When it's really cold in Mussoorie, the streets are deserted and the only signs of human presence are the huddled groups of migrant labourers singing their village songs round a sigri. From 5 pm to midnight, you are tucked inside a tulma (a soft blanket of beaten wool), a marvellous stretch of uninterrupted reading ahead of you. No phone. No TV. (The monkeys shivering under the eaves have pulled the wires out anyway.) The quiet on these spacious nights is not a deathly hush but a vibrantly beautiful communion with reality. The only illusion is the tick of a quartz clock. The patter of sleet on the tin roof makes you realise you are snugger and warmer here than you would be in Delhi.
Talking of Delhi, passing Kitab Mahal recently, I picked up the 1991 Censor (sorry, Census) report. Talk about statistics being the lamp-post to a drunk man, giving support to sagging bodies rather than shedding light. Shekhar Kapur has discovered there are officially no more Thakurs left in India. Now the Census would have us believe there are no Brahmins either. But there are still a few mainstream minorities who have managed to avoid the Indian Rope Trick. Delhi has 12 Vaishnavas, and Orissa two Shaivites! I propose to keep this Census report alongside the Polish Book of Jokes.
