Barabanki: The Professor, the Pandit and the Policeman-Anuj Tiwari

Book: Barabanki: The Professor, the Pandit and the Policeman
Author: Anuj Tiwari
Publisher: Rupa Publications

What makes a crime thriller work for you?

Superintendent of Police Naveen Mishra and his storyteller colleague Sub-Inspector Awasthi are called to investigate the death of a student at the Indian Engineering College, Lucknow. Little do they expect their investigation to uncover a connection with a crime nexus in the heartland of Uttar Pradesh. As the plot thickens, Jayanti, who is a student at the college, and Raghav, an alumnus of the college and now successful author, find themselves entangled with the investigation. Their reunion after three years is overshadowed by the mysterious death of Jayanti’s father and linked to the seemingly harmless professor at the college, Ansari. Follow Naveen and Awasthi as they navigate a corrupt system, enemy bullets and a racket based out of Barabanki that can jeopardize the health of the entire nation. Anuj Tiwari’s first crime thriller, this book captures the game of ambition, power and greed that threatens the ancient city of Parijat.

The book has an interesting plotline that explores two crimes and how the characters are related to both of them. I liked how the author has used the local area and the geopolitics to supplement the story and create this book. The story opens with a death in a college campus and as you wrap your head around it this event, you read about a cartel making fake medicines. The entire journey is about the police solving the two crimes through the cities of Lucknow and Barabanki. The storytelling is gripping and keeps you engaged as you journey along with the characters, however the book suffers from some flaws that affect the reading experience. The first issue is that the timelines in the story do not align, specifically that of Raghav and Jayanti. Not revealing much here, but the years mentioned in the book have a significant time gap between the two and their story doesn’t match up. Another issue with the book is that the author has crammed in too much details with respect to the law and while he mentions the clauses, he is assuming the fact that the reader is well versed with the law. The crime thriller part of the book moves as a side plot rather than the central story. The climax is quite cliché and somehow didn’t seem satisfactory for the story.

The characters of the book are interesting in the concept and I specifically loved the character of Naveen as a police officer and the way he handles the case in the story. The author has chosen an interesting set of people who make the story a good read. I would have appreciated if a bit more attention was paid to the character details. For example, it is mentioned that Prakash was in the army, but in the later part of the book, we find out that he was a police officer. This could have been fixed with a fresh round of proofreading.

Overall, the book is a decent read that scores a 3.75/5 for me.

I was provided a copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

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