Azoospermia

India is likely to face food, water shortage, as its population is set to increase to a phenomenal 1,535 million by 2050 making it the most populous nation on earth, according to Worldwatch Institute report. The 89-page report, titled Beyond Malthus, by Lester Brown, president of the non-governmental think tank, projects India's population to increase to 1,535 million against China's 1,517 million by 2050 AD from the present
figure of 976 million against China's 1,255 million. Whether India, already facing acute shortage of water, can avoid a breakdown of the social system in the face of such increase in population remains to be seen.

: News Item.

The story of how India belied all such doomsday prophesies and rose to glory and world domination began in 2030 AD in an ancient townhouse in upstate New York. An obscure but brilliant medicinal chemist named Ashok Joshi had just begun a post-coital recitation of the glories of ancient Indian science. His only audience was his strikingly beautiful white Anglo-Saxon protestant wife Alice laying in his lap, her long svelte fingers caressing the hair on Ashok's bronze chest.

"Kashyapa observed", Read Ashok, " that an inherent urge made one Parmanu combine with another. When two Parmanu belonging to one class of substance combined, a dwinuka (binary molecule) was the result. This dwinuka had properties similar to the two parent Parmanu..."

Alice yawned, long and hard.

"Yeah, yeah," She said. "This is rather similar to early western science. But what happened since? I mean, for like fifteen centuries? How do you explain this amazing mediocrity of Indian science today?"

"In two words: no resources!" Ashok came back, touched to the quick. "All our resources are eaten up by our exploding population. India is full of brilliant people. But most of them don't even get close to a scientific
lab."

"So you mean to tell me that as soon as you guys get a lot of resources, India will just take off?"

"Yes, but that's a big if. The way the population thing is going, the possibilities of our ever beating the odds look rather remote to me."

"Well, I am sure something is being done about it out there.." Alice said thoughtfully.

"I am not sure. I am not sure at all. Ah well, in two more days I will be able to see for myself. I am excited about this conference in Bombay, you know. First visit to my motherland and all.."

"Listen, guy, you are a third generation immigrant now. I suggest that you keep your loyalties with The United States , you know. This sudden switch of loyalties is rather annoying."

"There you go again, sectarian as always. India and the US are not at war, you know." Ashok said.

"Looks like once a Hindu, always a Hindu to me." Alice said with a huff, got off his lap and went to sleep.

Ashok stayed up late that night, too excited to sleep.

Entry from the diary of Ashok Joshi, Ph.D.:

"Bombay 07/09/2030: Landed in Bombay today morning for the conference. My first visit to India at age forty (a crying shame, really). Kissed ground at Sahar Airport, thus completing the cycle which began with my grandfather kissing the ground at Ellis island some seventy years ago. The Bombay locals apparently found this funny and sniggered. The airport has been cordoned off from the surrounding slum by the army. Saw one armyman catch hold of a coolie boy, apparently illegal, and kick him in the stomach repeatedly. The boy fell down and just lay there, no one came to pick him up. The day has been a horror emotionally. The India in my mind no longer exists. The population of India now exceeds 1.5 billions. They overtook China in 2020. The filth and human degradation around me is unbelievable. My host Suresh manages to smile through it all. Admire him greatly. He is a brilliant scientist, being completely wasted by the Indian system. Should try to bring him to our lab at PF."

Numerous other entries to similar effect. Ashok Joshi obviously reeling from the shock at the conditions of life there.The conference on advances in contraceptive science seems to have gone well for Ashok. He presented some data on another series of drugs: the INDOWINs were apparently not discovered yet.

But when he came back to New York after the conference, he was a radically changed man. His old affableness was all but gone. He had grown silent, brooding. Even the exquisite features of Alice failed to cheer him up. The seeds of his future total emotional collapse seem to have taken root around this time.

Letter from Dr. Suresh Babu, Bombay, India.

Dear Professor Joshi,

It was a great experience for me to meet an eminent scientist like you. Not only are you successful in the US, but you are also greatly concerned about the state of the motherland. Few amongst us attain this level of competence and empathy.

Our long dialogue that night at the hotel got me thinking. The only way to improve conditions in India meaningfully would be to somehow drastically reduce the population. Until this happens, our politicians will continue to make the tradeoffs of choosing quantity over quality in every decision they make. I would not
blame them either. If I were in that seat, I would do the same. But then as far as reducing the population is concerned, I do not see much hope. Our people are incredibly fertile. Our women have been convinced that
their entire self-worth is based on producing a good number of children. In their frame of reference, this even makes economic sense. Given the low levels of surplus each one of produces, the family cannot survive without at least three working children. I saw that you were horrified when you saw seven year-olds working. We are used to that sight now.

