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A succinctly written novel unfolds the not- uncommon life ofpeople in a mohalla namesake of Imran Khan the cricketer, not the po litician. There's also Wasim , Javed, Benazir, Zia, ZulEkkar, Navaz Sharif and Yahya, among a colourful array of characters. We see the 111ohalla through lmran's musings from jail and one can't help loving Vanity Bagh the way he does. The author uses the right tenor of optimi s m and resignation; dark, bur , vry humour that we are lulled into tl1inking d1is is a 'slice o f life' - of families, neighbou rs and the community.

An

eesSalim

professor's widow; the troubling r ole his father may have played in the killings, haunt him.

The author uses the right tenor of optimism and resignation; dark, but wry humour that we are lu lled into th ink ing this is a 'sl ice of life' - offamilies, neighbours and the community

January and February see m to h ave been the season for literary festivals everywhere -

Chennai's The Hindt1 Uterature far Ufa festival was he ld ove r three days between Januar y 13- 15 Thi s was foliowed by che now famous and established Jaipm· Utemfure Festival held between January 17-24, which has ac its he lm celebrity writers N amita Gokhale and William Dalrymple. The lisc of authors who attend chis festival every year must be the envy of lit fests everywhere. The Labore Literature Festiwl, the most glamorous in Pakistan, was he ld berween February 2124, was attended by Vikram Seth, Mira Nair, Amit Chaudhari and a host of other well -known authors from around the world.

The 2014 Perth Writm' Fcsti1'tl! and the recentl y concluded Adelttide IViite,:r' Festival were attended b y authors _Ja.5pteet Singh and Jeer Thayi l. Jeec Thayil's book

N11rcopolis was reviewed in chis column a coup le of yea rs ago

Heli11111 is a novel by Jaspreer Singb, which has as its backdrop the a.nti-Sikb riots of 1984 When his business a:ip to Iceland en route to Dell1i is prol o nged b y a volcanic eruption, sc ientist Raj Kumar begins to obsess; the killing of his former professor in the 1984 anti-Si kh riots, the day after lndira Gandhi's assassination; the whereabouts of the

Vani!J Flagh (Picador India, 2013) by Anees Salim won Th e Hindu Prize for Best Fiction in 20 13, announced at The Hindu's Utemture for Ufe writers' festival in Chennai. le is the tale of a young man, Imran Jabbari and h is friends, who, partly out of boredom and partly inspired by their local legend and aging Don, Abu Hathim, decide to form a 'gang ' to emulate him. This ragtag group doesn't really do much by way of big- time crime, u n til one day when they are hired to despatch some stolen scooters to different parts of the city. Nai:ve as they are, they think this is their big break, and agree to do it. Only after bombs go off in all the locations where cbey parked their scooters, do tl1ey realise they have been conned and inadvertently invo lved in a terrorist act.

Sentenced for 14 years, lmran. is assigned to the bookmaking section of the p rison, where each time he opens a book and stares at its b lank pages, the memories of Vanity Bagh come alive and we are led gently th.ro ug h tl1e notuncommon lives of the 111ohalla's inhabitants.

Lmran Jabbari is the son of the local /1//(/1/1 and like everyone e lse in the lllOballa, he was named after the successful, rich and famous of Pakistan. Lnran is tl1erefore, the

It is an extremely readable book, written with wry, understated, self- deprecating humo ur, which will resonate well w itl1 Austral ians.

However, what I found tmsetiling was the entire Muslim community in r7ani[y Flagh identified with Palcistan, and that the only 'other' was Mehendi, a nearby suburb which is represented as a monolithic, unvariegated Hinduextremist neig hbourhood

The only idiom of interaction between the (only) two groups is a.long a binar y divide, and of tense confrontation and perennial distru st teetering o n commu n al riot; there was simply no otl1er form of inter-digitation, even of the commonplace everyday life. This may have served the author\ narrative, but such reductionism, even for tl1e purposes of storytelling, seemed too simplistic and unrepresentative to me.

However convenient this is for a stor yline, such reductionism, and one-dimensional narrative is a little disquieting This was my only real grouse with the novel.

Anees Salim i s an advertising professional in Kochi who has written four novels and is working on bi s fifth. Vani!J Bag/.1 is his second novel. Others on The Hindu B ook Prize shortlist i ncluded Manu Joseph (The Illicit Happiness ef Other People) , :Manjul Bajaj (A notherMrm's Wife rmd Other Stmies), Sonora Jha (Fonig/1) and Amandeep Sandhu (Roll ef l-Io110111').

The on ly idiom of interaction between the (only)two groups is along a binary divide, and of tense confrontation and perennial distrust teetering on communal riot