The Taj Conspiracy (19 page)

‘Yes!’ Arun said, his eyes bright. ‘His paintings were so monstrously vivid. I would be standing in the Uffizi in Florence, in front of a Caravaggio, and there, on the wall, I could imagine a scene out of one of Varanasi’s little lanes being played out on the canvas. In his paintings I saw people with grubby soles. I knew those feet—they were the feet of people who spend their days and nights barefoot. And those half-shadows in which he painted his characters, their faces simultaneously conveying one emotion and masking another. The brilliant interplay of bright with dark—chiaroscuro, as they call the technique—it mesmerised me. I, for one, had never seen anything like that before. That made him unique to me. On my return I scoured the Banaras Hindu University library for literature on Caravaggio, his paintings, his life, anything and everything.’

It was Mehrunisa’s turn to smile. ‘It fits. Your propensity for Caravaggio.’

‘Why? Should I be peeved at your value judgement?’

Mehrunisa waved her hand in dismissal. ‘You know what I mean.’

‘Yes. A guy with a scruffy beard, grubby hands, and loud laughter would best appreciate the unpretentious, manic genius of Caravaggio. Not to mention the can-blow-smoke-through-the-nostrils bit...’ Arun laughed, throwing his head back, snorting. It drew interested, amused glances from the other tables.

‘Caravaggio lived a rough-tough life and his paintings are full of the grime, ordinariness and lust of life. Why,’ Arun guffawed, ‘even his Cupid had dirty toenails! The beggars, the prostitutes, the menacing shadows—what a relief from the piety and soft tones of Botticelli, or—pardon me—the musculature of Michelangelo who put muscles even on women! The Delphic sibyl—you recall? Face of an angel, and the biceps of a giant!’

It was a sticky night, the air ponderous with the impending monsoon. Mehrunisa and Arun remained quiet for some time, immersed in the quiet companionship that comes from sharing. A mosquito came droning in front of Arun’s face. He clapped it between his palms; the spell was broken. With a snap of his fingers, Arun ordered paan.

Mehrunisa had seen its orange juice spat merrily in the streets and declined the offer. Grinning mischievously, she rested her chin on her palm. ‘Some art historians say that Caravaggio’s art is, ultimately, a murderer’s confession. You must know he murdered a young man and spent his life thereafter running from the law.’

Arun smiled, a smile that got lost in his beard, but lit up his eyes and rounded his cheeks. ‘He was a rough and ready guy—a street brawler, a gang member, a murderer.... You have studied his paintings so you would know what gave that luminosity to the brilliant white he used in his paintings.’

‘White lead paint,’ Mehrunisa replied quietly.

‘And?’

‘It is highly toxic.’

Arun’s response was a shrug as he lit up a cigarette. ‘When did genius ever play by the rules? His mantra: transgress.’

‘It’s interesting that you use the word transgress. I thought you’d say innovate.’

Arun Toor burst into one of his guffawing laughs, nodding his head in some secret merriment. ‘That is the difference between you and me, Mehrunisa. The difference, let’s say,’ his voice went flat, ‘between privilege and penury, between ideal and real. The genius in the underprivileged world does not innovate; he transgresses. Remember
that
!’

Mehrunisa acknowledged this with a lift of her brows. ‘You do seem to have a strong empathy with Caravaggio. There are art historians who believe that it is his guilt, the burden of his oppressed soul, which lends his canvas such feverish intensity. Applying the deductive reasoning you demonstrated, what could be the cause for your empathy with Caravaggio the murderer?’

Arun went still. In a deadpan voice, he asked, ‘Are you calling me a murderer, Mehrunisa?’

He leaned forward and whispered, ‘Perhaps I do have murder on my mind.’ Next he gave a slow, half wink, following it with a languid smirk as smoke curled out of his nostrils.

The paan juice that stained his lips a reddish-orange should have made him look ridiculous. Instead, with the deepening night sky in the distance, the iron rod used for plucking roti from the clay oven glinting against the brick wall behind, and the faint light casting Arun’s face in shadow, his coloured mouth made him look faintly ghoulish. The scene, Mehrunisa realised, could be straight out of a Caravaggio painting!

