At the serene hour of around 9 PM, He found himself strategically concealed in a water-flooded paddy field, his senses heightened by anticipation. Immersed in his thoughts, he couldn't help but reflect on the peculiar notion that even God Indra, the esteemed king of Swarg, seemed to endorse their decision with the distant rumblings of a dry thunderstorm.
As the darkness of the night began to unfold, he felt his heart pounding in rhythmic synchrony with the elements around him. With calculated precision, he stealthily approached the next person in their covert operation, raising his hands above the unsuspecting comrade's ear. A hushed whisper escaped his lips, "Is it time?"
Meanwhile, the countdown relentlessly ticked away, creating an atmosphere thick with tension. Amidst the watery terrain, each passing moment seemed to carry the weight of uncertainty. Thoughts raced through his mind, contemplating whether their allies could execute their part of the plan in the nick of time.
Suddenly, the tranquility of the paddy field was disrupted as darkness swiftly descended upon the entire city. It was a telling sign that, in one corner of the urban landscape, a regiment had successfully executed their mission, seizing control of the electricity office. The orchestrated actions in the paddy field had set the stage for a covert triumph that echoed through the night.
The clock struck 9:00 PM, a customary moment when the entire city tuned in to Nepal Television for the captivating "Kahani Chandrakanta Ki." The singular channel held the undivided attention of the populace. However, their meticulously planned power outage provoked widespread clamor, leaving the audience in disarray. Anger rippled through the crowd, exacerbated by the realization that the episodes wouldn't grace their screens again for the next two years.
Seizing the opportune chaos, he issued a commanding directive, rallying everyone to march forward with a resounding voice. Armed with rifles, the assembled group unified in a collective shout of "Lal Salaam," a fervent declaration drowned out by the city's cacophony. Amidst the urban turmoil, he strode purposefully through the bush, but an unexpected hesitation gripped his legs. A subtle feeling lingered, as if an unseen force sought to impede his progress. Despite a history of taking lives, this impending act weighed heavily on him — a foreboding prelude to what could unfold as a tragic massacre.
One of the comrades held out his hand and patted on his shoulder, it was then he realized that he was in front of the city and there was no way turning back from there. Either he could have sacrificed the lives of the innocent’s for a greater cause or left everything as it was and let his friend to be a martyred; there had to be bloodshed in either ways and few were to be sacrificed. The mission had made him so brutal, for the first time in years, he had second thoughts about murder. He was breathing deeply. Any how, he murmured the command and hurried to hide the dilemma inside. He could sense the dilemma in the other commander too. It was time to crawl on the ground to be at pre-determined position and Palace and all they needed was psychological fortitude.
With the power cut, It was a moonlit night making torches unnecessary. In utter silence, they took up their positions at pre-decided attack points. One Maoist contingent led by Shyam kandel together tore and trashed the gates, and attacked the District Administration Office. The attack was so sudden and intense that the police officer manning the district administration office did not even get a chance to retaliate. Soon after they captured the DAO, few comrade started sprinkling inflammable material all over the building, walls and every documents and set it afire there.
The police force, the armed forces and the army sensed the attack, although initially the general public took it as a general building fire. The district police office being near the district administration office, a team of police force was sent there to investigate the incident. It was then another team led by Binita Gautam attacked the district police office. There was little resistance but the unarmed police force could not put up much resistance against the armed Maoist troop.
As planned the contingent at DAO did their best to uproar there presence. Upon the confirmation, the police officer tried to contact the DPO, but with no answer they contacted both APF and Army office, and informed about the Maoist attack. Both APF and Army sent a troop to retaliate at DAO.
Another contingent led by Govind Dhakal attacked at Nepal telecom office and it too was captured within few minutes. They disconnected all the telephone line/connection. With no contact with each other, it created Havoc in both the APF office and army camp.
And as planned at exactly 9:30 PM, two remaining contingent from two different directions simultaneously attacked APF and Army office. One team led by Mital Mehta attacked at Armed Police Force and he himself led the attack from side of Army Base Camp.
It had been 30 minutes, people still unware of what’s going on in the city, were waiting outside their house because of the high temperature. They were hooting for electricity, suddenly a bullet fired. Before anyone could talk among themselves, shots were fired all around. The people rushed inside the house and locked themselves in their rooms under the bed. There was a lot of running, a lot of crying — people from nearby village could hear people cry and could feel the chaos in the city. Everybody was taking cover, jumping around as they couldn’t think of a safe place to hide, banging, yelling, there was so much going on. That caused pandemonium in the city. All they could do was pray for their safety and pray for it to end as soon as possible, but it was going to be a long night that would haunt and traumatize them for years.
