RESONANCE Read online

  "The Americans are no different from the rest of the human race. They too are prone to exploiting life for selfish gains. The Supreme Court of the United States declared that the Native American Tribes and their land is a sovereign nation. Right under the nose of the authorities, drug peddling, flesh trading and smuggling are rampant in these 'sovereign nations'. All this goes in the name of culture, respecting other cultures. And the very same Americans bomb our tribes without understanding the 'otherness' of our culture."After a pause, he said, "Rather, the world is one."

  "Still, why force him? Let him choose his own path."

  "I know my son too, Begum. I know that right from the beginning he wanted to study in the Ivy League. He worked hard to get admission to one of the finest programmes. So, I never interfered. Today also if he wants to complete his education at Cornell, I will never force him to come back. However, if you ask me for my opinion, then I would want my child to return after he completes his research paper. I would love to see him prosper on his native soil and live among his own people in ease and peace."

  "Still…"

  "No questions."

  Nausheen observed her husband's hand shaking violently and scratching his right thigh. She had seen this for many years. Whenever her husband was under extreme emotional stress, it would happen invariably. In these times, the best thing was to leave him alone to deal with the situation.

  A shrill voice echoed from the living room. "Come down, Mom."

  "Call me Ammi. Don't imitate those Westerners."

  "Come at once!"

  Nausheen's eyes widened when she saw Geo TV flashing the report of the Mumbai attacks. "How could they? Why?"

  The question remained unanswered as Aban and she watched the events unfolding before their eyes: mindless killing at a busy railway station, a gruesome bloodbath inside two five-star hotels, a chilling carnage in a café, a morbid massacre on the streets of the Mumbai and a ghastly butchery inside a Jewish Centre.

  "Where is your Abba?"Nausheen turned her gaze to Aban, who held his head in disbelief.

  "He's left."

  Meeting at Connaught Place

  The macabre Mumbai attacks happened in the late evening hours of November 26th, 2008.

  The same afternoon Sundaram Iyer had gone to attend a meeting with the officers of the Central Water Power Commission at Sewa Bhawan, New Delhi. In the evening, he asked his chauffeur to leave the car keys with him, as he would be late.

  Sundaram drove his car to Connaught Place and steered into the parking lot of M-Block, in front of the famous Variety Book Depot. He walked leisurely to the Lalit Intercontinental Hotel at Barakhamba Avenue and entered the Presidential suite, booked by a Dubai pharmaceutical company. Sundaram's three accomplices were eagerly waiting for him. He greeted them and asked each of them to power off their cell phones and to remove the batteries. With all cell phones dead to the world, a satisfied Sundaram asked Somashekhar Rao to turn off the television as well.

  Somashekhar Rao obeyed, returned to his seat and blurted out, "How come you could not prevent the Indian Government from cancelling our contract, Sundaram?"The disenchanted Managing Director of the Progressive Architecture and Construction Company Ltd. of Hyderabad demanded answers from Sundaram Iyer.

  "They say that the project cost has overrun because of non-performance by your company. You know the Hydroelectric Corporation is quite miffed with the project delay. "

  "What about the ten million dollar bank guarantee that they have already encashed?"

  "Calm down, Mr. Rao. You have already moved the Indian Council of Arbitration for resolving your commercial dispute. Your lawyers can always point a finger at the environmentalists, who have been hindering your work. Isn't it natural that your work gets affected for reasons beyond your control?"

  "We put forth the same argument, but the metropolitan judge brushed aside our point of view."

  "I'll talk to the Law Secretary. Let's see if he can be of any help."

  "Everything has a price, my dear Iyer."

  "Who knows that better than I? Forget about the company's revenue? What will you gain even if your company gets the money back from the government? Perhaps a few words of hollow appreciation! That's not an incentive in this cruel world, my dear friend."Sundaram chuckled. "Therefore, tonight we are going to finalize the issue in a way that will please all of us. In fact, none of you will need to serve anyone. What I'm going to tell you will make everyone sufficiently well-off."

  "How much?"

  "Five million dollars for each one of you!"

