The intelligence war was over because Antara didn't call anyone when she recently visited Kolkata.
As in, those that were not her spouse's relatives.
Antara didn't like people who talked a lot, it had become a problem after her parents got their landline phone in the late 1990s.
If a relative called and Antara happened to reply, she'd say, "Yes", "No", "Thank you", 'I don't think so but I'll check etc" and then hang up. She had thought it was the polite way to deal with others. These people, however, complained to her parents that though she had picked up the phone, Antara didn't start a conversation.
What would Antara talk about? Ajit paid for things, Anjali cooked, Antara studied. Later, she had a difficult relationship which would lead to a marriage. Not one of these were topics which you should discuss with others. Did you watch any movie lately? No, she didn't.
Over the last few years, Antara did write daily emails to one and all. She sent various social media invitations to others, to initiate a gradual move away from Whatsapp, an app Antara didn't use. Not one of these individuals was willing to use another Instant Messaging app or would reply, initiating their own discussions of WWII, and you have to believe these people were expecting a phone call from Antara when she was visiting Kolkata?
The 'minders' were difficult people, why it was called a "torture-surveillance". They had described the Chetla danger to Antara in elaborate terms. "They'd deny you, say Chetla was their relative, show photos of Chetla being present alongside your relatives, whether those photos were real or not. When seriousness, intellect, a thoughtful attitude became known as Treasury attributes, when the opposite of the above was to be embraced and celebrated to insult the Treasury, you wouldn't know the lengths to which people would go".
Antara knew the lengths to which people would go.
In Class KG2, she was made to sit on the last bench at the back of the classroom, with a girl called Ginni/Guinea. Currency sat at the back, it was not the foremost on people's minds.
In Class 1, Samrat (meaning 'emperor') had poked Antara's eye with a pencil, during Bengali class, then immediately started howling, "Oh, boo-hoo, it hurt so much, my eye, my eye" even before Antara managed to complain to the teacher, who had started laughing anyway. So some Emperor had tried to play using Lenin, ended up hurting the legit lease and had been ridiculed by Bengalis for losing control of the Bolshevik Revolution. (Oh dear, that's the Russian narrative, without any warning!)
In Class 2, another boy had buried his head in his arms on the desk, softly crying, "I have to face my father at court tomorrow" (his parents were going through an acrimonious divorce). That same boy was at Lehman Brothers (NY) when it collapsed in 2008 and how would Antara have known that the Lehman collapse pitted her against her father, that his Communism would throw him to the opposite side?
In Class 3, Antara's birthday was memorable, "Your birthday? I'll make your birthday cry", one of the teachers had said. It was 1987, the year the legit lease was supposedly lost to Japan. Whether lost or nulled or voided, it was always because of the Hebrew Congregation.
Hardly any reason to pay up or get excited.
By 1988, ETSI/standardisation had set in, Antara sat on the front bench every day, with a boy whose myopia was worse than hers. That boy stayed in India, had boys of his own, but he was close to S&P Global, the one purportedly with German intelligence, so how was his myopia worse than Antara's? Because he switched to Bausch & Lomb contact lenses in the early 1990s, what Antara could never use because of Ukraine?
Then who'd Antara call in India, if she had nothing to talk about?
It was no longer possible for Indians to return to Antara's life in a triumphant manner. They could be smug because of what they had done to the legit lease. They could be not knowing about how Jewish women had been regarded in the legit lease. However, the possibility of a triumphant return was over.
Antara was good with history, she witnessed the disruption of historical work over the last decade. That was all there was to it, hardly any reason to feel intimidated around her.
Unless, men and women were unsure of what Antara's life had been like as a freelancer, after she had quit HT. Again, there was nothing to it, "A whole rush of books, Antara, new publications, thought I'd read the names out to you over the phone, tell me which one sounds fun, or you'd want to review".
Or, "I've fallen short, I could really do with an essay, can't you just whip up a literary discussion?"
Of course, all of that ended around a decade ago, after a trip to Batanagar.
February 23, 2026.
****
