Genesis Maker: The Indian Marvel (Rewrite)
Chapter 123: Ch.120: Stones for the Future

Chapter 123: Ch.120: Stones for the Future

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- Kamal Asthaan, Ujjain, Bharat -

A pause, then Aryan pushed his chair back slightly, the hush in the hall settling deeper as they felt him shift from listening to leading.

The meeting stretched on, shifting like a restless tide from one subject to the next. Papers rustled. Voices rose and settled, rose again. Outside the tall windows, the sun arced lazily toward the western sky, but inside the great hall of Kamal Asthaan, time seemed pinned to this table where Bharat’s tomorrow was being argued into shape.

She let that sink in before leaning slightly forward, hands resting on the table’s edge.

Nehru gave a slow nod at that, conceding a point even as he made a new one. "Then you must ensure the village hospitals stay funded when your cities chase profit, Samrat."

Aryan’s lips curved, not quite a smile but close. "It begins," he said, "with the truth that this Samrat’s throne means nothing without the Prime Minister’s mandate. My rule is not separate — it is shared. For the next twenty-one years, this chair and that chair"—he gestured toward Surya—"are bound by trust. And when I am gone, another shall sit here only with the people’s will behind him."

Aryan’s smile flickered — faint but real. "They will, Panditji. Because profit will never outrun the people’s trust — not under my watch."

His father caught his eyes — and though Surya said nothing, the quiet pride there needed no words.

"Namaskar," Aryan said, voice steady and warm, carrying easily in the sunlit hall. "My greetings to you all — my guides, my guardians, my challengers when I stray. Today, I ask not just for your counsel, but your courage."

Aryan, quiet so far, leaned forward — his fingers tracing a faint line on the polished armrest.

"Then let’s begin."

Anjali Rajvanshi lifted her chin, speaking for the first time — her voice softer but cutting no less sharp. "And the shape of that future, Aryan?"

When the door guards shifted and murmurs quieted to an expectant hush, all heads turned.

Anjali rose from her chair, draping her pallu neatly over her shoulder. Her eyes moved across the room — gentle but unyielding.

Around the room, pens scribbled, files shuffled, fresh cups of tea arrived like tiny lifelines. Outside, the sun had begun its slow fall behind Ujjain’s ancient spires, but inside the hall, it felt as if dawn had just broken — a new day hammered out in patient argument and stubborn hope.

"I have said it before," she began, voice clear enough to hush even the side whispers, "and I say it again now. If we try to paste the same system onto every corner of Bharat, we will fail our people. What works for Bombay’s steel mills cannot feed a small hamlet in Bundelkhand. What fuels Calcutta’s factories cannot lift a tribal hamlet hidden in our forests."

Opposite them, at a smaller section of the table, sat Sardar Patel and two other senior leaders from the Indian National Congress — the only opposition, though the lines between debate and duty blurred often in these walls. Patel’s arms were folded, his eyes kind but unyielding. He had come because he had to, not because he always agreed. And that, to Surya, was exactly why this gathering mattered.

At the far end, where the table widened and rose onto a dais, a high-backed throne stood ready. Ornate but not gaudy — sandalwood inlaid with brass lotuses, flanked by two lion statues carved so lifelike they seemed to watch the room.

"And our people’s health?" he asked, his tone thoughtful. "The best road means nothing if a child cannot walk it. We have temples. We have factories. We must have clean hospitals too. And not ones stocked with foreign vials at foreign prices."

At the center, Prime Minister Surya Rajvanshi sat straight-backed, grey at his temples but eyes bright as ever. Beside him, Home Minister Anjali Rajvanshi’s sari gleamed emerald in the soft light, her calm presence wrapping the side of the hall in a warmth that quieted even the most restless nerves. Subhash Chandra Bose leaned forward, fingers steepled, his sharp eyes flicking to every corner, already reading the mood like a battlefield map. And near him, CV Raman adjusted his spectacles, lips moving silently as he noted something down — science did not wait for speeches to finish.

When a young secretary stepped forward to gather fresh notes for the record, Aryan leaned back at last, exhaustion and fire both threading through his voice.

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Silence returned — this time not heavy with uncertainty, but humming with a fierce, reluctant hope.

