It was a moonless night in December. A cool breeze from the window disturbed Indrani Debi's sleep. She felt for the adjoining pillow, knowing already that her husband, Manoj Dutta, wouldn't be there.
She knew that he would be occupied with his telescope, observing stars and planets. Indrani Debi cribs about her husband's habits of not having closed the door and not having worn his sweater. Carrying Duttada's sweater, his wife makes her way up to the roof to disturb the meeting between her husband and the one whom she called the designing woman, (the telescope) that had cast a spell over her husband.
For Duttada, his telescope, Divya Chakshu or the Divine Eye as he called it, was a mark of fulfilment of a lifetime ambition. As an amateur astronomer, he had hoped to have some spare money and spare time to buy a telescope and observe the heavens. After retirement he had actually had both.
Duttada's Secret Mission
Like every other amateur, Duttada too had a secret ambition to discover a comet one day. He knew that comets could be new as they came from remote corners of the solar system and orbited around the Sun. When a comet came close to the Sun it has a longish tail, at times, which gets lit up brilliantly by the sunlight and then it disappears for many years.
Despite, the fact that he only had an eight-inch Dibya or telescope and not the gigantic telescope that the professional astronomers had, he was determined to discover a comet. A reason for this was also that he believed that the professional astronomers were more interested in finding galaxies than insignificant things like comets.
Duttada's Success Made him Famous
That particular night, Duttada was sure that some success was close at hand. He had seen a faint stranger. He had re-examined and cross checked it with his charts, made calculations and was as it is meticulous with his observations. He realised that what he had been seeing was a comet. The news of this discovery gets published in the Ananda Bazar Patrika, two days later giving credit to Duttada.
The newspaper reported that Indian Institute of Astrophysics had been informed about a comet by Manoj Dutta and its confirmation was awaited. Soon, the comet came to be recognised and was named after its discoverer, 'Comet Dutta.' After this finding, Duttada became the centre of publicity, something that the introvert Duttada didn't like much. Due to the publicity, Duttada regretted having discovered the comet. His wife too agreed with him, but for a different reason. On being asked, she told her husband that comets bring ill luck and she wouldn't have wished her husband to be associated with the discovery of one. Duttada tells her that these are all superstitions and there is nothing harmful about the comets.
The Meeting between James Forsyth and John Macpherson
Johnson brought James to the Whitehall after a security check and after having introduced James to Sir John Macpherson, he left. Sir John apologised to James for being summoned in this manner and handed over a typescript to James. This typescript was James paper that was based on Duttada's finding. John had acquired the original manuscript from the editor to whom James had submitted his paper.
In the dining hall of King's College, Cambridge, the butler passes down an envelope to the Provost, which was meant for James. James Forsyth was a scientist who had written a paper based on Duttada's finding. The Provost hands over the envelope to James. The envelope contained a note from John Macpherson, Defence Science Advisor in Her Majesty's Government. In the note, John Macpherson had asked James to, come and meet him without any delay and keep his visit confidential.
Sir John Discusses James Paper with him
Sir John agrees with James over the fact that his paper is very important. At the same time, Sir John felt that it should never be published. James was sure that there was nothing wrong with the accuracy of the paper, nor did he want his paper to get suppressed. However, known Sir John to be a great scientist, he thought of patiently hearing him out. James paper talked about the collision between Comet Dutta and the Earth.
Sir John was worried about profound implications of a paper that talked about catastrophic effects being published. Sir John spent some time discussing if James findings were correct. But, if they were, this was the news of disaster that they were talking about.
The Impending Disaster and Planning an International Meet
James and Sir John discuss how the cometary collisions that they were talking about could occur in less than a year, ten months to be precise. Ten months is all that the living species were left with for their survival on Earth. Sir John felt that it was important to do something to stop all this. More than two brains were required to handle the situation. Sir John wanted to call a meeting. At the same time he wanted the meeting to be as confidential as possible. He was worried about the panic that might be caused by breaking of such news.
Although James disagreed with the feasibility of planning an International Conference in less than a week's time, he gives in to Sir John's scheme of things. Sir John, meanwhile, asks James to tone down his paper, adding several `if's and but's' to make the news less certain, in order to avoid panic.