Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line by Deepa Anappara *** (of 4)

 

Jai, the 9-year-old resident of a slum on the outskirts of an Indian city like New Delhi is the most adorable detective I have ever come across. Jai lives in a one room house with his older sister and loving parents. His mother keeps house for a demanding "hi-fi madame" in the fancy apartments towering above their basti; his father is an optimistic construction worker.  His neighborhood is crowded with goats, chickens, bazaars, trash, a single toilet complex with a long, contentious queue, and neighbors too numerous to count. While Jai's parents work all day, Jai and his friends have the run of the place accompanied by all the joy of being an unchaperoned 9-year-old with limitless imaginations.

When Jai's friend Bahadur fails to return to his mother and father, Drunken Laloo, Jai appoints himself chief detective. His main qualification is that he has watched nearly every episode of Police Patrol on TV. His skills will be important because the local police remain solidly disinterested even as other basti children go missing.

While most of India treats its slum-dwellers as disposable, interchangeable drones, the genius of Deepa Anaparra is to imbue every basti resident with humanity, which is to say that some are loveable like Jai and others are petty, supportive, friendly, thoughtful, spiteful, jealous, weary, and well, a lot like people of every race and class. There is a lesson here for all of us.