Page 59 - Love Story of a Commando

‘Hmm!’ Was that all he could utter?
Sheer disbelief was floating in my eyes, yet I was not ready to give
up. Do or die!
‘So what are your plans, Mr Durrani? Do you want to drop your
luggage in your hotel-room or would you just like to go to the servers,’ I
asked in a very businesslike manner.
‘Servers.’ One single word!
Poor me! Eyes still wide in disbelief.
‘Would you like to accompany me in my car or do you have an
arrangement?’ I asked again, not ready to give up.
If chivalry is a word then he surely was not aware of it.
Instead of replying, he took out his mobile phone, pressed the keypad
and growled, ‘Yes!’ That was it.
Not even a single second passed and a white Hindustan Ambassador
car flashing a red beacon screeched to a stop near us and two police
personnel jumped out of the still moving car and saluted him crisply. I
stumbled a bit and flinched, totally dazzled by the quick events. He got into
the Ambassador and uttered a single word ‘come’ without even turning back.
I followed him at once, not thinking about my own driver and car which was
in the parking area.
There was utter silence inside the car and right then, typical of
Mumbai weather, it began to mist just enough for the car windshield wipes
to skip and hop like a tap dancer as we moved steadily towards our
destination. The rain in Mumbai is beautiful. Then the petrichor emanating
from the roads and soil delights the olfactory receptors! I was tempted to roll
down the car window and stick my face outside and let the breeze play with
my hair, but I decided against it, sighed and let that thought go, with a very
austere Mr Durrani projecting a rigidly puritanical outlook sitting just beside
me.
Our ride to the data servers was in silence, save the swish of the
windshield wipers!
We finally reached the data server building which was situated in
Navi Mumbai Mahape IT Park. Navi Mumbai is a very well planned city and
known to be the hub of software-based companies that acted as IT solution
providers, providing software, hardware, data centre services or website
hosting solutions or many other services to offshore clients while the desi
employees would also be recruited by the same multinational companies as
cheap work force for clients abroad. These are some high security and highly
energized zones of Mumbai, known as the ‘Silicon Valley of Mumbai’.
Our technology-enhanced flagship office building was a state-of-the-
art nine-storey office built on the highest security zone of the IT park where
most government or intelligence offices were situated.