When R.P. Singh left Professor Kaul’s house after spending three hours being updated by Mehrunisa, his head was a little fuzzy. It had been an entirely pleasurable time—ambience, female company, food—yet what he had gleaned from the meeting had confounded him.

The Arun Toor that emerged from the anecdotes that she had recounted was a man of contradictions: a sloppy dresser yet fastidious arranger of files; a man who frequently changed the style of his beard but never of his clothes; a Benares boy who was in awe of an Italian painter; a history scholar who headed the drama club in college; a practical man who was nevertheless obsessed with the number three; devoted to the monument yet aware of his Jat heritage that had once ransacked the Taj.

He was not sure if he had heard about one man or two....

Delhi

M
ehrunisa was studying an upside-down Ardhnarishwar as she sat opposite Raj Bhushan. The ASI director-general was on the phone. He had called her that morning to share some news. Since he was occupied, Mehrunisa studied the two-that-are-one-form of Shiva for which he had earlier exhibited great enthusiasm, and wondered if there was a woman in the director’s life, a Shakti to complete his Shiva.

‘Yes.’ Raj Bhushan grinned as he rubbed his hands. ‘It is good of you to come at such short notice, but I thought it might interest you.’ He paused. ‘Would you care for a trip to Jaipur?’

‘Jaipur?’ Mehrunisa asked. ‘Why?’

‘For the Jaipur map. In the Maharaja Sawai Man Singh II Museum in the Jaipur palace is a large cloth map. In 1722, the Mughal emperor Muhammad Shah appointed Maharaja Sawai Jai Singh as the governor of Agra. At that time, the Maharaja was planning a new city at Jaipur and, for comparative study, he instructed that a map be prepared of the Mughal empire’s old capital and its prominent buildings. The result,’ Raj Bhushan said as he rested his elbows on the armchair, ‘is an image of Agra much as it had been under Shah Jahan.’

‘Oh!’ Mehrunisa leaned forward in excitement. ‘You mean the map shows the Taj Mahal?’

The ASI director-general’s face broke into its peculiar broad smile, his mouth forming a humungous ‘U’ even as the teeth stayed hidden from view. ‘Not just the Taj Mahal, but the entire riverfront scheme planned by Shah Jahan—of which many gardens, buildings and tombs are lost or have fallen into ruin.’

He opened the right-side drawer of his desk and brought out a case of mints. Flipping the lid open, he tilted the case towards his guest—who declined with a shake of her head—and popped a fresh mint into his mouth.

Amazing! Mehrunisa thought. This map would be further proof that the Taj Mahal was integral to an elaborate plan by Shah Jahan and not an isolated structure that could have been usurped.

Raj Bhushan smiled as he arranged the papers on his table and stacked them neatly to one side. ‘I was correct in my estimation! Finally, something that cheers you! As a matter of fact, I have been in talks with the Jaipur royals to buy the map for the ASI.’

A bearer walked in with tea, and the director-general instructed him to deposit the tray near the corner sofa. ‘Shall we,’ he said, indicating the sofa to Mehrunisa.

Once they were reseated, Raj Bhushan began serving tea as he talked. ‘It was Akbar who started to develop Agra as a riverfront city. However, it was during Shah Jahan’s reign that the garden with buildings on a riverfront terrace, like the Taj Mahal, became the norm. The Jaipur map shows the chahar baghs as a characteristic of Mughal Agra’s urban landscape: a square garden divided into four quarters by paved walkways and canals can be seen in many buildings. One popular example, considered the design predecessor of the Taj Mahal, is Itmad-ud-Daula’s tomb, constructed by Nur Jehan for her beloved father.’ Raj Bhushan handed her an elegant bone china teacup.

‘It would be worth a look. Besides,’ Mehrunisa paused, ‘Kaul uncle’s niece lives in Jaipur. Perhaps I can persuade her to visit uncle for a while—it may help jog his memory.’

‘His niece, hmm?’ He had finished pouring the tea and replaced the teapot in the carved walnut tray. He eyed the placement, shifted the kettle marginally so the spout and handle were aligned in a straight line and sat back satisfied.

‘Have you met Pamposh?’ Mehrunisa asked. ‘We spent several vacations together as children.’

‘Briefly. Let’s hope she can be of assistance to your uncle.’

