The Gonds quickly spread across the road, and those who were barefoot, which was most of them, had to do quick hops on the blazing tarred surface to prevent the soles of their feet from being toasted. It was a swaying, but firm, human barricade.

Patnaik’s first reaction was the expected one. Disbelief.

‘Eh? What is this?’ he said.

To which Jadob, a natural spokesman, said it was a blockade.

‘Blockade for what?’

‘We will not allow these people to dig up the hill.’

‘They are not here to dig up the hill. They are here to survey it,’ said Patnaik.

‘Then we will not allow them to survey the hill and then dig it up.’

The surveyors, who had never dug anything in their lives, were thoroughly puzzled. With the bridge blocked, the only way to their destination was if they jumped into the Tel and swam across.

But Patnaik was on top of the situation. Patnaik was on top of most things at most times. In his head.

‘Eh, look, you people. You talked to Rath. You talked to the Collector. I don’t know what you have been hearing, but this is a government team, doing government work. So you will have to step aside and let us pass. I have never heard of something like this. What do you think you are doing? Move. Just move.’

Patnaik had never heard of something like this in Balangir because there is always a first time for everything.

The Gonds did not move.

‘Okay,’ said Patnaik, slowly, sweat beginning to trickle down the side of his head.

There was silence, except the sound of the Tel flowing under them.

‘Okay,’ said Patnaik, again. ‘So this is how it will be, will it? Okay. You men, forward, now.’

The policemen, all forty of them, got off their vehicles and lined up. Patnaik gave the order.

A lathi charge is an important thing. It is a very specific action that policemen carry out, and only when given the order by an officer. Not every time a policeman whacks someone with a stick is a lathi charge. There are entire paragraphs in police manuals in Indian states, which mention the right way to do a lathi charge. You form up like this, then you advance like that, slowly, batons raised. Then you hit the other side.

What is truly frightening is that more time has been spent thinking about the right way to carry out a lathi charge than all the ways for a policeman to speak politely to people.