THE BUTCHER OF BENARES Read online

  Hawa Singh cleared his throat and spoke in his heavy baritone.‘This is Brian Johnson, who was killed inside the Kashi Vishwanath temple.’

  ‘Brian...’ Abhay tried to recall. ‘I did hear about the second murder but never knew who he was.’

  ‘We have found two of those killed were connected to the Vatican. We are still working on that,’ said Ruby.

  ‘Vatican, yes, now I remember. He did come to meet me.’

  Ruby was all ears, her eyes wide at this discovery. ‘He told me that he was some kind of archaeologist and wanted me to grant his firm a contract to excavate around the Fort area.’

  ‘Why?’ asked Hawa Singh.

  ‘He said that they had studied some satellite pictures and done some research which revealed that there could be something major hidden under the Fort.’

  ‘Like what?’ Ruby asked.

  ‘He seemed to be more interested in old manuscripts that would give an idea about the earlier inhabitants,’ said Abhay Narayan Singh.

  ‘Did he ever mention the Bhrigu-Samhita?’ asked Hawa Singh.

  The very mention of the word froze them all. Only the ticking broke the silence for a while.

  ‘I see what you mean,’ Abhay finally said slowly and thoughtfully. ‘We did speak about archaeology, astronomy and astrology. He looked very interested in the ancient Vedic science of astrology but he never mentioned the name, “Bhrigu-Samhita”.’

  ‘We have to explore this connection with the Vatican,’ said Hawa Singh. ‘These people seem to have unearthed some secret that the Vatican didn’t want to come to light. It’s the Vatican that had them killed in Benares.’ He looked at the gigantic clock behind Ruby. It showed 12 am. Midnight.

  It took a second to change it. 29 January was upon them.

  CHAPTER 21

  7 am. 29 January

  The fog now looked like a cement wall around the SSP’s office. The policemen standing on guard outside shivered, despite their winter uniforms and the heavy woollen mufflers around their heads and ears. Their teeth chattered and it was hard to breathe. They had to fight to keep their eyes open. It had been more than thirty-six hours since any of them had last slept. All leave had been cancelled. All hands had to be on deck.

  Their fingers were numb. It was unlikely they would find purchase on the triggers of the rifles were danger to suddenly appear. It was the perfect time for dark souls to emerge and lay siege.

  Inside the SSP’s office, fingers curled around mugs of hot tea. Only a few of the officers had had their quota of full eight hours’ sleep. They were not used to working for such long hours. None of them seemed to have any pointers to the killer—apart from reciting a litany of his crimes.

  Earlier, Hawa Singh had hardly closed his eyes for two hours. He had stretched out on the bed in Ruby’s room, while she cleaned his wounds and put white medical tape in the form of crosses over the cuts on his chest and on his arm. Later, the faint tap-tapping of the keys on her laptop lulled him to sleep. He was dimly conscious of having held her hand as he lay exhausted, she beside him. Just doing that had eased his pain, within and without. These simple gestures of love and caring were somehow lost in the world outside their little room, with its demands of cold connectivity, craving and frustrated longing. Ruby brought him back in touch with his own humanity.

  Then, as always, he woke up in the pre-drawn and accompanied Ruby back to their headquarters.

  Now, he stood in the SSP’s office, facing a giant map of Benares. The SSP, Ruby and some other senior officers watched as he pinned on it small triangular flags representing each ghat in the city, and saffron flags for all important temples. There were some hundred ghats in Benares and Ruby prepared a list of them alphabetically. Her meticulous work included the name of every ghat: from ‘A’ for Mata Anandamai, right down to ‘V’ for Vijayanagaram.

  Two armed policemen were assigned to patrol each ghat. Their names had been written alongside. They were given strict orders to keep out all beggars, urchins, sadhus, pandits, vendors, boatmen, flower-sellers from the ghats, from night to the next morning. There was another instruction, ‘No one will speak to the media.’

  There were more than 23,000 temples in Benares. Given the paucity of personnel, Hawa Singh had chosen the ones that attracted the highest number of worshippers.

  The one that grabbed his attention the most was the Sankat Mochan Hanuman, one of the most revered temples of the god, situated by the Assi river. It is believed that this site was where the medieval saint Tulsidas had a vision of Hanuman. Thousands flock to the temple on Tuesdays and Saturdays, the days associated with Hanuman.

