Vikas Swarup - Six Suspects

I don't know whether to thank God or Bollywood for this remarkable turnaround. The love affair between the rich girl and the poor boy is staple fare in Hindi films. I wonder whether Ritu Rai is a star-struck scatterbrain, getting her kicks from romancing the poor. Another possibility that crosses my mind is that, like the film-maker Nandita Mishra, she too might be making a documentary on slum life. But when I look into her eyes I don't see any deviousness there, I glimpse only genuine honesty. And a wave of relief sweeps over my body, causing love to gush out of my eyes, drenching the bench and cooling my heart. I kiss Ritu back and clasp her in a fierce embrace as though the two of us are the only living beings left on this planet.

The embrace is broken by someone shaking my shoulder violently. I look up to find a tall man with a thick curled-up moustache glaring at me. It is Ram Singh, Ritu's bodyguard.

'Baby!' he thunders at her with the authority of a trusted retainer. 'Your entire family is waiting at home with your birthday cake and this is where you are spending your time? If Bhaiyyaji were to see you in this condition he wouldn't leave you alive. Now come with me this instant.'

Ritu wrenches herself from me with a terrified cry and gets up from the bench. Ram Singh grabs her arm and begins dragging her towards the car park. She cannot even muster the courage to look back at me.

I am left contemplating the reach of her father. If Ram Singh can inspire so much terror, what will being face to face with Jagannath Rai be like? What kind of nasty things will he do to me once he finds out about the naughty things I have done with his daughter? I can only hope that just as the gangsters whose briefcase I have stolen have no clue to my whereabouts, Jagannath Rai will be unable to trace me.

On returning to the temple, I find Champi sitting in her usual place, chatting to a dark-skinned stranger. This is the first time I have seen her chat with anyone in the temple. I approach the gulmohar tree. The man sitting on the bench is the strangestlooking person I have ever seen. He is no more than five feet tall and jet black, like the habshis they show in movies dancing with the heroine in a nightclub in their leopard-skin loincloths, chanting some nonsense like 'Hoogo Boogu' and thrusting their spears in the air.

'Who was that stranger you were talking to?' I ask Champi the next morning.

'He is my friend, and he is staying in the shack next to ours,' says Champi. 'What does he look like, Munna?'

I glance at Champi sharply. There is an expectant look on her face, as though my answer will be a confirmation of what she has already visualized in her mind. I see the same bashful glow on her cheeks as I have seen on Ritu's. With a shock I realize Champi might be falling in love with that tribal. Somehow, because of her ugliness, the possibility has never crossed my mind, and I realize how selfish and insensitive I have been.

'What does he look like?' Champi repeats.

'He is tall and dark and very handsome,' I reply, bringing a smile to Champi's face. No point telling her that her Romeo is a black midget who looks like a clown.

The next week is the most agonizing of my life. Ritu does not call me and her mobile appears to be switched off. I am unable to sleep, my mind full of grim portents. And my foreboding seems justified when I get a frantic call on 17 March from Malini, Ritu's friend whom I met in the night club. 'Munna, Ritu needs to see you. With great difficulty I have managed to bring her to my house. Can you come right now to West End?'

I take down the address and rush to her house, a smart villa in a leafy suburb. A distraught Malini receives me and takes me to her room, where I receive the shock of my life. Ritu limps up to me, looking like one of those battered housewives they show on TV. There are bruises on her forehead and chin, welt marks on her cheeks and dark circles under her eyes.

'Who did this to you?' I cry.

'There was a big fight in the house on the day of my birthday. Ram Singh spilled the beans about my affair with you. My father threatened to shoot me. But it was Vicky who actually hit me.'

An incandescent rage begins building inside me. 'How dare he do this to you?' I seethe. 'I will kill him.'

'Now I have been forbidden from leaving the house and my mobile has been confiscated,' Ritu adds. 'Luckily Malini came to meet me today and managed to bring me here. I wanted to warn you to be very careful. Your life could be in danger.'

'But what about your life? The butchers in your house are quite capable of killing you.'

'It is a woman's fate to suffer. But I have taken one courageous decision at least. I have told my father that I will not marry Kunwar Inder Singh, even if he kills me. That alliance was arranged by my father only to further his political agenda. I refuse to become a pawn in his dirty game.'

'Then marry me.'

'My family will never allow me to marry you.' Ritu slowly shakes her head. 'But I have made it clear that I shall not marry anyone else either.'

'Then marry me against your family's wishes. We could go to a temple right now. Once we are legally married, your father won't be able to do a thing. The police will protect us.'

She gives a hollow laugh. 'I have seen how police officers quake on hearing my father's name. They will be the first ones to drag me back to him.'

'Then what are our options, Ritu?'

'None. They say in books that all's fair in love and war. But I have seen with my own eyes, nothing is fair in either, Munna. Our love is a prohibited one.'

'Just because you belong to a high caste and I don't? I do not agree with you,' I challenge her. 'Forty years ago my mother and I were called Untouchables. We wouldn't have been allowed inside the temple. Today she not only works there, she also lives there. And no one dares call us Untouchable.'

'But let her come to our house with your marriage proposal and then see what happens.'

'What will happen? At best your family will say no.'

'Don't be naive, Munna. You know what they did to that poor Muslim boy who dared to marry the daughter of an industrialist in Kolkata. They killed him.'

'But I am not Muslim.'

'Then take a look at this newspaper report.' She produces a crumpled news clipping from her handbag. It is from some Hindi newspaper.

'What does it say?'

'It says that two young lovers were lynched in Uttar Pradesh because they belonged to different castes. Nineteen-year-old Pritam and eighteen-year-old Sonu were hanged one after the other from the roof of a house in their village. He was a high-caste Brahmin, while she was a member of a lower-caste community. Hundreds of people watched as the couple were hanged. What is even more gruesome is the fact that the boy's and the girl's parents not only sanctioned the punishment, but even watched as their children swung from the makeshift gibbet.' She shudders as she reads.

'I don't care if they kill me. I still want to marry you.'

'But I care, Munna, I care. If my brother can do this to me, his own sister, think what he could do to you.'

'You exaggerate unnecessarily.' I wave my hand. 'I am not scared of Vicky Rai.'

At that precise moment my mobile phone trills. This surprises me because the only person other than me who knows this number is Ritu. I press the Talk button and an unknown voice breathes down the line. 'Motherfucker, listen to me carefully. My name is Vicky Rai. And you have dared to raise your eyes to my sister Ritu. Now I will carve you up like a pig, I will break every bone in your body and then I will feed your carcass to my dogs. Get it?'

The line is disconnected and the air inside the room becomes noticeably colder. Ritu doesn't hear the message, but from the expression on my face she guesses the identity of the caller immediately. 'It was my brother, wasn't it?'