A Fast Buck Affair

A Fast Buck Affair

By D P Ramachandran

Copyright 2012 D P Ramachandran

Published by Notion Press at Smashwords

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Chapter 1

It was Swaminathan’s idea to rob the cash van, and it looked a smart one, the way he put it across. Swaminathan was always full of ideas, and was quite liberal in sharing them with his friends. His closest pals at the time of this latest idea taking shape in his head were his two room-mates, Karthik and Rajmohan. Both these guys had lots of time to while away, with little money for worthier pursuits when they weren’t at work. So they found themselves listening with rapt attention to their room-mate while he outlined his plan of robbery, as they often did when he came up with his brainwaves.

Swamy was a good talker, and they enjoyed listening to him, partly out of awe for what they considered his immense knowledge of almost everything under the sun. They were impressed watching him read many books, an exercise they counted far beyond their intellect. And that more than made up for his scrawny physique and lousy looks. However his schemes were of use to them only in as much as to listen and kill time. Mostly they found them wonky in the end, and forgot all about what they heard before the day was over. But there was something fascinating about this latest one, which had them wondering whether Swamy might after all have come up trumps this time.

Swamy’s schemes were all about making money, a commodity he was perpetually short of, no matter how much he earned. From his perspective, his two friends also never had enough of it, although the poor sods never really seemed adequately aware of it, despite the pittance they earned as salesmen for banking service packages. He knew better, because he was finding how tough it was to make both ends meet with a far better package he earned from a secretarial job in a corporate outfit. Their pitiful existence with no exposure to the finer things of life evoked sympathy in him. A life void of the fun of partying and the ecstasy of getting stoned, in his considered judgment, was no life at all. But it was bothering him that living life as it should be lived saw him broke most of the time and borrowing had become a routine necessity.

When Swamy got an opening in the corporate sector almost immediately after his graduation, though at a lowly secretarial level, he felt at the top of the world. He was barely twenty then, and had great plans for himself. A bright student at college, he reckoned it no big deal to do his master’s in business administration through a distance education course, which should see him climb the ladder right onto the top. He fantasized his life as a CEO, and how he would stun his parents with the figure work of how many times more than a district collector he earned, since they always wanted him to try for government service. They had settled down at Trichy after his father’s retirement from the Railways by the time Swamy graduated, and had looked none too happy about their only offspring going off on a non-government job to Chennai, with no possibility of a transfer to his home town.

That was more than ten years ago and Swamy was yet to surprise his parents, except with his appeals for monetary help every now and then. He had picked up a taste for partying and booze in the first year of his life in Chennai, was onto drugs by the second year, and by the third year trying his chances at the races in a desperate bid to boost up his finances. Somewhere down the line he had totally abandoned his vision of becoming a CEO and surprising his parents.

By nature Swamy wasn’t greedy. What appeared to be his obsession with money was merely his reaction to a shortfall of the stuff which seemed to perennially haunt him. Initially he could manage the show by short-term borrowing from friends or occasional back-up from home; but soon those resources were overstretched. Luckily for him at that stage, credit card culture was picking up, and he soon found himself in possession of almost a dozen of them. He surprised himself with his ingenuity when he managed to roll on for a couple of years by engineering umpteen innovations in the use of credit cards. There was money to be had always, through cash credit or by purchasing goods on his card for obliging friends and pocketing the cash. And with the due dates of payments for the various banks staggered during a month, he could always meet the minimum payment required, which was only five percent of his dues. All the same Swamy was sensible enough to realize that this robbing-Peter-to-pay-Paul game couldn’t go on indefinitely. His hope of getting on top of the situation in one stroke with a big win at the races was proving illusory with every season, as much as winning one of the lotteries, for which he purchased tickets every week. It’s time, he surmised, that something more definite was done about it.

One passion Swamy had, besides a love for everything good and easy in life, was books; nothing serious, just crime thrillers or action stories. James Hadley Chase was his favourite author, since the books were small and quick-reads, besides being available in plenty with pavement vendors who sold second-hand and pirated copies dirt cheap. He had read so many Chase books that he couldn’t always recollect their titles. The storylines somehow lingered in mind, vaguely though; and there was one in particular he remembered far clearer than others. Although he couldn’t rightly recollect the title of this one as well, the story was quite vivid in his memory. This concerned the waylaying and hijacking of an armoured cash van by a gang of robbers. Although the operation ends in a disaster, Swamy was impressed by the audacity of the endeavour, and as he always did after reading a failed plot, he worked out his own amendments to it which could have made it succeed.

