January 22, 2001South Block, New DelhiEvening Brief (Confidential)
The packet did not arrive as a document.
It arrived as an event.
By the time it reached South Block, the diaspora petitions had already ignited India's internal pressure circuits—gurdwara committees calling MPs, editorials forming in advance of facts, Punjab's television studios sniffing for a historic pivot. The proposal moved quickly through hands that normally slowed everything down, because everyone understood the same thing:
Kartarpur was no longer just a site.
It had become a live political current.
Inside the briefing room, the mood was not celebratory. It was wary—like engineers examining a bridge built by a rival.
Brajesh Mishra read the first headline phrase aloud, almost tasting it for poison.
"Visa-free corridor."
He frowned as if an explosive had been placed on the table with a ribbon tied around it.
Across from him, Vajpayee took the paper more slowly. He didn't rush to the outrage. He read for structure: where the leverage was, where the trap would be, where the exit might exist if things went wrong.
He saw a narrow opening disguised as generosity—and behind it, a calculation disguised as devotion.
"A corridor," Vajpayee murmured, half to himself. "Not a gate."
Mishra leaned forward, voice clipped. "It gives him moral capital. International praise. Photographs of him as the patron of religious freedom. He wants to turn a military regime into a humanitarian brand."
Vajpayee did not disagree. He simply widened the frame.
"And it gives us something else," he said. "A measurable test."
He tapped the section that Aditya had clearly designed to look reasonable.
"Joint security observation." Vajpayee's finger rested on the words. "Shared responsibility. Shared visibility. If it succeeds, we have a precedent. If it fails, the world sees who could not protect devotion."
Mishra's eyes narrowed. "Or the world sees India walking its people into a Pakistani-managed funnel."
The room tightened at that word—funnel—because it captured what security professionals feared: a narrow, controlled space where a single incident could create a global image.
A junior intelligence officer cleared his throat and placed a second sheet on the table—less polished, more blunt.
"Sir, the vulnerability is not theoretical. A visa-free lane can be exploited."
Mishra nodded once, satisfied to have the institutional fear spoken out loud.
"Exactly," he said. "Terrorism. Smuggling. Narcotics. Arms. A corridor becomes an ideal cover. You don't need to move a truck through it. You move one man, one packet, one detonator, one courier."
Another official added, quietly: "And if something happens on our side after pilgrims return, the accusation will be immediate—they brought it back."
Vajpayee sat still, absorbing the realism without flinching.
"Say it plainly," he instructed.
The officer complied. "A corridor can be used to route narcotics, counterfeit currency, or small arms. It can also be used to insert a handler into a crowd. Even one incident—a blast, a stampede, a stabbing—would be enough to bury the peace process under grief."
Mishra seized on it.
"And who will be blamed?" he asked, rhetorical. "We will. The government that trusted a military ruler's corridor."
He pointed to the proposed force name with visible contempt.
"Tourist Police." He looked up. "This is theater."
Vajpayee's reply came softly, but it carried weight.
"It is statecraft," he said. "In this region, theater is often the only language crowds understand. The question is whether the theater hides competence—or hides weakness."
He read the tourist-police clause again, eyes narrowing slightly.
"A 'police' unit trained like commandos," Vajpayee observed. "This is how a soldier tries to look civilian."
Mishra's expression hardened. "Or how an intelligence state tries to hold a pistol behind a smiling face."
A third official, from Home Affairs, spoke cautiously. "Even if Pakistan secures its side, sir, a corridor changes our internal security posture. Punjab becomes a permanent high-alert zone. We will need counter-intelligence screening, crowd management, medical readiness, and—most difficult—public messaging. If we treat pilgrims like suspects, it becomes humiliation. If we treat it lightly, it becomes negligence."
Vajpayee listened, then asked a question that forced them to think beyond fear.
"And if we refuse?"
Silence.
Because refusal carried its own cost: Punjab's anger, Sikh sentiment, diaspora headlines, and the perception that Delhi had failed to seize a historic opening.
Mishra answered anyway, grimly.
"If we refuse, we look obstructive. If we accept and it goes wrong, we look incompetent."
Vajpayee nodded. "That is the trap of every peace initiative," he said. "You either accept risk—or accept permanent hatred as policy."
He turned to the final section—the one Aditya had clearly included to create local stakeholders on Pakistan's side.
A joint market. A minimal fee.
Vajpayee's lips curved faintly. "A management fee," he said, almost amused. "He is turning devotion into infrastructure."
Mishra didn't smile. "Or turning devotion into a toll booth."
Vajpayee's gaze remained steady.
"Even toll booths create a reason not to blow up the road," he replied. "Money is not holy, Brajesh—but it is stabilizing. It produces people who lose profit when violence returns."
He leaned back slightly, then delivered the conclusion with the calm inevitability that made advisors uneasy.
"We do not say yes tonight," Vajpayee said. "We do not say no tonight."
Mishra looked irritated. "Delay?"
"Due diligence," Vajpayee corrected. "We demand protocols. We demand inspection rights. We demand verification mechanisms. We demand that joint observation means joint authority to pause the flow if threat levels rise."
He tapped the paper again.
"And we insist," Vajpayee added, "that any 'visa-free' movement be limited to a sealed zone, with biometric equivalents of the era—photographs, registration slips, stamped entry cards, and controlled headcounts. No improvisation."
Mishra exhaled slowly. "And if he refuses oversight?"
"Then he reveals what this is," Vajpayee said. "A headline, not a corridor."
The room understood: the response would be framed not as acceptance or rejection, but as conditions that only a serious actor would meet.
Islamabad: The First Move (Rewritten)
January 22, 2001Chief Executive's Secretariat, Islamabad23:35 Hours
Aditya received Delhi's interim response through channels: India would "review operational feasibility" and revert with protocol requirements. Not a yes. Not a no.
A stall, but not a rejection.
General Mahmood studied Musharraf's face, waiting for a flicker of frustration.
Musharraf gave him none.
"They're afraid," Mahmood said quietly.
"They should be," Musharraf replied. "Fear is proof they are treating it as real."
Mahmood lowered his voice further. "They will raise terrorism concerns. Smuggling. Narcotics. Arms. They will say the corridor becomes a pipeline."
Aditya nodded as if that was the most predictable part of the entire day.
"That is why the corridor must behave like an airport," he said. "Entry control. Identity checks. Separate lanes. Constant surveillance. Medical posts. Crowd barriers. Rapid response."
Mahmood's eyes narrowed. "And the Tourist Police?"
Musharraf closed the file with deliberate calm.
"Must be polite enough to be loved," he said, "and lethal enough to be feared."
Mahmood held his gaze. "And if they strike anyway? If someone wants to turn a pilgrimage into a blood headline?"
Musharraf walked to the wall map and placed a finger precisely where the corridor would run—short, narrow, engineered.
"The corridor must be too small for chaos," he said, "and too dignified for propaganda."
He turned back.
"And if they strike," Aditya added, voice even, "they will strike under light."
Mahmood frowned. "Light doesn't stop bombs."
"No," Aditya said. "But light assigns blame."
He paused, letting the cold logic speak.
"And when blame is assigned correctly," Aditya continued, "it becomes harder for any state to quietly feed the monsters."
Outside, Islamabad slept. Inside, the next phase of Operation Sweetness took a new shape—not cricket, not celebrity prayer, not televised history.
A strip of land.A sealed passage.A corridor designed to carry devotion—and to expose whoever tried to turn devotion into a weapon.