Dibyendu's WallScript

In truth, human history was constructed upon three primitive impulses. One type of man was addicted to spitting on the road as he walked along. Another kind instinctively pulled out a handkerchief whenever touched by another human being—or kept himself at a safe distance. And yet another, those with less water in their bodies, did not sweat at all; they roamed through summer and winter in the same clothes, untouched by climate.   Although Plato, Voltaire, Hegel, and Nietzsche each offered their own interpretations of these dispositions, nothing certain was ever agreed upon. Every age produced its wise men, and each explained these instincts in a different way, but none of those explanations ever became universal.   I once knew a learned man. Once upon a time, he was a fearsome lawyer, famous across the city. Now he lives under the patronage of an industrialist, looking after the deeds of 170 properties, registering offices, houses, and shops for rent, keeping track of endless...

A budget was announced.   The old woman, wrapped in a greasy quilt, slipped into the shadowy room by the roadside. Outside, winter pressed heavily; winds whistled through the city’s hollow bones. She left the entire room aside and curled herself into a corner against the wall. No one in this world knew whether she had eaten tonight or not. Perhaps only God, in His secrecy, knew such details. The moment she lay down, the old woman was absorbed into deep sleep. Beneath the quilt there was no stir of movement. From the outside one might have mistaken her for some inanimate thing, covered with a discarded old blanket and thrown away in a dark corner. Believe firmly—it was the merciful Lord Himself who had designed this illusion. In the budget it was promised that in the next five years, fifteen million jobs would be created.   On the main road of the city stood a two-storeyed, well-decorated house. The front room on the ground floor was being demolished to make way, perhaps, for s...

Only manual well of the village was running away! Napla was chasing after it. Or so Ratna claimed to have seen. Whether she had witnessed it awake or in dream, that she could not swear upon. To uncover the truth, perhaps the CBI—or at the very least the CID—was required. Otherwise, the public would simply have to go on living inside a lie.   But where did Napla go? It has been three days without a trace. His wife, his children, and his old mother refused to believe that Napla had gone walking down the bypass after Well, toward Calcutta.   The most boastful boy of Tili Para, Nidhiram, declared that he had seen Napla being chased by two civil policemen. One was half-starved, the other a cripple—so how could they ever catch him? After a short sprint, the policemen too decided that for the salary they drew every month, such exertion was not worth the sweat. Instead, they slipped into a park along the highway and fined the couples hiding in bushes fifty rupees apiece.   But wh...

I have always known how to suffer in silence. I can hide my pain. Even when the heart splits into two jagged halves, my lips still keep the smile stitched tight. No one ever notices. A small, unnecessary sorrow—yet perhaps never before had it come so piercing, so absolute.   When I first saw you, your cheeks were swollen with pimples. You were not beautiful—not in the way the world calls beauty. Yet the innocence etched across your face enthralled me. All my life I had searched and wearied myself for something nameless; suddenly I felt as if I had found it—within you.   Perhaps I would never have carried any expectation to your door, if not for the stubborn endurance I have always borne toward life. And then, in that deep forest—mist-choked daylight, where no sunbeam could pierce, where silence itself grew like moss on stone—I discovered you. Shilbhadra had warned me: that jungle is a labyrinth, a chakravyuha. There is an entrance, yes—but once you walk inside, there is no ret...

A renowned female pornographic actress had visited a college campus to participate in a public debate on pornography. Of course, speaking openly about pornography is never easy. In any country, it is a most delicate task. Yet, by the law of nature, the raging hormones of students bear uncanny resemblance to the hormones of pornography. Therefore, in practice, one might expect revolutionary students and the pornography industry to share far-reaching agreements—though they may never confess it aloud. Whether such an alliance existed or not, the undivided attention of the students was locked upon that debate. Inside the campus, there was but one subject burning under the fluorescent lights.   Professors and rival students alike had been sneaking glances at the classical works of this actress, buried deep within the university systems. Elderly professors, unwilling to lag behind in knowledge, had also gravitated toward this unfamiliar medium—drawn by a strange joy, a voracious hunger...