ANTI-SOCIAL NETWORK (7 page)

Virkar smiled back, but noticed that her expression had again turned inscrutable. He was still trying to figure it out when she reached for his face and planted a soft kiss on his lips. While he was still recovering, she reached behind her head and slipped out her hairpin, letting her long tresses do the talking. Her eyes had held his, and suddenly Virkar read everything that was written in them.

They had made love. Scorching, wanton, rough love. Their lovemaking session did not seem to stop as they had melted into each other again and again. Somewhere around midnight, they had fallen back on the bed, exhausted, and drifted off into the peaceful sleep that comes to lovers who have satisfied each other fully.

Now, pulled out of his sleep by the phone call, Virkar was torn between his duty and his desire. As he put his clothes back on, the object of his desire propped herself up on her elbows. In a throaty voice slurry with sleep, she said, ‘You don’t have to go. Stay.’

Virkar struggled with himself, but finally let the call of duty guide his actions. ‘I have to go,’ he said firmly as he continued to dress. ‘There’s been another murder.’

T
his time the body was missing its eyes. The sightless holes that existed in the place of human eyeballs created a sense of horror in everyone who had looked at the girl’s sliced remains so far. Virkar felt a sense of irritation welling up inside him; he realized that his theory about Sagarika going crazy and killing Kshitij and Rajesh because they were blackmailing her had been shot to pieces. He wondered who this victim was and why she had been attacked by Sagarika. Virkar knelt in front of the bloodied body and examined the single wound on the girl’s chest. He couldn’t help but marvel at the expertise with which the knife had been jabbed between the ribs. ‘Sagarika is getting better and better at this,’ Virkar thought out loud.

He was about to fire a question at the sub-inspector from the local police station when Naina interrupted him. ‘She’s trying to say something with these missing body parts.’

Virkar frowned at her. Just as he was getting ready to leave her apartment, Naina had insisted on accompanying him. Virkar had explained to her that it was against regulations but Naina had reasoned that she could offer up an insight to the case as she knew the killer. Virkar, to his consternation, couldn’t find an argument to counter her logic and had relented, but not before giving her a strict warning not to say anything in front of the other policemen at the crime scene. But she clearly did not think much of his instructions as she now continued, ‘The cutting of the penis perhaps signifies sexual misdemeanour; the cutting of the tongue could mean something that was said or not said; and the missing eyes could indicate that there was something that this girl had seen or perhaps not seen.’

Virkar and the sub-inspector stared at Naina, letting her idea wrap itself around their brains. Finally, they broke their gaze from her and looked at each other, not knowing how to take the next step. After a few minutes, Virkar opted for the easiest way out. ‘What is her name?’ he asked the sub-inspector.

Relieved at being asked something that he had an answer to, the policeman pulled out an ID card from a girl’s wallet and read: ‘Nayantara Joshi. Aged twenty. Resident of Mandaar Society, Lalbaug, Dadar. Student of Kanti College, Prabhadevi.’ Virkar raised his hand, signalling the sub-inspector to stop. It wasn’t making any sense to him—how was a girl from a middle-class family in Lalbaug connected to Sagarika?

The sub-inspector tucked away his diary, ready to leave, but Virkar stopped him in his tracks. ‘I would like to see all the CCTV footage from the mall.’ The sub-inspector sighed and led Virkar and Naina through the corridors of the silent mall to the security room. There, on a bank of monitors, a security attendant played back the footage of the girl wearing a baseball cap and dark glasses going into the changing room of the MoJo Wear store and coming out a few minutes after Nayantara was seen entering the adjoining stall. As Virkar and Naina watched the monitor, Virkar suddenly noticed a thoughtful look on Naina’s face. ‘Is there something you see?’ he asked hopefully.

Naina stared at the screen as she said, ‘It is Sagarika, I think, but a different version of her.’

‘Yes…the schizophrenic, psychotic version,’ the sub-inspector who had been listening in on their conversation quipped.

Virkar shot an irritated look towards him. ‘Have you made sure that all the staff and mall employees have been interrogated?’

‘Saheb, the murder was reported only in the evening. By then, the shift had changed and most of the employees had left for the day.’

‘And why has it taken you until this morning to inform me? And what was the mall security doing? Couldn’t they have held them back?’ Virkar’s voice was biting.