He took out his khukuri and stabbed it in the heart of the army personnel. With blood splattered on his arm, he felt awake. Although the smile on his lips and the glow on his face were completely overlooked in the dark, it reminded him of his cruelty. He felt the gory inside as he gently slit the soldier’s throat. Covering the soldier’s mouth with his hand, he waited and enjoyed until the soldier’s body stopped tormenting. And when a bullet passed through his ear, he realized that the war had begun and it was not the time for self-satisfaction. In a hurry, he took out the safety pin, swung the grenade and then threw it into the army building.
Boom 💥
14 oz M67 fragmentation grenade broke apart in many small pieces and fly in all the direction.
Upon observing no casualties, he yelled; “what a waste.”
As he ran to enter inside the building with the other comrade’s protective back cover, he missed to see the bullet coming and it passed through his helmet. With no helmets on his head, he was more likely to be killed but he still kept running with other comrade and finally succeed to enter the building.
Since they were wearing army uniforms and the lights were off, it was almost impossible for the army to differentiate between the Maoists and the real army under moonlight and torch flashes.
Both sides were firing at each other. Gurkha’s; the fiercest warriors and most feared armies in world were at war among themselves. It was difficult to tell which side were predators and perpetrators; and who were the victims?
The Maoists present inside the building started killing individual soldiers one by one. The army chief had no option but to surrender. And with it, the firing at army camp finally stopped.
It was definitely not the first times, Maoists had attacked government offices and raided security bases. But the guerrilla warfare in the jungles of mountain was no match to the war at plain field of Madhesh with high people density. In truth, that was the first time they were in guerrilla warfare outside their comfort zone of jungle warfare.
With no gunfire, the general people locked in the room under the bed, inside the daraz or wherever they were taking cover or hiding felt their breath. But still probably no one had manage to have courage to step out of it. Somewhere deep inside, they all knew that it was not the end.
And again there were gunfire all over the city, but this time it was different. The Maoist had successfully captured the city and celebratory gunfire was done with shooting firearm into the air in celebration. The gunfire that gave happiness to the Maoists were raising people’s heartbeat with every shot.
With no counter-attacks by police forces from nearby villages and towns, the Maoist parties were convinced that their other allies had also been successful in their mission to stop the back-up. It was time to finish the work they had come for and return. They had accomplished their mission and about to leave the city.
A night vision helicopter MI-17 arrived for reinforcement and repel the attack. The city was never ever so bright before, they were all panicked. Neither they had faced it before nor they had expected it. Fear of unknown weakened their excitement and they thought they were not going to make it and escape the city. None of them feared the army or police but they greatly feared the helicopter equipped with night vision.
But there was no choice, it’s either do or die and they were not cowards. Although he knew that their guns were not capable to aim high enough, he ordered for the same. They all started gunfire in the sky targeting the helicopter. After almost 10 minutes of continuous gunfire, they had successfully gunned down the helicopter with pilot and around 15 army personnel on board. They were all amazed of their own doing and accomplished much more than they were supposed to. That was the first time Maoists had gun down a helicopter even though helicopters have in the past been damaged by ground fire.
The fighting with security forces continued till 4 a.m. in the morning. That had definitely given the many government officials a some sleepless night. They must had realized Maoist's true power and potential.
The mayhem that began at 9 pm lasted seven hours, instilling the fear of death in every person there. So much so, that locals were cowering behind the closed doors of their house for days. Folk who spent a sleepless night quaking with fear during hours long attack and after, were too scared to speak their mind for months. There were even 20 or more of people crammed in a single poky little room the whole night. Nobody came to buy any mutton at next day on an occasion of chaite dashain.
Sarlahi district administration office, district postal office, district land revenue office, district police office and army barrack they attacked from all the four side at once. Maoist had kidnapped the chief district officer, broke into the prison and freed around 150 of prisoners along with their friend which had been captured and tortured and definitely they lost few of their friends. But it’s was all their bravery/sacrifice that lead them to victory.
One question that was hunting him that they attacked from all the four side of the city and eastern side was the border directly connected to Sonbarsa, a Indian city, then who were the troops that attacked from that side? How they managed to cross the border with gun and other machineries? Where did they spent those night planning the attack? He also knew that their guns were not of high range to shoot high enough into the sky to gun down a helicopter, then how was a night vision gun down? With many questions in his mind, the chief commander Gopal Bahadur Thapa also famous with Nick name Badal instructed the troops to leave the city.
#If_Gods_were_Rebellions #To_be_Continued
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