There was a big, impressive and old iron gate set into the wall, and a wicket gate set into the big gate. Here stood a policeman at attention, that is, leaning against the wall and cleaning his ear. By now some of the Gond guards knew Korok, more or less, so after shaking the tiffin box a little, the policeman rapped on the wicket gate, which opened, and Korok entered Balangir District Jail.

In the courtyard, he stood among the few visitors after giving his name, until he was called, and walked through one of the doors into a thick-walled room smelling of new paint.

Here a fat and sweating policeman asked Korok his name and pressed a metal disc into his palm. The disc had the number fifteen etched on it, although it had been pressed and disfigured by many fingers over the years and the digits could be just barely seen. This was his visitor number.

Korok took this disc and walked into an inner courtyard, where other visitors were meeting their relatives or friends.

His father was sitting under the tree at the centre of the yard. This was his fifteenth month in prison. The police had arrested him for smuggling timber from Deogan Reserve, the huge forest on both sides of the Tel. That is, they had not actually caught him with the timber. They had arrested him near the main road on the other side of the village. Now, you can’t steal truckloads of logs of precious trees on your own, so Korok’s father must have been working with other people to smuggle the timber. But the police hadn’t found out who these people were. Actually, they hadn’t found the timber his father was supposed to be smuggling either. But the police had said the man was a timber smuggler, so they put him in prison.

Every once in a month or two Korok’s father’s case would come up in court and the magistrate would set another date for hearing it. Sometimes the files were not in court. Sometimes the policemen were absent. Sometimes even the magistrate was absent. So Korok’s father would be sent back to jail and wait for the next hearing. He thus became an undertrial—not yet convicted of anything, but not free either. Balangir Jail had more undertrials than convicts.

In the months since the police had picked him up, Korok’s father hadn’t changed much. His beard, particularly under the chin, had gone grey one hair at a time. But he was otherwise the same. He did not complain, nor did he talk about the past or future.