The Calcutta Chromosome

Calcutta, August 20, 1995. Murugan is walking past St. Paul’s Cathedral when he’s caught in a monsoon downpour. He is going to the Presidency General Hospital to seek out a memorial for Ronald Ross, a British scientist. Murugan is looking for an arch that has a medallion with a portrait and inscription that reads: “in the small laboratory 70 yards to the southeast of this gate Surgeon-Major Ronald Ross I.M.S in 1898 discovered the manner in which malaria is conveyed by mosquitoes” (23).

With drenched trousers, Murugan decides to duck into the Rabindra Sadan auditorium. Upon entering, he notices the outer gallery is brightly lit and hung with posters. There is an event underway and people are pressing through the door of the auditorium. “A thin, rasping voice” then begins to speak over the loudspeakers:

Every city has its secrets […] but Calcutta […] where all law, natural and human, is held in capricious suspension, that which is hidden has no need of words to give it life […] it mutates to discover sustenance precisely where it appears to be most starkly withheld—in silence (25).

The words catch Murugan off guard and he looks around, only to see that the hall is still empty.