Will write tomorrow or day after, that is to say, I will not write now

Khamosh Adaalat Jaari Hai

me: comrade free?

Amalendu: no

me: k

Sent at 16:52 on Tuesday

Amalendu: hai...

had a meeting with students...

now free...

me: how much income tax do i pay when i get a consultancy of 38000 per month

approx fig

Amalendu: aprox. income is 4.5Lakhs per annum right?

me: 4.2

Amalendu: do you have any saving in LIC, PF, PPF, ELSS

me: no chance narang saheb

Amalendu: or NSC or five yer fixed deposit in bank?

me: no darling

Amalendu: ok

Sent at 17:44 on Tuesday

Amalendu: 5k+20k+35k= about 60k

but...

me: saath hazaar

ok

Amalendu: consultancy income has lot of loopholes...

me: ya

Amalendu: you can show quite a bit as expenditure....

me: like

house rent can i shownt be

Amalendu: all telephone expenses, travel expenses...

me: ok

Amalendu: food and lodging...

me: ok

but how did u calculate?

Amalendu: buying computer or internet or laptop...(depriciation about 50% of the cost of comp or laptop)

upto 1.1 lakh no tax

me: k

Amalendu: 1.1 to 1.5 (10%)

me: ok

Amalendu: 1.5 to 2.5(20%)

2.5 and above 30%

me: ok

so out of my 4.2

only 3.2 is getting taxed

Amalendu: yes

even you can deduct your house rent...

me: and if i invest 50000 then?

Amalendu: how much rent do you pay?

me: 4500pm

Amalendu: do all the calculation for the financial year...

don't give me monthly picture..

when did you join this job?

me: June

Amalendu: ok..

that means you have 9 months income this year..

right..

me: ya

and in my consultancy fee its written that its against 18 days every month

Amalendu: thats ok..

you dont have anyother income right?

me: no

thats not accounted i mean

Amalendu: so your this financial years income is 3.4lakhs

me: ya

Amalendu: deduct house rent from that

me: ok

Amalendu: 40K

me: just tell me if i invest 50k somewhere what happens is it deducted

Amalendu: for 9 months

remaining is 3 lakhs

me: ok

Amalendu: deduct some expenses in travel say 20K

me: ya

2.8

Amalendu: remaining 2.8 Lakhs

deduct telephne expenses say 10K

me: ok

Amalendu: 2.7 lakhs

do you have a comp or laptop?

me: office laptop

but i can show a computer

and cameras

Amalendu: yes

what is the aprox. price of both?

me: 2k

Amalendu: what?

me: 2lakh

Amalendu: take only one thing this time may be comp not camera...

me: ok

Amalendu: use camera for next year IT calculation...

me: thats only 40000

Amalendu: so 20K is depriciation of Comp

me: ok

2.5 bacha

Amalendu: so remaining 2.5K

2.5 L

me: ya

Amalendu: yes

do you have distance travel like air travel train expenses?

and lodging...

me: that was borne by office

Amalendu: did you spend anything from your pocket...like your wife and child travelling?

me: ya

not much

Amalendu: how much aprox?

in the financial year...

me: very little two trips to raigarh and back

2000

Amalendu: you dont have to produce bills./////

me: ok

thats so human

Amalendu: take 3A fair and make it about 5 or 10K

me: ok

Amalendu: remaining 2.4L

me: ya

Amalendu: now from this upto 1.1 L

no tax

me: ok

Amalendu: 1.1 to 1.5 10% i.e. 4K tax

1.5 to 2.4 20% i.e. 18K tax

total 22K tax

me: ok

and now if i do a LIC of 50000 then

Amalendu: now if you invest in section 80 ie. pf, ppf etc

say 50K

me: k

Amalendu: your tax liability will be 4k+8k = 12k

me: ok

Amalendu: I would suggest invest in tax saving mutual funds

me: ok

will do that

Amalendu: DSP ML tax saver or SBI Magnum tax gain

me: will do with SBI

Amalendu: lock in period is 3 years and growth is better...

