We drove in the opposite direction since I had learnt that many of the voting booths were operating in the verandahs of village schools, where we would be able to slip in and out quickly, and where the light was ideal for shooting with our bulky camera. As we drove, our ‘source’ spotted booth capturing in a verandah. The cameraman, sound recordist and I darted out of the car, camera rolling, and within 45 seconds we had the first ‘live’ shots ever of systematic booth capturing, with the precision of an organised assembly line. Four people squatted on the floor—one franked the favoured party’s symbol on the ballot, another affixed thumb impressions of ‘voters’, a third ensured that the Presiding Officer signed each ballot and stamped it, and a fourth folded the ballots neatly and deposited them in the ballot boxes. We had crystal clear shots, and were ecstatic. But I wanted to push my luck, and so, after driving for half-an-hour, we saw another booth being stamped, again in a school building. The cameraman jumped over the ropes that defined the booth’s boundary, as did I, but the sound recordist threw the recorder at me and yelled, “Hum giriftaar ho jaayenge. Main jaa raha hoon” (We will get arrested. I’m leaving). We had entered the prohibited radius around the booth, and could be arrested, for violating election law (as a precaution, before leaving Delhi, I had confidentially informed three of the country’s top editors about my plans: B.G. Verghese, H.K. Dua and Arun Shourie, my brother. They knew, and would have borne witness, had we been arrested.)