Song of the Golden Sparrow a Novel History of Free India

DeScriPtionGuilty of the crime of sleeping on the job, the lowly yaksha Prem Chandra Guha, is banished to India on a punishment posting. During his stay here, he must writea sufficiently riveting history of the land of his exile. Prem Chandra arrives inIndia on the first dawn of her independence and fate brings him to Netarhat, an obscure town near the forests of Chhota Nagpur. It is here that he meetsManhoos, an orphaned urchin who repairs motor vehicles for a living, and hisfriend Mary, a feisty tribal girl from the nearby Santhal village.Assuming the shape of a common sparrow, Prem Chandra turns into anunobtrusive observer and follows the fortunes of Manhoos and Mary as theytravel to Calcutta, and then to Rishikesh, Bangalore, Ahmedabad... As theyplunge from one adventure to another, a series of figures play key roles in theirlives: the Naxal leader Charu Majumdar; Satyajit Ray, in his crisp dhoti andclipped accent; the ever-giggling Maharishi Mahesh Yogi; the powerful businessmagnate, Ameer Premji; and even a mysterious man with a 56-inch chest.On the broader canvas of India, other events are playing out. Indira Gandhideclares an Emergency; a new party, the Jana Sangh is formed; SiddharthaShankar Ray cleanses West Bengal of Naxalism and Jyoti Basu brings in thirtyyears of Communism; somewhere, a dam is built, and hundreds of tribals arerendered homeless, elsewhere, a masjid falls, a deadly virus rises and the groundof India shakes beneath her feet...Song of the Golden Sparrow is the story of Manhoos and Mary, and mirrored in theirtumultuous lives, is the history of free India from 1947 to 2022.