Sandeep got back into thinking mode as he paced about his table. He knew there was no way he could fool a journalist like Vishal.
Biting his lip, he thought it out before owning up, "We weren't going to close the case completely. The news of arresting a suspect was the only plan we had. I too have been contemplating the scenario you mentioned earlier of the criminal's resurgence into spotlight again. The "what-ifs" of cases where the culprit kidnaps someone else and releases a video, or comes online to ridicule us by proclaiming we got the wrong guy. All of that are potential problems. But we need to have a middle ground somewhere between restraining public protests and actually catching the criminal."
"Maybe you should keep thinking about it till you realize that you would fall into a grave you dug on your own if you proceed with deceiving the public like this," Vishal replied calmly.
He straightened up, gave Sandeep a look of encouragement and opened the door to step out, leaving the DSP to his thoughts.
As he walked down the corridor, passing by the occupied policemen in the police station, victims and perpetrators of various issues busying themselves with the proceedings of their own cases, Vishal took his phone out and called up his colleague. "Is it all ready?" he asked.
When he got a confirmation from the other side of the call, he ordered the person, "Good, let it out then."
###
It was a chain reaction after Vishal lit the ignition.
The news agency that he worked for was well known to be against the ruling party at the helm of the government in the state they operated majorly in. Vishal and a couple of other investigative journalists had been after the quid-pro-quo transactions taking place in the higher echelons of the government, preparing for a large-scale exposure of the multiple scams and scandals happening in the hindsight of ignorant public.
They and their company affiliated lawyers had been secretly digging into everything and compiling the information to blow the whistle on it whenever needed.
The moment Vishal realized Mitra's case was being side-tracked in the name of appeasing the public, he realized there were very few ways in which he could make sure such excuses didn't serve as pitfalls to closing the case. He had asked his colleague to check with the senior management and chief editors of the news agency if they could start exposing the scandals one by one.
Unbeknownst to Vishal there had been many behind-the-scenes push and pull between the people of power and the management executives of the news agency. As soon as he suggested the operation to muddy the government, the executives were more than welcome to start the war.
The prime-time news at eight gave an exclusive coverage of the quid-pro-quo transaction between two ministers of two neighbouring states: one giving up the rights to a massive development project, so it would shift to the other state and the other giving huge benefits off the record to the businesses the former maintained in the latter's state, including inflated investments in said businesses.
It was just the tip of an iceberg of other illegal transactions like insider trading, medical scams, unauthorized mining, anti-environmental industrial processes and so on.
The breaking news exposing just one such activity sent things into a frenzy. It wasn't just a minor transaction, it was a wilful jeopardy of two governments, denying the rights of the people of one state and excessively concentrating business in another.
The evidences were put up in social media and online news portals at the same time. Other news channels quickly picked up on the details and the information spread fast among them, sparking exclusive news coverage and urgent, heated debates on live TV.
Legal cases had already been prepared to be filed and escalated to the judiciary system before the news broke. Those who could benefit from the scandal took full liberty of exaggerating and blowing the information out of proportion.
By eleven in the night the news was making waves and the politicians involved had started trying their best to cover it up. Yet, it wasn't something that could be buried, given the kind of political factions that were involved in the whole rigging of the system.
Around midnight, Vishal walked back into the police station and went straight to Sandeep's office, walking slowly and revelling in the light of the fire he had lit. Sandeep, who had taken off for the day around eight, came back to the office to review the situation.
Given that one of the major culprits involved in the scam was a minister of their state's legislative assembly, there was a backlash in the political circles of the city. There were expectations of political rallies and protests demanding for a fair investigation to erupt in the city the next day.
Sandeep, as like the other higher police officials, had been asked to review the situation and come up with measures to contain the situation.
Sandeep was in a conversation with an accompanying inspector as he walked into his office, when he noticed a serenely standing Vishal waiting outside his room.
As their gazes met and Sandeep studied the contentment and confidence in Vishal's face, something clicked into its place in Sandeep's thoughts.
He beckoned Vishal to enter his office room first, sent the Inspector away saying he will be called for in a while and entered the room after Vishal, closing the door behind him.
Vishal stood patiently in the middle of the room as Sandeep asked in a sharp voice, "You work for VTN, don't you? The news channel that was the whistle-blower of today's scandal."
Vishal nodded. "I do. And it isn't just the news channel. The news I cover gets reported in the newspaper they publish and the social media channels they run."
It was the fastest Vishal had seen Sandeep walk as he crossed the distance between them in fury and stood abreast him, ready to explode.
"Did you start this Vishal?" he asked, his voice barely hiding the anger in its folds.
"You guys started this," Vishal answered unflinchingly. "You wanted to minimize public attention and agitation towards Mitra's case, and I did what you wanted. It's just that the way you wanted to achieve it was through a false narrative and an act of illicit cover up with a wrong suspect, while I chose to do that through an exposure of another truth. I don't avoid facing reality and being honest, sir. No matter how hard it is. The public's attention will be diverted now and in a good way; they need to know the kind of things that are happening with the taxes they pay. We, on the other hand, will get enough time without any scrutiny to catch the criminal for real. If he strikes again with another such video, we won't have to lie our way through it again. We can be honest."