The sub-inspector remained stoic. ‘Saheb, this is a big mall. We cannot stop its functioning and shut it down. And we were waiting for instructions from the senior inspector of our police station who is out of town right now. We could only get in touch with him this morning and which is when he told us to call the Crime Branch.’

Virkar’s voice was raised now. ‘Then how the hell do you expect to catch this serial killer who is obviously smarter than you, me and everybody in this room?’

‘Saheb, we have called all the employees; they will be reporting to us in the next few hours.’

‘I want a full report by tomorrow afternoon.’ Virkar turned on his heels and walked out.

Once outside, he saw that Naina had followed him without a word and together they walked out of the mall. Just before they reached the spot where he had parked his bike, they spent an awkward moment staring at each other until Virkar finally said, ‘I have to change and shower and head to my office.’

Naina nodded. ‘Yes, don’t worry about me. I’ll catch a taxi.’ Virkar didn’t say anything as she hailed a cab. She sat inside and threw him a last glance that Virkar managed to return with a small, tight smile. He started his Bullet and rode off in the direction of Bhoiwada, his mind jumping between his personal and professional life, with each thought contradicting the other as they tumbled together in his brain. Suddenly, his phone began to vibrate. Half expecting it to be Naina, Virkar stopped the Bullet on the side of the road and fished it out of his pocket. Glancing at the dial, he was disappointed to see an unknown number. He picked up the call nevertheless and listened as the voice on the other line said, ‘Inspector Virkar, I am Inspector Kamble from the Jagtap Circle lock-up. Usman Teacher wants to meet you. He says he has some information on your current case.’

‘A
nti-Social Network, that’s what they call themselves,’ said Usman Teacher through teeth gritted in pain. Two days of the ‘third degree’ treatment at the Jagtap Circle lock-up had him keeled over in pain. His bluff-and-bluster attitude was gone, replaced by naked fear. The man had too many secrets that could hurt too many people in power. He knew that he had perhaps just a few days left before someone decided to shut him up forever. The end would perhaps come as a random custodial death or perhaps as an encounter at a court hearing. Usman had realized that his only way out was if he traded some information with his captors. The situation was too dire to use the normal ‘sweetening agent’—hard cash. So he decided on the only other thing that he could use as leverage—information.

Hence, as soon as Virkar arrived at the lock-up, Usman wasted no time. He had offered what he called ‘crucial information’ that would help Virkar make a breakthrough in his serial-murder case. Although Usman Teacher had a strong khabri network, Virkar doubted he could have anything worthwhile connected to this extremely odd case, but he decided to wait and hear what Usman wanted in exchange. Usman told Virkar that he feared for his life and wanted to get out of Mumbai, and so he wanted his case to be handed over to the CBI in Delhi. Virkar, of course, knew that he didn’t have the authority to pull off any such thing, but he hemmed and hawed, promising nothing and yet conveying to Usman that whatever action he took on his behalf would depend entirely on how good the information was. After almost an hour of back-and-forth, Usman Teacher finally realized that Virkar would not budge from his position. The pain of the third degree was draining his energy and he had very little time left to maintain his coherence. He decided to take a leap of faith based on what he knew of Virkar’s reputation.

‘Anti-Social Network,’ repeated Virkar. ‘Is this some kind of a joke?’

‘Not if I tell you what these kids are capable of,’ said Usman Teacher as he pushed himself back into a comfortable position, for the first time feeling like he had the upper hand. He felt the familiar tingling of nervousness buzzing in his ears as he began to part with precious nuggets of information. In the past, the nuggets had bought him a good life. He hoped that this particular one could save what was left of it.

‘Six months ago, a group of computer-savvy college students connected together through the Internet. They came together to program…uh…something called…computer malware that is undetectable by the anti-virus software sold in the market. This malware is disguised as links to video or music, which young people normally download. Inside this malware were remote-access tools. Through these tools, this “Anti-Social Network” group hacked other people’s computers.’

Virkar interrupted him mid-speech. ‘How is Sagarika associated with these people?’

Usman Teacher allowed himself to cough and spit out the phlegm that he had been suppressing for some time now. Virkar couldn’t help but notice the flecks of blood in the coughed-out spit.

