Politicians, business magnates, sports stars - the Indian diaspora has
done well for itself in its new homes around the world and, on a
literary basis, crossed another test of acceptance with their depiction
in fiction as regular, non-stereotypical characters. From police
inspectors to businessmen to cooks in nearly half a dozen countries
across four continents, overseas Indians are increasingly figuring in a
range of splendid tales by a number of non-Indian writers.
Among
the first possibly featured were way back in the early 20th century -
and by no less than Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in the Sherlock Homes series.
Andamanese aboriginal Tonga appears in the detective's second outing
"The Sign of Four" (1890) but the second character is more substantial.
Daulat
Ras is one of the three scholarship aspirants suspected of acting
unfairly in "The Adventure of the Three Students" ("The Return of
Sherlock Holmes", 1904). Described by his tutor as "a quiet, inscrutable
fellow, as most of those Indians are", Dr. Watson finds him "a silent,
little, hook-nosed fellow, who eyed us askance" when they meet but
Holmes is more discerning.
For the next, we must pick more recent authors.
Mr.
Patel, who runs a grocery store in Lochdubh village up in the Scottish
highlands, is a frequently-appearing character in prolific British
writer M.C. Beaton's Sergeant Hamish Macbeth series of whodunits, which
currently number 31 - from "Death of a Gossip" (1985) to "Death of a
Liar" (2015).
He debuts in the second, "Death of a Cad" (1987).
As our policeman visits his shop-cum-house, it is first Mrs. Patel
wearing a "bright red sari" he encounters. "Och, Mr Macbeth," she said
impatiently, "Whit d'ye want at this time o'night?" The husband, a
"small brown man with liquid brown eyes and a beak of a nose" is more
welcoming. "Evening, Mr Macbeth," he said. "Will ye be havin' a wee
dram?"
You can't be more integrated than that!
Then there
is Lt. Raghavan of the New York Police Department in Matt Beynon Rees'
"The Fourth Assassin" (2010), the last installment of the Omar Yussef
quartet. She is in charge of the investigation when our Palestinian
schoolteacher-cum-investigator finds a headless body in his son's
apartment during a visit to New York. In an earlier post, I mistakenly
noted that she doesn't have a speaking part in her two scenes but the
"short, dark-skinned woman with straight black hair spraying across her
narrow shoulders" with a "hard-pitched and sharp" voice does - and is
quite sardonic.
As her Arab subordinate hesitates in reading a
love letter seized as evidence, she goes: "Come on, bashful. Translate,"
and when he still demurs, she says: "Okay, fine, we'll go back to the
precinct house and dim the lights, and you'll read me Romantic Rania's
letter over a nice bubbly flute of Chateau Budweiser."
Colin
Coterill's Dr. Siri series set in the Laos of the 1970s has a pair of
Indians resident in Vientiane. The extremely humble Bhikhu is the cook
at the Happy Dine Restaurant and his estranged son Jogendranath or Crazy
Rajid as he is known, wanders around stark naked and speechless.
But
his father reveals the traumatic basis for his condition - the deaths
of their family by drowning in a shipwreck on their way to Southeast
Asia. They debut in the second - "Thirty Three Teeth" (2005) and
occasionally appear in others though Rajid plays a stellar role in the
ninth - "The Woman Who Wouldn't Die" (2013), where he saves the life of
Siri's nurse and her child from a vengeance-seeking Frenchman by a
colossal bluff - in crisp English!
An endearing character is
Nairobi businessman Mr.Malik in British-born, Australia-settled
journalist-turned-writer Nicholas Drayson's "A Guide to the Birds of
East Africa" (2008), an ingenious (but warm-hearted) love
story-cum-zoological caper.
The short, slightly overweight,
balding middle-aged widower develops a crush on his Tuesday morning
bird-walk leader and intends to invite her to a ball, but a rival with
the same target surfaces. To resolve the issue, club members - A.B.
Gopez, Mr. Patel and lawyer Tiger Singh - devise a unique wager - and
ensure plenty of misadventures for both. He returns in "A Guide To
Beasts of East Africa" (2012).
Southwards is Superintendent David
Patel of the Johannesburg Central Police, the detective partner and
(unaware love interest) of Private Investigator Jade de Jong, the
daughter of his old police superior. He appears in three of the series
by Jassy Mackenzie - "Random Violence" (2010), "Stolen Lives" (2011) and
"The Fallen" (2012), but I haven't read them yet.
Like real
life, overseas Indians seem certain to continue leaving their mark in
the printed world too. To adapt Leigh Hunt, "May their tribe increase!"
(31.05.2015
- Vikas Datta is an Associate Editor at IANS. The views expressed are
personal. He can be contacted at [email protected])
