BABAY'S DAY IN

Narayanan called his friend Vijay on phone and said to him “I have good news to share with you. But time being, it is suspense. I can give a clue to you. Do you remember how my daughter was glued to your cell phone and the way she cried when you took it back? For more details, refer to today’s Times of India, Page three”.

Vijay replied “Oh! Yes. I read it in the morning. Is it our Tara who did the miraculous job! A prodigal child! Born CID, I suppose! Can’t believe! A baby of 20 months nabbing three hard core criminals! How it happened? I want to see you. Where are you? Are you free”?

Narayanan said, “I am at present at the photo studio – G.K.Vel. The police wanted Tara’s latest photo. Why should I give them an ordinary photo taken on my mobile phone? So, I came to the studio. It will be with a professional touch.”

Vijay said, “Stay back. I am here nearby. I will join you there.”

In a while he came to the studio. He was having a toy – a policeman -- which, upon a press of a button, will salute and march on. An apt gift for a daring girl who helped the policemen to nab three notorious men. But it took quite a while for him to get what he wanted.

Vijay apologized saying that in search of getting this toy, he got delayed. He said that he wanted this toy only as a gift to the girl and for getting it, he had to run around a few shops.

Tara grabbed the toy, without hesitation, as though she knew it was brought exclusively for her. The studio owner said it might take a few hours for him to get the photos ready.

So both friends went out and settled at a nearby coffee shop. Narayanan narrated the story of how his daughter hit the headlines of the newspaper by her playful adventures on the cell phone and landline phone, both available to her and kept within her reach. She had actually saved the entire family from a great trouble. She had helped the police to catch the thieves. Or else, the thieves would have wrecked hell upon the family. Vijay’s curiosity grew deeper and he wanted to know how it all happened.

Narayanan gave a long report with elaborate details. When it comes to praising his daughter, he just could not resist and never resisted stretching it too far. Vijay was in the mood and lent a patient hearing.

Everyone who knows Tara knows how hard it is to pacify her when she cries aloud. Of late her craze for phone was unimaginable and it was the only thing which helped others to keep her quiet. So Narayanan had to surrender his phone to her to keep her mouth shut. The first thing she did, was to key in a few numbers and start blabbering – without even waiting for the person on the other end to answer the call or to respond. This she kept on repeating quite often. In between, she laid her hands on landline also, which was in its usual place – very near to her play area. In her playful events, she had actually called a few people, without realizing that they had been listening to her and responded to her promptly. What she told the listeners was ‘come home soon uncle’. When they asked for address, she gave that also. ‘Door no 7, street no 7, Sai Nagar. As for Tara was concerned, all numbers were just 7. You just ask her what is the result for three plus four or eight plus nine, it is all seven only. At home Narayanan’s family used to have great fun in asking her various combinations of riddles and questions, for which the answer would be just seven and Tara would without fail hit the right answer. It all started when they were training her to memorize her house address.   After all, in a few months’ time, she had to be admitted in a play school, where the school authorities insist upon each baby knowing his / her house address more than the baby getting used to their toilet habits. Luckily for Tara, her house address contained more sevens than any other number. Rather it was all sevens in her house address which made her telling seven as the answer for any query requiring numbers.

The previous day when she used Narayanan’s cell phone to make empty calls, it had actually gone to a hard core criminal and he replied promptly asking for address which he had noted down. He knew it was a baby’s voice. Then itself, he had hatched a plan to kidnap the baby for which, he had come in the daytime and surveyed the house, studied its whereabouts and the in mates of the house so that he could assess how much could be  extracted from the disparate parents. He had mentally noted down the strategic points of the area, the house, its surroundings and people’s movements in that area. It was an independent house adjacent to a vacant plot, which was ideally suited for mischief mongers to try their hands. He thought it would be better if he had an assistant so that his master plan could be executed meticulously. He called a friend of his to join him. But he refused saying he had some other agenda for the day. As the kidnapper was determined to carry out his work, he was rather constrained to do it alone. He thought the night after eleven pm would be most suitable for his job. Tara had unknowingly invited a problem upon herself – but as luck would have it, she had pushed that very problem upon the kidnapper Kabaali. The problem, meanwhile, did not fall on her. It fell on the culprit and his partners in the crime.

