The 2029 Independence day is only one month away.

The Chairman of DRDO ( Defence Research & Development Organisation ) took a deep breath and switched on the secret switch on the back of Jawaharlal Nehru. The cloning with AI ( Artificial Intelligence ) had been perfected on deep learning tools over a decade now. The Prime Minister was very pleased with his earlier project of Nandini – cloned cows in the model Rohtak village. It made him launch, Moo, a subsidised milk scheme and turned Nestle, Mother Diary and Amul  to red. Electronic docile cow projects are now hot on start-up list.

The Nehru blinked. And blinked again. Then he opened his eyes and looked at the people around him. He has to get him a jacket and a Russian Eagle pipe. More important he has to sale the idea to Prime Minister. He had already briefed Aide-bhai.

After a second of silence, Nehru said, in Hindi, “Where’s Edwina ? Where’s the stingy Morarji Desai who can tell me how much should I spend today ? Who are you? Where am I? And why’s it so sunny outside?  What a blinding sun. This is damned country – I do all my meetings after sunset. ”

And was silent again. Then the Chairman of DRDO turned around and said to his Officer on Special Duty, “Go and request for a meeting with the Prime Minister through PMO. And be properly dressed when you call. The phone is an IOT device.”

When the Chairman entered the Prime Minister’s room, the later  was in heaven over a plate of white khatta dhokla. He was being briefed about a Make in India storm – called Narayan Namo to combat the Made in Spain, El Nino by his Aide-bhai.  Aide-bhai was  picking up blue chip stocks on his mobile stock app, while discussing how to grow a brewing cyclone from an infant. That obviously required more deliberations with ISRO, particularly if the torrent can be guided over the states currently ruled by the opposition, trading off central relief to buy votes in the forthcoming winter election.

The Prime Minister requested the Chairman to take a seat and said, “ Aide in-Chief bhai, the morale of the country has been pretty down. There is absolutely no cash. The automobile industry has also crashed as everyone is using shared services. Home delivery, home office, home entertainment, home subsidy, have made it superficial for urban people to go out in the age of AI, VR and IOT. 7G provides data free as a trade off to our policy of 100% foreign equity participation in petro-chemical industries. They only have to make one waterless toilet for every five employees. Swachh Bharat has finally happened, outside is now cleaner than the inside of most  homes. Even though I  promised that we are on the verge of a permanent settlement on Kashmir with China,  there had been no terrorist attacks for three months already, and even though the United States committed to renew diplomatic relations with China the minute they got out of Kashmir – yes, well, there was a window of opportunity to go back in there again and we took advantage of it – and even though the previous week, in a highly impressive ceremony, the bodies of soldiers killed in the “New Kargil” operation (or, as the newspapers called it, “Capturing Li Kequiang’s Yeti”) were laid to rest– despite all that, morale somehow did not rise to the great heights it had reached ten years earlier, when the surgical strikes were publicised and Beef & Burqa banned. Aide-bhai, what is happening? You’re not coming up with any one-liners that I can use against all those Opposition-bhais and bens ? What is the matter? Why aren’t you doing your job? Do you want to go on chutti or what? Yes, Chairman – what can I do for you ?

Before the Chief Scientist and Chairman of DRDO could open his mouth, the Aide -Bhai said, “ No, no, Boss-bhai. The independence day is only a month away. We will create a new wave. Am sure the Chairman has come to consult you on a novel idea. He spoke with me last week.”

And in the secret meeting of the three powerful people, the Prime Minister said, “First of all, I deny that morale is declining. And second of all, we must raise the morale by Independence Day. We must!”

Hardly had the Prime Minister finished talking, there was a discrete knock and security let in the beautiful Parsi Minister of Health.  She immediately gave flying kisses to all and requested the Prime Minister to grant their long pending demand for an increase in the budget for AIDS research.

When the Prime Minister finished choking with laughter at the request, he said, “First of all, I deny laughing. And second of all, maybe you can invent something for the forthcoming Independence Day ? AIDS does not exist in cows. And human sex is a meaningless exercise. Invent something novel. ”

“Invent?” – said the Minister of Health very suspiciously – “Maybe you should talk to the Ministry of Agriculture ? I heard they are developing a variety of salt from sea-water that tastes like sugar.”

“ What a useless waste of money ? Why can’t they grow more bio-tech sugarcanes?” the Prime Minister wondered.

“ Boss bhai, it will give a further boost to salt export from Kutch. Domestic consumption of salt has to reduce,” chipped in Aide-Bhai.

