A striking fiction on man’s folly

Published by
Archive Manager

This is a fiction which begins with a man called Shettigar dying while trying to hit hard to kill a mosquito sitting on his stomach.

Inspector Thombre rings up Abir Ganguly, a crime reporter, to reach a scene of possible crime where gangster Chhote Sion’s gang is scheduled to spend a night at Samruddhi. On reaching the site, Abir witnesses a shootout. Bullets are fired and a man dies. Have the cops screwed up, he wonders!

Abir’s boss Mahesh, not knowing that Abir had been present at the site of the crime, wants him to file a story about the victim. “I’ll expect your draft by Friday morning. You have a week. But it better be good,” warns his boss.

Abir meets Muneeza, a student of commerce and daughter of the victim killed in the shootout. Abir befriends her to be able to extract more information on her father. Muneeza tells Abir about her aunt with whom she is staying as she now had no parents. She tells him that her aunt did not like her talking or meeting him so often.

One day when she comes to know that Abir had been present at the site of her father’s murder, she breaks off with him. How could their fragile relationship survive the circumstances that brought them together!

Meanwhile, while sitting in his room, Abir carries out a conversation with a lizard on the wall which, out of jealousy, conveys that if Muneeza had started to stay in their house it would have caused a great deal of unhappiness to it and it would have jumped on Muneeza to frighten her away.

Meanwhile, unable to talk to Muneeza and missing her terribly, he tries to contact her but she refuses to take his phone call. One day, she, however, replies to his call. It seems the lizard loses the battle against Muneeza in its attempt to keep Abir away from Muneeza.

-MG

(Hachette India, 612/614, Sixth Floor, Time Tower, MG Road, Sector 28, Gurgaon-122 001)

Share
Leave a Comment