Ek Briyani

One day, I think about a decade ago, I went to meet one of my Uncle from my hometown. It was his first visit to the city of Bangalore. It was already long past lunch time, but my uncle didn’t have his lunch yet. So we went to a nearby restaurant.

"I won’t have dosa right now, will I get rice here?" said the uncle.

Being from a Riceoholic's land, I understood his feeling very well and replied, "you should try Chicken Briyani here, it’s really delicious"

As uncle was new to this part of the world he wasn’t quite acquainted to the great Briyani culture out here. But without any hesitation he was ready for the adventure.

"Ek, Briyani dena," he asked the waiter.

Within minutes the guy returned with an aromatic bowl of Briyani. My uncle was confused to see a boiled egg piece at the top of the bowl, covered with Briyani rice.

"Oh shit, I asked for 'Ek Briyani' and the waiter had given 'Egg Briyani'," complained my uncle.

"Bhai saab, maine to 'Ek Briyani' bola tha, aapne to 'Egg Briyani' le aaya. Actually I want chicken briyani," the uncle pleaded with the waiter guy.

The waiter replied with a smile, "Sir, ye chicken briyani hi hai, egg is free."

My uncle was so happy and his face brightened to a smile.

Grab a copy of my debut book Story of Tublu from Amazon or Flipkart. It is a Contemporary Fiction novel, published by LiFi Publications Pvt Ltd. The book has its share of drama, that entertains; humor, that makes one reminisce; love, friendship and emotions that defines the amazing journey that is, life.

For The Sake of Humanity

life was different then; loud music escaped from almost every room, guys desperately looked for a matchbox late in the night, holding cigarettes in their hands; those blistering laughter and the frequent booze. If one would take a stroll around the hostel in the evening, he could have possibly got a taste of all form of music including folks songs, Bollywood numbers, modern/classic Regional songs, Pop, Rock and Metal music amongst others. There were quite a few Metal freaks including my room-mate, Nair. We worshiped Metal songs regularly those days. Well, this is the kind of music which can be enjoyed best at a little roaring sound. Our room had two big speakers attached to our music system.

We had a senior named Houkib. I hope I've spelled the name correctly. Houkib was from Manipur and he was a true Christian. He was a guy of cool temperament and during our stay in hostel we had never witnessed a moment when Houkib drifted away from his coolness. Quite often he was occupied in his room reading or singing Gospel songs together with his friends. His room was a couple of rooms away from ours. Houkib was among the guys who sleep early and wake up early. After dinner, it happened quite a few times that I and Nair were inside our room, enjoying some metal songs, relaxing. Houkib would enter with his usual smile, but also with a little bit of discomfort on his face, this time. I and Nair were little curious as he wasn’t a frequent visitor. Houkib would stand near the music system, pick a few audio cassettes one after another and had a close look at them. After a few moments he would reduce the volume, smile and say "For the sake of humanity!"



Grab a copy of my debut book Story of Tublu from Amazon or Flipkart. It is a Contemporary Fiction novel, published by LiFi Publications Pvt Ltd. The book has its share of drama, that entertains; humor, that makes one reminisce; love, friendship and emotions that defines the amazing journey that is, life.

Anirban Nanda

Anirban is a final year student of Electrical Engineering at Haldia Institute of Technology. He lives in Haldia, West Bengal. Though he is a technical student he loves to read novels more than his Engineering textbooks. Reading books has always been his favorite pass time. Anirban fell in love with writing when he was in class twelve. He has published some of his stories in his college magazine. His anthologies "A Phase Unknown Women-A Tribute Season 2" , "Dream-Castle" and "The Paid Eminence" are due release in April, 2015. He has also become co-editor of an international magazine releasing soon.

One good thing about studying in an Engineering college and experiencing hostel life is that you would remain a student throughout your life. No matter how hard you try, no matter how older you get, you simply can't get that hostel boy out of your life. Sometimes in one situation or the other, the boy inside you will show his presence. Even though hostel life is more or less the same in any college, but there's something different about life in an Engineering hostel. The best part is we never study, but somehow everyone pass the semester exams. 

My debut novel "Story of Tublu" has a glimpse of hostel life. Many readers even felt that the novel is about the life of an engineer. I always had the intuition that guys who experienced hostel life are definitely going to enjoy the book, at least our engineering guys. But then I am totally overjoyed that Story of Tublu is also liked by many others, beyond campus. 

I am glad that Anirban read my book. It seems he enjoyed it wholeheartedly and also shared a review on his blog.

