...tock Book Two The fisherman's pointing finger Snakes and ladders Accident in a washing-chest All-India radio Love in Bombay My tenth birthday At the Pioneer Cafe Alpha and Omega The Kolynos Kid Commander Sabarmati's baton Revelations Movements performed by pepperpots Drainage and the desert Jamila Singer How Saleem achieved purity Book Three The buddha In the Sundarbans Sam and the Tiger The shadow of the Mosque A wedding Midnight Abracadabra Book One The perforated sheet I was born in the city of Bombay ... once upon a time. No, that won't do, there's no getting away from the date: I was born in Doctor Narlikar's Nursing Home on August 15th, 1947. And the time? The time matters, too. Well then: at night. No, it's important to be more ... On the stroke of midnight, as a matter of fact. Clock-hands joined palms in respectful greeting as I came. Oh, spell it out, spell it out: at the precise instant of India's arrival at independence, I tumbled forth into the world. There were gasps. And, outside the window, fireworks and crowds. A few seconds later, my father broke his big toe; but his accident was a mere trifle when set beside what had befallen me in that benighted moment, because thanks to the occult tyrannies of those blandly saluting clocks I had been mysteriously handcuffed to history, my destinies indissolubly chained to those of my country. For the next three decades, there was to be...
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