  This was the same temple that had suffered the brunt of a terrorist attack on 7 March 2006. In the attack, one of the three explosions had hit the temple while the evening aarti ceremony was in progress, and many devotees were injured.

  Two other temples were also earmarked by Hawa Singh—Durga Mandir, built about 500 years ago, and Durga Kund, built in the eighteenth century. The latter was built in the Nagara architectural style, characterized by its colour—the ochre-red sacred to the goddess—and its multi-tiered spires. There is a rectangular pond there, where, on the annual celebrations of Naag Panchami, the god Vishnu is depicted reclining on his serpent Shesha Naag. It was the presence of the pond that alerted Hawa Singh. The last victim had been found inside a temple where a well permitted the killer to escape right across the Ganges via a tunnel below. Couldn’t the pond be hiding similar underground secrets that would provide a waterway route to the expected assassin?

  And then there were the temples dedicated to Annapurna, the goddess of food, located close to the Kashi Vishwanath, and the Sankatha, close to Sindhia Ghat, dedicated to the goddess of remedy. The last had a large sculpture of a lion, and a cluster of nine smaller structures, shrines of the nine planets.

  The last two to catch Hawa Singh’s eye was the ancient Kalabhairav, near the Head Post Office at Visheshar Ganj, dedicated to the kotwal, or guardian, of Benares, and the Shiva temple, Mrithyunjay Mahadev, which also had a well believed to be fed by several underground streams, and having curative powers.

  ‘We have to concentrate on all these sites and round up all the suspects,’ Hawa Singh told his men. ‘The fog could be the killer’s biggest ally, but we have to beat it, to beat him.’

  ‘I can’t let this go wrong. The image of the entire police force is at stake.’ The SSP felt it was his turn to address the assembled policemen.

  Hawa Singh responded dryly, ‘I don’t work to protect the image of the police. I work to prevent crime and apprehend those who commit it.’ The SSP opened his mouth to say something, but then closed it with some effort and turned away.

  ‘What did you find out about the second victim?’ asked Neeraj Thakur.

  Ruby looked questioningly at Hawa Singh, and he nodded his permission. She was free to share the details. ‘We know his name—Brian Johnson, a British citizen,’ she began. ‘He was an archaeologist with a London firm. His last assignment, before he came to India, was at the Vatican.’

  ‘Sir, this Vatican is up to something. Both victims had a connection to it,’ ACP Shishir Jha put in.

  ‘I have checked with the Vatican but they don’t seem to be responding,’ Ruby went further. In the case of Brian, I have found that he was sent by his firm, Allen Archaeology, to work on a secret excavation inside the Vatican City. Brian was working along with Israeli archaeologists in a mission to prove the authenticity of biblical place names. The Israeli archaeologists have recovered a seal containing the oldest mention of Bethlehem ever found. It dates back 2,700 years. The Bible mentions Bethlehem, and so this finding is proof that the city did indeed exist at the time. The seal, 1.5 cm long, was found in the City of David, a huge archaeological site just outside the walls of Jerusalem, where it is believed King David built his palace. The Vatican subsequently invited the archaeologists to conduct secret excavations in the Vatican City too. It is not known exactly where they were working in the Vatican
, as that had been kept secret. However, Brian, who was researching with the team, seemed to have developed a deep interest in Vedic astrology as well. He came to Benares and met with Abhay Narayan Singh.’

  Silence fell like a curtain in the SSP’s office—they could hardly hear one another breathe. Hawa Singh was the first to break it. ‘There is something about the Kashi Naresh that connects him to the killer. Both the victims had met him. He has a vast storehouse of antiques and ancient manuscripts that the victims were probably interested in delving into,’ he said.

  ‘Are you suspecting him to be the killer?’ the SSP asked Hawa Singh.

  ‘Yes, I am. He is on top of my list,’ said Hawa Singh.

  Sub-inspector Gaya Prasad Sharma, who had hitherto hardly spoken a word, spoke up. ‘Sir,’ he interposed, ‘I have checked the prints found on the knife. They are not in any records. I even sent them to the National Crime Records Bureau but there, too, they couldn’t find a match.’