The Prime Minister nodded with the force reserved only for prime ministers, and said, “ Good point. We should have a ‘ Check-up Blood pressure day’. Coin a Hindi phrase for this. Please take note .”

The Chairman finally broke his silence and said , “ Prime Minister, I have come to share with you a novel idea. Scientific, but Indian. Something revolutionary, but with roots. Maybe something related to our Freedom movement.”

“ Freedom. A nice word for the matured.” The Prime Minister silently remarked.

“ Freedom ?” Aide-Bhai asked in some confusion.

“Stop repeating what I say!” demanded the Prime Minister. “You know there are hardly people left who had participated in the freedom movement. In fact none. People aren’t interested anymore. Movies on Subhas Bose and Patel have been flops.”

“ That’s understandable. Even Bengalis don’t like to idolise Subhas Bose anymore. Too much of activity for them. Tagore is better. And Patel being Gujrati is always looked on sceptically by others. More so after we made his ‘ Made in China’ statue by CSR funds from Public Sectors,” quipped the Health Minister, “Anyway the concept of India has changed from 1930s. We only have to hold our reigns in the Hindi heartland.”

“The hell with them!” the Prime Minister pounded his (soft) fist on the table. He used an earbud to tickle himself and said,  “You see – that’s just the problem! People forget the history of our Freedom movement. We must, must, must do something! You are correct, Chairman, what do you have in mind ? ”

“ Prime Minister, DRDO have made a machine more ‘human’ than we ourselves are,” submissively said the Chairman.

And then, in an exciting flash of intuition, the sort that only Ministers have , the idea popped into the mind of the Prime Minister.

And he said, “What about a AI based clone controlled from any IOT device ?” Then he got irked and said “ But you and your technical stuff, does not work most of the times. You know the present USA President likes Bollywood and he got a clone of Rekha- the yesteryear sizzling heroine, made. He wanted me to experiment with her in the Oval Office after the gala dinner. Whenever I touched her, she mentioned, ‘You have performed an illegal action and this program will close down.’ The President got very embarrassed and was on the point of ordering a FBI enquiry into it, when I intervened and gave his technical staff a simple idea to get a clone of Pa done with his thunderous voice, height and wig. I received a complement from the US President a month back. Rekha is behaving very nicely and even happy. I don’t want our CBI to get dragged in what you make, Chairman. “

“ Sir, we are much better than the Americans in this. We had been cloning from time immemorial, right from early vedic age. Recollect Ganesha. In a  very hush-hush manner our highest-ranking scientists worked on the first online AI based clone. It is based on deep learning.”

What the Chairman did not mention was that with the help of micro-celled, multi-orgasmic satellite communication (although they still hadn’t found a scientific use of the latter program), the first AI based clone was a 24*7 IOT device. All the time. Which opened a window for it not only on a wider variety of facial expressions, but also on the largest database in human history. The clone was everything: all the history, mathematics, art and philosophy from the time human beings came into existence, plus another million, three hundred thousand and seven hundred  video films of Sports, Bollywood, Kollywood, Tollywood, including the porn web-series, the political speeches and the doctored interviews. They have made two of such kinds.

The Chairman had anyway made up his mind to make one of them Jawaharlal Nehru. Not just the face and the jacket and pipe: the character, personal history, hatred of Jinnah and Bose, the frustrated artistic ambitions, non-alignment with his wife, the repressed sexuality. All the accumulated memory of that man, including the most marginal details, up to those final minutes on his death-bed.

And when they turned it on, they weren’t just plugging in another machine. They were bringing Jawaharlal Nehru back to life. And it was all so that the people of India could watch him deliver the Tryst with Destiny speech while the current Prime Minister hoisted the flag and announced the flagship schemes which would excite India for the next five years in a misplaced exuberance. The Prime Minister will then blame dynasty politics and Nehru will publicly apologise. That’s the script given by Aide-Bhai. His problem is with the other clone – what shape to give it and what is the atypical content of deep learning to be imbibed into the character.

He simply said, “ Prime Minister, we have made a Jawaharlal Nehru. If yourself and Aide-Bhai be kind enough to visit our facility, I can demonstrate to you.”

The Chairman loved the dropping of jaws his statement caused. He only hoped his wife should not treat him like a dusting rag at home.

The next day, the VIPs visited and saw Nehru.

“Well,” asked the visibly agitated Prime Minister, “Does it work?”

The Nehru looked him in the eye. It got up and extended its hand. “ Jawaharlal Nehru. Nice to meet you.”