Above them, the carved ceiling caught the sunlight and scattered it in a hundred small reflections — like tiny, stubborn stars refusing to fade, no matter how dark the world beyond might grow.

Behind him came a handful of trusted aides — messengers, scribes, quiet shadows who vanished to the edges once their Samrat took his place. Aryan paused at the dais, met each pair of eyes, and dipped his head once — not as a ruler above them, but as the one who would carry their hopes beyond what any single election could promise.

He turned to Patel, eyes respectful, firm. "And our relationships — especially with those who once ruled us. This, too, we must decide here. The British still cling to the Ceylon shores, the Maldives, islands we once called our own. We have aided their people quietly, but what next? Do we stand aside and wait for them to beg for help? Or do we say openly what we whisper now — that Bharat’s ocean is not a chessboard for old kings to play upon?"

Surya Rajvanshi leaned back, a slow smile blooming under his moustache. Anjali caught her son’s eyes and gave the smallest nod — a mother’s nod, not a minister’s. Bose cracked his knuckles, eager for the fight that would come, not with bullets but ideas. Raman was already jotting formulas in the margins of his folder.

"Growth. Governance. Strength," Aryan said simply. "Bharat must rise not only in numbers but in dignity. Roads, ports, schools — more of them, yes, but smarter. Villages that feed themselves and cities that don’t crush the weak. Defence strong enough that no empire will dream of chains again. Science that serves every child, not just the privileged."

He paused, meeting Raman’s nod of agreement. "We grow our own grain — why not our own medicines? Let Bharat be the wellspring of its own cures. Train our youth. Fill every district with skilled healers. Let cheap, honest treatment be the birthright of every citizen."

Aryan met his gaze head-on, young but unflinching. "Then we must stand ready — not as a pawn caught between foreign storms, but as a pillar others lean on. We choose when we fight, when we talk, when we build. And when the world sees our hand steady enough to guide, they will fear to bind it in chains again."

"If we must meet again tomorrow, so be it. If we must break this hall into committees that work through the night, so be it. But let this place be where the next twenty years of Bharat are carved in stone. And when history asks what we did with our freedom, let this be our answer."

Somewhere near the back, an older finance minister let out a soft breath — half alarm, half reluctant awe.

Some ministers murmured in agreement, tapping their pens on pages now covered in fresh notes. But farther down the table, Jawaharlal Nehru sat back, arms folded, face calm but eyes already sharpening.

"Respectfully, Home Minister," Nehru said, nodding to her, "hybrids are well and good in gardens, not nations. The root of exploitation lies in unchecked capital. If we want equality — real equality — we cannot keep the beast half-chained. We must decide now — do we wish to be just another nation of rich cities surrounded by hungry villages? Or do we build from the ground up — all of it shared, none of it hoarded?"

A soft murmur of assent rose — part prayer, part promise — as the greatest minds of a young nation bent again to their pages, maps, and hopes.

Patel’s brow furrowed. "And the price, Samrat? Are we ready for the consequences if we push too soon? The world grows restless. Germany rattles its sword, Japan its claws. The next war may sweep these oceans too."

It was Anjali Rajvanshi who pulled the gathering into sharper edges when the talk turned to how this vast plan should touch the smallest life — the farmer in a drought-hit village, the mason’s daughter dreaming of a school she could walk to safely.

And Sardar Patel exhaled, almost a sigh but not quite defeat. He drummed his fingers once, then twice, before leaning in and saying what the hall needed to hear.

He paused then, letting the echoes settle. In the hush, the weight of his youth seemed to fall away — only the iron behind his words remained.

"We need both wheels to turn together," she said. "Let our cities roar with business — trade, profit, private ambition. That is the engine that will pull Bharat forward. But our villages? Our small towns? They need the protection of the state. Shared wealth. Support for the weakest, so they stand tall enough to chase the same dreams. Hybrid capitalism and socialism — two legs to carry us across this century."

CV Raman lifted a hand then, his voice more professor than politician. "We can debate frameworks," he said, "but standards must bind them all. Steel quality. Food safety. Medicines. If we build a nation on dreams and cheap promises alone, we will collapse. Our industries must hold themselves to the same standards as any empire that thinks to compete with us."