Pakistan-occupied Kashmir

I
n his bunker, Jalaluddin scrutinised the folder that had arrived that day. From within it he retrieved several thick stacks of surveillance photographs. A kettle, glass and a bowl of candy stood to his right, so the carpet in front of him lay free of any items.

Tearing the rubber band off the first bunch, he laid out the pictures in a row on the carpet. The Taj Mahal lay spread out before him, the monument captured from several different angles: the façade and interior of the mausoleum; the two flanking buildings; the gardens and walkways.

Jalaluddin poured himself a glass of green tea. Over small sips he peered intently at each photograph, as if committing it to memory. Another set of pictures showed the security detail around the monument: sandbags, police in khaki uniforms with metal detectors, the barbed wire barricades, the CCTV cameras, the policeman inside his cell manning the cameras.

The photos were not the work of an ordinary tourist. What was captured was not the aesthetics of a monument renowned the world over for its beauty, but the security, or lack of it, around it.

Additionally, the photographs had been clicked at different times—the garments of the visitors and policemen switched from summer wear to sweaters and shawls.

His man had sent word that police had apprehended him while he was photographing at the monument—the last batch of photographs consequently were in their possession. Let off after a couple of days of questioning, he was lying low.

Jalaluddin harrumphed quietly as he finished studying the photographs. His jihadis were single-minded in their pursuit. He grabbed some candy and padded to the mouth of the cave where icicles had formed. Sucking on the sweet, he watched the falling snow with approval.

Agra

S
SP Raghav looked around the cramped study where he awaited Professor R.N. Dixit. The constable given charge of going through Arun Toor’s files had compiled a list of contractors and consultants who had worked on the Taj Mahal during Toor’s tenure as supervisor. The name of the retired chemistry teacher had come up—apparently he had been consulted for the recent chemical cleaning of the Taj Mahal. It didn’t seem like much of a lead, but the duty constable was unwell and Raghav had a couple of spare hours, so he decided to pay Dixit a visit.

The walls of the small room were lined with shelves bursting with books, files, folders, ring binders. Open volumes were splayed atop the shelves, the professor’s desk, even his worn chair. The mess seemed to indicate a man preoccupied with something.... Raghav blinked hard; the musty air was suffocating him. Scraping his chair back, he stood up abruptly.

A framed photo on the wall above a bookshelf showed the professor with the famous BHP leader Kriplani. Raghav squinted at another picture to its right—an old black and white college picture with names listed below. He walked up to it. Scanning the names, he did a double take: both Kriplani and Arun Toor were listed there. Hmm... so Arun Toor had been a student of Dixit’s at Benares Hindu University; Kriplani, it was well known, was a BHU professor before he turned to politics.

As Raghav prowled the room his ears pricked up. Amidst the utilitarian household sounds—rhythmic swish of a broom, the wet slap of slippers, the pressure cooker’s whistle—he caught a faint bubbling sound. He went still. It seemed to come from a tall almirah, the upper half of which had glass doors, the bottom half wooden ones. He put his ear to the wooden almirah—the noise was coming from within.

The wooden doors were bolted at the bottom. Curious, Raghav pulled the bolts and opened the doors, which yielded to reveal a largish storage area, completely barren, at the end of which he could see a wooden panel. Raghav’s unease was growing by the minute. Crouching, he probed the panel. Applying pressure with both hands, he worked the edges. Suddenly, the panel flipped backwards. Raghav coughed. A chemical smell filled his nostrils even as the bubbling sound grew louder. He was staring into pitch dark.

Squinting into the darkness, he crawled forward. In the blackness, a blue triangle hovered, above which floated a spectral white. It was so eerie it filled Raghav with trepidation. He glanced back at the study. The almirah was a passage to a room that Dixit frequented. In which case, a light switch had to be close by.

Raghav breathed his relief and stretched his hand out of the almirah to probe the wall outside. Nothing on the right. On the left wall he found a switch, flicked it on and light washed over a white-painted room. Raghav blinked as shiny glass apparatus, orderly jars and beakers, tidy shelves and clean tables came into view. A beaker bubbled atop a Bunsen burner—the blue flame—that was reflecting off the surrounding glass.