Farishtey (last part: Pg 114) 2/10 - Page 27

unresd my comment to pg 37

IT WAS INTERESTING dr.

Just read it in a go...once again awsm story dear ...liked it.

awesome update di.

Awesome update
Arjun and Shree phone convo was nice
flashback was nice...feeling bad for Kiran..so it was Sikander who had helped Kiran
the chess scene was amazing
Arjun and Anjail convo was lovely
so Shree have came to meet Arjun
he also saw Kiran
thanks for pm...continue soon

woweee...nice update
loved chess scene...the phone call was amazing
shree in the garage
waiting for more
contd. soon
thnx for pm

Nice update..
I pity Kiran..Sikander had played his cards well..
Anjali knows about her dad..poor girl.!
The chess game was nice..
Shree in garage..waiting to know more.
loved Arjun-Shree's convo..
thanks for pm..cont soon

Awwssmmm part
loved it
Supperbbb..
Amazing...
cont soon
thanks for PM

My dear Kunchu,

I could not do my comments on your chapters 5 & 6 that day 3 weeks ago, as I had thought of doing, and in fact not till now, when you have reached Chapter 9. I have read all of them at one go, and in a way, I am glad that I will now be commenting on all these 5 chapters together. For they are in fact one unit, a unit that has merged its component parts seamlessly into a roman noir whole. So here goes for Chapters 5 to 9.

It is bitter, the whole of it, but it is not the bitterness that I wrote about re: your Chapter 4, the acrid bitterness of nostalgia about times gone horribly wrong. This is the helpless bitterness, all the more acute for being suppressed, of those to whom fate has dealt a very bad hand at the game of life. Those who do not even have pieces to pick up, not to speak of fitting them together into a new whole. Those for whom existence itself would be an unbearable burden, which they would lay down but for responsibilities they cannot shirk and duties that are still outstanding.

It is there in Avni, whose mind is clouded with bitter frustration and anger at the police officer, Sameer Rathod, whom she had trusted and who had let her down, and grief as she remembers her husband and the life she had hoped they could have had together. A grief that would have crushed her, but for the little girl for whom she has to carry on and build a life anew for the two of them.

It is there in Shree and Sameer Rathod, neither of whom has been able to come to terms with what hit them that fateful day. Sameer takes refuge in anger, directed at Arjun, while Shree cannot do even that. Perhaps that is why it is he who is, at long last, able to think clearly, more clearly than Arjun himself, and see what must have happened and how.

Sameer Rathod is now, after the chance encounter with Avni Joshi, facing the resurrected ghost of a deep regret,regret at having let down this woman who had believed in his word and had been proved wrong, though for no fault of his. He wants to make up to her for the hurt he had caused her, and it remains to be seen how he proposes to do it.

But the deepest and most poignant bitterness of all is that of Kiran Joshi.

It might seem odd to see me empathizing with a cold blooded killer who thinks nothing of eliminating his boss's enemies, and even less of becoming a hardened gangster at the service of a man who he knows is evil personified. Evil at its darkest, its most vile, a sadist of the worst sort, who delights in killing and in the infliction of the maximum pain he can think of on his enemies.

But Kiran is not evil himself. He is proof positive of the depths to which even a simple but weak man can descend if the motivation is strong enough. In fact, the weaker the man, the more easily, and the deeper, he falls.

Kiran is genuinely horrified by what Sikandar does to Roshni and to Arjun, but that does not make him bolt from Sikandar's service. He is said not to care about his own life. Then why does he let his soul be soiled by endless crimes, done against those who have not done anything to him personally, just because they are seen to threaten or block Sikandar? Why does he not leave, and if Sikandar were to hunt him down and kill him, why should that bother a man for him his life means nothing?

The fact is that Kiran Joshi wants to survive, and that trumps all else.

He descends the moral ladder so swiftly because he is weak. He has no strong moral anchor, no things he will NOT do no matter what. His refusal to have anything to do with drug smuggling or the flesh trade is meaningless, for he helps protect and preserve the evil empire that indulges in both with great profit. It is merely a kind of hypocritical salving of such conscience as he has left.

Similarly, he knows, in his heart of hearts, that it was his conscious decision to assist criminals that has led to his arrest, and that even if his wife had not turned him in, he would have been caught sooner or later. But his weakness makes him turn on his wife as the scapegoat, and not all of Rathod's explanations and advice can make him see reason.

It might seem a little difficult to some to see this frustrated weakling turn into the remorseless, conscienceless, brutal right hand man of Sikandar, but psychologically, it is perfectly plausible. Kiran Joshi has buried his inner demons: his longing for his beloved daughter, for whose sake he entered on this path to Hell, his longing for the wife he still loves despite the mask of anger at her betrayal, above all the longing for his old simple, untainted life.

But now that he is back from where his dark journey began, these demons are going to be resurrected. We shall see how he copes with them, with the shortfuse violence that it now his trademark, or with shades of the old Kiran Joshi.

In short, Kunchu, your Kiran is a triumph, one of the most complex and gripping characters you have created thus far, ranking up there on par with your Sikandar, the one who loved Roshni deeply, genuinely, and violently enough to kill her with his own hands. Unsurprisingly, the relationship between this Sikandar and Kiran is splendidly ambiguous, a hate-hate relationship on both sides, held together, on the one side, by need, and on the other by the force of habit and a twisted kind of dependence

As for the rest, this has already become too long, so I will desist. But I am fascinated by this bubbling boiling witch's cauldron that you are stirring with a large ladle. Where your dramatis personae - Arjun, Avni (another signal achievement, even if not quite on par with your Kiran), Kiran, Anjali, Sameer, Shree, Karan, Simran, not to forget the shadowy, sinister Sikandar - all pop up and then disappear under the seething brew.

I look forward to following them as you proceed, and I am sure the marked resemblance of Farishtey to the romans noirs of James Hadley Chase and Peter Cheney - where betrayal is the norm, not the exception, as is the unexpected knife in the ribs - will not fade away but will become even more marked.

My felicitations, Kunchu my dear, on what is perhaps your most adventurous work to date.

Shyamala Aunty

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