen north of the Vindhyas. The crumbling temple where villagers still worshipped stood with its body parts strewn around it, carefully numbered by the Archaeological Survey of India, then forgotten. Each piece was a work of art, some reminiscent of the erotic couplings of Khajuraho, though the temple predated the erotic art of Khajuraho by 200 years.

Most faces had been dutifully defaced by passing Islamic conquerors and passing vandals, but even the disfiguration could not hide the sheer individual beauty of the sculptures. Chandan had wandered into this village after having chanced on a rather poorly illustrated Rajasthan Tourism Development Corporation brochure titled “Lesser known destinations of Rajasthan”. Desperately seeking to delay his return to Delhi and back into the company of the obnoxious SinhaRoy, Nandy had decided to go back after taking the longer route through Bharatpur on the Jaipur-Agra highway before turning back to Delhi on the Agra-Delhi highway. This was not more than a couple of hours more to the journey but a couple of hours that he could do with away from the office.

“Beautiful, no?”

Chandan turned to see a tall Rajasthani with a dusty blazing red turban perched on a weather-beaten forehead. Dhoti wrapped loose and high over his knees, the man squatted next to Chandan, his weight resting on the roughly hewn stick.

“That one is beautiful, one of the best. But, saheb, the better ones have been taken away to different museums around the world. Some by the sarkari people some by the dalals.” He wiped his brow on the back of his sleeve. “Many come, saheb. Some to see, some try and steal, some to admire… what brings you here to Abhaneri, saheb?”

“Nothing, I was just passing by… why is this place called Abhaneri? Why on god’s earth should someone build a fabulous temple in the middle of nowhere?”

The Rajasthani dutifully posed next to a pillar of intricate carvings, years of accosting madly clicking tourists for a couple of rupees of baksheesh giving him a telepathic appreciation of what they wanted.

“Saheb, I don’t know who built this and why. Some say it was the great Raja Chand who ruled over this place three thousand years ago… some say it was Raja Bhoja who ruled over Gurjar. But Abhaneri was actually Abha Nagri, where Harshat Mata spreads joy and brightness or abha all around. Harshat Mata, saheb, is Mata Durga. Even now, Saheb, we have festivals and people come from far off places… but there was a time when my ancestors used to dine with the kings.”

To Chandan some of it sounded practiced ASI spiel, some earthy nostalgia. Changing lenses, he continued shooting, “But is there any haveli, any palace, any fort around here?”

“No saheb, but the Chand baoli does have staying quarters.”

“Chand baoli?”

The villager gestured at the wall that ran around an enclosure opposite the temple. “There saheb. One of the world’s most beautiful baolis… they say if you drop a coin on the top most step, it goes all the way down to the water…”

Chandan began to pack in his photographic gear. “A baoli? What is a baoli?”

“Saheb, baoli is a well… but not like one where you drop a bucket… it has steps that go down. The women used to go down the steps and collect water, have a bath, wash their clothes, dry them on the steps… now they have closed the baoli”

Chandan and the Rajasthani lad reached the what looked like the entrance to an ancient stone house. Lying around the entrance were a few charpoys and slumbering men in khaki. The notice outside read take shoes off and no photography. Chandan stepped out of the threshold and stood still, his gaze on a descending quadrangle of steps, perfectly geometrical in clusters of four steps at each descending level. The baoli was like an inverted pyramid made of sandstone, each step a marvel of precision, each cluster of four steps a pyramid.

“This is smashing! Why doesn’t the world not know about it? I have never seen anything this breathtaking. Arre bhai, what is your name?”

“Nathuram, saheb”

“Why has this place not become a paradise for tourists? Why is it that all those truckloads of tourists going from Agra to Jaipur not coming here…?”

Nathuram watched Chandan perplexed.

“And why would they come here, saheb? To see the ruins?”

“No! To see this” Chandan waved his arms around in a frantic attempt to share with Nathuram the sheer ecstasy he felt, the ecstasy he was sure that travellers like him would feel when they stumbled on this splendid work of human art. “This is one of the world’s most fascinating architectural things… you know, you have never been out of this village, but the Taj Mahal is nothing compared to this!” Chandan babbled in an attempt to share with this villager his ‘find’, one , he was sure that Nathuram could not appreciate because he took the beauty of the temple and the baoli for granted.

Nathuram spat on the ground, “Saheb, I have done duty in Jaipur, I have seen Alwar. I have seen Amer. I have seen Agra. This is okay. Quite nice but not chamatkar, saheb. Besides, who will want to come here? There are no hotels, no shops, not even a glass of water to drink.”