So what is the answer? I do not know. The ways of the Lord are strange. Hope your research is going well. Any possibility of a position for me in your lab or at PF?

Truly,
Suresh.

New York, 11/05/2030

Dear Suresh,

Good to hear from you. If young people like you are to have a future at all, you have to act now. You seem to focus exclusively on voluntary contraception. And lament its massive failure, given the folkish ways of the Indian people. I am sure all this is politically correct etc. But it will solve nothing. Please understand that birth prevention is not compulsory and will not be used. Death prevention is a must and will be used in every case to the fullest extent, adding to the population problem.

You have to think outside the box.

Think: what if they did not know that they were being fed a contraceptive? Are you with me still, or is the thought too frightening to contemplate? Do you have the guts to make India great again?

Truly,
Ashok Joshi

P.S. I am keeping an eye on positions for you here. Right now I am short on grants, but I have a couple of projects in the grants pipeline. If they come through, we can think of something.

Dear Dr. Joshi,

I should not be writing this at all. I, however, do not seem to help myself. Yes, the thought of feeding people with a contraceptive without their knowledge is frightening and downright immoral, in most frames of
references. It does however, have this strange fascination for me, especially since it does not involve killing off large chunks of population. For the sake of our children (not that I have any, yet), we may have to do
just that. What did you have in mind?

Do destroy this letter as soon as you finish reading. I have destroyed yours.

Suresh.

Dear Suresh,

Thanks for your concurrence. Please do not think that I have a well-developed plan already. I don’t. We do, however, obviously need a drug that can be given by mouth. It must dissolve in water so that we can put it in drinking water dams. When we put it in a dam, it is going to get diluted enormously, and it must be active at extremely low doses. It must also preferably dissolve in body fat and leach out slowly, over ten to fifteen years, so as to destroy the body’s reproductive capacity thoroughly. I do seem to have stumbled on a series of compounds of this kind, which I have named the "INDOWIN" series, in the vague hope that some day in the future they will help India take over the world. I do not like playing the evil genius here. It’s only our current pathetic condition and the thought of one day seeing our culture rule the world that sustains me in this endeavor. I want nothing for myself.

As far as your coming here goes, let’s complete this job, and I promise to get you here somehow, if not in my lab then somewhere else.

Destroy this.
Glory to the motherland!

Ashok

Sir,

Your genius amazes me. I am your man. Which drug? How much do we need? How do you propose to add it to the water supply? Have you done the calculations?

Glory to the motherland!

Suresh

Suresh,

Re: The Indowins: I found that the Indowins affected spermatogenesis, possibly through the inhibition of testicular dihydrofolate reductase (DHFR). I have studied their effects on the fertility of male mice at
various dosages (0.1-50 fg/kg/day) for 55 days and male rats at 5 fg/kg/day for 65 days. I found that of the compounds tested, Indowin 240 is a potent antifertility agent that causes complete infertility at doses of > or = 5 femtograms/kg/day in mice. Extrapolating to humans, I can safely say that if we can get a microgram into a man over a year, it will stay in his body fat and get us the desired effective concentration in his blood over ten years, ensuring total azoospermia (total absense of sperms in the semen) in a couple of years.

Let us say he drinks between one and one and a half liters of water a day. That gives us about five hundred liters a year to get our microgram in. This means we must achieve a concentration of two nanograms per liter in the reservoirs. For a billion liter reservoir, we need two billion nanograms, or two grams of INDOWIN 240 - about 2 teaspoonfuls- to be added to any of the reservoirs of the newly-linked Ganga-Kauvery national water grid every day: surely a task within easy reach. And we can now prepare tablets which will
give this sustained release pattern rather easily and well.

The last point is about selectivity. I have established that the Indowins will not inhibit the DHFR enzyme from the top tenth percentile of the population based on mative intelligence, leaving them free to reproduce. These are the people we want around. This is the genotype that's going to take the motherland to glory.

Ashok

Over the last year he had been brooding, snappish and Alice was sensing something amiss in his work life. But he had also grown rather uncommunicative, and she was at a loss to understand what was going on with him.