  Hawa Singh nodded thoughtfully and said, ‘What about the thumbprint that was found on the axe that killed Tailanga Swami?’

  ‘We managed to get the prints of Baba Ramtirath, the Naga leader, and Neelambar Nath, the new Aghori Swami, but none of them match to the print found on the axe.’

  Hawa Singh scratched at his heavy stubble. ‘Do one more thing,’ he said. ‘Match the print on the axe and the one on the knife.’ When he caught the look of shock on Ruby’s face, he went on to explain, in his usual terse way, ‘The probabilities are infinite. I’m just trying to narrow them down,’ said Hawa Singh.

  CHAPTER 22

  The qualities essential to a policeman are a systematic mind, logical thought process, and a good memory for details. But above all, he has to be a dogged individual, never one to give up.

  Hawa Singh had not become a policeman to catch young lovers romancing in parks, to guard corrupt politicians or to rain blows on protesting innocent masses. He didn’t carry the bullet in his head for nothing. He was there to get the true criminals, the ones who committed violent crimes and threatened the very fabric of society.

  The Butcher of Benares had to be stopped in his tracks.

  He walked into Mukti Bhawan and saw his father, Fauja Singh, sitting unclothed in his room, smeared with ashes. He was staring at the wall and chanting ‘Om Namo Narayana’.

  Hawa Singh rushed to him. ‘Do you want to die naked?’ he shouted into his father’s ear.

  Fauja Singh turned to look at him with a smile. ‘It’s not my time yet.’ He resumed staring at the wall and continued with the chanting.

  Hawa Singh had heard that Benares does lots of crazy things to people. Many foreigners had given up their bright careers to settle down on the banks of the Ganges as sadhus, some of them with the Naga sadhus and the Aghoris. There were those who had given away their vast fortunes in charity in search of God.

  In their search for moksha, they had lost their Ferraris, their big homes and their yachts. They’d left behind loving families and lovers. They’d discarded expensive clothes to become naked fakirs.

  Hawa Singh knew Benares exercised a similar pull on his father. Fauja Singh had tried all the various alternative medicines available in the temple city, stopped to consult wayside astrologers on his future, even had predictions picked out by parrots, sacred bulls, tarot-card readers and the pandits on the banks of the river. He loved to be in the company of mystics. No doubt some charlatan had now advised him to strip himself of clothes, and turn to chanting.

  Hawa Singh picked up the tattered blanket and put it around Fauja Singh. The man continued to chant and stare. Hawa Singh looked in the direction that his father was staring, and suddenly, the wall seemed to rush at him. He felt the bullet pricking at his brain. He saw a shape that he had seen earlier—a rectangle with its diagonals intersecting each other and the mid-points of each line connecting with the other. It was the shape of a horoscope.

  It was drawn on the wall with charcoal, its thick black lines standing out. He peered at it more closely, and saw letters and numbers written inside it. He saw the number ‘3’. The bottom loop curved up and then came down to cross the arc. He had seen the same loop in another horoscope drawn on the body of Brian Johnson.

  Fauja Singh looked up from his staring. ‘A Naga sadhu came to me and drew that chart,’ he said slowly. ‘He told me that I still have many more years to live.’

  Hawa Singh was increasingly certain the chart was drawn by the same hand that drew the chart on Brian’s body. The Butcher. The killer had actually come right up to his father and left his stamp on the wall.

  One thing was clear: the killer was watching his every move. He was there somewhere, close by. Someone who would trail him, attack him in the fog and look for the right moment to kill him.

  He’d been racking his brains to ascertain who could be the next victim. Now, he felt he was that person. The killer seemed to be a step ahead of him all the time. Who was this killer and what did he want?

  Fauja Singh was looking at him, bemused. ‘Those doctors had told me that my heart would soon stop working. I came to Benares to get moksha—but what if I actually don’t die?’ he asked.

  ‘Who was this man that came in and drew this chart?’ asked Hawa Singh in turn.

  ‘I have already told you he was a Naga sadhu. He was totally naked and smeared with ashes. He carried a long trishul. His hair was long and knotted.’

  ‘Are you sure that he was a Naga? Aghoris have a similar appearance.’

