Kaleen Bhaiya, seated on his gaddi with a hookah gurgling beside him, didn’t look up. “A son burns his own hand to save the family fire. You would burn the house to roast a single roti .”

“Sharad is a vulture, not a son,” Munna snarled.

Guddu Pandit and his younger brother, Bablu, ran a small wrestling akhada and a handloom business. They were respected, not feared. Their father, Bauji, had always kept a safe distance from the carpet smuggling syndicate of Kaleen Bhaiya. But the old man was ailing, and the brothers’ bank account was thinner than a monsoon creek.