"It's a wonderful debut for any writer. The tag-line of the story says ‘an amazing journey called life’  -an apt tagline indeed! It is literally a journey of life; filled with every human emotion possible -love, pain, loss, friendship, hate, jealousy and more. The story shows the transformation of adolescence to maturity which is done quite brilliantly for both Maina and Tublu -our central characters. The jokes of Ganesh and mischief of Pranjal is so funny that it will make you laugh like a mad. Hostel life is described nicely and it will compel you to take a walk down your memory lane. It's a fascinating and gripping story till the end which can be finished in one sitting. If you want a fast and good story in a simple language; grab this one"

To read the complete review please click the below link:

Review of Story of Tublu by Anirban Nanda

Grab a copy of my debut book 'Story of Tublu' from Amazon or Flipkart. It is a Contemporary Fiction novel, published by LiFi Publications Pvt Ltd.

Raja Hindustani

It was year 2005. We continued to enjoy the same carefree hostel life style but only after our office hours. One day my school friend Karuna called me. Well, it is always a treat to hear from old friends but the situation was more than just a delight. Karuna was doing his MBA that time and was about to come to Bangalore for his internship. It was just cool and Karuna stayed with us for almost a couple of months. I was staying with few of my college friends in an apartment and everyone had a great time with Karuna. 

Time had simply flown by and Karuna’s internship was over. He had to return to his college and was about to join work in a month’s time. We planned for a short weekend trip and decided to visit Pondicherry. Well, Pondicherry is a popular tourist destination in South India. Apart from the mesmerizing beaches the city has many colonial buildings, churches, temples, and statues which, combined with the systematic town planning and planned French style avenues, still preserve much of the colonial ambiance. As my friends had different plan so finally It was only me and Karuna for the adventure. We booked our bus tickets. Pondicherry is at a distance of around 350 km from Bangalore and it usually takes five to six hours by bus. 

We reached Pondicherry early morning. As expected we immediately glued to our beds in our hotel room. We woke up late and had some heavy breakfast. It was our first trip to the beautiful Indian French town and we didn’t know much about it. Our hotel was pretty close to a beach,  but there were rocks and only rocks all over the place. The beach looked beautiful but it was pretty dangerous as well, definitely not the kind of beach I was expecting. I just couldn’t imagine Bipasha Basu romancing with John Abraham on that rocky beach. Well, the only thing I knew about Pondicherry that time was that the entire Jism movie was shot there. I and Karuna thought to hire a taxi to explore some exotic beaches, but the taxi charges disappointed us instantly. We tried out luck here and there and then suddenly an Auto driver approached us. He sounded quite friendly and promised to take us to all the well know places in Pondicherry at a very reasonable price. 

'So, what's your name?' I asked.

'My name is Raja, but you can call me Raja Hindustani'

Raja Hindustani is a classic Bollywood movie where Aamir Khan played the role of a taxi driver. There was no doubt that our Auto driver was a huge fan of Raja Hindustani and the movie had a deep impact on him. He had also fixed a big poster of the movie on the back of his auto. So Raja Hindustani took us to Auroville beach, first. The beach is located at about 12 km of Pondicherry and is more commonly known as Sand beach or Auro beach to the local people. We were happy to encounter a lot of pretty faces out there. Auroville Beach is one of the few beaches in India where surfing is possible. The beach attracts thousands of foreign tourists every year and they generally prefer to stay at the beach shacks. There were many restaurants near the beach and we decided to chill out in one of them. One of the best things about Pondicherry is the food. You can simply go to any restaurant and you won’t be disappointed. We relished different kind of recipes and consumed gallons of ice chilled beer. 

Raja Hindustani also had food with us but he politely refused our beer offer as he had to drive. I and Karuna had a great time chatting with him. Raja Hindustani was a local boy and he worked in Mumbai for a few years as a bus conductor. He then took us to the Paradise beach. It took around half an hour to reach there. As the name suggests, it’s one of the most beautiful beaches in Pondicherry. In order to go to Paradise beach one needs to take a boat, which is the one and only choice to reach there. We stayed there for a couple of hours and it was very relaxing. The wind was pleasant and the wave sounds were too soothing. By the time we left Paradise beach it already started to get dark. We asked Raja Hindustani to drop us to a nice bar in the city. 

He then took us to a place. It was a little crowded out there; many of them looked like tourists. 

'If you have come to Pondicherry then don’t miss the dance show out here,' said Raja Hindustani. 

'We are really tired and we are in no mood to watch any dance show, now'

'It’s okay, you people will enjoy this'

We bid goodbye to Raja Hindustani and then book out tickets for the dance program. It was a bit expensive but then we were also curious about it. We gulped some more chilled liquid. Now what to say? It was a totally different kind of performance by the dancers and it was beyond our wildest imagination. Well, the next day we explored a few more places, some more dishes and in the night we boarded our bus to Bangalore.

Image courtesy: google images


Grab a copy of my debut book 'Story of Tublu' from Amazon or Flipkart. It is a Contemporary Fiction novel, published by LiFi Publications Pvt Ltd.