The Thar Incident - 5

Continued from Part 4.

******************

It had taken a week before the debris was recovered from the site and then a week after that the first scientific analysis of the wreckage reached the PSA's desk.

It was in the late afternoon that the PSA sat down and began to read the report that had come from his handpicked investigation team.

The report was handwritten and very simply titled "Technical Evaluation: Survey of Methods and Preliminary Results". The entire report contained about 28 pages of text and equations and each page was a slightly different handwriting as it was written by a different author. Each author had signed his part of the report. The first page of text contained the title and the executive summary which read as follows:

"The debris as presented to us was subject to a variety of scientific investigation methods. The preliminary results of the investigations are presented herein. The aerodynamic design of the vehicle is far in advance of current limits on flight control and dynamics. The propulsion system is an unknown quantity at the present time. The purity of the materials in the debris suggest the use of extremely advanced metallurgy well outside the limits of known aerospace technology. The control circuitry depicts an extraordinarily large scale of integration. The investigation has been unable to determine any of the control algorithms. The initial conclusion supported by these results is that the debris is the product of an extremely advanced technology development cycle capable of almost arbitrary levels of precise manufacture. A biological investigation of the occupants is also attached. A preliminary conclusion is that the samples do not match any known lifeforms."

The page then went on to list which scientists had conducted what specific investigation. The page was signed by the director of the lab. Gingerly the PSA turned the page on the report and began to read the details of the investigations.

The PSA's attention was drawn to the page titled "Microscopic investigation", The text very blandly stated:

"Samples of taken from various points on the wall of the craft indicated a high level of organization and structure when examined under an electron microscope. There were large arrays organized on an atomic length scale. The low levels of repetition and connectivity patterns suggest that this was most probably part of a control system of the craft. It is difficult to fathom what sort of control logic these used, however if it is the case that data was stored in these atomic size structures then a conservative estimate suggests a data storage capability in the range of terrabytes per square millimeter. Structuring of materials on this length-scale is not novel - but build large structured arrays of material at this scale and especially with high levels of reliability to use in a control system - is simply beyond the scope of all known technology. "

The words in the section titled "Propulsion Systems" were even more stark:

"There is no discernable enclosure inside the craft that appears to belong to a propulsion system. It could be that propulsion system appears to enmeshed into the outer shell of the craft. It is unclear how such a system could work or how the craft would actually power it. It is possible that the craft derives its energy (and thence propulsion) by the very act of motion. There is evidence of very high levels of radiation inside the craft. The pattern is uniform suggesting that the craft continously exposed to the source and yet there is no reactor or any other known source of radiation inside the craft. The ambient radiation levels inside the craft would expose a human being to five lifetime doses in under a very short time of exposure. This suggests that the craft has not been designed for human use."

A few pages later, the extremely bizarre biological analysis of the occupants was presented. This was the longest section which began by stating that most of the "bodies" recovered at the site had been subject only to MRI analysis and that only one of the partially burnt specimens was actually physically autopsied. There were a few line drawings of the interesting results. The last few pages of the biological analysis concluded,

"Despite their humanoid appearance there are very few elements of similarity between the occupants and other humanoid species. Specifically the occupants appear to have a circulatory system of some kind for internal energy transport but it is unclear how this system is powered. The tissue matter does not resemble any known biological specimen and some of the body parts do not depict a discernable cell structure and seem more like synthetic polymers. We cannot pin point any sexual differentiation in the samples. The tissues seem utterly transparenent to all manner of radiation. We cannot identify the means used by these samples to acquire and process information. There appears to be no control circuitry which rules out the possibility of these being drones or robots made on earth. All these strongly supports the idea that these samples are of exobiological origin."