me: ok

Amalendu: you should also buy mediclaim policy for your family

me: how much does that cost

Amalendu: being in hyderabad it may be useful

me: because my cash is so sporadic in nature

Amalendu: spend 2k you will get for about 1 lakh for the family

this is for the year

me: 2k means 2 lakhs

Amalendu: no

2000

me: 2000

ok

Amalendu: buy from Natiaonal Insurance

me: so initially how much money does this mediclaim needs to be put in

Amalendu: govt. one

no just 2000 aprox for 1L

me: ok

fine

Amalendu: you can put 4k for 2L

this is nonrefundabale

me: and does it mean recurring at some intervals

Amalendu: every year you have to renew it...

me: ok

good

Amalendu: if there is no claim in previous year you get some bonous

it is like car insurance

me: and SBI mutual funds whom or where do they sell that

Amalendu: but necessary when you are away from your home in a big city and with a small child

me: ya

Amalendu: any agent will do that

me: ok

Amalendu: just ask your office a/c he will help you

me: ya just did that and she is calling a person

Amalendu: am I sounding like a proper finacial advisor?

me: yes very enlightening

be one u will earn more

Amalendu: still I dont file my own return...

me: OK

Amalendu: I take help of an agent...

me: FINAL QUESTION

WHAT IF I DONT FILE RETURN THIS YEAR

Amalendu: agent takes about 300 rupees and does everything for you

me: HOW MUCH AM I FINED LATER

Amalendu: how much TDS your organisation deducts from you?

me: 10%

I TAKE HOME 34K

Amalendu: which means you have already paid more than 30K tax right?

me: YA

Amalendu: you have to file the return to claim the refund...

thats first thing...

me: YA THATS WHAT MY BOSS TOLD

Amalendu: second and most important thing is if your are travelling abroad...

3 years IT return works very positivly for your visa

me: OK

Amalendu: do you have PAN?

me: YES

Amalendu: good

me: got it in June

Amalendu: will this be your first IT return?

me: yes boss

Amalendu: great welcome to Govt. of India

me: thanks I am honoured

so now i am buying this sbi mutual fund

how much does this cost

Amalendu: are you planning to invest 50K?

me: if get a salary this month or else 25

Amalendu: whatever is the amount divide it between two

me: ok

Amalendu: I would suggest some good part in DSP ML Tax saver

me: ok

Amalendu: the NAV of it is about 15

per unit

me: ok

Amalendu: and SBI Magnum Tax gain NAV is about 60 per unit

me: ok

what is DSP

Amalendu: go for 60% in DSP and and 40% in SBI

me: ok

Amalendu: DSP Maryll Lynch

me: ok

Amalendu: a company

me: ya

fir wo bazaar me mera paisa laga denge

Amalendu: yes

you can check daily NAV in business news paper

or http://myiris.com/mutual/

me: ok

so i will do this coz my ac says we are getting salaries

Amalendu: long time back I bought Reliance Diversified power sector growth at 23 rupees

me: ok

Amalendu: now it is 75

yes

me: i pumped in 50000 last month when the market crashed

Amalendu: after or before crash?

me: at the time of crash

Amalendu: good

me: now its gaining

Amalendu: nice...which companies?

me: dont know ---its a desi mutual fund concept where u have a friend whom u trust

Amalendu: he invests

me: ya

he had been my asst in Bombay

Amalendu: is he a Gujarati?

me: yes

Jatin Popat

Amalendu: good....

dont worry...they are trust worthy in money matter...

me: ya he is a raigarhiya

Amalendu: and no one can better time this market than those...

me: thats all the more untrustworthy though

In 2001 I lost 1 lac in this shares business just due to trust

Amalendu: for me also a guy advises...from Ahmedabad...

me: ok

my shares are from reliance

Amalendu: for long term banking sector seems to be good...