Chandan shook his head in exasperation, “Nathuji, Taj Mahal, Jaigarh, Amer are ‘known’. They are familiar. This is not known. This is exotic. This is wonderful. This is beauty lost. This is like the temples of the Incas, a lost, world.”

THE JAIGARH GOLD: CHAPTER 1

Kathmandu airport was missing its usual maddening chaos. The blue-shirted security guards lolled around in their usual laidback fashion. But that was the only thing that seemed like a normal day at the airport, a tired-out Singhabhadra mused. For Singhabhadra, it was the fourth or fifth visit. He had begun to lose count and apart from the Yak and Yeti, there was little of Kathmandu that held any fascination for him.

To be honest, despite his visits, he had just about explored Durbar Square and walked around Thamel. Beyond that, he was more acquainted with the boardrooms of Nepal Tourism Corporation. Interminable meetings with marketing sub-committees, core groups, India specialists, and board members left him with a throbbing headache. This time was specially bad. Yet again, Nepal had plunged into crisis, possibly the blackest in its history. The Crown Prince had mowed down his family, indiscriminately shooting at everyone but strangely accounting for the King, his father, the Queen, his mother, and his younger brother. The Crown Prince had proceeded to shoot himself, survived for a day, was crowned king while on life support as the tradition of the Kingdom went, and died a few days later. The new King and his son were neither revered like the dead king nor were above controversy. The son, yet to be anointed crown prince, had a colourful history to boot, having used his four-wheel drives to run amok on the streets of Kathmandu.

Singhabhadra mused about the two days past where he seemed to be representing India, the country and its media which had gleefully latched on to the sensational tragedy and spent every minute in the immediate aftermath extravagantly speculating on every minute detail. Singhabhadra had made the transition to a public relations consultant after ten years of being a fairly indifferent hack with an acknowledged flair for writing and little more. Singhabhadra could write a beautiful piece and, on his day, could be fairly provocative.

But, after ten years, he had little to show either in name or fame or, for that matter, a good story. He had worked, weevil-like, into the gut of the publication and shaped himself into a manager who could put a few pages together, write the odd editorial and generally keep the organisational wheels turning. Along the way, he had made many friends, few enemies and a general reputation of being a good guy to have around.

When he finally broke lose, it had little to do with lack of professional satisfaction, more to do with a wife and a child who couldn't be supported on a salary. A salary that hadn't dramatically changed since he had chosen to stay camped in the same place for five years-- a very, very long time to stay in one place. But the five years of helping youngsters get going was a cheque that he cashed in discreetly when he moved into public relations. In a profession bereft of too many hands that either understood the media or how it worked, Singhabhadra became a natural success as he impressed his first clients with his journalist credentials.

Unlike most days, the sole flight scheduled for the evening was RA 217 to Kathmandu. A bandh had been called in the country by the expanding Maoist forces which had finally started striking at the heart of Nepal after the revolutionary forces had spent the past two years culling a thousand hapless policemen in little, remote outposts. Singhabhadra tiredly tried to block out the loud recounting of woes by a distraught Indian. Duped, conned, saved by the golden chain that many Indian men wear as a matter of form, the man had scraped together the money to book his way home.

Singhabhadra tried to keep his focus on the homely policewomen who did duty on the x-ray machines that passed for security at the Tribhuvan International Airport. Their tight light-blue shirts played up the generous mammaries. Their broad backsides swayed to a sensuous beat as they loitered lazily, hand in hand, on the pink marbled waiting area. Somehow, to Singhabhadra, these alabaster skinned women of generous proportions, with huge vermillon-and-crushed rose tikkas on their foreheads, were infinitely more sexual than the muscular blondes, redheads and gone-to-seed western tourist showing more than an ankle and a knee with bra-less breasts lolling under barely adequate tops scattered around the lounge.

Though firmly monogamous (as much by conviction as by lack of opportunity), Singhabhadra could not now find much sexuality in the archetypal white skinned beauty unless they were completely naked. Not that he had seen one in flesh and blood. But hours of surfing free pornographic sites had somehow removed all the thrill of seeing an arm and a leg. Now, he figured, he would need to see them spreading their glory to feel a stir in his loins. Singhabhadra had become the Internet impotent. His wife would have to labour hard to get him to a decent enough erection and he himself would shut his eyes tight and fantasise about dogs fucking women or five black men and a blonde before he reached his climax.