  Somashekhar Rao nodded and Sundaram turned his attention to Parag Nanda, who seemed to be lost in his own world. "What's bothering you, Parag?"

  "I'm worried about the Intelligence Bureau, which is making a mountain out of a molehill. They are exaggerating my role in the Israeli Barak Missile deal."The impatient Parag Nanda, who had always lived in the lap of luxury, could not take 'no' for an answer and so wanted a quick fix solution. "Why don't you put in a word for me to the Defence Minister and if possible the Prime Minister and get things sorted out?"

  "That's out of the question. You know both are impeccable. They are not going to interfere in the work of the IB."

  Parag Nanda was visibly fidgety. He picked up his glass of scotch and drank it in one large gulp. He quickly poured out another shot and stubbed out his cigarette with the other hand.

  Ignoring the young Nanda's grumpiness, Sundaram Iyer continued, "Tell me if you will be able to get our remaining consignments of explosives through the Nepal border."

  "That is another big problem. After the accession of a communist government in Nepal, diplomatic relations with India have taken a steep downturn. The Indian government doesn't count on inimical Nepal anymore since it is not cooperating with the extradition of the Naxalites and the Maoists, who have taken refuge inside their country. The IB and R&AW have even resorted to snatching terrorists from Nepal without taking their Nepalese counterparts into confidence. Nepal, in turn, has adopted a very hostile posture. Their Central Customs Authority is not clearing anything from its check posts even though we take care of its interests."

  "Surprising!"

  "Laughable too. They say fake currency notes have flooded India. So, the customs people don't trust our cash. They want payments in Euros or dollars and that too everything in advance."

  "Bizarre! Anyway, talk to the Director General of Nepal Customs. You can always declare your consignment as some innocuous item like steel. I don't see why his men at the border will not clear it?"

  "Even if they do so, it will raise suspicion on the Indian side."

  "Why?"

  "Nepal doesn't produce steel."

  "Think out of the box. You may even forget the Nepalese route. More importantly, you cannot declare the consignment as UNDEX. That's the point, isn't it?"Sundaram said blandly.

  "We don't need UNDEX, the underwater explosives, my dear friend,"Somashekhar Rao cut in.

  "Why?"

  "It won't cause the intended deluge that you have planned. Even though, the explosion will create a massive water-dome in the reservoir, causing water surface shockwaves to hit the wall of the dam with tremendous force, it will still not be sufficient enough to cause a large rock-pile dam to fall."

  "Well, it will create wide cracks inside the masonry and steel panels and then it will not be possible for the weakened foundation to hold it for a long time. The massive backwater pressure of the reservoir will crumble it."

  "Nothing will happen. I'm a structural engineer and I know how big structures like dams take care of cracks. They withstand severe earthquakes and don't collapse like a house of cards. The enormous weight of the sand and earth of the gravity dam will quickly fill up the crack. Any porous opening disappears in the blink of an eye."

  "What if we carry out successive explosions one after another? Will it not be sufficient to cause dam failure?"

  "Each successive explosion will amplify the height and the strength of the wave
s. Even though each of them will weaken the various segments of the dam, still it cannot tear the dam apart."

  "What is the solution then?"Sundaram seemed to be worried, as his grand plan seemed to be falling apart piece-by-piece.

  "Resonance, my dear, resonance,"said Somashekhar Rao, "It is one of the most striking and unexpected phenomena in physics, which can cause bridges to collapse, aircrafts to turn to dust and buildings to come crumbling down. Think if the sturdy Broughton Suspension Bridge in Britain could give way due to the resonance created simply by the rhythmic steps of marching foot soldiers, imagine the magnitude of devastation that a bigger resonance can create. Tabla maestros and opera singers have been known to shatter glass to smithereens with their mesmerizing beats and shrill high-pitched notes."1

  Somashekhar Rao poured wine in a plain wineglass and pinged the glass with a teaspoon. He observed the sound attentively and then walked over to the System III Sirius Turntable at the far corner of the room. He chose Luciano Pavarotti's opera performance in bel canto. He mounted the LP, gently lowered the stylus and turned the volume knob, increasing the echo and hum. Nothing happened at tenor and countertenor levels, where the intonation alternated between two extremes. He then slowly turned the knob in the opposite direction, slowly reducing the sound to a very low volume, and waited.

