Railsong: Read an excerpt from the new novel by award-winning Rahul Bhattacharya

The tale follows Charu through a country etched in intricate detail - its Springs, censuses, the things that tie it together. An excerpt from chapter one.

‘I want to count people,’ said Charu to her father.

.

‘Your brother has started with buffaloes.’

‘Let him count buffaloes,’ she responded.

‘All right,’ he conceded. ‘Do it from the window.’

‘The door is bigger than the window,’ she argued with a three-year-old’s determination.

‘Fine. Concentrate, don’t miss any.’

She gripped his fingers tight and swayed by the train door, concentrating. He felt clever, even wise, for deflecting the coin crusade. It showed on his face as he waited for the bridge over the River Bhombal,and receded as he reacquainted himself with his worry: what if it got dark? Darkness, on top of the short halt, would make it hard to extricate the trunks and suitcases and all six family members – seven if you were to include the clothes horse in the brake van.

But everything went well for the Chitols. The infant slept at the breast in milky stupefaction; the children ran up competitive tallies and forgot to campaign for yet more new paise to fling into the water when they crossed the bridge – which arrived while it was still light, and so did their halt, where all the luggage and family members, including the clothes horse, successfully alighted.

Near-blemishless limewash coated the bricks at the railway station. Long fans hung off the iron beams, modern-sculptural in their repose. From the stationmaster’s cabin protruded a sleek two-faced clock, bearing modern sans serif numbers, and the cabins too were marked in brisk lettering, of such gloss the paint still appeared wet. As before, they gave Chitol the feeling that here was potential, promise in the future.

Now too the modern feeling did not last, there being hardly any sign of modern life once they left the station. One-horse and two-horse carriages pucked and pocked on barely paved roads. Few electric lights came on to greet the evening. But it was invigorating, calling to mind the title of deceased eminence William ‘Hilly Billy’ Tomkin’s booklet, which Chitol had taken care to peruse: Observations, Records and Witterings from a Salubrious Railway Transhipment Point. The mild altitude was perceptible; the air had a fine, calibrated nip. The beginning of spring was in the mauve and orange flowers where none were a week ago. Here and there great sal trees rose into the sky, and here and there, sure as fall and spring go hand in hand, their large yellowing leaves wavered towards the earth. A foresty fragrance accompanied the Chitols as they passed from the town into the township, under the curved iron banner that stated, incontrovertibly, ‘Bhombalpur Railway Workshop, estd 1960’.

No sooner did they arrive than they were counted. It was February of a year ending in 1 and the decennial census was under way – the ninth general census, the second of independent India. This particular enumeration, the first of her life, Charu would retain no memory of. But she, too, was counted. Afterwards, the figures found her to be one of approximately 439 million in the country.

(Excerpted with permission from Railsong by Rahul Bhattacharya, published by Bloomsbury; 2025)