The Morning Walk Ambush

The Morning Walk Ambush — 

I discovered yesterday that one should never underestimate a morning walk around a Kolkata lake. You may think you are going out merely to improve your circulation, enjoy the fresh air and perhaps compensate for yesterday’s lunch. In reality, you may be walking straight into a political ambush.

For some time I had been getting the distinct vibration that, after the BJP came to power, the CPM was quietly preparing itself for the opposition slot. I certainly did not expect any sensible person to openly support the TMC, particularly when financial irregularities and alleged scams seem to be getting exposed with such depressing regularity.

Of course, I don't come across many vocal CPM supporters during my morning walks. The CPM's 34-year record is still fresh in the memory of most walkers, whose average age is comfortably above sixty. These people have had the unique opportunity of tasting both CPM and TMC rule in Bengal. So, judging from the general body language around the lake, I had assumed that the BJP had acquired a fairly comfortable fan club.

Yesterday I discovered how dangerously wrong an assumption can be.

My ambusher was Mr X, a retired IAS officer, known to me through my brother-in-law. He is related through his wife to the owner of a popular Bengali newspaper which, during the glorious days of Trinamool rule, appeared to be particularly enthusiastic in singing the praises of the government.

Now, I don't know whether Mr X himself ever enjoyed any of the largesse of the TMC era through this family connection. I have absolutely no evidence to make such an accusation.

But the thought did cross my mind.

Especially because, with the change of political dispensation, government advertising is no longer flowing in the same old direction, while the newspaper establishment has apparently been facing some rather uncomfortable questions about its office building.

When politics changes, the newspaper's editorial temperature can sometimes change too. And when the advertising tap changes direction, one can understand why some people may develop a sudden interest in the politics of the new government.

But let me not speculate. I am only an innocent morning walker.

And innocent morning walkers should know when to keep their mouths shut.

Mr X approached me with the expression of a retired bureaucrat who had absolutely nothing political on his mind.

That should have been my first warning.

He wanted to revive a discussion I had previously had with his wife at a social gathering. She had been vigorously criticising the government over what she felt was the shrinking of the Mughal chapter in the NEP.

My brother-in-law and I had argued that ancient Indian history itself had never received the importance it deserved in our school education. Otherwise, we would probably have known much more about Aryabhatta, Varahamihira and Maitreyi. Even the Gupta Empire, whose influence extended over a substantial part of the subcontinent and beyond, was hardly served to us on a silver platter in our textbooks.

His wife, however, was in no mood to surrender the battlefield. In her usual loud and energetic style, she continued criticising the government.

I then mischievously shifted the battlefield from history to language.

I asked how, in Bengal, our perfectly respectable Ramdhanu had somehow become Rangdhanu. And blue, which we had happily called Neel all our lives, somehow acquired the more exotic Asmani.

She seemed perfectly comfortable with these linguistic innovations.

I began wondering whether history, language and politics had all become members of the same extended family.

Yesterday, Mr X came ambled towards me.

I wished him good morning and, before he could launch his missile, asked a completely harmless question:

"By the way, did you enjoy the leftover food your wife carried home that day? You weren't there."

He said he didn't eat much.

Then came the first shot.

With a faintly cynical smile, he said:

"I learnt many new things."

Ah!

So the retired IAS officer had not forgotten our little history seminar.

I immediately understood that this was not a statement. It was a file noting.

I could almost visualise the bureaucratic format:

> Subject: Views expressed by S.N. Roy during informal interaction.

> Submitted for kind perusal and necessary action.

I decided that the safest course was to change the subject.

I asked him whether he would be in Kolkata during Puja.

That, too, turned out to be a trap.

He smiled mischievously and said:

"You are missing the new style Durga Puja."

I knew exactly where this was heading. There has been considerable discussion about changes in Durga Puja practices, including some of the practices traditionally associated with Mamata Banerjee personally.

