Hindi mystery writer Surendra Mohan Pathak possesses the knack of mixing humour in his whodunnits. It applies mainly to his Sunil Series novels whose hero is an investigative journalist. Today I am reviewing a relatively recent novel of his (published last year only) in which the complete opening chapter is dedicated to humour only and the mystery which is the main theme of the novel follows that. The name of this highly entertaining murder mystery is Dhabba (stain).
Since Mr. Pathak commands great knowledge of Urdu language and Sher-O-Shaayari too, he has used this knowledge of his in creating humour through the hero’s Punjabi friend, Ramakant Malhotra. The readers who have some general awareness of Sher-O-Shaayari (Urdu poetry), will laugh like anything while going through the opening chapter of this whodunnit.
Dhabba starts with a Mushaayara (the conference of Urdu poetry) arranged in the Youth Club (run by Ramakant) where the hero of the novel, Sunil reaches. Ramakant alongwith Sunil enters the Mushaayara and gets irritated to listen to the nonsense Ghazals and Nazms being recited by most of the Shaayars (Urdu poets). He then declares that he will also recite Shers (Urdu couplets). He recites Shers in his own style and interacts with the Shaayars present there. These incidents lead to a laugh-riot for the reader. Sunil, being more sensible than his friend, drags him out of the conference hall which is the venue of the Mushaayara. Thereafter the friends start discussing the real issue which is the problem of a publisher, running a semi-porno magazine who also happens to be the arranger of that Mushaayara in the club. He, in fact, runs something like a friendship club under the pretext of running the slightly indecent magazine and earns through the advertisers whose posts are received at the post boxes provided by him.
The problem of this publisher, Prakash Khemka, turns out to be a complaint lodged against him by his competitors that he increases his sell through fictitious advertisements linked to post boxes because the respondent to the post box advertisement is required to attach a coupon with his reply which is to be cut from the magazine itself. Khemka seeks Sunil’s help in this regard to prove that his post-box linked advertisements are genuine and draws his attention to an advertisement of this category, given by a young lady who is not willing to let anybody know her identity (except the one whom she is going to contact herself). Due to his helping-nature and ever-present aspiration to get interesting stories for his newspaper, Sunil agrees to help him and take certain steps in this regard with the support of a young trainee journalist in the office of his newspaper, Blast.
However after the purpose of Khemka is served, Sunil comes to know that he has been used by Khemka for his vested interest linked to a sum of Rs. 20 crore left by a deceased rich person as inheritance for the mother of the young lady in question. Now things take such a turn that the young lady, Vaishali Paahuja, finds herself trapped in the charge of murdering her friend, Gauri Parmaar. One life-principle of Sunil is - ’I cannot see a damsel in distress’. Hence he is ever-ready to help the damsels (only when he believes that the concerned damsel is really innocent). How Sunil investigates the murder alongwith Ramakant and proves Vaishali’s innocence by exposing the real murderer, is the remaining story, full of mysterious twists and turns and containing many colourful characters. The novel deals with the police strategies (gimmicks) also, used to pressurize the suspects in the bid to extract the truth out of them and during the investigative proceedings, Sunil and his love-hate buddy, police inspector Prabhudayal try to outwit each other, adding further spice to the already interesting narrative.
Dhabba is a highly entertaining novel, much better than several so-called entertaining Bollywood movies. While the first chapter makes the reader laugh out loud, the following chapters keep him engrossed in going through the mystery. After it is over, it renders the full Paisa Vasool feeling to the reader.
Despite being a murder mystery, Dhabba has enormous repeat value because of the high-quality humour incorporated in it. Since the Sher-O-Shaayari like things cannot be translated properly in English, this novel can be thoroughly enjoyed in its original Hindi version only. Readers of Hindi fiction should not miss this big treat which combines both humour and suspense in its menu.