Aryan’s gaze swept the room again. "We need a plan. Not for tomorrow’s headlines, but for the world my children’s children will see when they stand where I stand now. A five-year plan, a ten-year plan, a twenty-year plan — stones laid so deep no storm can wash them away."

Aryan tapped a blank page before him, as if sketching something only he could see. "War comes whether we wish it or not. It is simply inevitable. Even today, Europe trembles. Japan grows bolder. If the storm finds us again, we must not scrabble in the dark for bullets and boots."

"You mean," he said slowly, "two Bharats under one flag. One in the daylight — and one buried deep for when the storm breaks." View the correct content at free.w e bn.ov(e)l(.)com.

He spoke up when Anjali paused, his tone polite but edged with the certainty of a man who’d rehearsed this argument in his mind a thousand times.

He lowered himself onto the throne, folding his hands on the polished armrests. Silence clung to the corners, waiting for the first stone to ripple the pond.

He looked up then — young face lit by the afternoon sun, blue eyes sharper than any blade.

"I asked you here," Aryan continued, "because the road we walk together needs more than slogans and bulletins. Bharat is free — but freedom means nothing if we drift from crisis to crisis with no spine to hold our future steady."

—

For a moment, the room felt too small for their words. Then Subhash Bose gave a low chuckle, cutting through the edge. "Better we fight here with words," he said lightly, "than fight on the streets later with sticks when it all falls apart. Let’s not pretend we will not need wealth to build power — and power to protect our wealth."

He glanced at his father — a brief flicker of son to father, king to chosen prime minister. Surya nodded once, the lines at his eyes crinkling with quiet pride.

Aryan Rajvanshi — Samrat of Bharat — stepped in, his footsteps soft but impossible to ignore. He wore no crown today, only a simple cream-colored sherwani stitched with fine gold at the cuffs. His black hair was neatly combed back, eyes bright and ocean-blue in the morning sun. Eighteen — and yet he made men thrice his age straighten their spines when he passed.

The ministers leaned In — some eyes narrowed, others curious.

Subhash Bose leaned forward, voice cutting through. "Samrat, you ask for unity of mind and mission — then tell us the shape of your vision. Where does this plan begin?"

"This is only the beginning," he said simply. "Bring your best. Bring your doubt too — we will shape both into our foundation. If it takes all night, then let this hall hold our sleeplessness. Bharat has slept enough under other men’s boots. Now, she dreams on her own terms."

"One more matter," he said, voice quiet but unmistakably his father’s steel glinting through the warmth. "We speak of visible plans. Railways, farms, factories. But what of the shadows?"

His hand lifted, palm open as if holding the idea for them all to see. "This hall will decide the steps. Our military — Minister Bose and his team will craft a doctrine that protects us in this century and the next. Our economy — Raman and his scholars will chart the engines of steel and knowledge we must build."

Aryan’s grin was quick and sharp, like the crack of a match in the dark. "Exactly. And if we build it right, the day the world tries to shackle us again, they will find their chains melt on our hidden furnace."

At the long horseshoe table sat Bharat’s strongest minds and steadiest hands — men and women whose names would one day fill pages in schoolbooks, though now they leaned back in their wooden chairs like any other people gathered for a long debate.

A low murmur rippled — not of dissent, but the soft weight of leaders realizing how far they would have to think beyond votes, manifestos, and rival slogans.

Anjali met his gaze evenly, fingers drumming once on her folder. "And who feeds the ground up, Panditji? Who keeps the lights burning if your all-sharing plan chokes the engine that pays for the lights in the first place?"

"So alongside our open economy, we build a hidden one — a spine of steel no enemy can see until it is too late. Shadow foundries. Secret stockpiles. Skilled hands trained to shift from plough to rifle if the land calls for it. All this, without starving our farms or factories of what they need in peace." View the correct content at free.w e bn.ov(e)l(.)com.

- February 9, 1939 -

The great meeting hall of Kamal Asthaan buzzed with the low hum of dozens of important voices — some tense, some curious, a few already scribbling notes on neat stacks of paper laid out before them. Shafts of morning sun slipped through the tall carved windows, falling across polished marble floors and gilded pillars that seemed to catch every word and fold it into the palace walls.

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