The main bungalow was being remodeled into something it had never been designed to hold.
Not a drawing room. Not a district guesthouse. Not even a commander's office.
A nerve center.
For two weeks the Crown engineers had been arriving in waves—first the survey men with their measuring chains and notebooks, then the men with toolboxes and crates, and finally the specialists who spoke less and stared more. They brought their own habits with them: tea at precise hours, tight handwriting, and a quiet arrogance that assumed every village problem could be solved if the right wire was connected to the right pole.
They were building the radio station the way the British built everything: with method, with redundancy, and with the unspoken belief that control traveled through infrastructure.
On the bungalow roof, a tall mast rose piece by piece. It was teak, chosen because it resisted rot, and it was anchored by guy wires that hummed when the wind touched them. The engineers drilled into the roof beams, set iron plates, and tightened the bolts until the entire structure felt less like a pole and more like a declaration.
The mast cut into the sky like a spear.
Sandalbar would not rely on messenger boys and rumor-chains any longer.
It would broadcast.
At the base of the mast, the Crown team laid down a proper grounding network—copper strips hammered into earth, rods sunk deep, every connection sealed, because lightning in Punjab did not negotiate. They erected a small auxiliary shed behind the bungalow to hold batteries and backup parts, and they ran insulated wiring through the walls with such care that even the plaster dust was swept away each evening.
Inside the bungalow, the broadcast room began to take shape.
The engineers removed a section of wall to widen the space and installed a heavy wooden table that was bolted to the floor. They placed the transmitter in a locked cabinet, and the receiver in another. A telegraph key sat on the side like a stern reminder: if the voice failed, the signal would still go through.
The set itself looked like magic to the villagers who peeked in through the doorway—dials, meters, small bulbs that glowed like captive stars.
To the Crown engineers, it was not magic.
It was discipline made physical.
One of them, Captain Harding, leaned over the frequency dial and spoke without turning his head.
"This is not a toy. No one touches the transmitter without my men present. If I find fingerprints on these knobs, I will shut it down and file a report to Lahore."
Ahmed Khan nodded politely. He never argued with a man who could ruin a project with a single letter.
But when Harding left the room, Ahmed's eyes shifted to the Farabi guard at the door and then to Jinnah.
The guard's face did not change, but the message did.
We understand. We will control it.
Jinnah's reply was even simpler.
"We will make it so clean," he said quietly, "that even Lahore will have no excuse to complain."
While the Crown engineers built the body of the station, Jinnah's team prepared its soul.
Evelyn took charge of the broadcast schedule the way she took charge of a clinic—by turning ideas into checklists, and checklists into routine. She insisted on rehearsals, tested voices for clarity, and wrote short scripts with simple sentences because she understood something the engineers didn't:
A radio station did not transmit information.
It transmitted confidence.
And confidence had to sound effortless.
One afternoon, Jinnah sat with Evelyn and Ahmed in the half-finished broadcast room. The walls still smelled of fresh lime wash. The table was new and hard. Outside, the hammering on the roof continued—clink, clink, clink—like the station was being built to a rhythm.
Evelyn spoke first, holding a thin folder of notes.
"Balvinder is ready," she said. "He's been practicing. He can speak plainly without sounding insulting. And he can make people laugh without turning it into vulgarity."
Ahmed's mouth twitched. "That alone makes him rare."
Evelyn continued, more serious now.
"He wants to call his segment 'The Iron Turban.' Ten minutes each evening. Hygiene. Order. Discipline. He will scold them, but with humor. He can make men obey without making them feel humiliated."
Jinnah nodded.
"Good," he said. "But humor is not enough."
He looked toward the transmitter cabinet, as if the machine itself needed to hear this.
"We need gravity," he said. "And we need melody. If the station becomes only instruction, people will avoid it. If it becomes only entertainment, people will forget it. It must feel like Punjab speaking to Punjab."
Ahmed stepped forward with two files, as if presenting evidence in court.
"First," he said, opening the file with care, "the intellect. Abdullah Shafi."
Jinnah had seen the name before. A schoolteacher. Quiet reputation. The type of man who could speak to farmers without sounding like a politician.
"A Sufi scholar from Pakpattan," Ahmed explained. "Not a sectarian mullah. He teaches children during the day. At night, he recites poetry to illiterate men and somehow makes them understand the meaning without feeling stupid."
Evelyn flipped through the notes. "He speaks clean Urdu?"
"And Punjabi," Ahmed said. "He can switch without effort."
Jinnah's eyes narrowed slightly. "And he can discuss agriculture?"