me: no idea

Amalendu: particularly in 2009 and 10 you can get the return if you invest today...

me: ok

Amalendu: thats my analysis

me: i just spend so much that nothing is left to invest

propensity to save is conspicuously absent

Amalendu: and I have not invested a single rupee directly in stock market...

me: GOI should subsidize liquour

and people who admire women should get tax waivers

Amalendu: match called off

me: bad

do I post this chat on my blog

Amalendu: yes

me: yes

there are so many confused souls

the other day i was reading abt taimur lane - the mongol

Amalendu: haan...

me: he was a strange character - somebody with that much violence is extraordinary

Amalendu: true...

me: gyanesh was online yesterday

and he sent me a film

Amalendu: which one?

me: soft core pornography

Amalendu: ok

me: I ate his head with hardcore messages

Amalendu: ha...ha...

me: my wife is coming on the 8th

we will plan a visit feb end

Amalendu: yes.. that would be nice...

me: bcoz tini's kid will be one year old on march 1

so that can also be attended to

Amalendu: april 11 or 13 we are planning Aadi's mundan...

me: good

Amalendu: in Subramanya temple...

me: children look beautiful with tonsured heads

Amalendu: yes...

me: that temple in puttur

Amalendu: as such he has very less hair...

like me

me: haha

Amalendu: no...

me: blore

Amalendu: it is near deepika's village a famous Kartikeya temple...

me: ok

Amalendu: even Sachin Tendulkar visited that...

me: then its good

Amalendu: its 40 km from Puttur

me: ok

i remember that temple with a fish pond

and ashwini

Amalendu: i.e. Mahalingeswara in Puttur...

me: ya

Amalendu: ashwini is in TISS Mumbai...

me: ya she scrapped around august

Amalendu: thats long time...

me: really

people should be more sensitive

Amalendu: yes..

me: all social sciences are based on that

Amalendu: what?

me: sensitivity

Amalendu: sensitivity?

ok

me: and did u learn driving

Amalendu: which part of your body is most sensitive?

NO

me: thighs

because they are weak

Amalendu: all social sciences are based on thighs....

me: In fact

Amalendu: this seems to be logic...

me: good

Amalendu: foundation of philosophy...

ha..ha..

me: ya

bunny had written a wonderful paper on right to philosophy

will send you that

Amalendu: send...

me: went

next month onwards i start studying fo r my MA

Amalendu: yes

me: they have a week long gap between each paper

so thats enough to read five questions

Amalendu: yes...

but will you travel every week?

me: Did you read anything by this years Eco nobel laureate couple

one of them never had formal training in economics

Amalendu: no

so also many past laureate

me: thats good

did u see sashi on saturday

Amalendu: yes

me: and beers

Amalendu: he was asking about you a

no

here in our Academy

me: ok

Amalendu: we had a Research Advisory Committe meeting

me: ok

Amalendu: he is one of the members

me: one of my optional papers is Research methodology

Amalendu: he asked whats your plan about that documentary...

me: I am finishing the website of my org and then i take a plunge

Amalendu: I told him about your sending a mail to Sainath...

he is interested in short films...

me: thinking of getting it funded by stakeholders and approaching somebody like raghubir yadav for the role

Amalendu: he was telling that that there lenses available where you can get the depth of film in video camera...

me: yes

Amalendu: he wants to buy those and make short films

me: In the camera format he has only one camera comes with that film look

Amalendu: he has started appreciating film from the depth of photography angel....

me: This technology is called progressive scan

Amalendu: ok

me: He has to shoot with artificial lights once to get the real film effect

Sent at 18:46 on Tuesday

Amalendu is busy. You may be interrupting.