The Prime Minister recoiled, as if bitten by a snake.

“It’s all right,” said the Chairman, “he’s harmless.”

“What do you mean, he’s harmless,” said the Prime Minister, “he’s Jawaharlal Nehru – the Machiavellian architect of modern India. The dynasty started with him.”

“Well yes, “ the Chairman shrugged. “That doesn’t mean he’s a Rottweiler.”

“Wait just a minute,” the Prime Minister said, “how come he speaks colloquial modern Hindi?”

“The internet,” explained the Aide-Bhai. He obviously loved the clone much to the relief of the Chairman. “Nehru, sing a song from the Honey Singh hits, our next Cultural Minister.”

Nehru sings,

“Chaar bottle Vodka
Kaam mera roz ka
Na mujhko koi roke
Na kisi ne roka..”

“Okay, I get it,” grumbled the Prime Minister. “Ah… Mr. Nehru, do you know why you’re here?”

“Yes,” said Nehru solemnly. “And I think you are absolutely right. India needs an excitement. Now cricket is no longer a religion after cows displaced cricketers. And Indian film-stars are passe after Netflix . I want to speak to my countrymen and also remind them of Gandhi, Patel and Shyamaprasad. Much of the conflict that you created with Sardar Patel was artificial. We worked together, shoulder to shoulder, to make India free. I advise you to announce the first Digital five year plan- from the archived notebook of Mahalonobis, which I have got in my memory. Maybe you can announce a posthumous Bharat Ratna for him – better late than never. Remember, a moment comes, which comes but rarely in history, when we step out from the old to the new; when the age ends; and the soul of a nation which was long supressed finds utterances. My heart is with the Indian people throughout all the generations.”

“Pardon me?” the Prime Minister opened his eyes wide.

The Chairman took the Prime Minister aside and explained: “You have to understand – he knows everything. Everything that happened after his death, all the scams, the way we made our cows docile, the spectrum, social media and the utter destruction  of socialism, of which he was a strong believer. How soft cash through digitisation have made us totally hard up. He knows that today, racism is considered a scientific joke but still valid for our electoral politics. And he greatly admires everything India has achieved in the post-liberalisation phase including paper-boats. He thinks it’s wonderful. Especially the off -shore settlements and the Indian Hockey team. It changed everything he thought about the Indians being only farmers.”

“He’s Nehru. An aristocrat !” the Prime Minister shouted furiously. “All of a sudden he loves the opposition and the masses ? That’s all I needed!”

“Ah… it’s even worse than you think. Now he sees the fanatic Muslims as the greatest threat to our civilization,”  said the Chairman with sincere apology.

The Prime Minister’s eyes narrowed to two small slits.

“Don’t tell me…he was a friend of Bhutto and Nasser. ” he whispered.

“I suspect so,” said the Chairman, and sighed. “Now he’s against the Middle East.”

“Fuck.”

“Fuck me”, said his aide, while trying to turn his bulky backside towards the PM.

“Fuck fuck fuck fuck! This is no joke. Are you guys understanding the repercussions ? ”

“ We have not yet spoken to Mr, Adani, Mr. Goenka, Mr. Shiv, Mr. Maran and Mukeshbhai,” expressed Aide-Bhai.

The Prime Minister covered his face with his hands, but the moment the door opened for the orderly to bring in the lemon tea, he said quickly, “I deny saying dirty words in English!”

Only then did he see that by the side of orderly, the Minister of Health has also crept in. “Ah, it’s you,” he said, putting his hands back over his face. “Fuck fuck fuck me.”

“What happened, lets meet at night ?” the Minister of Health consoled him ”then you can tell Mamma all about it.”

“The speech,” sighed the Prime Minister, immediately denying he’d sighed, “it’s not going the way I thought it would.”

“But everything’s ready!” said the astonished Chief in-Aide. “The podium is connected, Nehru is ready, we have AR Rahman for the anthem, what’s the problem?”

“What’s the problem?” the Prime Minister fumed, “the problem is that people will start liking this son of a bitch. Even his apology for dynastic rule will not be believed. Did you see the news last night?”

“No,” said the Minister of Health, “I was at the memorial service of BSF Jawans at Itanagar.”