Ahmed nodded. "He can talk about seed drills and irrigation timing through parables. He can teach modern law through stories. The farmer will listen because it sounds like wisdom, not government."
"What does he call his segment?" Jinnah asked.
Ahmed allowed himself a small smile.
"He suggested 'The Wisdom Hour.' But it will not be an hour. Fifteen minutes. Enough to plant an idea, not enough to bore them."
Jinnah gave a single nod. "Approved."
Ahmed opened the second file.
"And then," he said, as if announcing something softer, "the voice. Sohni."
Evelyn looked up. "The girl?"
"Yes," Ahmed replied. "Hindu. Teenage. Gifted. But she will not be brought alone."
He spoke with emphasis, anticipating the exact concern.
"She will come with her father and her uncle. Both are musicians. They've lived by music for years—simple instruments, folk style. Her father will remain her guardian in every recording session. Her uncle will accompany, and they will leave together."
Evelyn's expression did not soften immediately. It sharpened into professional caution.
"And she stays under supervision," Evelyn said.
"Completely," Ahmed agreed. "Mary will be present. A Farabi guard outside the door. The Crown engineers will not be allowed inside during recording. Harding's men can watch the transmitter, but they do not get access to the performers."
Jinnah listened without interrupting. He was not weighing romance or sentiment. He was weighing risk, control, and optics.
"And her voice?" he asked.
Ahmed hesitated, then allowed the truth.
"When she sings," he said, "the room stops. Men stop. Even stubborn men. It is not vulgar music. It is river folk—clean, old, and powerful."
Jinnah leaned back slightly, satisfied—not because he wanted entertainment, but because he understood the architecture.
This was not a political lineup.
It was Punjab.
"A Sikh soldier," Jinnah said quietly, "for discipline. A Muslim scholar, for wisdom. A Hindu gypsy, for beauty."
He let the words settle like a blueprint.
"That is the Punjab I want them to hear," he continued. "Not the Punjab of Congress speeches. Not the Punjab of zaildar terror. A living Punjab. Put them on air."
Outside, another hammer strike rang from the roof.
Even the building seemed to approve.
5) The Letter Home
That evening, the estate's machinery began to slow.
Not stop—Sandalbar never stopped now—but soften. The looms in the village sheds quieted one by one until the constant clack-thrum faded into something distant, like an engine cooling. Men returned tools to racks. Guards changed shifts. The radio engineers finally descended from the roof, faces grimy, satisfied, and left behind the mast standing in the moonlight like a thin, dark monument.
Jinnah sat alone at his desk in the Lodge.
The room around him was becoming civilized again. The smell of disinfectant and flood had been pushed out by polish and new leather. Papers were stacked with purpose. A lamp burned steady. Outside the window, the estate's new order moved quietly—guards pacing, carts rolling, people living without panic.
He took out personal stationery: thick cream paper embossed with his initials. He unscrewed his fountain pen with the careful patience of a man who understood that writing to family required a different kind of precision than writing to officials.
He wrote not as a commander.
Not as a politician.
He wrote as a brother, and as a father.
"My dear Fatima and Dina…"
He told them the monsoon had retreated and the house was finally habitable. He mentioned the garden with the grapevines planted near the Lodge, promising that one day they would throw shade over harsh afternoons. He described the routine as demanding, but strangely satisfying—because it was not mere management now; it was creation.
Then he paused.
And in that pause, the truth of loneliness entered the letter.
A house, no matter how well designed, was still only a structure without family inside it.
He asked them to come.
Not dramatically. Not pleading. Simply, as a man who had grown tired of victories that tasted like silence.
He promised to send the car to the station. He promised the estate would be safe. He promised Dina would have fresh air and water that did not taste like mud. He promised Fatima would have peace—real peace, not the fragile kind found in cities.
He signed simply:
"Affectionately, Jin."
When he sealed the envelope, he looked at the empty chair across from his desk and felt the quiet cost of everything he was building.
He had built order. He had tamed disaster. He had forced an empire to invest in his vision.
But none of it meant what it should mean if there was no one to share it with.
He called softly, "Ahmed."
Ahmed appeared at the door, tired but alert.
"Yes, Sir?"
"Post this to Bombay," Jinnah said, handing him the envelope. "Registered mail."
Ahmed took it with both hands, as if it were a document of state.
"Yes, Sir."
Jinnah returned to the window.
Outside, the new radio mast rose against the moon, anchored by wires that caught faint silver light. It looked like a blade held upright, waiting.
They are coming, Bilal whispered.
Jinnah's reply was immediate, quiet, and controlled.
Let us hope, he thought, that Sandalbar is ready for them.