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.
RATING: 4/5
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