  Every one of them watched tentatively, holding their breath. When the vocal chords of the artist let out a bass-baritone, a large crack spread from the top to the base of the wine glass to the rim, shattering it into tiny shards of glass.

  Somashekhar Rao walked pompously from the music deck to his awed audience. He chuckled, "Resonance of a Simple Harmonic Motion is the only thing that is capable of flattening the entire planet. A well calculated resonance could even split the planet into two."

  The Additional Inspector General of the Central Industrial Security Force then spoke up, "I won't allow any of your reverberation unless you accept my terms."

  Sundaram was upset, "We had a deal."

  "I never agreed to anything. And you've not paid my previous dues yet."

  "What dues?"

  "Well Mr. Iyer, you know the Deputy Commandant at the dam doesn't work under my jurisdiction. Another officer of my rank has jurisdiction over the region. But then, I had to carry out the assigned work against all odds. When the Indian Government received a specific terror threat on dams from western intelligence, the Director General called for a meeting in Delhi. After a lot of deliberation, I convinced the DG to allow us to place the security post at a faraway place on the reservoir and upstream of two rivers. He agreed. To implement it, he assigned the work to me. Then, I had to work out everything to the last possible detail. I knew that I couldn't carry out the sensitive work, if the Deputy Commandant posted at the dam oversaw it. So, I managed a five-day training program for the DC. When he left for the training at NIS Academy in Hyderabad, we started our operations. After that, we had to complete the entire work within those five days. It was tough job to place explosives right under the nose of constantly tracking satellites. You know that the government has placed the dam in a highly sensitive zone. Every forty-five minutes, the satellites routinely take pictures. After erection of temporary sheds, my men had to justify the sounds of drilling machines. Transporting and then placing those explosives in the bore was not the only task at hand. My men had to connect all explosives with the timing device, and synchronize the frequency with the Ku-Band satcom. We hid the VSAT antenna on top of the one of temporary tin-sheds of the security post. In spite of all these odds stacked against our team, we pulled off the impossible. In fact, the VSAT is presently catching National TV programmes and a few satellite radio stations. You can tune into the desired frequency even remotely, sitting on your comfortable couch, and detonate these explosives right from here. I hope, my dearest friend, you understand now that what we did was surely not a happy- baby-nappy-changing job."

  Sundaram Iyer smiled back, "Brilliant! Now tell me what happened to the temporary security posts?"

  "They are still there, guarded by the CISF personnel. And the poor guys don't know what lies right beneath them."

  Sundaram Iyer tried to underplay the swaggering AIG. "Terrific job. How much is your past due? I want to clear it."

  "A million dollars."

  "A million?"Sundaram Iyer was taken aback.

  "Yes, Mr. Iyer. I've to cough up a substantial amount to the naxals of Bengal."

  Sundaram Iyer looked worried, "Naxals are not experts in handling high-grade explosives, which can create a blast of such magnitude. The massive hills will stand tall. I think you have gone all wrong."

  "Check your facts properly, Mr. Iyer. Never ever underestimate the naxalites. Many of them have worked in the open cast mines, handling explosives that can literally move mountains. Blasting small knoll and tor is a daily affair for them. Their explosives are highly sophisticated. If our calculation goes right, all three hills will crumble down into the reservoir, one by one, and amplify the waves into gigantic waves."

  After thinking for a long time, Sundaram Iyer asked, "How much do you want for the next assignment?"

  "Ten million dollars, my friend."

  "Ten million!"

  "Of course. You know that before joining government service, I swore allegiance to our constitution."

  "So with greenbacks, you will change your loyalty."When the officer did not reply, Sundaram Iyer continued, "What if the Tupac-II people don't agree?"

  "I'm out then. Tell them not to count me in."

  "You do know that a government job is transferable, don't you?"Sundaram Iyer talked tough.