‘I thought you were an experienced man, Inspector Virkar. You are reacting like an impatient new recruit,’ he remarked. ‘These youngsters came up with an excellent idea. They created a computer programme that could hack into the e-mail accounts or social network profiles of a person, and pretend to be them’. Usman Teacher paused, enjoying the tension of the moment. ‘They would then request sexually explicit photos or videos from their victim’s respective boyfriend or girlfriend, as a mark of loyalty, love, lust etcetera. In many cases, they were successful in obtaining such photos. Once they had a photo or video in their possession, a member of the Anti-Social Network would then contact the boy or the girl in the photo or video to demand money from them by threatening to distribute the photos to family and friends if the police were contacted.’

Virkar let Usman Teacher’s words sink in. He had just remembered the sex video on Rajesh Chawre’s iPod. His pulse quickened. What he had just heard was plausible, but he still needed to check a couple of things. ‘And how is this related to my case?’ he asked, trying not to let his excitement show.

‘That’s your job to figure out, Inspector. I can only tell you that both your victims, Rajesh Chawre and Kshitij Bhatia, were members of this group.’

Virkar took a deep breath. Knowing that Usman Teacher would not have got the news of Nayantara Joshi’s murder yet, Virkar asked, ‘Are there any more members that you know of?’

Usman Teacher nodded. ‘A couple of girls and another couple of guys, I think. But I don’t have their details.’

Virkar’s face did not give anything away. ‘Is that all you have?’ he asked.

‘
Is that all?
’ Usman Teacher exclaimed incredulously. ‘I’ve just given you key information on the murder spree you are investigating!’

‘Calm down,’ Virkar said as he raised his hand. He then realized that he hadn’t asked Usman Teacher the most important question of all. ‘How the hell do you know all this?’

Usman Teacher smiled a toothy smile through his pain. ‘A khabri is always looking for information. Information is power. Information is money. Information is my life.’

Virkar now sounded annoyed. ‘Yes, yes, I know all that bakwas, but tell me exactly how you know.’

Usman Teacher smiled despite Virkar’s display of irritation. ‘One of my khabris is a waiter at an Udipi restaurant who also works part-time at a cyber café. He overheard a guy and a girl from this group talking about their plan. No one ever thinks that a waiter at an Udipi restaurant could be educated or know anything about computers, but they forget that this is Mumbai,’ he laughed.

Virkar’s palms were sweating. Everything that Usman Teacher had said could either be true or could have been cooked up by his wily brain. He needed to check things out for himself. ‘Where is this waiter? And where is this Udipi restaurant?’

‘The waiter has gone to his gaon, where he shall remain until I call him back.’ Usman Teacher’s eyeslids narrowed.

‘Where is his village? Tell me; I’ll go and talk to him personally. I promise that no harm will come to him,’ said Virkar, in all earnestness.

‘
Bas kya
, Inspector,
apun ko chutiya samjela hai kya
? You get me the transfer orders to CBI custody first, and only then will I give you the waiter’s address.’ Virkar could see the beady shine in Usman’s eyes through the thin slits of his eyelids.

It was the classic quid pro quo situation. Virkar knew there was a ring of truth in Usman Teacher’s story, but also knew that it was not very much to go by. He needed to think things over carefully before he took the next step. ‘Give me twenty-four hours,’ he said as he turned on his heels and began to walk out of the cell.

Usman Teacher then started to lose the composure that he had maintained till now. ‘Inspector, no more than twenty-four hours.’ Virkar turned his head and nodded. ‘One last thing,’ said Usman Teacher in a pleading voice, ‘please, can you place one of your trusted men outside my cell? Until you get back.’ Virkar gave him a long look; the snake-like suspicion was gone and fear was back in Usman Teacher’s eyes.

‘I’ll see what I can do,’ said Virkar curtly, as he left the cell.

I
t was a moonlit night, just the kind Virkar loved whenever he was out on the Koli Queen. As he sat on his preferred seat at the back of the deck aboard his favourite fishing boat, he felt the tension in his muscles dissipating. He was looking forward to the few hours of alone time that the boat ride would give him. He could hear Peter Koli’s shouted instructions mixed with the phut-phut-phut of the boat’s engine as it made its way out of the harbour. Soon, all sounds receded into the background and Virkar was alone, accompanied by his three favourite things: millions of stars in the sky above him, a kilogram of Jinga Koliwada and four bottles of Godfather beer by his side.