Hard to take this book in isolation. It reminds me of Kafka, Mahfouz, and vindicates Raspaille. Something like an Indian equivalent of East of Eden insofar as it traces generations of trauma, but the villain of this story is the Indian government/ the society that it has bred.

Ishvar and Om come from from the untouchable case, but manage to "escape" by learning the trade of tailoring from Ashraf who is a muslim tailor in a nearby town.

Ishvar's brother, Narayen, along with the rest of their family are murdered after Narayen asked for a ballot in a local election. Om is Narayen's son – who escaped the violence with Ishvar by happenstance of living with Ashraf.

They go to work for Dina Dalal who is a widow seeking to run up a business in her flat selling quality dresses to Au Revoir. Her relationship with Ishvar and Om is strained throughout the entire book. She is distrusting and wary of being taken advantage of (in more ways than one). En route to to Dina's Ishvar and Om meet a college student (Maneck) who is seeking board somewhere near the college, ends up staying with Dina.

3 In a Village by a River

Frustrated by the political corruption, Narayen says to Dukhi:

“Next time there is an election, I want to mark my own ballot”

“They won’t let you,” said Dukhi. “And why bother? You think it will change anything? Your gesture will be a bucket falling in a well deeper than centuries. The splash won’t be seen or heard.”“It is still my right. And I will exercise it in the next election, I promise you.”

“Lately you are brooding too much about rights. Give up this dangerous habit.” Dukhi paused, brushing away a column of red ants marching towards the foot of the charpoy. The creatures scurried in all directions. “Suppose you do make the mark yourself. You think they cannot open the box and destroy the votes they don’t like?”

“They cannot. The election officer must account for every piece of paper.”

“Give up this idea. It is wasting your time—and your time is your life.”

“Life without dignity is worthless.”

This is particularly telling after discussion of his father's ministry to the untouchable who are (along with his father) considered "undignified."

4 Small Obstacles

Describing having to shit on the train tracks, and being guided about the process by some rando they encounter:

“Yes, I’m your Goo Guru,” he chortled.

Ishvar was not amused, but Om roared with laughter. “Tell me, O great Goo Guruji, do you recommend that we buy a railway timetable, if we are to squat on the tracks every morning?”

“No need for that, my obedient disciple. In a few days your gut will learn the train timings better than the stationmaster.”

The next train was not heard till they had finished, washed, and buttoned their pants. Ishvar decided he would sneak out tomorrow morning before Rajaram awoke. He did not want to squat next to this philosopher of defecation.

Along the line, men and women abandoned the tracks and waited by the ditch for the locomotive interruption to pass; the ones in the bushes stayed put. Rajaram pointed at a train compartment as it glided slowly in front of them.

“Look at those bastards,” he shouted. “Staring at people shitting, as if they themselves are without bowels. As if a turd emerging from an arse-hole is a circus performance.” He flung obscene gestures at the passengers, making some of them turn away. One observer took exception and spat from his window seat, but a favourable wind returned it trainward.

“I wish I could bend over, point, and shoot it like a rocket in their faces,” said Rajaram. “Make them eat it, since they are so interested in it.” He shook his head as they walked back to their shacks. “That kind of shameless behaviour makes me very angry.”

“My grandfather’s friend, Dayaram,” said Om, “he was forced to eat a landlord’s shit once, because he was late ploughing his field.”

Immediately after this scene, after the stranger slicks back his hair with water from the river they're shitting next to, Om –who is ostensibly one of the protagonists/good guys of the story who we will become sympathetic to– starts oogling the woman in front of him in line to get water from a well:

Om returned to the tap for another bucketful. The line had grown considerably. A few places ahead he saw a girl with a big brass pot balanced against her hip. When she raised her arms to lift it to her head, his eyes were drawn to the swell of her blouse.

The weight thrust a fine sharpness into her hips as she passed. Water overbrimmed the pot and sloshed, trickling down her forehead. Glistening drops hung in her hair and eyelashes. Like morning dew, thought Om. Oh, she was lovely. For the rest of the day he felt he would burst with longing and happiness.

