It’s the morning of March 24. We are at the Darbhanga railway station to catch the Bihar Sampark Kranti Express. There is the usual hustle and bustle on the platform.
Seeing off her 20-year-old son, a distraught mother steals glances through the steel bars of the train. “He is leaving for New Delhi to work,” she says. “He is going for the first time. Look at him—he is the most handsome boy in the compartment.”