Dragon Fire

Prime Minister’s Office, South Block, New Delhi, India

‘Is the Dalai Lama safe?’ snapped Hari Dixit.

The Home Minister, Indrajit Bagchi, answered Dixit’s question. ‘He was in his complex and was not a target, sir.’

‘Casualties?’ said Dixit to the table at large

‘Twelve dead,’ said Bagchi. ‘The Speaker of the Parliament was shot with a pistol. The others died of shrapnel wounds. Seventeen wounded. Three are expected to die.’

‘Responsibility?’

Bagchi referred to Mani Naidu, the head of the Intelligence Bureau. Naidu glanced down at the e-mail printout in front of him. ‘Witnesses say it was a single monk, a very cool operator by the sounds of it, who let off two shots at the Speaker before throwing the grenades. He escaped during the mayhem that followed. We may have picked up one of his team near Palampur after the Bhat Vihan Bridge was blown—’

‘Blown?’ said Dixit.

‘A bridge across the Dehra River on the main route down from Dharamsala was destroyed by terrorism, exactly one hour and forty minutes after the attack on the Tibetan Parliament.’

‘And your suspect?’

‘He was alone in a Maruti jeep,’ said Naidu. ‘We found a .38 pistol — we are checking it against the rounds which hit the Speaker — with plastic explosives and a Pakistani-made hand grenade. He is a known member of the Lashkare-Jhangvi, the most extreme of the Islamic groups operating in Kashmir and Pakistan.’

‘They were responsible for the attempt on your life, Prime Minister,’ said Chandra Reddy, head of the Research and Analysis Wing.

‘I know who they are,’ said the Prime Minister impatiently. ‘What I don’t know is why Pakistan would want to take the Kashmir war into Tibet.’