N.B. this is something that happened before the emergency. The emergency makes everything worse for sure, but this is an account of the state of affairs before such political complications. This is the kind of thing which got Raspaille "cancelled" but this book presents many such instances of filth, perversion (this is comparatively harmless relative to what follows throughout the entirety of the book, also perpetrated by Om...). In a single page we receive a comprehensive caricature of India stated as matter of fact. The most critical scene in Camp of Saints involves burning poop on the ship and the lust of its inhabitants fornicating in orgiastic filth. Almost every single prominent male character in the book is a victim of perpetrator of sexual abuse in some manner or another...

Goo Guru explains a street performer's behavior in this same chapter:

The monkey-man in the colony had a standing agreement with the woman. Her blackened or damaged bananas went to his two main performers. “The poor dog has to find his own food, though,” said Rajaram.

“Which dog?”

“Monkey-man’s dog. He’s part of the act—the monkeys ride him. But he is always in the garbage, looking for food.

Monkey-man can’t afford to feed them all.” The Primus sputtered twice; he pumped it up and stirred the pan. “Some people say “Monkey-man does dirty, unnatural things with the monkeys. I don’t believe it. But even if he does, so what? We all need comfort, no? Monkey, prostitute, or your own hand—what difference? Not everyone can have wives.”

5

Maneck is curious about pubes in the photos of women:

Someone showed him a deck of playing cards that had pictures of naked women. The dark patches between their legs horrified him. It couldn’t be, the pictures had to be fake, he thought, remembering the smooth, sweetly whispering hole of Suraiya.

“That’s hair—that’s the way it’s supposed to be,” said the older boy. “These are genuine photographs. Look, I’ll show you.” He undid his pants to display his pubic hair, also releasing his tumescent penis from its confines.

“But you’re a boy, it doesn’t prove anything about girls,” said Maneck. He wanted a closer look at the cards. The fellow would not let him unless he did him a favour. He held Maneck very close, rubbing against him and moaning. It was a strange sound, thought Maneck, as though he was trying to do kakka. The cards were handed over after the fellow had spurted.”

Shortly after arriving at college, Maneck wants to go home. He went to college as a contingency to receive an education so that he could aspire to higher professional life than inheriting his father's Cola business, but he does not like it there. Incidentally, his father also wants him to come home, but puts up a fight (which he's internally willing to concede) in order to save face with family/friends that would give him/his family a hard time for Maneck's failed college experiment. He says he does not want to be seen as too soft a father. And so Maneck, due to a tragedy of errors, Maneck stays at school. Manceck is unwilling to reveal to his father the real reason he wants to come home which is that he was mugged by a gang of roving students who made him shit himself in a freezer and then forced him to masturbate in front of them.

While at school, Maneck meets Avinash who teaches him how to fumigate his bed and also teaches him how to play chess.

10

Dina gradually learns more about the tailors who are reluctant to share much about their background, introducing the apt simile of a quilt describing the story of their/her/everyone's lives:

She had a dozen more questions to ask, but respected his reluctance. If they wanted to, they would tell her more some day when they were ready. For now, she added the pieces to what Maneck had already revealed about their life in the village. Like her quilt, the tailors’ chronicle was gradually gathering shape.”

In Dina's apartment there are a number of funny, frustrating, and heartbreaking conversations between subsets of the four inhabitants. Regarding Om's lice:

“But I hope Om doesn’t get fond of his medicine. Or we’ll have to suffer the kerosene stink every day.”

“But how does it work? Does it poison the lice in my hair?”

“I can tell you,” said Maneck.

“You are a champion fakeologist,” said Om.

“No, listen. First, every little louse soaks itself in the kerosene.

Then, in the middle of the night, after you are asleep, Dina Aunty gives each one a tiny matchstick. At the count of three they commit suicide in bursts of tiny flames without hurting you. There’ll be a beautiful halo round your head when it happens.”

“That’s not funny,” said Dina.

“Suicide isn’t supposed to be, Aunty.”

11

Om and Maneck are working at a retail store and have bribed the owner to let them sneak into an area behind the changing room to perv on women who come in to the store.

She returned behind the curtain. Seconds later, there was a muffled thud and a scream.

Jeevan jumped. “Madam! Is everything all right?”

“I heard a noise! From the back!”

“Please, madam, it’s all right, I promise you,” he grovelled with masterful calm and speed. “It’s only rats. Please don’t worry.”

She came out flustered, flinging the pants on the counter. He reverently restored them to their hanger. “I’m very sorry you were frightened, madam. Rats are such a problem wherever you go in the city.”