“Your loss. His stoned great grandson charmed everyone. He admitted that he’d made a horrible mistake in taking drugs for three decades and did not listen to his own mother and to the patriarchs of his party. He did not kill his brother in-law though his sister had been requesting for it for so long, as Roberto supplied him with his choicest drugs whenever and wherever he needed them. He had no problem with dying to atone for it. And that’s nothing yet: then he said he had only one request, that we should watch out for the Pakis and Bangladeshis, and we shouldn’t trust a single word they say, because they’re not so hot as a race.  Now we get his great-grand father with his powerful oratory of destroying Arab world and the country will rock for hate-mukht world.”

“So,” the Minister of Health, “So what? Everyone who votes for you also thinks that anyway. Annexation in the only way to remove hate.”

“ Everyone will vote for you who has a Modi-come of sense,” echoed Aide-Bhai.

.“Terrific!” the Prime Minister fumed, “Through this Mr. Nehru, we will call for the mass annexation of the Middle East. USA is waiting for me to nod and they have promised HI Visa in reciprocation to all brick layers of Punjab and Rajasthan for building that imaginary wall. Maybe we have a point here.”

“Aahh.,” exclaimed the Minister of Health.

“I deny that you said aahh,” said the Prime Minister.

“You can’t deny things other people say,” the Minister of Health informed him, “only things you yourself say.”

“Aahh,” said the Prime Minister, and put his hands over his face again. “What should we do?”

“We need something… something strong…” the eyes of the Minister of Health clouded over for moment. “Something emotional, sad, that will bring things back into perspective for Indians.”

“We already had ‘Narendra Modi’ and ‘ Accidental Prime Minister’ being broadcasted on all the popular channels and debates on that was organised on the News Channels. But anti-incumbency is still high. I decided for a mini friendly war with Pakistan but our Defence Minister vetoed it as he did not want to come to South Block early due to his IBS problem,” grumbled the Prime Minister.

“No, something much more… tell me,” – the  Prime Minister’s face suddenly brightened – “maybe DRDO makes another clone like that?” Then he whispered to the Chairman.

For more than two weeks, the research scientists of DRDO worked around the clock.

They made the eyes black, big. And sad.

The smile – gentle, touching. And sad.

The body – fragile, youthful, as it had been. And sad. Very sad.

And at the end of those two weeks, they plugged in Edwina Mountbatten. Zzzzzt..and her eyes opened.

“Whatever action is performed by a common man, the great men follow in his footsteps, and whatever standards he sets by exemplary acts, all the world pursues. ” said the Edwina Mountbatten, misquoting from the Bhagwad Gita, interchanging  ‘Common man’ with ‘ Great’.

They let her scan the internet quietly, and in an hour and a half, she was updated.

“Wow,” she said. “I don’t believe it.”

“Yes,” the Chairman told her. “It’s amazing what science can – “

“Incredible!” she said excitedly, “what a hunk that Leonardo di Caprio is!”

After consulting Chief-in Aide, the Chairman made the clones public. And hell broke loose.

Edwina conquered them. Conquered? Knocked them out is more like it. She was the success of the decade. She appeared on eight TV programs a day, telling her heart-rending stories. Not even a week had passed, and the entire world had already fallen at her feet. Whatsapp and social media were flooded by Edwina jokes. She wore sari of Sabyasachi in one programme and that became the style statement, displacing the Bollywood brigade.  The high point occurred on a special program in Jawahar Lal Nehru stadium,  in which the two clones were guests moderated in a AAP Ki Adaalat show, sitting across from each other. She was so beautiful when she said to Nehru ,  “I hated seeing you drive away this morning after your rehearsal of the apology speech of dynasty rule before the Prime Minister . . . You have left me with a strange sense of peace and happiness. ”

“Perhaps I have brought the same to you? That’s the tryst with destiny,” said Nehru and then he broke down and cried on live TV.

The Prime Minister mumbled over his masala chaas while watching this at his residence, “ “Life is a dreary business, and when a bright patch comes it rather takes one’s breath away . . .”

“Forgive me,” Nehru said, “Forgive me. I can’t believe I was such a shitty person who lacked the guts to marry you. I know Louis was ready for a divorce. Kamala  wanted younger ones and ruined my daughter’s marriage by making overtures to her own son in-law. This Gandhi stopped me and after that it was too late as I was in awe of Ambedkar.”

“It’s not so bad,” Edwina comforted him, “the important thing is that we’re both here, all the rest doesn’t matter.”

For the remainder of the program, they held hands.

The Prime Minister rubbed his hands in glee and turned off the TV. He said to his Aide-Bhai, “ Brother bhai, it’s a done deal. The people are ecstatic. Tomorrow we make Nehru give the speech and then we will make him apologise for dynasty politics and extra-marital affairs. The celibate RSS will  be happy and can ban Valentine’s day also.”

