Meet the Cast
“Twenty-four persons of no importance whatsoever, each one carrying a matter he does not discuss. Here you may only be introduced. What lies beneath is disclosed at the end of the analysis — and one of these, kindly note, is you.”
Hukum Chand Sethi
Proprietor, Sethi General Store (Est. 1971)
Thirty-one years behind the same glass counter, and he greets the whole colony by surname and by ailment. Toffees are given on credit that is never collected, and the ledger is kept in a hand nobody has ever questioned. Ask him how business is and he will say, very good, very good, thank you.
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Bishnu Prasad Barman
Retired Upper Division Clerk, Sub-Divisional Office
His handwriting was famous in three tehsils, and in thirty-eight years of service not one file left his table out of order. Retirement has not altered the schedule: bath at six, newspaper at seven, tea at half past. Officers came and went; correctness stayed.
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Salim Mirza
Trumpeter, Royal Star Wedding Band (Uniform No. 4)
Uniform number four, braid polished, and the loudest brass in any procession from Nala Road to the cantonment. Weddings, mundans, election rallies — he has played at all of them and been photographed at none. When the baraat turns the corner, the sound you remember is his.
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Kamala Iyer
Assistant Teacher, Class VI-B, Municipal Girls' School
Class VI-B has been hers for twenty-two years, and four hundred girls have learnt their rivers from her chalk. She is early to every assembly and stays back for the slow ones without being asked. The staff room calls her Madam; nobody in that building calls her anything else.
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Raghav 'Raghu' Tiwari
Photocopy & STD Booth Operator, Court Compound Gate No. 2
Photocopies at fifty paise, trunk calls at the going rate, and a booth the width of a cupboard at Court Gate No. 2. Every clerk, tout and weeping litigant in the compound knows his name and borrows his stapler. He is everybody's man, all day, without exception.
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Mahadev Naik
Night-Shift Watchman, Ambika Apartments (Wing B)
From ten at night to six in the morning he sits under one bulb at the gate of Wing B, torch and register on his lap. Eighty-four flats sleep behind him; he knows every scooter by its engine sound. Residents wave at him in the dark and forget his face by daylight.
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Pushpa Rane
Proprietress, Rane Tiffin Service (Home Delivery, 40 Dabbas Daily)
Forty dabbas leave her kitchen daily, each one labelled in her own hand, each one still warm when it reaches its bachelor. She began with four tiffins and a borrowed pressure cooker in 1998. The mutton on Sundays is spoken of in two colonies.
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Yusuf Ali
Cycle Repair Mechanic, Corner of Nala Road
At the corner of Nala Road, with spanners laid out like surgical instruments, he has straightened rims and patched tubes for a generation of schoolboys. He charges too little and refuses to be thanked. Whatever the town discards, he mends and calls it nothing special.
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Sushil Gupta
Insurance Agent (Part-Time), Sub-Agent Code 4417
Sub-agent code 4417, cloth bag on the handlebar, and a scooter seat that doubles as his office. He can quote a maturity value for your daughter's wedding before the tea arrives. Nobody in the neighbourhood has been more thoroughly warned about the future.
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Anil Deshpande
Junior Assistant, Municipal Water Department (Section III)
Section III of the Water Department, third desk from the window, twenty-one years without a single day's unauthorised absence. His files are neat, his tea is at eleven, and his signature is a small careful thing. He has seen four juniors promoted above him and congratulated each one warmly.
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Om Prakash Yadav
Head Coach, Shakti Akhara (Est. by his father, 1968)
The akhara was dug by his father in 1968, and the mud is still turned by hand every morning before five. Boys come to him thin and leave with shoulders. He speaks of discipline, diet and the old days, generally in that order.
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Sarala 'Aunty' Pathak
Marriage Broker & Convenor, Colony Ladies' Committee
Ninety-one matches to her credit, a folder of photographs always within reach, and an opinion on every horoscope in the colony. Nothing is decided at the Ladies' Committee until Aunty has finished her tea and delivered her verdict. She is, by her own account, only helping.
