Synopsis – The Sergeant’s Son

‘The Sergeant’s Son’ is the charming story of Kalu, an airman’s son, growing up in Bombay’s Kalina military camp. The novel offers a kaleidoscopic portrait of people and places that he comes into contact with – mostly neighbors from the tight row of quarters. It is about India of the 1960s and 70s with its three-paise paper cones filled with fried grams, endless chewing gums and one-paise pink cotton candy that comes alive in the book; about times when fathers were tyrants when it came to disciplining children. Many of today’s readers may find in Samar, Kalu’s father, a despot. In fact, he was a desperate father struggling to give his children the best schooling.

Contrasted against the gothic architecture of St Joseph’s school, their one-room-kitchen tenement in Allahabad provides an interesting backdrop to the angst the children go through. Kalu also discovers the secret sensations of sex. Amid untimely creaking of cots, chinks in the door separating the neighbour’s homes, and a voluptuous maid he loses his innocence. With a consuming passion for painting, he soon realizes that life is beyond the scope of his palate and brush. Soon he finds himself on a train that takes him to a journey like his father’s. The book is a pan Indian tale with universal appeal, of vivid childhood imageries and nostalgia, narrated in a gentle tone.