Second number which went through from Tara’s phone, was picked up by a well-known robber, Kadiresan, who was ill famous for robbing all valuables including electronic gadgets – apart from cash and jewelry. When Tara dictated the address, he very well remembered the house, because he had come there as one of the painters and had evaluated the house. He had then itself, seen the baby and noticed her loud cry about which, he had to be very cautious, just in case he happened to enter the house for stealing. So, when Tara called him, he made his mental calculations as to how to enter the house and what all items he had to lay hands upon and how soon he had to escape without being caught – particularly by the wide mouth Tara and her loud pitch. While he was busy in his mental assessment, Kabaali had called him to join him in his venture. By then, he had neatly worked out his plan layout, and so he point blank refused the offer. Little did he know then, that the two would be meeting soon on the same day and at the same venue and more or less for the same cause – looting! For one the target was the baby and for the other, the valuables in the house. Each one was counting how much they would get in the deal. Both were not aware of the proverb “Do not count the eggs before they are hatched”. But both the criminals were good at hatching nasty plans for nasty deeds.

Tara was busy as usual with her innumerable half baked calls and imaginary monologues. But once again she clicked a full number which had gone to a thief, Kaali – a car lifting thief. He on his part had responded asking for the address and the car number. As usual, Tara gave her famous reply – Sevens.

It was sheer co-incidence that all three criminals had decided to descend on her house at eleven pm and carry out their heinous plan. Kabaali was an expert in getting small children into his folds either by chiding them in nice talks or by giving them sweetmeats. When these things did not work, he used a powder which would induce the victim to be unconscious. Kadhiresan was an expert in sneaking into any house, even through a small hole or gap. In Tara’s case, he had already noted the presence of a ventilator on the top of door. Removing the panels and getting inside would be just a child’s play for him. As for Kaali, opening any lock –be it padlock door-lock or car-lock, was not a big thing. He had a master key for all sorts of locks. Or else how did he manage to steal a car a month? And yet he remained uncaught and unreachable. A master thief is one who goes about stealing, but does not get caught, nor leave a trace or clue. He was no doubt, a master thief.

After making a good number of phone calls, Tara got bored in meddling with the cell phone. She just threw it and switched on to some other play thing. She dug herself into her toy-land container and kept throwing out one by one. While doing so, one cute little micky mouse toy hit the landline phone and the receiver fell down from its cradle. The minute she saw the telephone, all her attention went back there. She ran towards the phone and started the same old game of dialing and calling. Here also she was not disappointed. She had dialed railway enquiry, fire services, ambulance police etc. While all others dismissed her calls as child’s pranks, the police also almost ignored it. But it seems she had called them twice, so they took a serious note of it. They had noted down the address and were wondering whether any such address existed or not. They rang up the post office of that area, but the post office could not help in giving exact identity of the residents. But they confirmed street no, localities, colonies etc as correct. A police man went to the area and found out such an address to be in existence. He cautioned the members of the house. Narayanan’s wife attended on the policeman’s enquiry. She felt embarrassed when she came to know that the police took Tara’s nuisance calls very seriously and came in person to advise the house members. She begged for pardon and assured to keep the phones beyond baby’s reach. The policeman was actually looking for some small token amount of bribe, but on hearing the baby’s loud cry, went back without a word.