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Ramesh Bhai Solanki
Auto-Rickshaw Driver, Permit No. 6-2231
Permit No. 6-2231, twelve hours a day, jasmine on the dashboard and a deity above the meter. He knows every shortcut in the city and will explain, at volume, exactly what is wrong with all of them. Complain about the fare and you will receive a lecture free of charge.
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Bharati Nayak
Owner, New Glow Ladies' Beauty Parlour (First Floor)
First floor, above the tailor, and every bride in three lanes has sat in her chair before the muhurat. Threading, cutting, setting — and the entire confidential news of the colony, delivered while the dryer hums. She listens more than she speaks, which is rarer than it sounds.
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Jagdish 'Jaggu' Rane
Wedding Photographer, Rane Colour Studio
Four thousand weddings, one steady flash, and an eye for the exact moment the mother-in-law smiles. Rane Colour Studio still develops its own rolls in a back room smelling of chemicals and dust. Everybody's happiest day is somewhere in his cupboard, filed by date.
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Miss Doreen D'Souza
Piano Teacher; Organist, Our Lady of Mercy Church
Piano lessons on Tuesdays and Fridays, and the organ at Our Lady of Mercy every Sunday for thirty years. Scales are played properly in her front room or not at all. She still keeps the sheet music her own teacher gave her, pencilled and soft at the corners.
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Balwant Singh
Halwai, Singh Sweet House (Since His Grandfather's Time)
The kadhai is his grandfather's, the syrup is judged by ear, and the barfi is cut with a confidence that ends all argument. Festivals, funerals, engagements — Singh Sweet House supplies them all, from four in the morning. He sweetens every occasion in the neighbourhood.
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Nizam Sheikh
Master Cutter & Tailor, Nizam Gents' Tailors
Master cutter for thirty years, and the fall of a trouser leaves his shop only when he is satisfied, not when the customer is. Patterns hang on nails like documents of state. He knows the true measurements of every gentleman in the market, and mentions them to nobody.
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Girish Kulkarni
Watch & Clock Repairer, Stall No. 9, Old Market Arcade
Stall No. 9, loupe in the eye, tweezers steady, and a wall of clocks that he keeps in perfect silence and perfect time. Bring him a movement everyone else has declared dead and come back on Thursday. He is easily the most patient man in the arcade.
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Prabhakar 'Prabhu' Naidu
Conductor, City Route 44-C (Twenty-Six Years, Same Route)
Twenty-six years on Route 44-C, whistle in the mouth, ticket rack in hand, and a voice that carries above forty passengers. He can name every stop, every regular, and every driver he has quarrelled with. Move down, please — he has said it four hundred times today.
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Nirmala Joshi
Tuitions Taken, Std. V to VIII, Ground Floor Left
Ground floor left, nine children at a time, five rupees less than the going rate. She was first class first in 1991 and the certificate is in the trunk under the bed. Her students' marks improve; she mentions this only when their mothers insist.
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Havildar (Retd.) Tejpal Singh
Security Supervisor, Sunrise Mall (Shift In-Charge)
Twenty-two years in uniform, and the habit has not left him: shoes polished, shift roster memorised, nine guards inspected before the mall opens. He walks the concourse like a man on rounds. Recruits call him Sahib, and mean it.
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Shankar Chettiar
Head Waiter, Sri Krishna Bhavan (Table Nos. 1–14)
Tables one to fourteen, six tumblers along one arm, and coffee arriving before it is asked for. Twenty-nine years at Sri Krishna Bhavan, and he still remembers what you ordered the last time you came with your father. The regulars will not sit anywhere else.
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Kishore Barua
Travelling Ticket Examiner, Broad Gauge Section
Black coat, torch, punch — and a berth-by-berth progress down the sleeper coach at two in the morning. Broad gauge section, all night, in a train going somewhere he will not get down at. He is unfailingly polite even to those without a ticket.
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