Swamy believed that if you thought hard enough of a problem persistently, a solution would always emerge. That’s how he had come up with the plot for robbing a cash van of B & B Security Services, a firm engaged by various banks to carry cash to their ATMs. He was sitting in the office of a small-time timber depot in the suburb of Pallavaram one Saturday afternoon, when the idea was conceived. It was early April in 2006, and the stifling heat was driving him crazy. The owner of the depot, whom he had come to meet, was chatting away on the telephone as if Swamy didn’t exist. A guy couldn’t be more arrogant, he thought; was a telephone call more important than a visitor? But then Swamy was in no position to protest. He owed the fellow money, interest due on borrowed amount; and had come to plead for time. Thanikachalam, the owner of the depot, was essentially a loan shark. Swamy was gazing meaninglessly at the dreary movement of an archaic ceiling fan above, which made no palpable contribution to cool the humid air, when a vehicle screeched to a halt on the road in front of the depot. It was a cash van of B & B Security.

Thanikachalam put down the receiver as if stung, and was out through the door in a jiffy. A security guard had sprung out of the van even faster, and the two met for a second. Before Swamy could blink his eyes, the guard was heading back for the van and Thanikachalam was strolling back to his seat with a grin, an envelope in hand. Bloody Shylock, Swamy thought, just grabbed his pound of flesh; sensing that the shark had just received an interest payment.

Very prompt chap, always pays right on date, Thanikachalam said continuing to grin.

Yeah, but if he leaves the van like that somebody can rob the cash, isn’t it? Swamy observed casually.

It’s only for a second, and no one’s likely to bother anyway. It’s only cash to the local ATMs; not more than five or ten lakhs at best.

How do you know that?

He’s an old friend you see, and he tells me about his work.

Oh, so they never carry more than five or ten lakhs, is it?

They do, occasionally; that’s when they have to bring major amounts from outstations, let’s say from Madurai or Vellore.

How much do they bring then?

Anything up to five crores or so.

Wow, that big!

Sure, but why the interest, you planning to rob a cash van or what? Suddenly Thanikachalam had lost interest in the conversation and added brusquely. In case you are, clear up your dues first, you’re three months behind and I don’t wish to collect it from jail.

I have come to talk about that….. Swamy said pleadingly, but Thanikachalam cut him short. What’s there to talk, just pay up and that’s all.

It’s okay, I’m going to pay you; you’ve got to wait for only this one month. I’ll clear up on the 1st of May.

Last time you said after 31st March.

Swamy had to use every bit of his persuasive charm, explaining how his accounts will be in the blue by end of April when his annual increment was due, before the fellow could be brought around to grant him another month. He wanted to prolong the conversation if possible, because the nucleus of an idea had just formed in his mind to rob the cash van, and Thanikachalam seemed to have useful information. But the swine was in no good mood and seemed to read what was on his mind. It’d have to wait.

Chapter 2

Thanikachalam watched Swamy ease his motorbike off its stand and ride away. The fellow had something on his mind, he would bet. Thanikachalam was a crook and nothing crooked escaped his attention. What he hadn’t told Swamy was that the desire to rob a cash van was not far from his own mind, but he had found it too risky to attempt. To him Swamy generally qualified as an idiot, and that suited him perfectly, because he thrived on idiots. He had been doing that all his adult life, from the time he began his career as a constable in the Border Security Force in his early twenties. That"_s the time he began realizing the worth of conserving one’s money, a notion he had found none too attractive in his growing-up years in a household where it was ruthlessly practiced. His joining the BSF after his matriculation was more or less a direct consequence of that. It was his businessman father’s miserly refusal to part with even a small sum for him to buy a cinema ticket that ultimately drove him to the decision. Now almost twenty years thence and the BSF service behind him, he thought he knew better than his father; mere conservation and small-time business weren’t enough, one must know how to multiply the money by smarter means.

Men with robust physique and a sense of discipline were ideal material for paramilitary service, and Thanikachalam had both. Though he was no sportsman, his life in his native town of Cuddalore, where his father ran a grocery shop, had involved a lot of physical work. He often spent half his day pedalling around the town, collecting petty sums of interest from smaller traders who had borrowed money from his father. He grew up fast and was a ruggedly handsome youth nearly six feet tall by the time he left home to join the BSF. His straight-jacketed upbringing stood him in good stead when exposed to the temptations that saw many of his colleagues squander away their money. He never drank or smoked, whored only when he must, and spent money to buy only things which were of absolute necessity. It was only a matter of time before many of the other guys in his unit, who were broke from extravagant spending, began borrowing from Thanikachalam. And Thanikachalam was well versed with the ways of making a tidy profit out of the situation. But he wasn’t happy; this kind of petty profit was what his father made. He intended to do better.