I decided that discretion was the better part of valour.

I replied:

"Good. At least there won't be DJ music."

A tactical retreat.

But Mr X wasn't ready to let me escape. He clearly wanted me to continue.

I looked at my watch.

"I'm in a hurry. I've got to go to the office."

The office, incidentally, was entirely imaginary.

But at my age, one can invoke the office just as easily as one invokes a doctor when trying to escape from an unwanted dinner.

And so I escaped.

The encounter taught me an important lesson.

Never judge a man by his innocent face.

A man's face may say:

"Good morning. Lovely weather today."

His mind may be saying:

"Now let us examine your views on Mughal history, NEP, Bengali vocabulary, Durga Puja, government advertising and the political future of Bengal."

And Bengal is particularly dangerous territory.

Here politics is not merely discussed. It is absorbed through the skin.

You can begin a conversation about tea and, within five minutes, find yourself debating Mamata Banerjee, Modi, the CPM, Mughal history, government advertising and the Gupta Empire.

So I have now prepared my own Morning Walk Conversational SOP:

Weather — Safe.

Walking speed — Safe.

Knee pain — Very safe.

Golf — Mostly safe.

Food — Proceed with caution.

History — Dangerous.

Bengali vocabulary — Explosively dangerous.

Politics — Strictly prohibited.

And retired IAS officers?

Extreme caution.

After all, during his service he must have been an expert in putting up notes to his superiors that were so beautifully ambiguous that everybody could interpret them differently—and yet nobody could accuse him of having said anything definite.

Yesterday's conversation was exactly like that.

I went for a morning walk.

I came back with a lesson in bureaucratic survival.

And next time I see Mr X approaching me with that innocent smile, I shall immediately look at my watch and say:

"Sorry, I have an urgent meeting with my knees."

The Night the Ambulance Left Deucha

The Night the Ambulance Left Deucha

Sometimes reality writes stories that no novelist would dare to submit to a publisher. The editor would probably return the manuscript with a polite note:

> “Dear Sir, this is all very exciting, but ₹28 crore in cash and 15 kg of gold? Please make the plot more believable.”

And yet, this is Birbhum.

---

It was a restless night in April 2026. Somewhere in the dusty landscape around Mohammad Bazar, where stone, sand, politics and money often appear to travel together in very comfortable company, Tulu Mondal—better known as Nazibuddin to some—was allegedly beginning to understand that the weather was changing.

Not the Birbhum weather. That is quite another matter.

The political weather.

Imagine the scene. Tulu pacing around his office. Mobile phone glued to his ear. Dumper trucks somewhere in the darkness. Men waiting for instructions. And perhaps, outside, an ambulance.

An ambulance, you see, is a wonderful vehicle. It carries patients. It carries the sick. It carries hope.

And, according to the allegations surrounding this extraordinary story, it can apparently carry other things too.

Like cash.

Lots of cash.

The story goes that instructions were issued: increase the stone loading, move the material, keep things safe. The political wind was changing and, as every experienced businessman knows, when the wind changes, one must either lower the sail—or leave the country.

Tulu, it seems, preferred the second option.

From Helper to “King”

The rise of Tulu Mondal itself sounds like something from a Bengali crime thriller.

A transport helper, according to the reports and local reputation surrounding him, gradually rose through the stone and sand business. Dumper trucks multiplied. Routes expanded. Contacts deepened. And before long, he was said to be a major name in the transport and mining network stretching across the Birbhum region.

By day, the trucks carried stone and other perfectly respectable cargo.

By night?

Well, let us simply say that in certain parts of Bengal, a truck may have a richer inner life than its registration certificate suggests.

My Taxi Driver and His Intelligence Network

This entire affair took me back to 2023, when I was travelling around Birbhum.

As usual, the best intelligence agency in India was at work.

Not RAW.

Not IB.

Not CBI.

The Indian taxi driver.