As if this wasn't enough, the computational sciences expert had the following words to offer,

"Based on the assumption that data is stored in atomic sized structures spread along the wall of the craft, it is possible to say that the craft appears to warehouse and handle millions of exabytes of data. The ability to process such data is beyond all known algorithms and transmission of such data across even short distances is likely to cause serious degradation due to information entropy alone. A computational algorithm to search such a large database even an indexed one - is largely beyond current science-fiction. "

Normally the PSA would been awash with a desire to throw the report into the trash can besides his desk, however as the list of scientists testified, all nine investigators were high-ranking gazetted officers of the government. Eight out of the nine were recipients of the coveted INSA Young Scientist prize. Half a dozen of those were also recipients of the S.S. Bhatnagar prize for scientific achievement. The remainder were recipients of a number of private prizes like the Birla prize and one of the physicists had been awarded a Padmashree for his role in designing the cores of India's nuclear weapons. The nine scientists were among the most respected voices in India's science and technology establishment.

Wearily the PSA began to rub his eyes and stared at the picture of Homi Jehangir Bhabha that adorned his wall. It was an extremely wise decision on his part to ask his investigative team to keep all documentation handwritten and to quarentine any electronic system that had been near the craft or its occupants.

The Thar Incident - 4

Continued from Part 3.

******************

The Principal Scientific Advisor to the Prime Minister read his handwritten notes of the 0700 AM meeting one last time before he destroyed them. The PSA (as he was more commonly addressed in the bureaucracy) was reputed to have a photographic memory. His notes were only a guide. The meeting had been attented by the Principal Private Secretary to the PM (PPS), the Chairman of the National Security Council Secretariat(CNSCS), the National Security Advisor(NSA), the Principal Scientific Advisor to the PM (PSA), the Cabinet Secretary (CabSec) and the Chief of Defence Staff (CDS).

As he carefully shredded the notes, the PSA's mind wandered as he reflected on the happenings of last night. The voice in his mind ran like an unfettered stream,

"There was too little information to do anything at this point or even to form a concrete opinion, though one would ideally like to prepare for what might happen."

"There were really only two possibilities, either the craft was of terrestrial origin and was the product of a very advanced technology development cycle that we in India had no clue about or the craft was not from Earth."

"Both possibilities were quite worrisome. Over the past 60 years the Govt. of India's policy had invested heavily in the development of technology. The idea was to gradually narrow the technology gap that existed between the developed world and India. This was the key to ensuring that India's economy remained competitive and the political mess that resulted in the fall of the Mughal Empire would not repeat. A decidedly post-colonial paranoia had driven this policy at all levels. If this vehicle was evidence of a completely unknown technology development cycle operating in the developed world - then that would imply that the gap between India and the world economy was far more severe than earlier imagined."

The innate strength that came with a mind capable of intense divergent thinking now raced to the fore, as the PSA now built up the differential analysis.

"Alternatively this craft is not of terrestrial origin and a completely unknown race of sentient beings inhabited nearby regions of space or even possibly lived below the surface of the earth."

This second possibility though troublesome was not nearly as discomforting as it might have been to others in the world. The PSA was after all an Indian. The obsessive emphasis on the idea that Man alone was the pinnacle of divine creation had left Indian theology centuries ago. This idea was actually only prevalent among certain segments of the (non-Indian) adherents of Abrahamic faiths. The idea of a non terrestrial intelligence still posed quite a challenge as it suggested that mankind had inadequately explored its surroundings and quite possibly was not nearly as aware of the laws of the universe as some of the high priests of science would have it believe.

"Perhaps" the PSA had opined at the meeting " the answer to this question will reveal itself - whoever owns this will come to claim it. The time they take to come ask for it will tell us a lot about who they are. If the craft has a homing beacon of some sort they will have an easier time finding it.If they are on the planet then it will take them very little time to act. If they are not from the planet then their response could take time."

"So all that remains to be done now is to learn as much from the craft as possible before whoever owns this comes back to get it. It possible delay the discovery of the craft to facilitate a more thorough investigation."

"What to do when the owner returns? - well that is a more complicated problem, the owner would not be happy and would doubtlessly have more such advanced technology. The first thing that would have to be done would be to ensure that hostilities did not break out. To this end it is best to tell the owner the truth about the manner of the crash and what was done subsequently to investigate it. Another dimension worth considering is to proceed slowly in investigating the craft's apparent occupants, if by some chance the owner wanted the occupants' remains to be intact, it would not do to hand over the remanents of an autopsy. It is best if the investigations of the craft were minimally invasive and any invasive procedure was non-destructive to the best of our knowledge."