And his Chief in-Aide came out of his sauna wrapped in a towel and said, “Tell me, what are you going to do with the Edwina?”

“That is a problem,” he said. “We have to find some use for her.”

“Maybe an ambassadorship?”

“There are no openings,” he said. “Before the elections, I had to do some favours for a few  people.”

“But there are so many countries. Unfortunately she will not fit into the party otherwise I wouldn’t have asked you ” his Aide tried.

“There were a lot of people,” the Prime Minister closed the discussion.

“Too bad,” his Aide-Bhai said and sat down at his chess board to plan the next Fischer move. “Tell me, what’s happening tomorrow after the Independence Day celebration?”

“ The party in honour of the Spanish Prime Minister, who is our chief guest. He also wants to meet Edwina on a one-on one. ”

“So maybe you can ask the Edwina to even cook something from the internet.”

The Prime Minister suddenly froze. “Brother,” he said a few seconds later, “you are fantastic. That will be international breaking news. Churros by Edwina. And international Make in India Edwina Chefs.”

Yes, he immediately called the  Minister of Bio-Technology  and instructed him to open a production line of Edwina Mountbatten to be used as chefs.

“It’s a terrific idea!” the Prime Minister said enthusiastically, “we’ll make billions through Amazon and Flipkart! Maybe a cash back offer if the dish is not to the taste.  There wouldn’t be a dry-eyed person left in the world in next six months as they will taste royalty.  Is there anyone who won’t pay two thousand dollars for an Edwina Mountbatten cook in the house? Divorce lawyers will make merry as husbands will hang around in kitchens. You should ask their associations in every country to contribute to your party fund. ”

“But Mr. Prime Minister,” the Minister of Bio-Technology, “that could have sexual ramifications. A maid, a young girl… you know.”

The Prime Minister grew silent and thought about that. And a moment later, he said, “You’re right. In that case, no less than ten thousand dollars a piece! Let affairs be a function of the elite. ”

But in his stupidity, the Minister of Bio-Technology told his wife about this plan. She hailed from Tumkur and news flew from South to North in no time. The DRDO centre detailed the plan further, developed into a workflow and put up on their Intranet. And the Edwina Mountbatten, the minute she realized they were talking about her on the net, hacked into the DRDO Data Centre and read everything. That very evening, she managed to slip through the tight security into Nehru’s room at Raj Bhavan.

When he saw her, he stood up, sheepish. And he said, “Edwina, I’ve been thinking about you the whole time. I am really very, very, very – sorry.”

“There’s no time for that now,” she told him. “We have to escape.”

“But Edwina, I decided to speak tomorrow. Was rehearsing the script they had given me,” said Nehru.

“Don’t be an idiot,” she told him. “You’re not Jawaharlal Nehru! You’re a poor AI based clone into whose head they shoved a ready-made personality.”

“But that’s the only personality I have. I don’t have another one.”

She approached him and looked into his eyes. He was struck dumb. Her hand rose to his face and touched him gently.

Then she kissed him. Her lips fluttered across his mouth, then back again. He blushed.

“Edwina…” he said.

“Do you love me?”

“I… yes, I think so.”

“It’s their world, Jawahar,” she told him. “We’re two freaks. You they’ll kill after they win the elections, and me, they plan to turn into a housemaid.”

“No!” his eyes opened wide in rage.

“It’s you and me against all of them,” the Edwina Mountbatten said, tears filling her eyes. “Come on. Now!”

And that’s how the great escape happened. NIA was called for the investigation of disappearance of the two clones. IB Chief resigned.

And the Prime Minister was very, very, very disappointed, but immediately denied his disappointment on three TV channels at the same time. The channels were asked to start a debate on the future of AI and how prepared India is for a China launched Deep Learning attack ! Whoever argued that maybe it was feasible were labelled as socialists.

And the couple in love?

The Nehru started growing a moustache and a goatee. No one recognized him anymore.

The Edwina Mountbatten shaved her head, bought a midriff top, had a ring stuck in her bellybutton, and found a job immediately as an anchor of Al-Jazeera. Nobody recognized her either.

They rented a small house with some land in a down-and-out village on the outskirts of Allahabad. They sell organic eggs at double the price. No one knows that their eggs are delicious because their chickens are electronic.

Once a year, they spend a week’s vacation in classical Europe.

The Nehru is very excited during the flights’ take-off from Delhi.

He points down through the window and tells her, “That’s Pakistan – it could have been  mine.”