But she was smart enough to surmise that it had to do something with India and its population explosion.

And so when one day Ashok declared that he needed to make another trip there shortly, she decided to take matters in hand.

"Great. This time I am coming with you." She declared, causing Ashok's stubby jaw to drop.

"But honey, I willl be in the labs day and night there. What will you do with yourself? It's a rather strange place for you, you know. Not like Europe or something."

It was not easy to shake off Alice Thompson, once she had made up her mind.

"That's exactly the reason I want to come!" she said.

And withheld sex for days on end, and generally made life rather miserable for Ashok, who was no match for her to start with in these things.

He finally relented, with an air of extreme resignation.

"Well, I do not see how I can stop someone so determined. But do allow me to make some interesting travel plans within India for you, just to keep it interesting."

"Certainly, darling!", Alice said, magnanimous in her victory.

Sunlight was unnaturally bright as their plane hovered over Bombay. Alice stared out of the window, keeping up a steady chatter about the things she saw. She noticed the Manhattan-esque Nariman point, with its skyscrapers, the quaint "Gateway of India" built by the British to welcome their king, the long spread of suburbs along the railway lines, the green bay on the east.

And then she saw the vast shantytown besieging the airport, turned to Ashok craning over her neck , saw the look in his eyes and turned her head away in fear. She had seen rage, white-hot rage before. Had made her peace with it , too. But this was different.

And this was about the shantytown.

She felt her fears about this India affair confirmed, congealing to a knot in her belly. She shivered and fell silent.

As they cleared customs, a very tense looking Dr. Suresh Babu stepped forward from the throng, his surprise at Alice's arrival palpable. He looked at Ashok with a large mute question in his eyes: Didn't you know better than...

Ashok looked away apologetically.

And then suddenly Suresh was the very soul of Indian hospitality. "This is a very pleasant surprise, Ma'am, Welcome, Welcome!"

Alice - who had not missed the mute exchange, and which worried her even more - became the adoring spouse instantly.

"This was a bit last minute, I must apologize for forcing myself on you like this, but it was too tempting to pass up. I mean, I have heard about India all my life, as you can well imagine."

"You will have a great time here, Ma'am. I promise." Suresh countered as he lifted the heavy suitcases.

"So how are the fish doing, if I may ask...not too sick I hope?"

"The fish, Ma'am?" Suresh was blank.

"The toxicity studies in Goa, Dr. Babu..,the ones at the institute of Oceanography there," Ashok was doing his best to hide his exasperation. "Honey, Dr.Babu is a pure chemist, actually. His involvement in biology is
minimal..." He said to Alice.

Later on, with Alice ensconced in the hotel room, he took Suresh to the smoking lounge.

"Must get her out of the way, somehow!," he said emphatically.

"What would you suggest, Sir?", Suresh asked, worriedly.

"Let's find a camp of sorts for her.. Yes, a religious camp where they smoke pot. She loves the stuff...the discussions, I mean."

Soon after, one early morning , after a night spent in fighting off the German lesbian in the next bed, Alice sat staring at the sea on that shore in Goa. She felt a hand on her shoulder, and turned to find herself looking deep into the eyes of Swami Chidananda, the Master of the establishment.

"You look worried, child. What is it?" The Swami asked.

"Nothing really. I guess I am just in a new place, and not sleeping too well, that's all." Alice countered with an apologetic smile.

"Yes, India is strange for you people. How have you liked it so far?".

"Well, in here everything is great, I guess. But once you walk out of here...the slums do worry me a bit."

"Ah, the slums. Always the slums. Don't worry, child, they are just a stage. Please understand that they are Hindus, and that means they are a happy people..".

"I don't understand it, Sir. Looking at the wretchedness there, one would think..."

"A Hindu knows that everything passes, child..."

"I don't know. I know that I am upset... and I know my husband is upset, too. And I am worried about that, too."

"Ah, your husband. He's Indian, I heard. A famous scientist, too."

"Well, not famous, really. But solid, I would think. Very solid, and very committed to his work, too" Alice said, proudly.

"And what is his area of work, if I may ask?"

"He develops new contraceptives."

"Aha! Wants to solve the population "problem" here, I am sure".

"Yes, I am glad someone is doing something." Alice said, defiantly.

At this point Swami Chidanada was very concerned. He sat down before Alice, held both her shoulders, bore deep into her eyes.