The PSA realized he would need a very capable team of investigators with a penchant for secrecy. Reaching for the phone, the PSA called up the director of the only lab in the country that could be relied to perform such testing. A thousand kilometers away at an office overlooking the picturesque Gateway of India monument, a phone rang and the man at the desk reached for it - the director was an early riser, but this was indeed an unexpected call.

While the PSA spoke to his subordinate, the Chairman of the National Security Council Secretariat (CNSCS) was having thoughts of his own. The Prime Minister had handed the task of evaluating the risks in this investigation to him. As there were so many unanswered questions and because the PSA had expressed the possibility of a prolonged investigation, the CNSCS had recommended absolute secrecy in dealing with the matter. The CNSCS knew that despite his secrecy this would eventually leak out and a number of strategic communication plans would have to be drawn up. It was also on the NSCS's recommendations that the Chief of Defense Staff (CDS) had been given orders to conduct a nationwide military exercise. The exercise was supposed to involve having the Army deploy in response to two major disasters in the country. The cover story being released to the press was that chronic instability in Pakistan had forced the Indian Army to push for a series of national emergency preparedness tests. The lie - the CDS hoped would hold off more serious questions about what was being done.

The NSA had stayed behind in the meeting room with the PPS and the CabSec. The NSA had been assigned the task of evaluating the implications of this development on India's foreign policy. The NSA had until recently been completely submereged in discussions with the American and Russian intelligence communities about technology proliferation problems. It was only as a reflex but the NSA now pondered the proliferation implications of this unknown technology.

Thinking aloud the NSA spoke - looking towards the CabSec,

"You know - mankind has never managed to limit the spread of technology. The age of humanity has almost continously been bedevilled with terrible wars on account of technology proliferation. I can almost hear the voice of Leo Szilard in my head - the biggest secret is that this is possible to do - once that is out it is only a matter of time before someone tries to replicate it. What God does not permit - Man will endeavor to do...."

His words hung in the air... he continued..

" What if this had landed on the Pakistani side of the border. What would their reaction have been? Would they have questioned things the way we have? ... what should our reaction be? What should we do if some other nation with more nuclear weapons decides to coerce us to surrender this discovery with them"

The PPS now uncharacteristically cut him off,

"Perhaps you should take the day off to think this through?"

The NSA was lost in his own musings and mumbled his reply,

"Yes perhaps I shall fall sick today."

The CabSec grumbled, "If only all of us could take a day off like that.."

The PPS smiled and shook his head. The CabSec - the mother of the adminstration - perpetually overworked. Gone were the days when the CabSec could comfortably relax as Joint Secretaries did all the work. In the mid 80s under the influence of the reigning secretary C. R. K. Rao, the CabSec's sword-arm the Department of Cabinet Affairs had faded into the background. This withdrawal from the limelight had enabled the secretariat to carefully screen people that demanded access to its time. The result was a more optimal configuration where the Secretariat continued to be the intellectual powerhouse of the Iron Frame of government and yet did not have to bother itself with every random piece of information that popped up. Though he did not weild as much authority and decision making power as the CabSec of yesterday, today the CabSec barely had time to sit. Keeping an eye on things and screening out the problems which could be solved from the ones which couldn't was a demanding job.
This latest mess in the Thar represented a problem that could not be solved. The only thing the CabSec had to do now was to talk to his people to make sure that the secretaries in the MOD and the Finance Ministry would do what they were told. That was about as much time as the CabSec could spare on this. And with few words exchanged the CabSec walked out of the office.