Singhabhadra grimaced in annoyance as a disheveled Nepali flopped down next to him. Over time, he had developed an acute discomfort for all kinds of smells. Whites smelled of many days of unwashed sweat, a kind of paper rot smell; women in his office smelled either oily or day old beef; carpets smelt of dust piles; closed rooms where the air conditioning had failed smelled invariably of fart in the air. And Nepal to him smelt of goats. It was as if the whole country smelt of goats. He would smell it in the carpets, in the linen, in the corridors. It was not unlike the vomity smell that emanated from coconut-oiled heads that were exposed to the sun for too long and prevalent in the South of India. Or the jasmine hair oil which seemed to be applied liberally on heads in the East. Or the sweetly pungent smell of mustard oil tainted by the odour of fried fish flesh that overpowered him in the visits to Bengali homes.

But right now, sitting in Tribhuvan International Airport, Singhabhadra was being assailed by the pungent sting of khaini as the Nepali next to him meticulously ground tobacco and lime into fine dust. Seeing him watch with what he took to be interest, the Nepali offered the khaini to Singhabhadra. "In my regiment, they used to say that I ground the finest, like God's mills", the Nepali offered by way of conversation as Singhabhadra hastily turned the offer down. "It keeps the nerve going."

Singhabhadra knew that a conversation was in the offing but he had no intention of participating in one. "Hanh ji sahab, it keeps the nerve going. Many years ago, it is this pinch which saved my life," the Nepali continued undaunted as Singhabhadra desperately scouted around for an escape. "It was Sanjay Sinhji," the Nepali said quickly, having practiced over the years the art of capturing uninterested audiences. Singhabhadra raised his eyebrows. That name he had not heard for a long time. Son of the former Indian Prime Minister who crashed his chopper onto a mountainside; the principal architect of a period of insane dictatorial governance where women and men were rendered infertile; the scourge of the old guard in the Freedom Party... this was one tale he had not heard.

Singhabhadra hesitated enough for the Nepali to know that he his audience was captive. He slowly kicked his chappals off and leaned forward, "Hanh sahab, he would have killed me, there was no doubt. Here was this huge box of gold and here was I, the only witness who could read in his eyes the mind of a thief".

The Nepali took his time stuffing the khaini, gulped noisily as the juices flowed freely and wiped his hands on a mustard brown stained hand cloth. Singhabhadra tried to keep his interest out of his expression. He still did not know where this was leading to. "Have you heard of Jaigarh fort sahab? It is on the hill atop Amber, twenty minutes from Jaipur. We had found this khazana, saheb. Under the water tank. That is where the maharaja kept his treasures. We took it out and I opened the lid for the betichod. When he saw what I had seen, there was murder in his eyes saheb. That is when I took my khaini out and begin to grind it as if nothing had happened. That haramzada apparently could not tolerate khaini and he turned apoplectic in rage. But he forgot what I had seen, abused me for taking khaini in front of him and told me to get going and get rid of it… but for the khaini, sahab, I would be dead."

Singhabhadra suddenly lost interest. It was a trifle too tame, a trifle too fanciful. For all he knew, by the looks of the Nepali, if he had ever been in the Indian forces, he would probably never have risen beyond sergeant. Unlikely, Singhabhadra reasoned, that he would come anywhere close to Sanjay Sinhji. He quickly rose before the Nepali could go on, "And where did the gold go?" The Nepali spat a rust red stream at the fancifully copper plated trash cans, "They never did let it go to the government. Nathuram told me many years later that they had put it in Chand ki baoli in a village off the Jaipur-Agra highway. Sala died. I don't know whether he did every manage to get that gold out from there."

REWORKING THE EXIT STRATEGY: PART 1

Narad had called the meeting. Brahma was unhappy. Times had changed, no doubt, but Brahma preferred Narad to be the mischief maker of ancient lore than the Chief PR Officer for the Combined Heavens. Nowadays, he shuddered when reminded that Narad had possibly sprung from his forehead in a weak moment of poor humour. He preferred the other story of Narad being the son of Kashyap.

Somewhere along the way, Narad had transformed from the Veena strumming mischief maker and purveyor of gossip to the pinstripe three-piece suit Public Relations manager for the Combined Heavens.

Right now as Brahma looked at all the re-designated Gods, he mused how Man had finally got the Gods to cast themselves in their image. Brahma had been redesignated Chairman of the Board, Indra had taken the CEO hat while Vishnu and Shiva had both been given the Executive Director tags.