Mujhe Jhakjhorti smritiyon me
abki baar
thakaan ke alaawa
bastar aur loktantra

jaan kar maan nahi paane ka dukh
jaise dopahar do ki deewar
aur samudra ki kaid

kapde utaarte eeshwar
nange nakshatro ke alawa
yaad waali aurat ka jooda

harqat ko bazaar banate
vishwa ka anant
syah-safed
lal cheentiyon ki ankahi


translations welcome

On the terrace opposite
she skipped ropes in time

as clouds made shapes of her going away
we tried

to assign
smells to touches
and colors to tastes

for years now
the streets flood
in stories of her children

one of them
as i remember
crawls to my bed

underneath pillows of stones
where are the tiny fish
that once tickled her underfeet

dried to a drop
is that my kelo

are these the stories now
that i tender
for times after her going away

a butterfly lost its way through an evening crowd of returning people on and along their vehicles

6-number

Chote pahad ki dhalan utaro to H block
kuch aur aage P&T colony
fir C-Block ki pehli Kataar

Ek aam, dedh aakash ke neeche
Rajan Arora ka ghar

Her smells were ten thousand afternoons away from me
I remembered that I can forget
it s so easy

Rear view

----Scribble-----------------------------

This is not an arrangement for winters to fall in love with women wearing red undergarments, neither is it a report on the infant mortality rates in Dantewada- SouthBastar.

Not to be precise, it has nothing to do with what Savitri’s father left for her before leaving for his seventh pilgrimage in the mid of a soaked rainy day; her mother was irrevocably sad.
In between, they were those same rogues from the Kaser Para who stole in to the courtyard before it just got dark enough to tell the roses from chrysanthemums. They were seven of them, about the same height and stature and even voices. Savitri for that matter had never been to differentiate anyone’s voice on the phone.

(Grandfather detested the phone just for this vice to it. On the days when he still had the strength to find his way into the street and knock Munshi’s door for an orgasmic vent of nostalgia, he laid out an elaborate plan for a rebellion against the Department of Telecommunications in the country. Munshi is believed to have perished under the burden of quoting the cost of the movement which by any chance had to be raised at the mercy of their sons and daughters)

“She is in” first voice
“He out” Second
“Pluck it”First
“Why was he called the father of the nation when its more like he’s the grandfather”Third
“Shut Up Tamboli”Second

Did Tamboli shut his mouth or not is a question of infinite importance for the story to continue. But for the time being readers have to console with a rather cryptic piece of information that 26 years later when Prof.Jambalendu Khotishi was to deliver a lecture on alternative agricultural practices at the University of Budapest, the student who repeatedly looked out of the window and winked his eyes 61 times a minute gestured him for a private talk.

“I need to talk to you”
“Talk” said the professor
“Not here…come with me”

“He actually had not kept his mouth shut” the nervous boy told after they journeyed to the other part of the city, far from the calm of a university, into a mesh of shops and lights.

“And why do you tell me that” the professor pretended not to look quizzed.
“Because Savitri had wanted it “
Professor knew that it was important to know about Savitri., but the students were waiting at the University, and the officials even, how embarrassed they must be feeling at the guests queries, after all those bespectacled oldies on the first row had managed to be there for his speech…But even hearing of Savitri was more important than other things…leave aside getting a path breaking information of her whereabouts…what does it matter that all this boy churns up here is trash…he seems to be uttering SAVITRI…what a solace in all these 26 years when he had been used to hear this word only in his voice…

“Savitri had wanted to undress Tamboli that night..Mishra Ji misunderstood the offer and then even the roses didn’t smell like roses, you know these hybrid types…the boy continued for exactly 3 hours 28 minutes.
Later that evening when Professor recounted the incident of meeting Savitri’s mitochondrial boy, he wept.

ZOBROED

I

It has been a couple of years that I died there. Nevertheless, the place continues to be the same .
Its even true for me.
Death didnt change much of my apetitie even. I am still a small-eater.

II


BOOKS

FILMS

SMELLS

TOUCHES

HOURS

MY RIVER

HER PAINS

Maaya in Marquez - I

Its time that I write about Gabriel Garcia Marquez again.(Or do I write because of him.)

