Chapter 20

20
INVADE THE MALDIVES

Since 19:30 hours on 12th December, the entire nation came alert under the State of Emergency. Major Shafeeg in QRF5 on Kela Island, Thiladummathi Atoll, sent two coastguard vessels out to the sea and another to Hanimadeu with 130 troopers to strengthen the force at the airport in the Northern Region. At daybreak, one of the radar scouts detected and reported an intruder aircraft flying towards the Northern Region. Soon they established contact with the pilot who returned to say, “We are flying over the north of the Maldives to arrive at Gan from the west.” The aircraft of the type Ilyushin IL-76MD-90A with four PS-90 turbofan engines of the IAF should have taken direct course to the south to fly to Gan. By then they were in Maldivian aerial territory 30 miles to Kela Island in the north.

Major Shafeeg called the defence headquarters in Bandèrigé and passed the news. There happened to be no proceeding knowledge of an aircraft. Before the authorities could even begin communication with India, Major Shafeeg was witnessing the might of Hindustan that she wanted to show the world that day. He dropped the phone, picked the binoculars and stepped out of the guard post to observe the aircraft flying in the morning sky. Several islanders watched the scene at sunrise.

Indian paratroopers of the 13th Parachute Regiment jumped out of the tail of the IL-76 like mosquitoes from an easterly monsoon and stuck in midair hanging to their harnesses with mushroom clouds gradually descending in a row. Each manoeuvrable parachute got those colours of saffron orange, green and white of the Indian Flag. Sixty heavily armed troopers glided to an area allocated within the Indian interface in Kela Island. Major Shafeeg witnessed Indian military on the ground expanding to a wider area taking over KEP (Kela Energy Project) lying next to the Indian military interface.

As the paratroopers dropped to the ground, an Indian Flag was hoisted in order to declare an invasion of the Maldives under orders from the Air Chief Marshal General of Bharatiya Vayu Sena.

Brigadier Dynn sat behind the conference desk with his head in his palms, totally devastated. There was nothing he could do. He could not order to shoot them down which was clearly against the Geneva Convention to lower dead men on parachutes. He was helpless.

Commissioner X was not at the liaison office at the hour. He rang the Brigadier from his office, “We still have work to do. Operation Twelfth Night isn’t over. We still need their help. Major General is more familiar with Indian sector. Let him do the talking while we focus on to finish the job. I’m calling in the international media.” The Police Commissioner got relatively better links with the western world and the MNDF maintained proximate ties with India.

Brigadier snapped back, “But the invasion has taken place under my watch!”

“Under your very nose, that is how vulnerable we are. So be delighted it’s none other than India.”

“You are high on a joint. You can stay cool but I don’t smoke.”

“That’s your problem, Brigadier. I am moving. I have arranged an Island Aviation aircraft leaving at nine to the south with a team of doctors and nurses, forensic experts, police dogs and medicine. I know it’s a chaotic situation here but we must show up there, appearance counts.”

Madam Keshàe declared that Malé International Airport open for regular operations.

Colonel Omar got news from the Brigadier. He placed the receiver and turned to face his lieutenants and threw the half-burnt cigar to the map room floor. “Fuck the bastards! We have done everything to abort the siege on our own to proclaim victory but now the bullshit of Uthuru Kara has invaded this nation with the muscle of a super pretext of which they have not given reason. The flight is heading to land in Gan.”

Lieutenant Colonel Ishaq asked, “Where do we stand, sir?”

“Do nothing,” Colonel grunted.

“Well, you can shoot them down on grounds of unauthorised entry.”

“No, my friend, I can shoot one down with the anti-aircraft gun on the end of the runway. They’ll blow the whole place up to sawdust. Don’t you think they are here to assist us?”

“I can’t believe this! The international coalition will intervene, Colonel.”

“You fool! There’s nothing nobody can do now. This thing…this whole thing…comes right from India. Bloody India! What international coalition? You look like a bottle of wine. These Indian dacoits got too much shit in their arses for having cows on the streets. Now they want us to be a piece of shit.”

“Why?”