"Listen, child, listen once and for all. And tell your husband too. There is no "problem" here, child, not the kind you are thinking about.

You think this is just a miserable biomass. No. These are Hindus.

They are happy just to be there, just to be alive. With each breath, they name a different name of God.

They don't need anyone's help. Not yours. Not mine. Just let them be. Rejoice, if you can, at this triumph of life over death.

If there's a problem, it's your separation from God. Focus on that, child."

Alice pulled herself away abruptly and ran into her room.

Mathilde's heart continued to be overflowing with cosmic love. Alice found it impossible to communicate to her the idea that someone may not actually want her. After three more nights of broken sleep, Alice was thoroughly frazzled and ready to run away. She decided to surprise Ashok at his hotel, some sixty miles away, near the Institute of oceanography.

Upon arriving at the "Brahma Memories", she was informed that yes, a Dr. Ashok Joshi from the US had indeed checked in three days ago, taken a room there, but soon after checking in, he and his younger male companion - did she detect a certain rolling of the eyes at this - had sort of disappeared since.

Alice produced her US passport, established herself as the rightful Mrs. Joshi and demanded to be let into the room. The white skin worked, and she got in, finally looking forward to a night of unbroken sleep.

Before collapsing into the bed, she put in one call to the Institute of Oceanography, Department of Fish Toxicology and was surprised to hear that there was no Dr. Joshi from the US visiting there. In fact there was no collaborative project of any kind with the Population Forum of New York running there and so could she please shut up and hang up now.

"Hmmm", Alice said, before her eyes closed.

Notes of an evil genius:

Alice rummaged Ashok's bag for a new toothbrush. And regarded the copy of "Environmental Health Perspectives" she found at the bottom with mild interest.

Later on in an idle moment she was leafing through the journal. It did engage her mind better than the inane glossies supplied by the Brahma. And then she read, with a quickening of her interest:

"The relevance of aquatic food chain bioaccumulation of organic chemicals in contributing to human dose is presented."

"He should not be thinking of the human dose at this stage", she worried.

It is shown that for chemicals with log octanol water partition coefficients greater than about 3, the role of food chain transfer to fish consumed by humans becomes the more dominant route over drinking water.

A note in the margin said Ind 240 = 2.4.

"Hm, this means no fish are necessary to transfer the stuff to humans," Alice said. "Interesting..."

With all the innocence of a scientific paper, the report went on:

"For the compound BCEE with a log coefficient of 2.35, relevant time and space studies for groundwater and surface water concentrations show that the groundwater transport is minimal, and detention times are long relative to surface water."

"He just needs to substitute BCCE with 240, their coefficients are so close," Alice surmised.

"The data shows that from an initial depot of five kgs,daily steady state levels in surface water of 2 to 5 picograms per liter were obtained. A study of the skin lipid concentrations of BCCE for the human population
(n=5234) which recieved it's water supply from this superfund site showed a high accumulation of BCCE in the skin, mirroring comparable concentrations in the blood."

Alice was breathing heavily now. The "sample" of Indowin tablets had seemed a bit too large for scientific studies, and could have easily been five kilograms.

She remembered Chidananda's imploring face.

"There is no "problem" here, child, not the kind you are thinking about. If there's a problem, it's your separation from God. Focus on that, child."

"God! Ashok, love, not this!!." Alice gasped. She had to stop Ashok somehow.

Alice sank into the cushioned chair in the police commissioner's office with some gratitude. Again the white skin had worked wonders and Commissioner Goray was all ears.

"May I speak to you in confidence, Sir?" Alice asked.

Commissioner Goray, fifty-eight, graying, and the very soul of Indian cordiality, motioned the other policemen out of his office with an "Of course, ma'am."

"My husband is missing. I believe he is being manipulated by some gang, involved in sinister experiments. One Dr. Suresh Babu seems to have an unnatural influence on him. He may have even kidnapped him. Could you please find my husband without publicizing this in any way? I just want him back. And I will quickly take him back to the US, without any further problems, I promise."

Goray was thoughtful. "Find him we will, Ma'am. That's our job. But how will you take him back to the U.S. without his consent? And what experiments are these, anyway?"

"I do not have a good idea myself. But they may have something to do with adding a contraceptive to your national water grid. Involuntary administration to the population, that's what they are after, it seems."

"And why would he do that?"

