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An arresting literary thriller, Bunker 13 penned down by one of India’s most sensational investigative reporters, Aniruddha Bahal, is unique and contemporary. The book centres around a self-destructive and disgraced ex-army cadet who is prepared to do anything to get a story. MM, is a thrill-seeker and an astute penman, whose connections run deep into India’s unsavoury political establishment, into the Army, his current beat where his bravery wins him adulations from offensive sources.
Highly motivated, the protagonist tracks the Special Forces on a series of lethal missions on the Kashmiri border. He confirms his suspicion that a rogue band of officers have been smuggling drugs and captured weapons out of India’s jungle frontier When a raid on an enemy bunker uncovers an huge cache of arms and high-grade heroin, the commander in-charge taps MM to unload the goods and he finds himself enmeshed in an international net of gun-running, gang warfare and double-dealing more dangerous than anything he has undertaken so far.
MM endowed with an amazing appetite for hallucionegenic drugs, guns and sex, thereafter returns to the Capital, chases his Editor’s nubile daughter and sets up an elaborate sting operation. Bahal bypasses satirical thrust and adopts a more conventional thriller structure.
It is worthwhile mentioning that the author creates a stark and bizarre fantasy world that bears a superficial resemblance to the real ones but obeys few of its laws. The book’s strangest quality is that it has only the faintest tint of the essence of the cultural India.
And there is one glaring loophole in the novel; as long as the author’s emphasis is on satire, it all adds to the comic momentum. When it comes to thriller plotting, the twists and turns lead to an unconvincing plot in which millions of interchangeable minor characters wander in and out of view.
Bunker 13, interwoven in baroque variations, heralds the arrival of a completely novel direction for Indian fiction; as the Bookseller Magazine states that the book is “a funky and fiercely contemporary novel of high-tech weaponry and hedonism.” The book has an old-fashioned surprise ending , which restores a coherent morality. Bahal’s plot twist is unconventional and startling.
Finally the locations set in the book are exotic- the front lines of the Hindu-Muslim conflict in India and the protagonist is compelling, thrill-seeking, drug stoked and a muckraking journalist. And the story is complex leaving the reader exhausted and mystified over his deeds and actions. In other words, the character of MM exemplifies an unusual configuration of traditionalism spruced with post-modernist trends.
About the Author:
Aniruddha Bahal is the founder and editor in chief of Cobrapost.com, an Indian news Web site. He is also the cofounder and former CEO of Tehelka.com, the news Web site famous worldwide for Operation Westend, which uncovered widespread corruption in defense procurement in India. Bahal was one of the reporters who broke that story and is equally famous for his exposure of match-fixing in international cricket. He has worked for India Today and Outlook, among other publications, and lives in Noida, near New Delhi.
Book Review: Mona Sen Gupta
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