Fiction by Upamanyu Chatterjee: A hungry man, deranged by the smell of meat, kills a family of six

To the police, Basant Kumar maintained that the evening of September 29, 1949 had passed quite typically in the Dalvi household. The parents and the daughter had been discussing her engagement, the son had been trying to do his homework while listening to the radio, the sister-in-law and her daughter had been busy in the kitchen while he, Basant Kumar had been occupied with his routine chores, ferrying in water and wood and coal, washing up, rushing to the bazaar to buy sugar and eggs, tending to the cows, clearing the clothesline, going off to get the boy’s school uniform ironed, the usual. Never a moment’s rest for him.

“Well, go on.”

Well, the family had had dinner at 9.30-10, as they did every day. Gosht of goat, dal, tamatar-paneer. They always ate well. Then the sister-in-law and her daughter ate in the kitchen, whatever was left over. He waited. They called him. He went and washed up the thalis, pots and pans and then, after they had all gone to bed, he had his dinner in the shed, whatever was left over for him by the sister-in-law and her daughter from whatever had been left over for them.

“So you never had enough...

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