The PPS was a quiet man given to deep thinking about issues. He now shuffled towards his office down the hall, he decided that he would call an old friend, the director of one of the institutes of advanced studies that the Government had set up some years ago. The man he would speak to was the country's highest ranking social scientist, the author of several major textbooks in sociology and psychology. The PPS hoped that his friend would help him grasp the likely trends in public opinion to events that might come to pass. As a very tired and somewhat irritated sociologist reached for his annoying phone in the city of Bangalore, he really had no clue what he was going to be pushed into.

The Thar Incident - 3

Continued from Part 2.

******************

Lt. Amar Singh's men had sent a terse message on the commlink. The commlink was a burst transmitter that utlized reflections from the ionosphere to send a rapid pulse containing a small amount of information in code. The limited bandwidth meant that the message had to be text and when encypted could not exceed a few hundred kilobytes. The S.O.P required that the team moved atleast 3 miles before transmitting again so as to avoid radio triangulation. The team usually only transmitted once in the mission area that too using a Vernam cipher. The one-time pads used for this cipher were precious commodities - absolutely never to be reused - each mission was issued only two - one for a mission report - the other for an emergency.

Upon reaching the site, Lt. Amar Singh soon realized that there was no question of leaving the site or of sending more than one message so he had done his best to summarize the situation, the text message send about 45 minutes ago read as follows:

** Rch Site 2300 IST. lrg unk craft loc. in 100 ft ctr w dbris fld 1 km lg. Fire frm mig crsh vis in dist. LN KARNAL entr ctr & rep. no hum. rem. bt LNK died after 20 min in ctr. LN KAPIL ent. ctr. w same rslt. hazmat drll. not foll. due to haste. Craft apprs. shiny metal and debr. is aerospace type. No plates or mrkings. Tem hlding perim tll. reinf. arr. rept. 2 dead. hlding perim. rqst hazmat asst.**

The message that that the DAE physicist had recieved was more transparent.

"Listen, sorry about the time, but about 100 clicks north west of your position something fell out of the sky. A team reached it on foot but they have lost two members from some kind of hazmat exposure. They claim that the object appears to be some sort of aerospace instrument. I fear that somethings come a falling from space. Initially the boys at Kalagarh had a brief look at it, by looking on the IR mode of the Divya but they can't tell what it is - too much background. The Kalagarh boys are sure that nothing was scheduled to fall from the sky tonight. So this is unexpected and they say it doesn't look like any satellite we have seen before. It could be one of the newer American Misty 2.x s or perhaps even some new kind of UAV. Look I know its late but whoever owns this thing will be down there very quickly - so get to it and secure the site and give us your prelim analysis. Don't bother about the migs, the Divya shots suggest that the pilots are dead, there are no signs of any parachutes and the wreckage can be seen also. Cover story being prepared at Kalagarh is that there was a training sortie that ended in disaster. Newspaper will come with the usual horseshit about mig engines and spares etc... No mention is being made of the other object or anything else. Just get to it and send us your estimates we will send a Mi-26 skycrane from Chandigarh before 0200. and 11 IBG will join you by 0700. You should be out of there before daybreak. Remember there is atleast one hostile satellite pass by 0800 so whatever you do - get out of there before that."

The CO 58 Engineers and the NSC representative had recieved similar messages.

It was 0034 hours when the lead helo landed a few hunded meters from the site. The 22 Para team raced ahead and linked up and relieved Lt. Amar's team. The DAE man, the CO of the 58 and the NSC representative raced ahead. The DAE man fearing contamination had his radiation measuring instruments out. He pointed the geiger counter in front of him and began to read off the measurements. The readings had been scaled with a number to reflect the ambient radiation flux in curies. As they walked towards the crater radiation levels were rising dangerously. The contamination appeared to be airborne.

The CO of the 58 periodically peered at the site through a pair of night vision goggles. Though these wre third generation image intensifiers made in DRDO labs, the rotor of the Mi-8 was kicking up way too much sand for the night vision units to be very effective.

Almost breathless from the sudden exertion of running across the sand, the DAE man stumbled past the 22 Para team which cautiously followed him. As the men lurched up to the edge of the crater and the DAE man shone a flash light on the structure at the bottom of the pit, a barely audible gasp escaped his lips. Neither the bright green glow from the ionization tube nor the almost continuous clicking of the geiger counter seem to intrude - the men simply stood there stunned.