I think that this is kind of representative of the whole picture of India that's being painted. Bribery for the sake of perversion, which is excusable by filth.

14

Maneck goes to visit Avinash and learns that he died mysteriously. Attributed to an accident:

The father nodded. “They told us the body was found many months ago, on the railway tracks, no identification. They said he died because he fell off a fast train. They said he must have been hanging from the door or sitting on the roof. But Avinash was careful, he never did such things.” His eyes were watering again; he paused to wipe them. The mother touched his arm lightly with her fingers. He was able to continue. “At last, after such a long time, we saw our son. We saw burns on many shameful parts of his body, and when his mother picked up his hand to press it to her forehead, we could see that his fingernails were gone. So we asked them in the morgue, how can this happen in falling from a train? They said anything can happen. Nobody would help us.”

His death is jotted down by the police into their notebook and that is the extent of retribution that the family is offered.

15 - Family Planning

By this time, the chapter heading ahead of Om's wedding is as ominous as an epsiode entitled "The Red Wedding." Throughout the story, vasectomies have been suggested by various government officials as part of an initiative towards family planning for which it seems that all of them, regardless of office, have a quota.

Om and Ishvar are rounded up (again), forcibly vasectomized, and Om in particular is singled out for spitting at the head of the police gang with whom he had prior beef. This man orders Om's castration. India was fucking evil bro.

16

Beggarmaster being the pimp and protector of the streets and Dina apt is kinda sick:

She knew what he was getting at: his instalment, like the hire-purchase man’s, was overdue. “There won’t be any problem with the landlord, will there? Because the tailors haven’t paid? I can give you a little right now, if you insist.”

“Not at all. I am looking after the flat, don’t worry. With such good people I am not concerned about temporary arrears. You came to Shankar’s funeral, I won’t forget that.”

He made a collection note in his diary and shut the briefcase.

“Yesterday I finally made the donation to the temple in Shankar’s memory. There was a small puja, and as the priest was ringing the bell, I felt such peace. Maybe it’s time for me to give up this business, devote myself to prayer and meditation.”

“Are you serious? What will happen to all your beggars? And to the tailors and me?”

Beggarmaster nodded wearily. “That’s the thing. For the sake of my worldly duties, I must keep in check my spiritual urges.”

Dina remains distrusting of Ishvar and Om to the very end, despite their burgeoning friendship that has unfolded throughout all the tribulations to this point. After they fail to return from their trip to the village for Om to find a wife, she begins wondering if they're in-fact conspiring with Beggarmaster to take over her operation. Meanwhile the tailor B-plot is once again them getting brutalized by the emergency machine.

16 - The Circle is Complete

Dina goes to the courthouse where lawyers congregate peddling their services to passersby and meets a stoic wise dude who seems to be the only one not harassing her (literally copping a feel in the crowd):

“Dina began to wish Mr. Valmik would stop talking in this high-flown manner. It had been entertaining for a while but was rapidly becoming wearisome. How people loved to make speeches, she thought. Bombast and rhetoric infected the nation, from ministers to lawyers, rent-collectors to hair-collectors.

“So are you saying there is no hope?” she interrupted him.”

“There is always hope—hope enough to balance our despair. Or we would be lost.”

Now he took out a writing pad from his briefcase, lovingly selected a pen from the well-stocked pocket, and began making notes. “Perhaps the ghost of Justice is still wandering around, willing to help us. If a decent judge hears our petition and grants the injunction, you will be safe till the case is tried. Your name, madam?”

Very, very somber conclusion, as if the book is trying to sneak in a last few gut punches. But it's kind of been consistent in this tone throughout, so it doesn't seem like a cheap gas. Maneck is reading the newspaper sees a photo of three girls who hung themselves because their parents could not afford dowries for them to be wed. In the article, it describes how the parents had also lost their eldest who was his friend Avinash: the eldest who died of mysterious causes that were chalked up to falling off of a train despite the autopsy.

He paused, touching his pen pocket. “I must be truly blessed, for I have been able to tell my whole story twice. First to you on the train, then to a nice lady in the courthouse compound. But that was also many years ago. I’m thirsting to find a new audience. Ah, yes, to share the story redeems everything.”

“How?”

“How, I don’t know exactly. But I feel it here.” He put his hand over his shirt pocket again.”

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