“Why! You wanna know why? You see the eyes! USA, Australia, China, even the mean little race-carrier, Britain, eagerly seeking a military base here on a piece of rock or sandbank after losing all good colonies and that’s why. We sit tight, wait and watch. All we did, we did for nothing. It’s a debacle.”

After forty-five minutes, the IL-76 aircraft flew over Gan of Suvadiva dropping another battery of sixty paratroopers. The islanders on the adjacent island of Gaddo saw the mushroom clouds in the rays of the sun. They hoisted the Indian National Flag in deep saffron, green and white with the Dharma Chakra in navy blue. The third military interface was in Meedu and the forces there had hoisted the Indian Flag sharp at six o’clock, local time. That was slightly before the parachute jump in the north commenced and therefore it occurred the invasion being called on Indian military units from the very top. According to Lieutenant Kailash Mahendra in charge of Meedu interface, the order reached thirty-six minutes before the drop, in other words, the Ilyushin IL-76 transport aircraft was airborne. He received orders to hoist the Indian National Flag in Maldivian soil under the codename Operation Thirty-Six – Blue Waters. And a military band played the Indian National Anthem; Jana Gana Mana – Thou Art the Ruler of All Minds.

Fua Mulak Island wasn’t considered a military zone but a civil location for the space control station.

At seven o’clock local time and 07:30 hrs India time, Prime Minister Lotus of India surprised the world by announcing an invasion of the Maldives. “India sees it of fundamental importance both for the protection and security of the Maldives and India that our nation must occupy the archipelagic nation of the independent and sovereign islands of the Maldives. With regard to crisis that has risen last night from military siege of Fua Mulak Island by a formerly unknown group of terrorists, the Maldives Administration has called on India to help militarily and we responded immediately. Now we find with this new development that foreign organisations are behind the coup in the Maldives, evidently creating serious threat to our space programme and it endangers our nation of India for having these vulnerable islands as an independent country inside our terrestrial waters. We have no interest to put their civil rights and liberty in harm’s way but any intervention by a foreign body or outside cause, civil and military, will be dealt adequately by New Delhi as part of India holding equally recognised charter to all union territories and states of India.

“We will donate and embark on to develop KEP as a gesture to connect key islands in twenty atolls by submarine cable and supply alternative energy to the Maldives.

“Today, 13th December 2012, India has invaded the Maldives for our fundamental interest and greater security of India and the entire region and it compelled us to do so. It is also a significant date in the history of our nations and maladvipa – ‘garland of islands’ of prehistoric Marco Polo era that finally the unification of the ‘Hundred Thousand Islands’ of Lakshadweep entirely is laid down with maiden foundation to mark this glorious marriage to mahila dvipa – ‘the islands of women’.”

The old Sanskrit was how the archipelagos of the Indian Ocean were called but mentioning Lakshadweep would mean the whole archipelagic islands of the Laccadives and the Chagos included and ultimately it could stir an adverse global anxiety. He used the phrase ‘maiden foundation’ denoting just the beginning of a greater scope. Prime Minister Lotus finished the speech by quoting Jawaharlal Nehru, “To be secure on land, we must be supreme at sea.”

Though the Prime Minister cut short to declare the Thirty-Sixth State, Union Territory, the invasion was complete. Shortly after he delivered the speech had the Prime Minister entered a briefing session to study detail of the location of KEP lying next to the Indian military interface on Kela Island or the extent of commitment to place the submarine cable in order to supply any form of electricity to twenty key islands along 900 kilometres of sea. Since then KEP (Kela Energy Project) took a new direction, renamed KESS (Kela Energy Supply Station) for central element to distribute not only nuclear energy but potential alternative forms of energy produced and transformed to electricity in India.

For hours nobody in the annulled government of the Maldives was able to reach the Prime Minister of India.

Quite rapidly, in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the matter of invasion was on draft for submission to the United Nations.

The architect of MUM, Mehdi, who wrote it on Blue Waters about unification with India, had no luck to see the dawn of this day in the Maldives under Indian occupation or as a piece of India. Inspector Jabir took photographs of the corpse lying on the tarmac. When it all got cleared in the end, what left behind was a thick chalk outline of the removed body of Mehdi – the victim of the only bullet from Jaws of Sprout.