I had hired a taxi near Guskara. The young driver pointed towards a large house and lowered his voice. Immediately I knew something interesting was coming. Indians do not lower their voices when discussing the weather.

“See that house?” he said.

I looked.

“Yes?”

“Very big man. Started as a helper. Now? Sand business.”

Then came the important part.

“Black money, baba.”

That single “baba” carried more information than a 500-page chargesheet.

He explained, in his own colourful way, that under the political protection of the day, anything was possible. Trucks moved. Sand moved. Money moved. And, presumably, the people counting the money developed excellent wrist problems.

He did not need to mention the name.

In small towns, everyone knows.

Only the police, for some mysterious reason, sometimes have to conduct an investigation.

Then Came the Raid

And then, on July 29, 2026, Birbhum woke up to the sort of news that makes you put down your morning tea and read the headline twice.

Police raided the house of Minar Mondal, a retired government bus driver and brother-in-law of Tulu Mondal.

A retired bus driver.

Now, I have travelled in government buses all my life. I have seen the driver, conductor, passengers, chickens, schoolbags and occasionally three people sharing one seat designed for two.

But never in my imagination had I thought:

> “Perhaps the driver is secretly sitting on ₹28 crore.”

The raid reportedly uncovered approximately ₹28.5 crore in cash and 15 kg of gold.

Fifteen kilograms!

I immediately began thinking of my own modest household jewellery and felt that perhaps I had misunderstood the meaning of “saving for the future.”

The cash was allegedly hidden in trunks, cupboards, sacks and various corners of the house. The amount was so enormous that several counting machines reportedly gave up their struggle.

Imagine being a currency-counting machine.

You are brought to the police station in the morning, ready to perform your patriotic duty.

One bundle.

Two bundles.

One crore.

Five crore.

Ten crore.

Twenty crore.

And suddenly—

Machine: “I resign.”

Five counting machines reportedly broke down.

I am told that retirement is normally a human privilege. In this case, the machines apparently retired first.

Why Gold?

The gold, of course, added a certain glamour to the whole affair.

Cash takes up space. Gold is more convenient.

Apparently, once one graduates from keeping money in cupboards to keeping crores in cupboards, one begins to think strategically.

“Where shall we put it?”

“Cupboard?”

“Already full.”

“Bed?”

“Full.”

“Suitcase?”

“Full.”

“Then buy gold.”

And so, according to investigators, cash could become bullion—compact, valuable and easier to store.

That is the advantage of financial planning.

Some of us buy fixed deposits.

Some buy mutual funds.

And some, allegedly, keep fifteen kilograms of gold biscuits.

The Man Who Had Already Gone

The most dramatic part of the story is that Tulu Mondal had reportedly vanished much earlier.

By May 4, 2026, sensing that things were becoming politically uncomfortable, he was said to have left India.

This is always the problem with political weather forecasting.

You must know when to carry an umbrella.

And when to leave the country.

By the time the big raid took place in July, the man allegedly at the centre of the network was already absent.

Police began investigating relatives, properties, associates and the wider business network. The alleged wealth trail stretched across vehicles, houses, businesses and more.

What had once been whispered about by taxi drivers had suddenly become a matter of national headlines.

From a Whisper to a Headline

That is what fascinates me most.

In 2023, a taxi driver had casually pointed to a house and whispered:

> “Black money, baba.”

Three years later, the newspapers were talking about crores of cash and kilograms of gold.

I have often wondered whether, somewhere in Guskara, that taxi driver opened his newspaper, saw the headline and simply said:

“I told you so, baba.”

And what about that ambulance?

That remains the most haunting image of the whole story.

A white ambulance disappearing into the night.

Normally, when an ambulance leaves, we pray that the patient survives.

In this case, one wonders whether the patient was actually a few hundred bundles of currency notes.

The Lesson

Tulu Mondal’s story—if the allegations and investigation establish what the police suspect—would be a very Bengal story indeed.

