Chandni Begum is Qurratulain Hyder's last, most enigmatic and daring of her novels. It spans the period from the Partition to the time of the Mandir-Masjid dispute in Ayodhya in the early Nineties, consistently connecting the present to the past. Centered around two prominent Lucknow families, the narrative closes in on the lives and struggles of Qambar, a romantic revolutionary, and the three women drawn to him-Bela, the daughter of a mirasi-bhand couple, ...