It was the DAE man who first snapped back to his senses as he finally felt the ground under his feet to be unusually warm and moments later the hazardous gas detector began to whine. The detector had found high levels of flourine in the air.

"Get back" he screamed... the C0 of the 58 to turned toward the leader of the 22 Para team almost instantly - " Captain expand cordon to 100 meters. No one is to cross without hazmat suits. There is a pool of molten sand between us and the object. The molten sand is outgassing a toxic compound that kills within minutes of exposure."

The Paras responded immediately and soon most people in the team were suiting up. The CO of the 58 ran to the pilot of the Mi-8 and told him that they would need a bulldozer to move sand and a rover that was kept by BARC folks at the Pokharan test facility. The rover was used for inspections in hazardous zones. As he spoke the could hear the Mi-17s from the Aravali hills approaching the landing zone. He braced for the blast of sand as the lead Mi-17 began its rapid descent. The Mi-8 pilots began to prepare for a trip back to Pokharan.

As the DAE man scurried around collecting his first impressions of the scene. The NSC representative walked around talking to Lt. Amar. The Capt. from 22 Para began to direct the extra manpower from the Mi-17s into a cordon. A medical station was also set up.

It was about an hour or so before the NSC man, the DAE physicist and the CO of the 58 had a chance to consult with each other. With only a flashlight to guide him, the NSC man scribbled their respective reports on a tablet PC. The PC was linked to satcom terminal that had been set up by the NCO from 22 Para only minutes earlier.

By 0152 Hours the Mi-8 had returned with rover but indicated that the dozer at Pokharan was too heavy for it to lift. The NSC man sensing the predicament used the satellite uplink to instruct the Mi-26 Skycrane to make a detour to Pokharan and pick up the dozer. This delayed the arrival of the skycrane by an hour.

The CO of the 58 and the DAE man managed to get the rover to roll out. Luckily the rover was kept at a high level of readiness and the batteries used in it were actually charged. The two men carefully chaperoned the rover to the edge of the crater and gently ushered over the top.

It took the rover some twenty minutes to navigate around the pool of molten sand. In parts the sand had solidified and the rover actually just crawled over the crust towards the shiny metallic object in the pool. It was then suddenly that the crust under the rover gave way and the rover fell into what appeared to be a pit. Fearing that the control cables might snap the DAE man began to articulate the rover's camera arm when suddenly the light from the guide lamp on the arm fell on a bizarre shape and the DAE man froze. He gestured wildly towards the CO of the 58 and the NSC representative and they ran towards him. The Capt. from the 22 Para reached only moments later.

Words could ill describe the emotions that flowed through the minds of the four men as they huddled over the LCD screen displaying the live-feed from the rover's camera.

The DAE man broke the silence - eyeing NSC representative, he said..

"It can't be done today. There is simply too much work here. We have to bury the thing and come back tomorrow - better prepared. The sat recon will pick up the our tracks and everyone will know. I don't think that is a good idea now."

The NSC man nodded and said, "I was completely unprepared for this. We are going to have to implement the Pokaran satellite evasion drill here."

After a few minutes in the huddle. The DAE man shut the rover down and extracted the memory disk containing a copy of the videofeed. The CO of the 58 and the Capt from the 22 Para began to shout out orders to the men.

At 0300 hours the Mi-26 could be heard landing in the distance and a dozer rolled off the ramp. Over the next hour the crater was filled up and the site meticulously camoflaged. In keeping with the cover story released at Kalagarh, the site was now made to look like a coorindation camp for a search and rescue party. By 0500 hours two of the Mi-17 had taken off and inserted people around the wreckage of the fallen migs. The men pretended to be carefully patrolling the land in search of the pilots.

By 0545 hours a completed report of the proceedings of the last few hours ad the video from the rover camera was uplinked to the National Command Post at Kalagarh. And at 0600 the Prime Minister was gently roused from her sleep by an aide.

