James Whitby, sentenced to death for the murder of prominent lawyer and former Quit India activist Fareed Mazumdar, is less than two weeks from a date with the gallows. In a last-ditch attempt to save his son, Whitby’s father, arch-colonialist, Charles Whitby, forces a new investigation into the killing. The investigation leads Inspector Persis Wadia […]
Death of a Lesser God by Vaseem Khan
Can a white man receive justice in post-colonial India? It’s Bombay in 1950. James Whitby, sentenced to death for the murder of prominent lawyer and former Quit India activist Fareed Mazumdar, is less than two weeks from a date with the gallows. In a last-ditch attempt to save his son, Whitby’s father forces a new […]
Calcutta Blues: why Kipling despised the city
Rudyard Kipling famously wrote about Calcutta, and not to praise it, says Vaseem Khan, author of the Malabar House crime series. He looks at the history of the first capital of British India, its place in the independence movement, and why men like Kipling despised both it and the Bengalis who used the written word […]