The doors open without warning on “1.” To reveal not a battery of leering trigger-happy Khakis, but a waiter manning the entrance to a banquet hall. The strums of a sitar invite me out, lulling away any notions of danger lurking around. After the concrete and bare earth in the basement, I’m surprised by the feel of carpet under my feet, the sight of green and gold birds (peacocks, I think) taking flight on tapestries. The lushly planted garden visible through the large picture window seems particularly incongruous, given the building’s fortress-like exterior. It takes me a moment to realize I’m gazing at a blown-up photograph.
“You’re just in time, sahib,” the waiter says with a bow. His turban tilts towards me, as flamboyantly plumed as a cockatoo’s comb. “We were wondering if anyone else would make it for lunch.” He unhooks a metal-detecting wand from the wall. “I hope you don’t mind, but we have to check anyone new.” He scans my body—I guess I wouldn’t have gotten away with the gun after all.
Inside, more peacocks adorn the walls. I half expect a posse of Khakis to leap out from behind them and surround me with weapons drawn. Instead, I notice some of the diners are women—even a few children run around. However, I can’t spot Karun—at least not in my quick visual sweep of the room. “This way, sir,” the waiter says, and ushers me to an empty place at a round table. “They’ve already cleared the buffet, but I can bring your food here if you tell me what you’d prefer.”
“Dosas,” the man seated next to me recommends, pointing at the remnants on his plate. “The chutney’s fresh and spicy today—Devi ma must have decided to donate some of the coconuts she gets.” I nod to the waiter, who closes his eyes to convey the astuteness of my choice, then gracefully withdraws.
“You’re new here,” my neighbor remarks. “I didn’t realize the van was still bringing people in.” He introduces himself as Professor Das, from the microbiology department at Kalina. “I’ve been here almost since the beginning, so I can answer any questions you might have. For instance, in case you’re wondering, the food here is great, as you’ll discover in a minute.”
The dosa is very good, the potatoes redolent with tamarind and curry leaf, the wrapping crisp enough to shatter into pieces as I dig in. So good, in fact, that I wonder if this could all be a meticulously arranged setup—the Khakis masquerading as diners, the potatoes drugged to knock me out. Will I wake up in Bhim’s lair, my body stretched on a rack, my digits clamped in thumbscrews? There’s little recourse if that’s to be my fate, except to eat up.
Professor Das introduces the others. “That’s Dr. Jayant from Lohan Chemicals beside you, and next to him, Dr. Sethi, one of Mumbai University’s premier mathematicians.” I realize, as he goes around the table, that I’ve hit the Noah’s Ark of techies—surely this has to be where Karun is housed. Behind Dr. Deepender, the mechanical engineer from IIT whose hand I reach out to shake, are the rows of banquet tables. Is Karun at one of them, his back towards me, his face obscured?
The thought fills me with an urgency to scan the room more thoroughly for him. I interrupt Das mid-sentence, saying I need to make a quick trip to the bathroom. Even though he clearly points it out, I wind through all the tables on the way there, as if confused about the location. But my search disappoints—I don’t find Karun.
“You must try this lassi, Dr. Pradhan,” Das says upon my return, and pours me a glass from a jug. More drugs? I wonder, but it’s so refreshingly cold that I take several gulps. “So tell me, did they pick you up, or did you heed the call?” I’m not sure what I should answer, so I reply I was picked up. Das nods understandingly. “Just like most of us. Some complain about it, but I tell them to see it as an honor, that we’ve been chosen as the cream of the crop.” He looks pointedly around as he says this, as if aiming his words at the table at large. “Safe and well-fed in the middle of a war—what more could one want?” As if on cue, the waiter delicately lays another dosa in front of me with a pair of tongs.
So far, the other diners have stared down impassively at their plates, but now Dr. Sethi breaks their silence by asking what I do. Obviously, I must be a scientist if picked up by the van, but with so many fields represented at the table, I have to answer carefully, to avoid being exposed. I finally settle on geologist, giving my institution as the University of Lucknow, which I hope will be obscure enough. “I didn’t think they even had a geology department,” Sethi says, frowning at me. Das quickly interjects to say he’s heard they just started one. I nod in vigorous agreement—who knew?
The large monitor suspended above the buffet table blinks on before Sethi can pepper me with more questions. “It’s Bhim,” Das whispers. “He likes to address us whenever he comes to the hotel.” The face that fills the screen looks nothing like the blood-spattered visage I remember from the grainy video of the Haji Ali massacre, or the one spouting rabid exhortations to violence on the nationwide rath yatra. Rather, it is calm and clean-cut, the eyebrows neatly trimmed, the hair carefully coiffed. Could he be tripping on his Emperor Ashoka persona again?
“My friends, I hope you’re having a nice afternoon.” His manner is congenial, his voice so soothing, it’s almost mellifluous. He announces that the refurbished gym has opened on the second floor, that more laptops will arrive shortly, though the internet remains down. “Don’t forget the roof garden—there’s no better way to start your morning than a walk there. And afterwards, you can come have a dosa—we’ll start serving them for breakfast as well since you like them so much.”
He continues in this hotel-manager vein for a while, as if explaining the guest facilities at a resort. Just when I’m expecting him to announce the Jacuzzi and shuffleboard hours, he starts describing the finishing touches being put on the “paradise” at the subterranean level. “Your own television, your own private bedroom, not to mention pantries bursting with delicious food and drink. We’ll finally open it up tomorrow, so you’ll be able to see for yourself.”
Surely he couldn’t be referring to the crumbling bunkers I stumbled upon in the basement? Apparently so, because he quickly mentions a “trial run” on the nineteenth, “just in case there’s any problem.” “It’s more for your own peace of mind—all these empty threats and rumors floating around. You’re the most brilliant intellects in all of Mumbai—my responsibility is to keep you happy and sound.”
He pledges to reunite the assembled diners with their loved ones. “Some we’ve already brought together, others will have to wait a bit. We’ve found many of your spouses, your children—gathered them up in special units. Be assured they’re getting five-star treatment—I promise we’ll keep them safe.”
Bhim concludes with a burst of declarations, claiming that he only believes in freedom, that he only asks for a commitment to the country, that despite what people may have heard, he doesn’t insist on any particular religion or philosophy. “One day this war will end, my friends, and we will begin to rebuild. Let’s all look together towards that day and in a united voice shout Jai Hind.”
“Jai Hind,” the crowd replies, and I can’t help sensing something forced in the response, even though it is accompanied by a ripple of applause.
Bhim’s soft-spoken manner leaves me a tad disoriented. Would it have been too much to expect at least a little fanaticism, a bit of anti-Muslim rhetoric? Perhaps my image of a betel-chewing heavy was over-the-top, but surely Bhim’s résumé of exploits warrants someone more flamboyantly unhinged?
“A true visionary,” Das declares. People nod in agreement around the table, and again, I get that Stepford Wife impression—perhaps they do drug the dosas after all. “Tell me, are you married, Dr. Pradhan? Do you have a family? If so, you can rest assured Bhim will do his best to arrange a reunification.”