Awakening of India - 1947

[Here you go, extra chapter, even 200 stones isn't enough to stop you guys ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ]

Delhi & International Arenas – Late December 1947 to Early January 1948

The world was screaming.

Operation Bharat Shakti had torn across Pakistan like wildfire, and now the flames were reaching far beyond the subcontinent. In the gleaming halls of the United Nations, in the sand-swept palaces of Riyadh, in the ancient corridors of Cairo, everywhere, voices rose in fury.

"This is madness!" The Egyptian delegate's fist slammed against the mahogany table, his voice echoing through the Security Council chamber. "Naked aggression! Expansionism wrapped in the flag of justice!"

Around him, other Islamic representatives nodded grimly. The Saudi prince spoke with the passion of wounded pride, his white robes rustling as he gestured dramatically.

"The ummah will not stand for this slaughter of our Pakistani brothers! This is genocide disguised as war!"

The Iranian ambassador, his Persian eloquence cutting through the chamber's tension, invoked bonds that stretched back centuries. "The blood of Muslims flows like rivers while the world watches in silence. How long before they come for us all?"

Even Afghanistan's representative, a weathered man who'd seen too many border skirmishes, found himself in an impossible position.

His government despised Pakistan's meddling in Pashtun affairs, but this... this was something else entirely. The complete dismemberment of a Muslim nation.

V.K. Krishna Menon, India's razor-sharp envoy, sat motionless as the storm raged around him. His poker face revealed nothing, but inside, he wondered if Delhi truly understood what they'd unleashed.

The condemnations weren't just diplomatic theater, they were promises of consequences that would echo for generations.

Across the Atlantic, Prime Minister Attlee paced his study like a caged lion. The telegram in his hand trembled slightly, not from age, but from barely contained fury.

The Labour Party was hemorrhaging support over this mess, and the King himself had called twice in the past hour.

"Insanity," he muttered to his aide, crushing the telegram in his fist.

"How do you phrase 'what the bloody hell are you thinking' in diplomatic language? How do you tell an ally they've just lit the entire bloody region on fire?"

His aide, a young diplomat fresh from Cambridge, cleared his throat nervously. "Sir, perhaps we could stress our commitment to peaceful resolution while maintaining the strategic distance from the situation."

"Strategic distance?" Attlee's laugh was bitter. "We created this mess with Partition. Now we're watching it burn while pretending our hands are clean."

Meanwhile, President Truman stared out at the Potomac, his famous temper simmering just beneath the surface.

As if Cold War and Chinese Civil War wasn't enough, now India-Pak war too has jumped into the messy powerplay of Asia. Stalin was probably laughing himself sick in the Kremlin.

In his office in Delhi, Arjun Mehra read each cable, each condemnation, each threat with the detached interest of a chess master studying his opponent's moves.

The stack of diplomatic protests grew higher by the hour, angry words from Cairo, desperate pleas from London, stern warnings from Washington. The international fury was expected, predictable even, but its intensity was almost intoxicating.

He walked to the window overlooking the India Gate, where crowds had gathered every evening since the war began.

Victory banners fluttered in the cold December wind, and voices raised in celebration carried across the manicured lawns. The people were drunk on triumph, their earlier doubts washed away by an endless stream of victory bulletins.

"Sir?" His secretary's voice interrupted his thoughts. "The BBC correspondent is here for your statement."

Arjun straightened his achkan, checked his reflection in the window's glass, and transformed his face into a masterpiece of controlled emotion. When he stepped before the cameras that evening, every gesture was calculated for maximum impact.

The radio crackled to life across India and beyond, carrying his voice to millions. In village squares and city drawing rooms, in the cafes of Paris and the pubs of London, people leaned forward to listen.

"My fellow Indians... my fellow citizens of the world." His voice was steady, tinged with just the right amount of weariness, a leader bearing the terrible burden of necessary war.

"India desires nothing but peace. We are not conquerors. We are not aggressors. We are simply a nation that refuses to die quietly while our children are murdered, our borders violated, our sovereignty being trampled upon."

He paused, letting the weight of his words settle like snow. In the background, the soft shuffle of photographers and the scratch of correspondents' pens created a symphony of documentation.

"Pakistan's leaders chose this path. They invaded Kashmir, they sponsored terror, they rejected every offer of peace. What choice did they leave us? What choice does any nation have when faced with such extinction?"

Another pause, this one longer. When he continued, his voice carried a note of deep sadness.

"But we are not unreasonable. We hear the calls for peace from the international community, and our hearts echo them. India stands ready, has always stood ready, for dialogue. We will discuss a ceasefire the moment Pakistan withdraws every soldier, every irregular, every terrorist from our soil. The moment they provide verifiable guarantees that this madness will never be repeated."

It was beautiful in its impossibility. Pakistan, reeling and humiliated, could never accept such terms.

But to the world watching, Arjun appeared the voice of reason, the reluctant warrior extending an olive branch from the battlefield.

The crocodile wept its tears while its jaws remained locked around its prey.

"You're enjoying this," Patel observed the next morning, studying Arjun's face as they walked through the corridors of power. The Iron Man of India had seen enough politicians in his time to recognize the subtle signs, the extra spring in the step, the barely suppressed satisfaction.

"Enjoying?" Arjun's eyebrow arched.

"Sardar-ji, I take no pleasure in necessity."

"Is that what we're calling it now?"

Their footsteps echoed in the marble hallway, past portraits of freedom fighters who'd never imagined their dream of independence would lead to this.

Outside, Delhi buzzed with war fever. Victory reports flooded in daily, Karachi's port ablaze, Dhaka's government in flight, Lahore's walls crumbling under modern artillery. The public ate it up like sugar, their earlier doubts dissolved in the intoxicating wine of triumph.

Patel had watched this transformation with growing unease.

The India he'd helped build was becoming something else, something he wasn't sure he recognized.

"The Muslim League leaders who stayed behind...they're terrified. Some of them are asking for passage to the Middle East."

"Let them go," Arjun said dismissively. "Better to drain the poison than let it fester."

"And the others? The Congress members we've kept under 'protective custody'?"

They paused at a window overlooking the courtyard where once the Mughal emperors had held court. Now Indian soldiers drilled in precise formations, their boots beating out the rhythm of a new empire.

"The domestic situation has stabilized," Arjun said eventually, his voice carefully neutral. "Perhaps it's time our... guests... were allowed to rejoin society."

Patel stopped walking entirely.

"Nehru? Azad? Kripalani and few others? After months of house arrest, you want to just...let them go?"

"Magnanimity, Sardar-ji. The mark of a confident leader. The people see victory everywhere they look. Our former colleagues' objections to the war seem rather... academic now, don't they?"

"Or the mark of a man setting a trap."

Arjun's smile was winter-cold, sharp as a blade hidden in silk, "Perhaps both."

[A/N: Any guesses what Arjun might be cooking?]