A man begins small.

Trucks appear.

Stone moves.

Sand moves.

Money moves.

Gold appears.

Politics changes.

An ambulance becomes unexpectedly busy.

And finally, the counting machines surrender.

For years, people may whisper. Taxi drivers may point. Local people may know the story better than any official document.

But there comes a moment when whispers become headlines.

And when that happens, even the deepest cupboard may not be deep enough.

As for me, I still remember that young taxi driver near Guskara.

Perhaps I should have asked him for stock market tips too.

My experience with RSS

 October-November 1984: A Week I Will Never Forget

It was the 31st of October, 1984. I was posted in Delhi as Manager, Stabilization, at BHEL, working out of our office in Ashoka Estate near Connaught Place. It started as an ordinary day. By mid-morning, a murmur began spreading through the office, hushed voices, people stepping away from their desks to whisper. There had been an attempt on the life of Indira Gandhi.

Nobody knew anything for certain. The uncertainty was unbearable, so during a break I walked down to the Hindustan Times building, where an electronic news board ran a scrolling ticker outside, visible to anyone passing on the road. I stood there with a small crowd of strangers, all of us craning our necks, waiting for the letters to repeat themselves. The news was the same as what we had heard in the office: an attempt had been made. No names, no details, just that bare, frightening fact.

I went back to work, but nobody was really working. Every few minutes someone would walk past with a fresh rumor. In the evening, I boarded the chartered bus that took us back to West Patel Nagar, where I was staying at the time. The bus was unusually quiet, and then it wasn't, conversations would flare up in hushed tones, die down, and flare up again somewhere else. Everyone was speculating. Who had done it? Was she alive? Nobody knew who had attempted the assassination, and that not-knowing sat heavily over all of us.

By late evening, the news was confirmed. Her own bodyguard, a Sikh, had shot her. She was dead.

The next day, a holiday was declared, as one would expect after the assassination of a sitting Prime Minister. My parents lived in the Western Extension Area in Karol Bagh, and I decided to visit them with my wife Madhuri. I took her on my scooter, and our son Anish followed us on his own bike. It felt, that morning, like an ordinary family visit. We had lunch with my parents, and afterward, the three of us went up to the rooftop, the way families often do in Delhi, just to sit, talk, get some air.

That's when we saw it. Smoke was rising from the direction of Paharganj, thick and black, the kind of smoke that doesn't come from a kitchen fire. Then we heard sounds from the road below, shouting, running, a kind of noise that didn't belong to a holiday afternoon. Something was very wrong.

I told my parents I had to leave immediately. I could sense trouble coming, though even then, I had no idea what was actually unfolding. I had no idea that Sikhs were being targeted by mobs across the city. That understanding came only on the ride back.

Riding back toward our house, I saw things I still find difficult to describe. Mobs of men running through the streets, carrying televisions, telephones, household goods, looted from shops that belonged to Sikh owners. It was broad daylight. Nobody was hiding what they were doing. Thinking back on it now, I realize how much risk we were taking, riding through those streets on a scooter and a bike, with my wife and son out in the open, passing groups of men in that state of frenzy. At the time, I just wanted to get home. Looking back, I understand how easily that ride could have ended very differently.

When I reached home, my landlady, whom I called Mataji, was waiting with a piece of advice that I followed without question. She told me not to park my scooter outside, where I normally kept it, but to bring it inside the courtyard, out of sight. It was such a small, practical instruction, but it told me everything about how serious the situation had become. She understood, before I fully did, that anything visible, any object, any vehicle, any sign of who lived where, could become a target or a clue for the mobs moving through the area.

Mataji had three sons. The eldest was married. The second one was unmarried, a well-built young man with a handlebar moustache, the kind of moustache you noticed immediately. We all called him Mooch.

