Edited by Mona Chettri and Prava Rai

The pervasiveness of patriarchal atrocities come across as unusually stifling as stories such as ‘Dastoor’ elucidate how they thrive under the garb of custom and tradition. Such a hostile environment is exacerbated by rampant alcoholism, abject poverty and lack of employment whose intersection is reflected in many of these writings. Consequently, one also comes across women fighting and trying to forge an identity of their own and ‘dukka’ or toil becoming a defining aspect of their life.


Reviewed by: Shibani Phukan
By Aruna Chakravarti

In doing so, it weaves the spatiotemporal coordinates of interbeing where body, soul and universe are mutually entwined. The wife’s (Ira’s) deep connect with the luminous world of nature is manifest in her tender attachment to her brio-filled mulberry tree that fructifies, provides pleasant shade, attracts chirping birds, and vibrates with lively monkeys. Ira’s empathy with the refulgent tree annoys Sudhiranjan, her pragmatic botanist husband, and makes him so jealous that he poisons it secretly.


Reviewed by: Davinder Mohini Ahuja
By Daljit Nagra

In ‘Lucozade’, a childhood incident reveals caste prejudice within the diaspora. His mother confronts a ‘cleaner-caste Sikh’ shopkeeper; the moment exposes how ‘tamarind agony’ hardened into ‘values rigid as pumped biceps’. Migration did not dissolve inherited hierarchies; it hitchhiked to the newfound geography.
Nagra repeatedly foregrounds writing as physical labour. He speaks of composing with a ‘Bic biro’, calling it the ‘comeback tool of the underclass’. This is a refreshing take on the everyday object.


Reviewed by: Yogesh Patel
by Atanu Roy

His humorous answers to questions put to him by the King illustrate his presence of mind and ability to extricate himself from tricky situations effortlessly. There are innumerable stories of Tenali Raman’s cleverness. This story is also one such. Once the King asks him to tell him the measurement of the length and breadth of the universe as also the number of stars in the sky.


Reviewed by: By Gita Dharmarajan. Illustrations
By Sarnath Banerjee

In this sense, Brighu resembles the figure of the flâneur described by Charles Baudelaire, an urban observer who maps the city through meanderings, curiosity, and detached reflection. Banerjee’s storytelling in Absolute Jafar can similarly be understood as a metaphorical act of walking, whereby urban spaces are represented not as mere locations but as lived environments that are experienced and remembered by their inhabitants. The illustrations and panels of Absolute Jafar seem attuned to the narrative’s preoccupation with memory.


Reviewed by: Ann Susan Aleyas
By Dr Ira Saxena

She comes to India not as a tourist but as one coming home to the Bhansi Estate, where her great-grandfather had built a magnificent colonial bungalow, the Nandan Van. Anjula finds the landscape unattractive in comparison to the English countryside (p. 5). But the first five months make her adjust to the family home of paddy fields, eucalyptus and sal trees, tomato plantations and fruit orchards,


Reviewed by: Dipavali Sen Debroy