Laughter in a Cage

This novel, first in the trilogy ‘Laughter In A cage’, ‘Man Who Stole rainbow’ and ‘Woman Who Sold Tears’ evaluating freedom, justice and commonweal in British and Independent India through the depiction of life in Amritsar and Delhi from Jalianwala Bagh firing in 1919 to Operation Blue Star in 1984, covers the period up to partition. This novel Shows how the wrong policies propagated by Indian leaders before and immediately after First World War unleashed divisive forces which gave momentum to fissiparous activities leading inexorably and inevitably to Partition in 1947 rendering Gandhi, Jinnah and others mere straws in the blizzard of hate created by them. This novel is significant in its capacity to perceive beyond popular prejudices and misconceptions giving a lie to the traditional version of historical truth. Mr Shamsher Singh Narula started writing short stories in Urdu and Hindi in the nineteen forties which were noted for their human sympathy and narrative quality. In Hindi in fifties he wrote a novel which related to the situation that led to the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi and in sixties he wrote the second which laid bare the ignominy of life in Delhi when the Chinese armies reached Brahmaputra in November 1962. In Hindi he wrote a treatise on the philosophy of fiction which is one of the few works in the language on the fundaments of literary criticism. Mr. Narula is in ninety first year. He retired from the Press Information Bureau thirty two years ago.