Most of it – the history of the sadhus and their traditional role as the preservers of spirituality in India – he already knew. But he listened in silence because he could feel the tension building.

“So… for thousands of years,” the P.M. continued, “Indians have been renouncing their worldly life. And as I say, it’s a cultural tradition over here and we’ve never really taken any particular notice of it. But over the last generation, those keeping an eye on these things noticed the appearance of a curious phenomenon. Renunciates were re-appearing with remarkably similar stories of having made contact with God. Many were claiming to have received messages from God… signs that… perhaps, and I know this may be hard for you to accept, but please, hear me out… signs that perhaps God was planning to appear on Earth.”

“That’s quite a big statement, Mohinder.”

“It is, and I accept that there may be other explanations, but because of this it was decided by some of these interested people to experiment with a renunciate… and see if anything happened.”

“Go on.”

“It was suggested that it would be… interesting… to capture an act of renunciation on film, especially if it happened to come up with some kind of sign “

“Well… that would definitely be interesting.”

“They began work on an implant that would enable them to film a renunciation through the renunciate’s own eyes… in order to validate it if one of these messages appeared.”

“I see”

“They then called a meeting of interested parties and, in a secret ballot, enthusiastically ratified making this experiment. And at the same meeting they went on to choose a young Australian to be the bearer of the implant.”