The Thar Incident - 2

Continued from Part I.

*****

The turning of the Dhruv's rotors created a mini sandstorm that engulfed the helipad at the Pokharan special test facility. The pad itself was mostly used by high level dignitaries that were visiting the site and occasionally it was used to casevac injured personnel from the site. The IAF usually flew those flights, but this Dhruv belonged to another agency, and the helo was completely unmarked even the tail number was in low visibility gray lettering.

Inside the Dhruv sat a five man team from 22 Para (SF), two officers (a Captain and an Lt. ) and the rest were all NCO or equivalent ranks. One of the NCOs was highly experienced in satellite-communications and the Lt. was actually a medical officer. The men were nominally attached to one of the newly constituted Independent Battle Groups (IBG) that were believed to be in the Bikaner area but as the IBG was at its peace station, the men were available for other work.

As the physicist from the Pokhran site clambered aboard the helicopter, the CO of the 58 Engineers joined him as did the representative of the NSC. A lance naik appeared briefly to and pushed a heavy suitcase containing some basic equipment, a geiger counter, a small ionization detector (both developed at BARC), and a hand held air sampler made by DRDL, the sampler would tell you if there were any toxic chemicals or harmful biological agents in the air.

As the hatch in the back of the copter was shut, the Dhruv gently lifted into the dark night sky and over the din of the rotors the Capt from 22 Para (SF) shouted out to the DAE man,

"Do you know what were are dealing with?"

The DAE man shook his head, "Dunno.. could be anything... all I know is that the NSC says it fell from the sky and took out two of our migs on the way down"

The Capt looked at the NSC man, "We were first told that this might be a SAR for the pilots, possibly across the border... I only got the revised mission profile after we took off... what's the real deal."

The NSC man looked on grimly, and after a long pause spoke, " The pilots are dead.. but lets keep an open mind."

The Capt. looked back somewhat unsure of what to say.

As the Dhruv circled the base, the men inside could make out the shadow of the Mi-8 landing on the pad below. Within minutes the Mi-8 was being loaded up with BL-4 compatible hazmat suits and oxygen bottles. It was a familiar drill for the men flying the Mi-8. The Mi-8 and its crew belonged to the Ministry of Home Affairs. The only points of interest was that the pilots were always armed, and for some reason always wore breathing apparatus. The Mi-8 was originally part of the famed BSF air wing (or "Advani's Air Force" as some had jokingly called it when it was expanded in 2001). Nowadays ofcourse the airplanes were "on loan" to another department - the Disaster Managament Agency - another of the Government of India's secret leviathans that seemed to mysteriously appear out of innocuous line items in the CISF and CRPF budgets.

Unbeknownst to the men in the helicopters at Pokharan other giants were on the move at that late hour. At another NSC managed facility in the Aravali hills, company strength of heavily armed men were piling into three Mi-17 helicopters and the commander of the 11 IBG at Bikaner was being roused out of his sleep by a junior officer holding a single line message from Integrated Defence Forces HQ in New Delhi. The single line message when decrypted would simply read ... "Mobilize".

The Thar Incident - I

I am still struggling with my scanner, so in the meanwhile I am putting up parts of a story I wrote a few years ago.

*******
Part I.

With a thunderous roar the two Mig 21 MFs attached to the 46th Wing at Bikaner were airborne. At 1500 feet the airplanes leveled off and swung north in the direction of Rohtak. The boys of Viper flight were on their usual night training mission. After the great Indo-Pak crisis of 2002, what had seemed like strenous but boring training sorties in the late nineties, now appeared in a more serious light. There was another somewhat amusing dimension, that the Viper leader, Sqn. Leader Jagan (Jags) Mehra thought about as he radioed the flight control tower at Nal.

"Viper1 to Indigo, Flt 19 at India-5 Papa-89. request route clear".

The control tower at Nal replied :

"Indigo to Viper1: route clear steer to waypoint 1."

Viper1: "roger Indigo".