"I do not know. He does seem very upset at the population explosion here. Probably wants to do something for the country. And once we find him, I am sure we can arrange some kind of a medical emergency and fly him out to the US. I mean, there are drugs which can mimic a nervous breakdown or a heart attack or something," Alice ventured worriedly.

"And what's your proof that he is really planning all this?" Goray asked.

"Well, he has a rather large sample of a very potent contraceptive with him - something he discovered himself. And he has been reading in depth about your national water grid... a totally new interest for him. Also, he was rather insistent that I stay away from him the last few days... sent me to a religious place which would normally detest. And now I find him missing. I am worried, Sir." Alice was close to tears.

Commissioner Goray was having a hard time concealing his interest. This could be the biggest coup of his life.

"Okay, Mrs. Joshi, I will find him right away and bring him to you. And I assure you that there will be no publicity of any kind. We are good at this kind of a thing, believe me. Now, do you have any photographs of him?"

"Oh, lots. Here..." Alice handed over the envelope gratefully.

Commissioner Goray was masterful in the mission briefing. The audience of two commandoes, two helicopter pilots and Alice listened with grave attention.

"This is a complex case of possible kidnapping and international drug dealing. The quarry" - Alice winced - " are two men, believed to be carrying contraband drugs of unknown nature. We already have their whereabouts. The mission is to intercept their backpacking trip to the grid, immobilize them with medicated bullets and fly them separately to stations MX-4 and MX-5 for debriefing. They are probably unaware that they are being tracked.

We will use Xylazine, a sedative working on the central nervous system. Its action develops within 10 to 15 minutes after you have got the bullet in. The sleeplike state lasts for 1 to 2 hours."

He turned to the two commandoes: "You people are crack shots and I do not believe I need to educate you in rifles. But for the record, you shall be using the Harrington & Richardson hammer rifle our wildlife services are using on rhinos and elephants. It is designed for use from helicopters and is accurate up to a hundred meters. Try to get a clear shot on the neck, shoulder, buttocks or calves. The lower body is probably best since both are carrying backpacks."

"After immobilization, the two men are to be loaded in two different helicopters as I have already mentioned. The older man" - here the Commissioner flashed a photo of Ashok - "is to be brought to helicopter one. Both myself and Alice Thompson here will be in helicopter one, which will fly back to MX-4. The other man to go to MX-5 for debriefing by our international narcotics people. Any questions?"

"How much injury are we risking with these guns, Sir?". Alice asked.

"Not much. These will be superficial muscle wounds half an inch deep. The only real danger is of skull penetration if we get too close. But our boys here are crack shots. I see no problems."

"Are we allowed to know the reasons for separating the two men, Sir?" one pilot asked.

"Not really. But since you will be dying of curiosity anyway, the older man is not an Indian citizen."

The team looked satisfied.

"One last reminder: both the backpacks to come to me personally. This is extremely important. We leave in an hour."

Alice followed Goray back to his office worriedly.

"It's pretty much all farms from here, not too many trees to hide." The pilot said. Alice looked down worriedly at the ground, divided into hundreds of small subsistence farms by centuries of divisions among brothers. Yes, there is no room to hide. Not from the 'copters. Not from the guns. Not from these brutes. And I am on their side, too. Ashok, love, what have you brought us to? She thought.

"I think I have them, Sir", The commando's voice came in from the other helicopter." At ten-o'clock- about three hundred meters from where you are, Sir. Seeking permission to proceed to capture, Sir."

Comissioner Goray tensed. "Yeah, proceed to capture. Watch closely where they go after you get the bullet in. It's going to be fifteen minutes before they collapse. We will land shortly after you." He ordered.

My love's a rhino and these savages will now kill him. Alice thought as she saw the other helicopter dip suddenly, steady again, and continue the chase from twenty meters above the ground. She thought she heard two faint shots, but wasn't sure.

"Come in, Deepak. What do you have?" Goray barked in the transmitter.

"I got them both, Sir. They seem to be slowing down now," Deepak's voice came in, full of glee, full of professional pride.

You bastard, Alice thought.

As her helicopter flew to the place of the hunt, Alice could have sworn that she saw Deepak, the second commando, shoot something on the ground a second time. But she shrugged it off as some trick her mind was playing on her.

As they landed she ran to the supine figures. The first one was Dr. Suresh Babu - did he look stragely more crumpled than her husband lying some twenty feet away? She shrugged and ran to Ashok. As she kneeled to the ground she saw the sedative taking full effect. For one brief moment recognition flashed in Ashok's groggy eyes.

