Arjun Mehta Chapter 1 – The Final Departure The storm came in without warning, the kind of Mumbai monsoon that split the city into islands of survival. Streets drowned, taxis stalled like dying fish, and yet the lifeline of the city—the suburban trains—kept moving, dragging weary commuters through sheets of rain. At Churchgate station, the loudspeaker was already crackling about delays, though no one really listened. People had learned to treat delays like background noise, like the endless vendors selling umbrellas at triple their price. But on that night, when the rain lashed glass windows and lightning turned the platforms…
-
-
Rishabh Sen Episode 1 – The Key in the Dust The old mansion on College Street stood between two bookstalls like an unwelcome intruder in a crowded marketplace. Its façade leaned as though tired of holding its own weight, blackened with soot and rain. Once it must have been a proud colonial house with verandahs, high arched windows, and a tall iron gate. Now, the gate sagged on its hinges, its bars eaten by rust, and the windows wore shutters nailed from the inside. Even in the middle of the afternoon, when the book market throbbed with students shouting for…
-
ঋত্বিক গাঙ্গুলি পর্ব ১ : অচেনা শহর স্টেশনের প্ল্যাটফর্মে দাঁড়িয়ে থাকা মানুষগুলো একে একে ট্রেনে উঠছে। ভোরের অন্ধকার তখনও কেটে যায়নি, দূরের আকাশে একটা অর্ধচন্দ্র ম্লান আলো ছড়াচ্ছে। শহরের নাম—চন্দ্রপুর। বেশ বড় নয়, আবার একেবারেই ছোটও নয়। মফস্বল আর শহুরে জীবনের মাঝামাঝি এক টানটান অবস্থান। এ শহরে হঠাৎ এসেছিল অর্ণব দত্ত—চোখে কালো চশমা, পরনে জিন্স আর ফেডেড জ্যাকেট। লম্বা, চওড়া কাঁধ, হাঁটার ভঙ্গিতে সেনা-শৃঙ্খলার আভাস। সে ছিল একসময় আর্মির মিলিটারি পুলিশ। এখন ঘুরে বেড়ানোই তার কাজ। কোথাও গন্তব্য নেই, কোথাও থাকার বাধ্যবাধকতা নেই। চন্দ্রপুরে নামার সিদ্ধান্তটা ছিল সম্পূর্ণ হঠাৎ। ট্রেনটা থামলো, আর সে নেমে গেল। চারপাশের মানুষরা তার দিকে তাকালো,…
-
Debayan Roy Part 1 – The Festival Begins The Chatterjee bari stood like an aging sentinel in the heart of north Kolkata, its moss-streaked pillars and wrought-iron balconies bearing the weight of two centuries. On any other day, it was a decaying mansion where pigeons nested in broken cornices and the smell of damp walls clung to the air like an old cough. But now, in the first week of autumn, the house seemed to breathe again. Lights hung from balconies, drums beat in the courtyard, and relatives filled the old rooms with chatter and anticipation. Durga Puja had arrived.…
-
Rhea Malhotra Part 1 – The Announcement The morning bell at Raipur High had always been shrill enough to cut through sleep, chatter, even monsoon thunder. But that day it sounded different—longer, harsher, like the metal clanged with purpose. Students rushed into the assembly hall, uniforms sticking with the last drizzle of rain, shoes leaving muddy half-moons on the stone floor. The ceiling fans swung lazily above us, too slow to dry the nervous sweat running down our backs. Something was off. Even the teachers stood stiff in their lines, whispering among themselves. I stood in the second row, shoving…
-
Arjun Nair Part 1 – The Arrival The train screeched into Netarhat station just before dusk, scattering a few sleepy dogs off the tracks. Meera Joshi stepped down with her rucksack, adjusting her glasses against the thick blanket of humidity that clung to the air. She was thirty-two, a wildlife biologist with years of fieldwork behind her, yet this place carried a silence she had never felt before. The sal trees stretched in dark rows beyond the station, their shadows already deepening with the falling light, as if the forest had secrets it was unwilling to share with newcomers. A…
-
अमितेश ठाकुर एपिसोड 1 — बारिश की गवाही रात की बारिश समंदर से उठी हवा में नमक घोल रही थी। सिवरी के जर्जर डॉक पर पीली रोशनी के नीचे धरती काली चमकती थी, जैसे किसी ने डामर पर तेल उँडेल दिया हो। कंटेनर नंबर 7C-319 की मुहर टूटते ही लोहे की चरमराहट से हवा काटती हुई निकली और चुप्पी के बीच आर्यन भोसले ने आधी नज़र घड़ी पर डाली—01:47। उसके साथ तीन और लोग थे—दारू का कैप उल्टा लगाए योगी, चुपचाप रहने वाला शागिर्द समीर, और सांवला, ठिगना ड्राइवर जग्गू। सब हथियारबंद, सबकी उँगलियाँ ट्रिगर की खाल से दोस्ती करती…
-
Eira Sen Part 1: The Crackling The rain always came suddenly in her town, not like the timid drizzles that brushed over other places but like an argument with the sky itself. That evening, Tara was sitting cross-legged on the floor of her grandmother’s living room, tracing lines on her notebook when the storm struck. The shutters rattled, the lights flickered, and the smell of wet earth rushed in through the gaps under the door. Beside her, on the wooden cabinet that had been in the house longer than she had, stood the old Philips radio. Its red dial and…
-
Arvind Kashyap Part 1 – The Case Begins The rain had been coming down on Kolkata for three days straight, the kind that didn’t wash the city clean but left it sticky and smelling of wet dust, fish, and petrol. Arjun Sen sat in his office above a shuttered sweet shop on Bentinck Street, nursing his fourth cup of watery tea and wondering whether he should pawn his old Nikon camera. Once, he had been the man behind front-page scoops, the journalist who broke the stories others were too scared to touch. Now he chased cheating husbands through dimly lit…
-
Arvind Sen Episode 1: The Vanished Widow It was on a sultry September afternoon that I first heard of the case that would change the course of my modest career. The ceiling fan in my small office on College Street turned sluggishly, stirring the stale air, and I was almost dozing over a week-old newspaper when the phone rang. The voice on the other end was brittle, lined with suppressed panic, and unmistakably aristocratic. “Mr. Sen? This is Mrs. Chaudhuri of Alipore Lane. I need your help. My sister-in-law has disappeared. No one believes me, but something terrible has happened.”…