‘The Social Life of Indian Trains’ by Amitava Kumar: Dreams and nightmares of train journey

The last time I boarded a train, I was travelling from Dharbhanga, Bihar to Delhi with my family in 2025. My father, who usually keeps to himself, befriended a shy man who sat opposite us. Like my father, he had two daughters who lived with him in Delhi. While he told us about his 19-year-old daughter, he was ambiguous about the age of his older unmarried daughter. With slight embarrassment, he said she was “twenty-five plus”. My father, in an attempt to comfort him, said he too had an older unmarried daughter past the age of 25 and pointed to me. I returned the man’s awkward smile.

From then on, my sister and I were silent observers to the intimate conversations between my father and the man, whose name I have now forgotten. However, I could not forget his dilemma of being torn between modern-day Delhi and his village in Samastipur. Though he wished to act in his daughters’ best interests, he also felt accountable to his family in Samastipur, who pressured him to get his elder daughter married against her wishes. The man wished to open a diagnostic centre for his elder daughter to run.

Along with the chat, he also shared...

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