  ‘He looked like a Naga to me. The Aghoris only know tantra-mantra. It’s the Nagas who understand the finer aspects of the Vedas and Vedic astrology. He gave me these ashes and told me to chant prayers.’

  ‘You must have noticed something peculiar about him. His eyes, height, weight, any mark on body?’ asked Hawa Singh.

  Fauja Singh shook his head and wrapped the blanket tightly around him. Then, he said with a sigh, ‘Well, he looked lean, of medium height, he spoke softly and there was something about his eyes.’

  ‘Eyes, what do you mean?’

  ‘The colour was different.’

  ‘What colour?’

  ‘I don’t remember.’

  ‘If you saw him again, would you recognize him?’ asked Hawa Singh.

  ‘Yes, I would.’

  ‘Try and focus. Were his eyes blue?’

  Fauja thought hard. ‘Yes,’ he said finally, ‘they were blue’.

  CHAPTER 23

  The cold smile on his face was reflected in the coldness of his deep blue eyes. Baba Ramtirath, the leader of the Naga sadhus, and Shri Mahant of the World Council for Nagas, sat in front of Hawa Singh with the calmness of a psychopath. If looks could tell, he was the picture of a coldblooded killer.

  With years of living with the Naga sadhus, he was fluent in Hindi and Sanskrit, and one of the greatest exponents in Benares of Vedic literature and astrology. He was associated with black magic and was believed to possess the power to kill anyone in any part of the world by sorcery alone.

  There was a close-knit coterie of naked trishul-wielding giants who protected him and would kill for him. His body language was relaxed, despite the repeated threats the Aghoris had made to throw him and his people out of Benares.

  Hawa Singh had come to him with his father, Ruby, Sub-Inspector Gaya Prasad and some armed personnel in tow. One doesn’t take chances with Naga sadhus. You never knew when the naked sadhus of the Himalayas would rise up in anger. And they were always armed.

  ‘Look at this man carefully,’ Hawa Singh told his father. ‘Was he the same person who came in and drew the chart on your wall?’

  Baba Ramtirath sat there with a smile. Ruby felt nervous in the crowd of naked armed men. She couldn’t distinguish one from the other—their faces and bodies were unrecognizable behind the ashes. She looked at Gaya Prasad and he nodded at her in assurance that all was under control.

  Fauja Singh said apologetically, ‘This one has a beard. The sadhu who came to Mukti Bhawan was clean-shaven. Nor
did he wear glasses, like this one here.’

  ‘You never told me that he was clean-shaven!’ Hawa Singh protested.

  ‘You never asked,’ said his father, closing his eyes in concentration.

  ‘It happens,’ intervened Baba Ramtirath. ‘When you look too hard, you don’t see it. You have to loosen up and let the force guide you.’

  Hawa Singh opened his eyes and looked at him.

  ‘At times it is as simple as that—and as complicated,’ continued Baba Ramtirath. ‘You are now just like us, a sadhu, and a naked fakir, who has given up everything and dedicated his entire life for a purpose, for something. You are as transparent as our naked bodies, as truthful as the truth of Shiva.’

  ‘And I’m just a bull-headed policeman, who believes in the best outcome,’ retorted Hawa Singh.

  ‘Har Har Mahadev,’ smiled Baba Ramtirath.

  Ruby glanced at the giants standing in a circle around their leader. She had a feeling that the men believed in, and would die for their leader. They were fearless warriors and yet the most peaceful sadhus. This was one more paradox to add to the many about Benares.

  ‘Har Har Mahadev is not a war-cry,’ Baba Ramtirath told those assembled around him. ‘It’s the essence of all Vedas and of Hinduism itself. It simply means that God, or Mahadev, lives in each one of us. We are a part of Him. We have come from Him and life is a journey back to Him.’

  ‘Then why am I not getting moksha? Why is death not coming to me?’ pleaded Fauja Singh.

  Baba Ramtirath smiled his response. ‘Nothing happens without God’s will. You’ll have to surrender to His will, and His will will be yours.’

  Hawa Singh wondered, not for the first time, whether the man before him was a genuine sadhu or just another trickster. ‘We need to take a look at all the Naga sadhus in turn,’ he said aloud. ‘I suspect that one of them could be the killer.’

  ‘You are free to do as you please. Now that I have realized your father is just one of us.’