  "My voice will echo everywhere in the world, Mr. Iyer. The media is ever ready to sink its teeth into a juicy piece of gossip. And this is a real story. Anyone can get a good price if he has a story to tell the world. If I drop a bit of a hint, they will chase me till hell freezes over."

  Sundaram Iyer nodded.

  The AIG pulled out a miniature memory chip from his pocket and continued with his wordplay, "Well! I can put this chip inside my cell phone and activate it as a transponder. You know very well that I can blow up all three hills at this very moment, don't you?"

  "I know how capable you are. Now, hand over the transponder frequencies of the VSAT and the trigger sequence of the explosion."

  "It has a very small executable file, which contains a few codes only."The AIG handed the miniature memory-chip to Sundaram. "The Ku-Band frequencies are mentioned in a small file. These few lines of written code can move a hill and tramp down the valley. Very interesting, isn't it?"The AIG chuckled.

  "What about the abort sequence?"

  "That's in the same file. Tell your boss to transfer the contents to his customized watch. He can initiate the trigger sequence as and when he wishes, but he will have to conform to a perfect timing schedule in case of the abort sequence."

  "I will advise you one last thing though. Hold on to your horses till they are ready for the final race."

  The AIG nodded.

  The meeting was adjourned. Still unaware of the Mumbai attack, while going back to Connaught Place to pick his car, Sundaram was worried. "Why should one close the barn after the horse has already bolted?"he said cryptically.

  As Sundaram walked out, two things haunted him: 'Resonance' and 'Not to count me in'.

  A waiter of a well-known restaurant Kake da Dhaba and his paanwala friend, who were engrossed in late night chatter, casually watched a man entering a swanky Internet café.

  The neon signboard of the café boasted, "Open 24 X 7".

  Backup

  A car followed Imran Shah Malik's glossy black Mercedes Benz. The minute Imran turned right on PMG chowk, bullets started to spew forth from the car that was following him.

  The bulletproof car of Imran Shah Malik bore the brunt of a few shots. However, the rear glass shattered completely when a grenade landed near it and exploded. His highly secured cell phone which was on the dashboard fell on the floor and was beyond an
yone's reach under the front passenger seat. Imran fumbled, trying to pull it out, but could not. He stepped hard on the pedal, speeding down on N-5 or the New Grand Trunk Road towards Shahdara. Left with no choice, Imran activated his car phone and called his son, "Listen carefully, Aban. Go to my study and create a backup of my computer data right now. Leave for the US by the earliest flight. Once you reach the US, I will tell you what you need to do next."

  Imran Shah Malik's car veered sharply to its left, as a bullet burst the rear tyre. Although it sustained the impact, it was enough to send it off balance. Riding the wave, Imran allowed the vehicle to enter a narrow by lane.

  "What was that sound, Abba?"Aban's voice hollered into the instrument.

  "The boys are lighting up fireworks."Imran laughed.

  "I think…"

  "Stop sweating the small stuff, son. I have been hearing these noises since I was as young as you."

  "I'm worried, Abba…"

  "Take it easy, son. Never ever mention this to Ammi. She will panic unnecessarily. "

  Aban kept quiet.

  "Someday, I will explain everything."The father disconnected the line.

  He turned his car towards Landa Bazar. After crossing two blocks, Imran Shah Malik steered his car to a backstreet and swiftly killed the engine. He walked leisurely on to an adjacent alley, crossed a Hindu Temple and vanished into the darkness.

  Aban tried to log onto his father's Mac Pro, but it was well protected by a 256-bit random cipher text password, cleverly hidden in the shadow hash function generator. He immediately understood that it was a kind of one-time pad cryptograph. So, even if he succeeded in deciphering it, the merciless machine would present millions of possible password permutations. He knew that if he keyed in even one wrong password out of the million possibilities, the key generator would deliver another million combinations.

  As if mocking at a helpless man, the emotionless machine seemingly waited for an input.

  Aban just sat there, staring at it. He remembered what his father had warned him about when he was to leave for the US for the first time. "Life is not a gamble. So, never opt for a shortcut to make decisions. Gambling machines churn out all possible combinations, except the jackpot integer. Casinos around the world have perfected a fail-proof-system, ensuring that only the house wins."