Thanikachalam’s break came when his unit was deployed in the North East at the Indo-Burmese border. There was a lot of smuggling activity going on there, and soldiers and paramilitary men were known to have their hands in the pie, just for looking the other way. By merely keeping his eyes and ears open, Thanikachalam picked up the thread of the entire racket, and arrived at his own conclusions. There were three main items being smuggled in; electronic goods, dried cannabis plants and drugs in powder form. Electronic goods gave a pittance and was not worth the effort, while drugs were too hot to handle with customs guys sniffing around all over; only the grass – cannabis – looked an attractive proposition that gave good returns with minimum risk. And the nature of his duty placed him in an ideal position where he could quote the price for his services.

Early in service he had shown an aptitude for driving and had eventually become a heavy vehicle driver. Now in the North East he was constantly engaged in driving his truck between Moreh, the border check post manned by his unit, and Dimapur, the Indian railhead which supplied the security forces deployed at the border. It was a 500-kilometre round trip along National Highway 39 which wound its way through Naga and Manipuri hills. This was also the only route for the smugglers to get their contraband across to the railhead, before they could be moved to lucrative markets elsewhere. Civilian vehicles moving on that road were subject to umpteen checks en route, to prevent their carrying arms and ammunition for the insurgents. Therefore, the only means for the smugglers to move the contraband was to bribe soldiers or paramilitary men to carry the stuff in their vehicles.

Thanikachalam worked out his modus operandi with his characteristic thoroughness, once he had entered into a contract with the right people. Grass consignments, unlike those of smuggled goods and powdered drugs, were bulky. Smugglers used porters hired from local tribes, who brought the loads in through the porous border, avoiding the check post. Once they managed to get them into army or paramilitary vehicles, with the connivance of the men in uniform, their transit to Dimapur was generally safe. These vehicles moved in convoys for fear of ambushes by insurgents. The convoys were quite huge with heavy movement of troops and stores all the while, and it was neither the practice nor practical to check the vehicles at any stage. All the same Thanikachalam didn’t find it wise to carry such loads nakedly in his vehicle. Besides he wasn’t going to risk being caught as the transporter or go through the hassles involved in handing over the stuff to whoever was the recipient at Dimapur. He had the smugglers fit their men with military fatigues available in junk markets at Dimapur. They were to carry the grass rolled inside bedrolls of the kind soldiers carried while travelling. And he restricted their number to not more than six or so per trip. Half a dozen soldiers carrying their bedrolls would hardly invite attention, and as far as he was concerned, the guys had missed their unit transport and took a ride with him. And the moment they were dropped off at the railway station at Dimapur, his part was over.

The going was good for Thanikachalam for more than a year when he amassed a fairly good fortune. He had made friends with civilians in Dimapur who helped him open bank accounts without disclosing his identity as a service man, and he stashed away all the money in those accounts. But all good things have to come to an end; and in Thanikachalam’s case the nemesis came in the form of an old Havildar of the Military Police patrolling the platform of the railway station at Dimapur. He took an instant dislike to the slouchy walk of one of the smugglers’ men, which he distinctly considered un-soldier like, and demanded that the fellow produce his papers, an exigency Thanikachalam had not catered for. The fellow panicked and tried to run, only to be rounded up by young toughies of the MP, along with his friends who had followed suit. While the old soldier’s hunch had exposed the disguise, the contents of the bedrolls told the rest of the story.

Taken into custody, they were handed over to the civil police; but not before the Movement Control Officer of the Army at the station had elicited some information from them. It was pretty damning stuff for Thanikachalam, and was promptly conveyed to his unit. Thanikachalam and his smuggler cahoots knew nothing of the disaster.

The officer commanding the unit played it cool, and kept the matter under wraps, until the next convoy day. Then he made a surprise check at the vehicles’ marshalling point, and caught Thanikachalam red handed with a fresh consignment. Being a disturbed area, BSF too was under the army act and court-martial was swift. Dismissed from service, he was tried by a civil court for drug trafficking; but with evidence not too clinching against him, got away with two years’ simple imprisonment.