"Honey, you...this is not what it looks like..." he whispered as his eyes closed shut. The commando in her own helicopter was struggling with Ashok's backpack already. He ran back with it to his copter and she thought she saw Goray remove the tablet pack and replace it with something.

They carried Ashok's limp body to the 'copter and took off, Ashok's head rolling limply in her lap.

But he was breathing okay, and the wound was an expert shot to the back of the thigh.

"And now we inject metazone for the nervous breakdown symptoms," she heard Goray telling her casually.

Yes, and I don't even need metazone for the symptoms, Alice thought.

She heard Goray speaking softly into his dictaphone:

"Team XLV 27: Mission 21: Mission report for transcription: Based on an alert from the national anti-narcotic network, the team intercepted the two men seven miles northeast of station MX-4 and proceeded to capture them with xylazine bullets. One of the suspects, Suresh Babu, believed to be the kidnapper, was killed in the action due to penetration of the skull by the xylazine bullet, death being instant and on the spot."

Alice turned, her eyes spread wide with surprise and fear and looked in Goray's eyes.

And knew, in that instant, that he had ordered the killing.

"Why, you..." Alice started saying when Goray held up his hand in a very final gesture which seemed to say, "Forget you ever saw this. This is for the best. You have your husband back. Now please shut up and leave... Quickly. And remember, you are dealing with me."

Alice shut up, and focused on Ashok.

Goray went on in an even tone: "The other member of the pair, one Ashok Joshi, a US citizen of Indian extraction, was captured as planned. Dr. Ashok Joshi is a medicinal chemist, believed to have been kidnapped by Suresh Babu and the gang he worked for, for his scientific expertise.After debriefing, Dr. Ashok Joshi is to be released and allowed to proceed to the US."

"Proceed to the US I shall," Alice thought. "And I hope never to see you or this place again as long as I live."

Two days later, at a hastily booked USAir flight, Alice walked Ashok to the boarding gate. He could barely hold his head up, and his eyes were bloodshot from the repeated injections of metazone. He was almost completely incoherent and Commissioner Goray had to step in to ease their way through the various checkpoints. Alice smiled apologetically at everyone throughout the ordeal.

She turned to Goray one last time before they would enter the hallway leading to the plane door.

Goray wagged a finger at her from the distance.

"Never come back!", the finger said.

"For all his failings, this Dr. Joshi is a man after my heart," Commissioner Goray thought to himself. He had just completed reading the complete notations of the Indowin plan found in Ashok's electronic organizer in the backpack.

"His sheer audacity is breath-taking. And the morality of his actions: well, who can judge that? Unless somebody does something, we are clearly hurtling toward destruction. Our politicians are too chicken for any real action. And just as a passing thought: Isn't any real action anyone has to take almost exactly like what Dr. Joshi had in mind?"

By now his own mind was working furiously. His own son had immigrated to the US a few years ago and was very insistent that they come to live with him. Commissioner Goray had a couple of years left before he retired, but he could quit prematurely without much problem.

The Indowin tablets were burning a hole in his personal safe at the police station.

"'Glory to the motherland!', Joshi writes. Yes, it's been a long time since someone said that and meant it, leave alone giving the nation a real chance for glory! Now it's your turn, to act in the best interests of India, come what may."

He lifted the phone and called his wife. "I have made up my mind, honey," he said. "Lets go live with Sanjay for a while!"

"But what about the new house we are about to buy?" she asked.

"Never mind the house. We may not be coming back anytime soon."

Commissioner Goray stayed over late in his office that day. After everyone had left, he put the pack of Indowin tablets in his bag and headed for the national water grid reservoir a few miles away.

And that's how the richest country in the world finally got its due in international affairs. In a hundred years, the population of India fell to twenty percent of its pre-Indowin levels. Given the massive natural
endowments of India, hugh per capita resources became available. With the brain power of the Indians, Indian technology advanced to surpass the rest of the world and with ever-stricter application of intellectual property laws, the world started beating a path to India's door, much as it did for twentieth century US or early twenty-first century Japan.

Alice methodically destroyed all Indowin related files and materials and lived in semi-retirement in Maine, often temping as a teacher. Ashok had to be confined to a mental institution for the next ten years and when he was finally let go, his recollections of medicinal chemistry were nonexistent.

He did not live to see his beloved India restored to its glory.

But that often happens with great patriots.

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