‘Memories of my melancholy whores’ is Marguez’s first work of fiction in the last ten years…That’s what the introductory blurb to the book says. The previous book by him had been ‘Living to tell the tale’. Orthodox literary reviews suggest concrete autobiographical attributes to that book. In fact it has been accepted as an autobiography.

I have read them both, proudly enough within a month of their publication. The result has always been the same, an irresistible urge to fall in love. May be with words, or with that old woman announcing her presence at five in the morning through my deserted alley.

I have been seeing her for the last thirty years or so, with a basket atop her head carrying bundled sticks to brush our teeth that she barters for a handful of rice. Her skin seems far to meager to contain her body and the wrinkles identify with dunes of a great desert. Every so often I think what sounds would wake my alley up after she dies. But isn't she more than dead, walking twenty kilometers for almost a century, challenging the MNC’s like Colgate, HLL, etc. with her brush-sticks she collects in the jungle to earn a little rice; or is it life?

Garcia Marquez and the old lady raise certain simple questions. In this writing, I want to put up few points regarding the much structured definitions of Fiction and Non-fiction as two distinct genres, specifically in the case of Marquez.

Before I get into my thesis, here are a few humble and honest confessions.
This writing is purely non-academic, drawing from an organic point that it pens from someone holed up in an obscure place in semi-urban India without a scholarly attitude but a genuine interest to read and get inspired to write.
This is not a book review either.
Finally I would like to title this piece as ‘Maya in Marquez’

On his ninetieth birthday, a man decides to gift himself with a night full of wild passion with an adolescent virgin. The encounter spurs his nostalgia. He recounts and relives his past libertine excesses, only to console himself with an unavoidable truth that sex is a helpless substitute for love. This agony guides him to his solitary escape as a writer. He writes about his love in his weekly newspaper column and in turn becomes the most famous man in the town. That’s the story for us. Fiction; one may call it.

To the earlier book now- ‘Living to tell the tale’. In the first page itself, Marquez receives his mother who wants him to accompany her to sell their ancestral house. Subsequently we learn about their bizarre journey to Aracataca. Re-unions with bygone familiarities. We get informed of the author’s passion to become a writer despite considerable domestic resistance. His education. His politics. Women. Life. Music. And success. The narrative is nonlinear and is structured in concentric spirals of tense. Non-fiction; one may term it.

After reading ‘Living to tell the tale’ I realised that almost all I have read of him have had their embryos in his real life. In a sense, his writings do have a strong autobiographical basis. But the point is, whatever the case may be, autobiographical resources contrived with imagery or pure fancy interweaved with factual events, it makes a little difference. Because what ends up are printed pages bound in a book, and the grind of creating it is a different realm. It can never be comprehended by structured conceptions of the real an unreal. Just the way, one cant comprehend life in conceptions.

Art and only art has this power to transcend reality in order to comprehend it. Marquez does it by telling tales and the old lady by selling her stcks.

To be contd.

For desires I would like to harness, a poem after long.


A lesser gray agianst a dark gray against the black
Hills and nights

Intimate murmurs against a silence against the wind
Rivers and nights

Old smells against her salty back against a desire
Nights and nights

Dumb-Bell & Plastic Money

I bought the dumbbells and a pair of skates and even a carrom board. Significantly for me I paid by the debit card, obviously for the first time in my life. It was a nervous decision. For once, I even decided against undergoing this tech-ordeal and stepped out of the shop. Outside, by the street, vehicles threatened with their volumes and sounds. It would have been a rather foolish decision to venture into searching an ATM, withdraw cash and return back. Withdrawing cash is always a dicy proposition, you never know how much to spend and hence withdraw more than you need and the remainder evaporates mysteriously. I even came to think that when I had almost succeeded in accomplishing my task for the day (imagine I had searched a sports shop and despite its grand looks managed to step in and despite the in-crowd which seemed far too much comfortable than me, had managed to communicate my needs to a salesman) why retrace?
Should bank on the situational progress rather - I thought as my hands tremored while handing the card to the salesman. I followed him to the machine which reads such cards. A dark strip on its back tells things about my richness or poverty, the machine learns inroads to my wallet and debits the need-sum to balance the payments. I do not surprise on that. It has been long that I pride my scientific acumen.

