for Agra University to fetch Tulsi.”
“How you would describe his mental state exactly?” asked Puri.
“He was nervous—no doubt about that. Very jittery and preoccupied, in fact. But then you would be too, if a man like Vishnu Mishra had sworn to kill you.”
“You know where all he’d been staying these past weeks?”
“He’d managed to rent a room somewhere in Agra. I got the impression that he’d visited his village in the past few days, though. He mentioned seeing his mother after a long time. They are very close.”
Facecream paused. She felt a sudden inclination to explain to him why she’d volunteered for the Love Commandos, why she was so passionate about the cause. Perhaps if she told him about her past, he’d understand. But then his phone rang and as he answered it, the moment passed.
The approach to Govind, Ram’s village, looked timelessly idyllic in the pearly morning sun. A sandy lane led through fields of ripening wheat, and beyond, humpback zebu cows pulled wooden plows through the dark alluvium. Water being pumped from bore wells formed little streams that glistened in the sun like some magical elixir. Even the fumes from petrol generators hanging above the landscape like morning mist looked enchanting.
They passed a single-story building that stood on its own in the middle of a fenced-off plot. A red cross painted on its side indicated that it was a clinic. The rusty padlock on the door and the weeds growing in the cracks of the porch suggested it was government funded.
Govind’s only school was next—a collection of simple buildings with bars in the windows arranged in a semicircle around a banyan tree. There was a marked lack of activityhere, too. It was now half past seven and the front gates were closed. An empty chair stood sentinel.
Twenty yards beyond, farmsteads with cow dung patties drying on their walls marked the outskirts of Govind proper. Chickens pecked about in patches of chaff where wheat had been threshed by hand. An old man with languid eyes sitting on a charpai stared at the hatchback as if it was the first car he’d ever seen. His wife crouched on the doorstep of their house sweeping away the dust with a reed broom while holding the pallu of her brightly colored sari across one side of her face.
Gradually, the buildings grew denser, the lane narrowed and the car entered an open space in the center of the village. To one side stood a small shop offering everyday products like hair oil, soft drinks, cigarettes and strips of foil pouches containing gutka and paan masala.
Puri wound down his window and asked the shopkeeper for directions to Ram’s home. The man seemed to anticipate the question and made an impatient gesture with his hand. The “salla bhangi,” as he referred to the Dalit, lived on the other side of the village. “Take the lane to the left and follow the smell.”
The detective’s face showed marked disgust as he told his driver to carry on. Delhi society might have been acutely hierarchical, but nowadays, amongst the middle classes at least, money generally counted more than caste. A Dalit with the means could buy his way into any neighborhood; similarly, Brahmins no longer found themselves at the top of the pecking order by right of birth. But this wasn’t Delhi. And although untouchability had been outlawed as long ago as 1947, and it was no longer unheard of for Dalits living in rural India to be invited to upper-caste weddings (and occasionally even eat off the same plates), Puri could seethat Govind remained strictly segregated. Away from the large houses and cars, the sacred bathing pool and the richly adorned temple complete with a well-fed and especially smug-looking pandit, the Dalit ghetto was grim. Perched on a rocky slope that led down to a trench filled with garbage, a collection of mud and thatch houses stood alongside a filthy stockade holding a few cows and water buffalo.
There weren’t many people about—some men tanning
“How you would describe his mental state exactly?” asked Puri.
“He was nervous—no doubt about that. Very jittery and preoccupied, in fact. But then you would be too, if a man like Vishnu Mishra had sworn to kill you.”
“You know where all he’d been staying these past weeks?”
“He’d managed to rent a room somewhere in Agra. I got the impression that he’d visited his village in the past few days, though. He mentioned seeing his mother after a long time. They are very close.”
Facecream paused. She felt a sudden inclination to explain to him why she’d volunteered for the Love Commandos, why she was so passionate about the cause. Perhaps if she told him about her past, he’d understand. But then his phone rang and as he answered it, the moment passed.
The approach to Govind, Ram’s village, looked timelessly idyllic in the pearly morning sun. A sandy lane led through fields of ripening wheat, and beyond, humpback zebu cows pulled wooden plows through the dark alluvium. Water being pumped from bore wells formed little streams that glistened in the sun like some magical elixir. Even the fumes from petrol generators hanging above the landscape like morning mist looked enchanting.
They passed a single-story building that stood on its own in the middle of a fenced-off plot. A red cross painted on its side indicated that it was a clinic. The rusty padlock on the door and the weeds growing in the cracks of the porch suggested it was government funded.
Govind’s only school was next—a collection of simple buildings with bars in the windows arranged in a semicircle around a banyan tree. There was a marked lack of activityhere, too. It was now half past seven and the front gates were closed. An empty chair stood sentinel.
Twenty yards beyond, farmsteads with cow dung patties drying on their walls marked the outskirts of Govind proper. Chickens pecked about in patches of chaff where wheat had been threshed by hand. An old man with languid eyes sitting on a charpai stared at the hatchback as if it was the first car he’d ever seen. His wife crouched on the doorstep of their house sweeping away the dust with a reed broom while holding the pallu of her brightly colored sari across one side of her face.
Gradually, the buildings grew denser, the lane narrowed and the car entered an open space in the center of the village. To one side stood a small shop offering everyday products like hair oil, soft drinks, cigarettes and strips of foil pouches containing gutka and paan masala.
Puri wound down his window and asked the shopkeeper for directions to Ram’s home. The man seemed to anticipate the question and made an impatient gesture with his hand. The “salla bhangi,” as he referred to the Dalit, lived on the other side of the village. “Take the lane to the left and follow the smell.”
The detective’s face showed marked disgust as he told his driver to carry on. Delhi society might have been acutely hierarchical, but nowadays, amongst the middle classes at least, money generally counted more than caste. A Dalit with the means could buy his way into any neighborhood; similarly, Brahmins no longer found themselves at the top of the pecking order by right of birth. But this wasn’t Delhi. And although untouchability had been outlawed as long ago as 1947, and it was no longer unheard of for Dalits living in rural India to be invited to upper-caste weddings (and occasionally even eat off the same plates), Puri could seethat Govind remained strictly segregated. Away from the large houses and cars, the sacred bathing pool and the richly adorned temple complete with a well-fed and especially smug-looking pandit, the Dalit ghetto was grim. Perched on a rocky slope that led down to a trench filled with garbage, a collection of mud and thatch houses stood alongside a filthy stockade holding a few cows and water buffalo.
There weren’t many people about—some men tanning
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