Later that day, Mooch came to find me. He handed me a piece of paper with a telephone number written on it and told me, plainly, that if there was any trouble, I should call that number. I asked him what kind of trouble he meant, and what the number was for. He told me it was a control room number. I asked, control room of what? He explained that he was a member of the RSS, and that they had set up an emergency control room in someone's house in the area, specifically to help protect Sikh families from the mobs that were being organized against them.

Then he gave me a lathi.

I remember holding it, this simple wooden stick, and understanding that things had moved from "be careful" to "be ready."

That was Thursday, the 1st of November. Through the day, news kept filtering in, that Congress leaders, names like Sajjan Kumar and Tytler were being mentioned, were allegedly mobilizing gangs from the Bhangi colony to attack Sikh homes and shops. There was no police protection visible anywhere in our area. By evening, Mooch had organized something remarkable out of pure necessity: teams of young men from the neighboring houses, myself included, formed a rotating watch to guard our locality around the clock.

It wasn't long before we were tested. A truck full of men arrived in our lane. They stopped near a parked car, a car belonging to someone in the neighborhood, tipped it onto its side, punctured the petrol tank, and threw a lit matchstick at it. The car went up instantly, flames roaring into the evening air.

We didn't think. We ran toward them, armed with whatever we had, sticks, hockey sticks, the lathi Mooch had given me. The moment they saw a group of us coming at them, ready to fight, they turned and ran for their truck. They hadn't expected anyone to resist. Cowards, every one of them, brave enough to torch a car and loot a shop, but not brave enough to face people standing together.

The next day, the RSS organized a meeting in the central park of our area. They stood up in front of everyone and assured the Sikh families in the neighborhood that they would be protected, that the community would not let anything happen to them. We kept up our vigil for two more days, watching the lanes, watching the main road, watching for trucks. And then, finally, the police became active. Help arrived, late, but it arrived.

That week has stayed with me for over forty years now. It was the week I saw how quickly a city could turn, how neighbors could become looters overnight, and how other neighbors, ordinary men with moustaches and lathis and a telephone number scrawled on paper, could become the only line of defense between a family and a mob.

My father used to tell us stories from when he first arrived in Delhi after Partition, how riots were almost a regular affair in those years, and how the RSS had stepped in then too, to protect Hindu families caught in the violence. I understand that over the years, the organization has been painted very differently by Congress and by sections of the left, and I know that debate continues, with people on different sides holding strong views, some shaped by different parts of its long history.

But I can only speak to what I saw with my own eyes. In 1984, when the police were absent and the mobs were active, it was Mooch and the volunteers from our lane who stood between us and real danger. And in the years since, during various project postings across the country, I have seen the same kind of organization show up again, during floods, during earthquakes, organizing relief, distributing supplies, doing the unglamorous work that needs doing when everything else has broken down.

That is my memory, and that is my experience. Others will have theirs, and theirs may be very different. But this is mine, and I wanted to write it down before it fades any further.

When Even Playing Tennis Looked “Revolutionary”

When Even Playing Tennis Looked “Revolutionary”

It must have been around 1971, when the Naxalite movement was at its peak and Bengal—and much of eastern India—was passing through one of its most turbulent phases. At that time, I was posted at the Barauni Refinery of Indian Oil Corporation.

The atmosphere was such that every educated Bengali male with spectacles, a jhola, and a serious face was automatically suspected to be a Naxalite. Bihar Police, it was rumoured, even had a “special interest” in Bengalis. Some people joked that if you quoted Tagore correctly, suspicion increased further.

One day, our CPI union leader, Rameshwar Prasad, came to me with a mysterious expression and said in a hushed tone,

“Roy saab, police sleuths are following you.”

I burst out laughing.

“Poor fellows,” I replied. “They must be terribly disappointed.”

He looked puzzled.

I explained, “Every evening after office I go to Officers’ Club, play tennis, then badminton, eat dinner at the guest house, and sleep. If they are expecting secret revolutionary meetings, they are wasting government resources.”

