The circuit house is an interesting building to be found across India, at the headquarters of districts or sub-divisions and other such important places. Before new hotels started being built in these towns, circuit houses were the best places to stay at, and some of their cooks were really very good. Most of these old houses have many interesting stories from their past. But you had to be a really senior government official to get special treatment at a circuit house, and that has never changed. Balangir’s circuit house was as comfortable as any other, and Patnaik was sure the visitors would be happy.

There were about a dozen of these experts, some from Bhubaneshwar, others from Delhi. And they had their assistants and so on. The bauxite mine was the biggest thing to have happened in Balangir in years.

Patnaik took them under his wing and also took pity on them. They might have been experts on mines, but were not miners, and one or two were already feeling a little wilted in the summer heat. He would have to be very careful. The slightest problem for them and his senior officers might even believe that he had personally made the sun shine brighter just to annoy his guests.

And so they set out on the road to Deogan; Patnaik was in the lead with about forty policemen, the experts with their equipment following. Patnaik expected it would be a short day in the field and they would all be back in Balangir by the evening.

That was till Patnaik’s car reached the bridge on the Tel and he saw something he would have never expected in a dozen years. On the other side of the bridge several hundred Gonds were sitting patiently by the road, waiting for the convoy.

On hearing about the arrival of the experts from people in Balangir town, Jadob had quickly called on the villages around Deogan to send as many people as they could to block the approach to the bridge. So the Gonds had sat down on the road to wait for the government team.

Unfortunately, as the day progressed, and the sun increased in strength, the road became a bit of an oven. Korok and the others were used to sitting on hard surfaces. Korok’s bed had a thin blanket on the wooden boards, not a proper mattress. But even the toughest backside is no match for furnace-level heat. They couldn’t very well go on sitting on the road. They would get baked alive before Patnaik arrived.

The elders held a hurried discussion, and it was decided that perhaps they could block the road just as well if they sat on its verge, on the cooler grass. The villagers found this an excellent idea, and said the elders were very wise.

So when Patnaik and his minions arrived at the bridge, they found the Gonds blocking the road. In a manner of speaking.