This meeting was for him one where he had sworn to keep his peace as he knew that Shiva and Vishnu had a greater say in the discussion to follow from what he had read in the agenda.

Narad called the meeting to order which now had a dozen on Gods, half a dozen goddesses and two dozen apsaras in attendance. Indraprastha had been turned into a large board room with plasma screens and ipods and handhelds were scattered all over though, Brahma mused, god only knew why they needed these human instruments when all their senses were infinitely more endowed.

'' We have a problem," Narad said, "which requires a comprehensive solution. Over the past 50 years, our exit strategy has failed miserably, resulting in very poor PR. Where earlier people used to look at their passage into the next world as time for Gods and Goddesses, worship and the rest, we find that there is increasing disgruntlement specially as there is now a good appreciation of the body wasters like Cancer, AIDS, Hepatitis and the rest. There is no fear of an act of God. Worse, even natural disasters have ceased to draw awe and wonder. The whole approach has become quite clinical. It is time, therefore, for a complete overhaul of the exit strategies and its time we called in outside consultants."

Narad paused as much for effect as to invite reaction. All he saw was dowcast eyes as the assembled gathering struggled to grasp the concept. In a way he felt pity for them. They had done the same thing over and over again with great success. Centuries had passed with the same effect from the same practices, same interventions in the affairs of men.

And yet the pace of change over the past 50 years had been so rapid that even as Men and Women prayed to God more, they believed in the might of Heavens less and less. The Gods seemed defeated, disillusioned and in disarray. More and more them would make trips down to Earth to pick up the latest gizmo or, worse, a new magazine or book.

The apsaras were particularly affected as the nubile scantily clad women on earth were distracting more Gods than their more classical mould of beauties with a slight bulge in the midriff and abundance of endowment in the asset region.

Taking silence as consent, Narad moved on. "I have, therefore, taken the liberty of inviting a number of top notch Earth Global consultants to make a presentation on New Exit Strategies. Over the past 60 days McKinkey and ThriceWaterhouse have worked hard to prepare a SWOT analysis of our existing exit options and come up with choices. Please do note that they are still Earth bound and have been transported through dimensional portals. So they believe that they have come to a hideaway destination in India and are addressing a group of post-modern ascetics with immense wealth to squander. I would request all of you to not use your devic powers in front of them." Kamadev groaned as that meant walking across to pick up his choice of cuisine.

Narad nodded to the Dev at the door who scampered out. Shortly after, the Dev ushered in a flange of men and women in dark suits. The group looked a little disoriented, a little puzzled by the strange series of incidents.

But India was a 'different' destination as the President of McKinkey had patiently explained and there were likely to see 'different things and have different experiences'. Still, some of it was truly strange.

Specially, the bit about the plane landing vertically in the valley surrounded by brilliantly lit Himalayas. They had all taken pictures with their new digital cameras but there was certainly something odd in this strange gathering of oddly dressed men and women with a smattering of men who looked like they would be at home in any corporate boardroom. In fact, it almost looked like some of their clothes were changing shapes and contours and the walls of the room looked almost fluid. Vishnu smiled as he read the thoughts of the bewildered group in front of him and winked at Shiva.

The McKinkey leader muttered under his breath at the strange mix but reminded himself that India today was the largest outsourced destination and, god forbid, he might himself be outsourced to India if the country kept picking up its economic pace.

He picked up his visiting cards, stopped staring at the floating piece of wood and turned to introduce himself.

ON THE WINGS OF A PRAYER

The Jetwings magazine, the airlines' inflight glossy, tells me that flying is safer than doing most things in life, be it walking down the road or turning on your hair dryer.

People flying Alliance Air would beg to differ. The pundits and the ministers may argue, but as any frequent flyer on Alliance Air (unfortunates trapped in the feeder routes) would tell you, the airline is all about young pilots, young airhostesses and old aircrafts flying to dead airports and slumbering cities. Those who have to clamber on to one of these flights, joke about how the young crew at Alliance keeps your mind off the old plane while the relatively younger planes of the Indian Airlines keeps your mind off the old crew.

The academic debate about the years that aircraft fly send shivers down my spine. The condition of these deathtraps have little to do with the years in service. Today, the Indian Airlines planes are slowly reaching that point where many of them would go the way of the Alliance Air aircraft -- a patchwork of nuts and bolts with two engines strapped on. Often you get the feel sitting inside one of those ageing Boeing 737s of Alliance that the pilot is desperately thundering down the runway in the hope that a miraculous gust of wind would lift the plane before he runs out of airstrip.