On the way back I call Mukesh and relate him to this new achievement. Plastic money experience comes to me only months after I saw a barter trade still so much alive in south Bastar, Chhattisgarh.

Tresspassing

It has just been over a year that I wrote anything on this platform. In between, I didnt actually write anything at all. This particular writing happens from a moment of absolute blankness. I am on a table with a system thats not mine, my head is oscillating between two thoughts of buying dumbells or not. A thick book, that I have been reading for the last one day is threatning to pull out its spell on me and I fear I might again relapse into that pleasure of not having to read to write anything.
And thus precisely this writng commences.
I have had this recent desire to write a political fiction on Bastar. May be about the kids with whom I spent a wonderful learning time, or about the tribal who are suddenly subject to endless urban vices and yet survive. It may also shape up like a travelogue, or a report. A short story would be what I prefer.
Then I have those aborted stories still infecting my mind. A couple of them potential ones I bet. Or should I give it a try in Hindi, has been 6 years that I wrote in that language.

Nevertheless.

I want to think this useless thought again - why to write ...or more precisely, why to write when its not happening the way I would have longed it to.

I searched the answer for hardly ten seconds - the easiest reason that comes is that its good to be typing without bothering about the language, without caring the syntax, the structure, just concentrating on the speed. And how it pleases when one entire sentences goes on correct without the finger forced to trace a back key.

Its good to be typing, honestly, without bothering for the traffic jam that sounds at the corner of this street, without bothering that this street which is more than 1700kms away from my home has been seeing me for the last 26 days and yet I find myself a stranger here. Or in that case its simply fine to be typing without considering the new sticky mass of memory thats just started growing in my guts like a freah algae cover on a decaying old wall.

I dont know if this is the reason why I should write but more importantly I would not like to know a reason for writing and understanding why Pushkala is not here with me.

POST-END

JUST TO MENTION I MET PUSHKALA ON THE 6TH OF JULY 2006 YEARS AFTER THE SUPPOSED DEATH OF CHRIST.
COMRADE WE MUST MEET HER TOGETHER BECAUSE SHE DOESNT IDENTIFY WITH US SEPARATELY

End

This is the last I write here

Few sentences I woke up with today:

I rebel; so you are.
Albert Camus

Waiting is religious
Tukun

Life is naked
Helene Cixous

You have perfected the art of living on nothing
R.K.Narayan

fatal ignorance on my part
Papa

There are two types of people, one who shit and one who cant.
G.G.Marquez.

na hota tumhara
ho jaata nadi ka

relativity

woman:

"world is made of two colors, one she likes and the rest she doesnt" so well defined are the boundaries, she plays...

man:

"world is one color at a time" so much submerged he is

SOUNDS AT THE HORIZON

Comrade, this is the begining of my new story, have yet to tone the language, but the structure I guess shall be the same...check it out.

(1)
The hush of a simmering kettle. Clatter of two glasses on a wooden table top. Footsteps unheard in a noisy municial bus depot. Those nimble steps. The two curious eyes. Shyamalee feels her mouth watering. Chitka serves a plate of fresh smaosas each to the gentleman and the lady. Her kids busy themselves with butterscotch cornettos.
'this way girl' the lady with a basket of brush-sticks on her head drags Shyamalee, a girl of thirteen.

(2)
'make way...make way for the patient...side sir..'
Bhoori struggles to lean by a wall. Her eight months old impregnated stomach kisses a rush. In the rush: police constables with their wireless sets, an inspector of repute, men in hurry, the pale doctor, few nervous interns, those agile and beutiful nurses, three more men with mouthfuls of paan and mobile phones, a score or more of agitated youth all following a stretcher that rolls to the ICU. BHoori feels a grappling pain in her abdomen. Her cry dies in the faceless sounds of a crowd.

