• Comedy - English

    The Accidental Mayor

    Rohan Banerjee On the morning the town decided Arjun Mishra was qualified to run a municipality, he overslept, which, in his defense, was how he responded to most major events including India matches, family weddings, and gas cylinder deliveries, and when his phone alarm blared “RISE, MAYOR,” not because he was prophetic but because his roommate Pintu had changed the label after watching a motivational reel, Arjun groaned, flung a pillow at the ceiling fan like the fan could negotiate with Monday, stumbled into a bath that was more an apology to water than hygiene, zipped into his faded red…

  • Comedy - English

    The Misadventures of Benson Lane

    Rohan Banerjee It was a bright Sunday morning in Kolkata, which meant two things: the neighborhood cricket match would block all traffic, and Auntie Shukla would be out in full force, armed with gossip and a rolling pin. Benson Lane wasn’t famous for anything—unless you counted its residents’ Olympic-level ability to interfere in each other’s lives. The star of this story was Mr. Debu Mukherjee, a retired bank officer with too much free time and a suspicious interest in everyone’s grocery shopping. That morning, Debu Babu spotted something alarming at the lane’s corner tea stall. His long-time rival, Somnath, was…