In the dead of the night, while the whole world slept, Ajmal Kasab could not get sleep. It was not a sense of remorse for the killing of innocent people or the fear of the gallows which kept him awake, but the mutton biryani and sheek kababs he had for dinner- these Mumbai people were certainly the worst mughalai cooks, he mused as he helped himself to yet another generous dose of Diegene. He was not the only one awake that night. A crack team of Pakistani commandos were on their way to Mumbai in helicopters gifted by the Americans for anti-terrorist operations. Swooping down on the Arthur road jail compound, the Pakistani commandos whisked away their quarry before any could even say, “a la Laden”! For those who had earlier dismissed ISI chief General Pasha’s warning that Pakistan had identified targets in India for an Abottabad type action, the raid on the Arthur road jail must have come as a rude shock. But our Home Minister later claimed that our intelligence agencies had prior information as they had painstakingly ‘broken’ a complex Pakistani code which contained a brilliantly concealed reference to the target- ‘A’ for Abottabad, and ‘A’ for Arthur road (Pakistan’s ingenuity is phenomenal, but still no match for our sleuths, after all)! On being asked why did they not warn the police of this, the Home Minister replied that it was just another ‘inadvertent human error’ so there was really no need to apologize.
Nevertheless, the Home Minister immediately called for an emergency meeting which had the intelligence chiefs, the heads of the army, navy, air force, para military forces, members of the most important national policy making bodies such as the CWG, BCCI and IPL as well as some highly responsible people. The meeting commenced within ten minutes of it being called for – this was not due to the rapid emergency response system put into place after 26/11, but because a meeting was already in progress to evaluate an appropriate response to the response of Pakistan to our response after the American response in Abottabad which gave us the courage to seek response from Pakistan to respond by handing over India’s most wanted. So, since the agenda for this meeting was “response,” all the ‘responsible’ people were also present- Kalmadi, Raja, Kanimozhi, Balwa ect. The meeting however ended without any decisions being taken as Sonia and Rahul were pre-occupied with a problem which was far more serious- Mayawati!
In Islamabad, a visibly proud General Kiyani met the media. He told the media persons that Abottabad was a thing of the past and Arthur road jail was the ‘in’ thing. When asked if the reported absence of the jail staff in the Arthur road compound had contributed to the spectacular success of this operation in which not even a single shot was fired, the General rubbished this suggestion. He said that the success achieved was due to the high level of expertise of his commandos and that history bore testimony to his assertion- didn’t his old commando friend Musharraf too capture the President’s chair without a single shot being fired? Meanwhile in India, TV channels got hold of a copy of a Top Secret memo which confirmed that the Arthur road jail staff was indeed absent during the raid. They were busy attending a lecture on how to ensure ‘fool-proof’ security of the jail till the contractor who had won the bid for installing the state-of-art security system (but had subsequently been booked for a scam) got bail and resumed his contractual obligations.
The Pakistan Interior Minister too called for a press conference and confirmed that the ISI had ‘got back’ a prisoner back from India’s Arthur road jail compound. A reporter asked whether Pakistan was worried of the international condemnation this brazen act to secure the release of Ajmal Kasab would invite, the Interior Minister shocked everyone present by disclosing that it was not Kasab whom they had got back but someone else - it was a person on India’s ‘most wanted’ list given to Pakistan. He said that since India could not find this fugitive, Pakistan as a good neighbor had decided to help. When asked if such actions which undermine the sovereignty of India could derail the dialogue process between the two countries, the Interior Minister gave a reply that will probably go down in the annals of history as the most inspiring statement on combating the menace of terrorism ever made-Pakistan stands firm on its ‘commitment’ on the war against terror and in future too will not hesitate in helping India by hunting down India’s ‘most wanted’ who are on Indian soil!