(3)
A paperweight over loose papers. Files, folders, pen and other stationary. On a table. In a room. The archaic ceiling fan moans as it suddenly picks up speed. Bisaahu stares at the vacant chair before him and then looks at the wall clock.
'sir is here only after lunch' the toothless peon admits. On his way back Bisaahu turns once and reads the board. "District Industrial Office(DIC)". A tractor moves past him spreading a blanket of dust and noise.

(4)
Sixty eight typewriters play percussion. Intermittent, a loud call of names. Babulal waits for his turn. Gupta the advocate rolls the platen and spits.
'Got it' he asks.
From a firm clutch of his palms, Babulal releases; two notes of hundred denomination each. A key strikes the platen again. In a cosmos of black coats and niggardly bodies a banyan invites him, Babulal settles under the luxury of an ancient shade.

(5)
As they enter Kumhari, the lady with brush-sticks and Shyamalee; Pundit Ji returns from the river, his white spotless dhoti, wet and clinging to his skin, exposing the curve of his small dark buttocks, four pairs of lifeless hands stare at the master as he instructs his labors to place the cement sacks on a rickshaw. And when her mother pulls her close by the sleeve a four wheeler whizzes past Shyamalee. In an odour of combustible gases Shyamalee hears the call.
'this way...hey Dulaari!'
Four pairs of hands lift half a quintal of cement each on their curved backs, Shyamalee helps her mother bring down the basket of brush-sticks before an animated old lady, perhaps in her eightees.

(6)
Bhoori feels her stomach, the child kicks it and then lies still. The corridor stifles with loud angry voices, those that become slogans a while later. By the closed main gate of the Govt. Hospital, Dilip the police constable thrusts a pinch of tobacco by his gums before spotting Bhoori. When their eyes meet, a man in white pyjama-kurta announces -
'B+ve boys...need atleast four bottles'
A cloud of incoherence rises from the crowd as Dilip senses a compassionate chill grow in his spine and fill Bhoori's eyes.
'May I help you' he asks.

(7)
'should've planned for a tractor..' Bisaahu broods. But they need huge securities, father might not've agreed. After 43 seconds of indecision he raises his fingers. Through two rows of table and chairs a waiter reaches him with half a glass of tea. Paan shop's not bad either for a start, Bisaahu follows the buzzing fly over his glass of tea. His thoughts befuddle him and the fly flies to invisibility. Back again, he thinks about the prospects of setting up a poultry farm in his village. Not a bad risk, but they give only a lac. 20000 minus for the security, another 10 for the official bribe, a thousand for his friends and the inaugral party, and after paying off the debts one hardly sums up 60-65 thousand.
'paan shop's my only bet' Bisaahu concludes.
Two tables across, over a plate of expensive sweets a fly smiles at him as the rich Marwaari seth farts after a sumptuous breakfast.
'work' he utters.

(8)
An anthill decays in the jet of his urine. Babulal watches the earth change colors as it soaks his water. A leaf falls, few more, on a summer morning. When the cycle stops beside him and the man gets down Babulal errs in counting his cash.
'Leebra?' the man asks
'no Tapariya' Babulal answers.
'then why not go to the tehsil court, Dharamjagarh's close enough'
'not a civil case, criminal' Babulal shies as he answers.
A pulsating siren happens followed by a white ambassador with a rotary red light on its top. He turns his head towards the court building. Gupta arranges his papers and becomes untraceable ina maze of black coats. Yards away from the building, under the shade of a giant Banyan, Babulal imagines his destiny evolve in a clamor of typewriters, mobile human forms and infinite sheets of paper. He yawns.

Mahakaal ke paridhi me faila bhaya hoon
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Naarayan ki vishtha hoon