With that relatively benign conversation, the interesting part of "Jags" night began, training sortie 19 had just ended and Op Wake-Up was now go. "Nothing like putting a little fear of God into the Pakistanis.." thought Jags.

After a relatively sharp blinking of the lights the two migs dove into a sharp turn and came up along a southward facing direction. The Pakistani TPS-73 radar at Fort Abbas had seen Flight 19 dissappear from it screen about 30 clicks north of Nal and could not see the migs now flying at 200 feet.

The migs shot southwards towards that immense sea of sand between Bikaner and Jaisalmer and after about 10 minutes of flying sub-sonic, they reached waypoint 1-Bravo some 50 kilometers from the Pakistani border, right across the TPS-73 at Fort Abbas. It was at this point the lights on the lead mig went off and the wingman followed in suit.

Jags gunned the engine and his Mig 21 - light as a feather due to the absence of any weapons load shot up into the night sky at an astounding Mach 1.5. Wingman Dharam (Dhak) was right behind him.

Some 100 km away at the Pakistani Air Force's 75th Radar Sqn. at Fort Abbas chaos was breaking out...

The duty officer was screaming into the phone to the Air Defence Center at Sargodha, "Bogey inbound, angels 5 and rising.. speed mach 2. "

Wing Co. Mirza at the other end of the line in Sargodha was not very impressed, it appeared that the duty officer was new from the Quetta sector. Op Wake-Up was a nightly event. The Migs were unarmed.

Co. Mirza gripped the phone, "Listen Karim... its alright it happens everyday.. and.."

Karim cut him off..."There is another one, its moving too fast, descending, high altitude and same bearing..."

Co. Mirza was puzzled, "What?! check your instruments" (or head he thought... these boys from radar school what a pain...).

Karim continued, "Sir, bogey and number three object are now same heading almost same altitude.."

Co. Mirza was baffled, "Karim what are you talking about..." he then turned to his duty officer, a more experience PAF Sqn ldr recently posted here from Gilgit. "Aqif can you go down to the data relay center and see what is going on..."

The men in the Aravali hills saw the same thing and moments later Indigo was recieving the same information from another channel. The Indigo duty officer reacted instantly,

"Viper1 warning warning same altitude break off break off..."

Jags and his wingman were puzzled and then perhaps a second too late they saw it...

The fireball that erupted was visible for miles... perhaps it was all a little too close for Lt. Amar Singh of 26 Para (SF) whose unit was present near the border for reasons no one would really want to talk about anyway.

It was havildar Karnal Singh that saw the objects fall some two miles from their position, but Lt. Amar's people weren't the only ones watching, in the sky above a Divya-6 class earth observation satellite from the NRSA was seeing things too.

The men at the regional reception facility saw what the Divya was seeing, and hit the relay button, which put the image on screen at the National Command Post at Kalagarh near Mohammedpur in H.P.

Was Lt. Amar surprised to hear his radio man recieve an encrypted trasmission from the mission controller to head in the direction of the fallen object? perhaps not... but the physicist who was roused out of his sleep by a captain of the 58 Engineers Regt. at Pokharan certainly was. As he groggily answered the phone, his anger at being woken up was replaced by total surprise as he realized who was on the line, and within minutes he charged out of the room and ran past the captain to a waiting Dhruv helo that had mysteriously appeared in the night.

- to be continued.

Dr, Anil Aggrawal's site.

Hi,

I just found Dr. Anil Aggrawal's personal site. I understand that he write science fiction too. I used to read his columns of forensic science a PIB publication whose name escapes me. It was edited by an acquaintance of my father.

I will write to Dr. Aggrawal soon, I hope he agrees to submit a story for this blog, perhaps one he has written before.

My science fiction blog

Hi All,

This is my first attempt at making a blog dedicated to science fiction and fantasy in the Indian context.

I think Sulekha has a list of science fiction blogs and so does Adbhut.

There are a few small science fiction associations but for the most part this is a forgotten art in the Indian context.

There is another website which aims to to do the same thing that I am doing, I suppose I should email the webmaster.

Anyway more when I actually get something done.