The actual drama was yet to be launched. Around 10 pm, a curtain of silence fell on the house. There was actual pin-drop silence as the baby had gone to sleep and so were her parents. All lights were put off and it was not even a full moon day. But as time slipped on, one by one all three visitors to Tara’s house had assembled, each one, surprised by other’s presence. Initially, they did not realize that they were all on the same mission. Only when they stumbled upon each other, they realized that each one of them had come there with individual unique plan. The real trouble was nobody wanted to give up and nobody wanted to be a partner and nor they wanted to share their booty. First of all, exposing their plans was, in itself a great risk. Kabaali asked Kadir to go back, because the latter had refused the offer in the afternoon, when it was put forth by former. But there, at the venue, he was the first one to be present. Kadiresan asked Kabaali to go back as he had already worked out his plan very meticulously. If other two men, Kabaali and Kaali, were not present, he would have simply crept inside the house and made a clean sweep and left the place also. But now he was unnecessarily hung up. Neither could he carry out, nor could he retreat. It was the same thing for other two members also. Even though they were talking in low voice, the hush-hush was more than enough to invite anybody’s attention. After a long debate and discussion and much to their own dissatisfaction, they came to a compromise. They finally and unwillingly settled down to a midway course – Kadiresan was to open the main door lock, by sneaking into the house through the ventilator, so that Kabaali could gain entry into the house easily. Kaali needed to wait as a standby, till the door was opened. Or else he had to try his hands, on closed locks. After that was done, Kaali could go ahead with his car episode. Once inside the house, Kadiresan would lead Kabaali to the baby and her parents’ bed room after which, Kabaali would be on his own on his work. Kadir would also be at his jet speed in carrying out his laid-out plan. Once Kabaali was out with the unconscious Tara, he would straight go to Kaali’s house, from where he would raise his demand for ransom. That was the final plan. Both Kaali and Kadiresan demanded that they should sufficiently be compensated for their share of risks. When almost settled on who should do what, the trio were about to start on their ventures. Just then, they felt the presence of a fourth man in the scenario. Oh! God! A policeman! Instantly, they decided “Okey. No problem. This cop is a known chap but only thing is that his demands are a little high. On the contrary, if we do not agree, we all will be in soup. So better we include his cuttings too”. They came to the cop and tried to settle with him. But things were not that easy and time was ticking, faster than they could settle. Anytime, situation could get worse. Sooner they finished and left, the better for all of them. At this point, Tara’s earlier phone call worked. She had unknowingly telephoned the police department twice and on both the occasions it was lifted by very different policemen. One cop had gone earlier to check with the address and confirmed that things were normal and cautioned the house residents against unwarranted nuisance calls. The second call was attended by another policeman, a senior officer, who developed a feeling that the baby had an intuition of some sorts and sought for police help. So, he told his junior policeman to be at the house around midnight and ensure that things were normal. If it was not so and in case of an abnormal situation, he was advised to blow his whistle, so that some more policemen could be rushed to the spot and deal with the case. So, the policeman was there. As foreseen by the senior officer, the situation was tense and abnormal. The cop blew the whistle and alerted other policemen. Because of the sudden blare of whistle, Tara woke up in a jiffy and got startled. Instantly, she cried aloud. Narayanan and his wife also got up.  Immediately they rushed outside to know what was brewing there at this hour of midnight. Oh My God! Quite a few policemen, a few strangers and a faintly familiar face … oh, yes! The painter … what was going on … all in a terrible mess. Narayanan went to the policemen and asked what happened and why so many were in his house compound. By then all the three thieves were nabbed and hand-cuffed and were under police custody. The police officer simply said “Congrats Mr. Narayanan. It is your daughter who helped us to catch these three most wanted criminals. These criminals had actually targeted your house and spread nets to trap all of you. But you see they fell into their own traps and are now in our custody.”

Narayanan was not aware of any development unless and until it was narrated to him by the police, who in turn, extracted the information from each criminal. “My Goodness!” exclaimed Narayanan. “My car was to be stolen, my house was to be robbed and on top of all, my daughter was to be kidnapped! Oh! No, never, never!  Thank God – Tara, my precious jewel, saved us from this great nightmare. Thank you officer and thank you all policemen”.  He thanked the police team profusely.

Next day, Narayanan was not surprised when he opened the newspaper and found the night long family drama in print. After all it was big news and his family was yet to recover from the shock of miraculous escape.

All these incidences he told vividly to Vijay at the coffee shop. He instantly reacted. “It is more interesting than a detective story. It reminds me an old English movie ‘Baby’s Day Out’, where the baby goes crawling down the entire city and keep the three thieves chasing him. Here our Tara, sitting at home and just by making calls, simply drew them under one roof and put them behind the bars. So it is a story of ‘Baby’s day in’. Wonderful! Okey. Are you planning to get her into a special training as proposed by Police for sharpening her CID skills, similar to the Canine training – sniffer dog training?” Narayanan instantly retorted. “What nonsense! My daughter for a canine training – a sniffer dog training? Nothing doing. She is a gem of a girl- more than a precious jewel to us. I do not believe in child labour either. Let her do whatever she wants when she grows up. The police wanted her photo. So I came here and certainly not for enrolling her into any police training. Do you know how old she is – just twenty months. She is just learning to talk”.

While father Narayanan and uncle Vijay were busy talking about her future, Tara was busy keeping the policeman marching around her – this time the toy policeman.