I am no aircraft engineer, but this much I can vouch for: Duct tapes keep much of the innards of the aircraft in place; seats slip back all the way; wings look a patchwork of welding and ingenuous engineering; doors often do not close for reasons beyond engineering comprehension and most of the flights seem to land with thuds that turn the hair grey for even the most seasoned traveller. I am told, again by the informed Jetwings, that a thud-thud landing is often better than a greaser because it enables a better grip on the tarmac and allows faster stopping on short runways. However, I doubt whether the thuds are simply that when we land in Delhi or a Mumbai.

There is a huge dose of luck that carries most of these aircraft. I shall not argue with assorted experts who now, as always, are seeking to confuse the issues by displays of great intellect and knowledge. Yet Alliance Air flies primarily on prayer, the aviation fuel is just incidental.

A JOURNEY TO GREECE

I was the third one in the queue. Ahead was Athens, the crucible of western civilisation, Greek gods and goddesses, the home of Olympics, the progenitors of virtually every school of thought. Ahead also was a surly Greek, no way a God, who finally started to see some light. Five Indians had just crossed into the country. He himself had just let in two. He lifted his eyes and dropped his jaws.

For, dutifully lined behind me were 17 other black and brown faces in dishevelled attire, clutching Indian passports and looking forward to a week of pure gas. One of India's top five agencies had decided to treat its top 20 managers at a Greek retreat and thus the presence of the Indian contingent. The Greek God was joined by an equally surly lady. All of a sudden it looked like a veil had dropped.

The muggy weather outside looked muggier. Angry whispers flitted back and forth.

"Passport" barked the man. "All".

The language, tone, manner had changed.

Suddenly, all 17 Indians felt very Indian. Foreign. Outsiders. Defined by the colour of their skin. And nationality.

"Why you here?", he demanded.

"Conference", we said in chorus.

All the division leaders with their huge designations were beginning to feel like little children.

"Where invitation?" The man shouted again.

"No invitation. We invited ourselves," the brightest of creative sparks chirped.

Three overweight immigration officials appeared and gestured the motley bunch of by now very rattled Indians into a narrow corridor. I looked into a small room on the right as we passed it. From international pulp fiction, the identity of the men perched diffidently on wooden benches was quite clear: International flotsam waiting for deportation or worse, unless they could pull off whatever scam they had going.

The unruly, upset, shaken team of India's finest and brightest were marched schoolchildren-like into a bright hall with rows of chairs. In good Indian fashion, traits perhaps accentuated by the profession they were in, all began to mill around like penned sheep. Cigarettes and lighters worked feverishly to reduce the stress.

The tension was exploded by the agitated entry of a bulldozing official, shouting, screaming, roaring in rage. Much waving of hands and gesticulation later, it was clear that the restless movements were keeping him from counting heads and tallying them with the number of passports he held. By now our Indian contingent was getting edgy as they muttered their way to seats. Yet another explosion ensued. Apparently, he wanted each and every one to sit in the same row. By the end of the shuffling, it was quite clear to the exasperated, angry, cowed down, hurt, offended Indians why numerals are Roman and language is Greek.

With much dark humour, we settled in waiting for the next chapter. The sterile cold Emirates air hospitality at that very moment looked warm and hospitable. On the runway, the aircraft began to turn tail and plod off to take-off point, a development welcomed by a muffled chorus about getting the plane to hang on.

In the meantime, of course, the Indians were not inactive. In good Indian fashion, one of the members entrusted with the travel arrangements disappeared in a huddle with the Greek officials. Ten minutes became 20 and then half an hour. Suddenly, there was a flurry and the same dour Greeks returned brandishing the passports and shooing us out of Immigration. Obviously, someone had found a very Indian solution.

The muttering gang trooped out swearing loyalty to motherland or castigating it for being seen as such scum that "even Greeks misbehaved".

The next four days, however, did much to change all that: Greeks, were just like Indians. Ramming their cars into each other and getting down to fight it out; angry women and men; crowded thoroughfares; a lovely sense of being in Lajpat Nagar; crummy dilapidated streets, much like the by-lanes of Calcutta with incongruous Bengali signages; Indians by the dozens in the flee market.

Perhaps what did set Greece apart was that there weren't as many Indians you were bumping into as you did in virtually every major metropolis of the world. And the wine was delightful; the service familiarly Indian in being obnoxious; the hotel rooms quite, quite underclass; the girls pretty; the streets fairly full of peddlers and kiosks. Once you figured it was an India without Indians, was that much more enjoyable!