Frankly, I almost felt sorry for the intelligence department. Imagine tailing a suspect whose biggest conspiracy was whether to play singles or doubles badminton.

But the situation outside was no joke.

There was a dacoity in a zamindar’s house in Begusarai, and in the usual style of those times, some of our Bengali trade apprentices were promptly picked up and branded as Naxalites. In those days, if a Bengali youth carried a book instead of a lathi, police suspicion became even stronger.

I knew those boys. They were more frightened of workshop supervisors than of the Indian state.

So I took help from my friend K. K. Verma, whose uncle was a police officer, and somehow managed to get the boys released. In those days, personal credibility and contacts often worked faster than formal systems.

Around the same period, I had to visit Calcutta for finalising the starting relay CMM-4 with English Electric for our high-voltage coke-cutting motor. I was staying at the IOC guest house on Syed Amir Ali Avenue. Being a bachelor then, life was fairly uncomplicated—except that Bengal itself had become highly complicated.

My late brother-in-law, Ranjit Mukherjee, was a hardcore CPM supporter. Those were violent political days. Congress toughs and plainclothes policemen allegedly harassed many Left supporters. Ranjit had his own house in Dhakuria, but because of constant trouble he shifted quietly to Santragachi in a rented flat, almost like a political refugee within his own state.

One evening after work, I went to visit my sister there. Since we were meeting after a long gap, my brother-in-law became enthusiastic about arranging a “special dinner.” Bengalis can postpone revolution, but not elaborate dinners.

Naturally, dinner became late.

By then everyone in the house looked worried.

“You are not going back tonight,” they declared.

“Why?” I asked.

My brother-in-law replied dramatically,

“At this hour police may shoot first and identify later. You look exactly like an intellectual Bengali.”

I protested that I at least needed to inform the IOC guest house.

So he took me to the nearest thana.

But just before entering, he stopped.

“You go inside alone,” he whispered. “I won’t accompany you.”

“Why?”

“I am staying incognito.”

That sentence itself sounded sufficiently revolutionary.

So there I was—walking alone into a police station at night during the peak of the Naxalite era.

I showed my Indian Oil ID card and explained my predicament to the officer in charge. Fortunately, he turned out to be a practical and accommodating man. The moment he realised I was a PSU officer stranded between bureaucracy and Bengali family hospitality, his entire attitude softened.

He allowed me to use the phone and even advised me to stay back safely.

Thus ended my brief “underground political career.”

Next morning, I quietly returned to the IOC guest house—alive, well-fed, and still non-revolutionary.

Why am I writing this today?

Because I feel that period marked the beginning of Bengal’s long institutional decline. Many brilliant young students got swept into the Naxalite movement. Some were idealists, some romantic rebels, and some simply angry young men searching for meaning. Tragically, many were mercilessly killed in police action. Siddhartha Shankar Ray earned the harsh title of “Butcher of Bengal” from his critics because of the severity of the crackdown.

Later, he was sent by Indira Gandhi to deal with the Khalistani situation in Punjab. The template had already been created—politics, policing, fear, and force becoming intertwined.

Somewhere during those years, police gradually began getting perceived not as neutral protectors of law, but as extensions of ruling political power. Successive governments merely changed the colour of the flag; the system largely remained the same.

Today, while speaking to an ADG-level officer, I raised this very question.

“Why didn’t IPS officers resist?” I asked.

He smiled helplessly and said,

“The system gives very little scope.”

Then after a pause he added honestly,

“Of course, maybe twenty percent are corrupt.”

I appreciated the candour.

My hope is that with political change in Bengal, policing may gradually return to its original purpose—that the common citizen should see a policeman as someone to approach for help, not someone to avoid out of fear.

A society progresses not merely through flyovers and malls, but when an ordinary citizen can enter a police station without anxiety.

Much like I did that night in Santragachi—armed only with an IOC identity card and the confidence of an innocent badminton player.