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Distant drum
Hardcover
Published January 1, 1960
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About the author
Manohar Malgonkar
33 books54 followersManohar Malgonkar was an Indian author in the English language of both fiction and nonfiction.
Malgonkar was born in a royal family, and educated at Bombay University. He was an officer in the Maratha Light Infantry, a big game hunter, a civil servant, a mine owner and a farmer, and he also stood for parliament. Most of that activity was during the build up to Indian independence and its aftermath, often the settings for his works. The socio-historical milieu of those times form the backdrop of his novels, which are usually of action and adventure. He also wrote non-fiction, including biography and history.
Malgonkar lived in a remote bungalow, at some distance from the town of Belgaum, Karnataka. His only child Sunita (educated at the famous Lawrence School Sanawar) died at a young age.
Malgonkar was born in a royal family, and educated at Bombay University. He was an officer in the Maratha Light Infantry, a big game hunter, a civil servant, a mine owner and a farmer, and he also stood for parliament. Most of that activity was during the build up to Indian independence and its aftermath, often the settings for his works. The socio-historical milieu of those times form the backdrop of his novels, which are usually of action and adventure. He also wrote non-fiction, including biography and history.
Malgonkar lived in a remote bungalow, at some distance from the town of Belgaum, Karnataka. His only child Sunita (educated at the famous Lawrence School Sanawar) died at a young age.
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September 21, 2016After my last blog post on Gabo, I realised that I had not paid any homage to my favourite Indian authors that I admired longer, who I swore by and who certainly left their impress on me as a person. Two of them, Mulk Raj Anand and R.K. Narayan, pioneered Indian writing in English – the so-called Indo-Anglian writing – a hundred years back. Each in his own way started a “genre”, while the third, Khushwant Singh the Irrepressible Sardarji, was unputdownable till the end.
However, I decided that I would start with the fourth, the officer and the gentleman. Belonging to a princely family of the Maharashtra region, Manohar Malgonkar was commissioned into the Maratha Light Infantry just before the World War II and saw action in Burma. The experiences of these early career days found ample reflection in his first novel, the “Distant Drum”. Incidentally this was also my first Malgonkar novel. I still remember the book – a red clothbound Indian edition with already yellowing pages, borrowed from the library of the Andhra University. It opened my eyes to the wonder that was (and still is, to a large extent) the Indian Army.
“Distant Drum” chronicles important early years in the life of the protagonist, a career officer named Kiran Garud. Malgonkar takes us with him to Burma and shows us the horrors of the Eastern Front first hand; involves us in an indiscretion that leads to the suicide of a brother officer, an Englishman; shows us the dramatic change in the attitudes of people, from politicians to the officer class themselves, with the coming of Independence; introduces the new class of “Indianised” officers then joining the Army, who, in many ways, were the very antithesis of the existing Anglicised officer class; and more than hints at the coming rot in both the country and the Army.
Over everything else, “Distant Drum” is a magnificent recounting of the izzat and elan of life in one of the greatest modern armies of the world at an important time in its history. Its most memorable and poignant scene is the meeting in no man’s land (for a drink !) between Kiran and a Pakistani officer (Salim?). Commissioned into the same regiment before Partition, they were now officially enemies.
Malgonkar displays his full faculties in ample measure in this first novel. It was indeed a riveting read for a starry eyed boy from a small mofussil town aspiring to become an engineer.
My next Malgonkar was “A Bend in the Ganges”. The name derives from a quote from the Ramayana. It was a pale green clothbound British edition, Chatto & Windus, much thicker than “Distant Drum”. The story also had a much broader scope. “Distant Drum” must have been well received in the West for Malgonkar to get a Western publisher for “A Bend”, a rare enough honour for an Indian author in those days. “A Bend” chronicles life and aspirations of youth during the freedom struggle and ends with the Independence. The idealistic protagonist is imprisoned in the Cellular Jail in Andamans for his role in a terrorist act against the British government. He escapes during the Japanese occupation of Andamans, lives under an alibi in the South for some time, and returns to his native Punjab only to witnesses the horror of the Partition. The slow breakdown of trust and age-old relations between the two communities is masterfully, unforgettably related.
My next was “Princes”. It was a red cloth-bound, probably also Chatto & Windus. “Princes” is a masterly chronicle of the lives of the feudal upper crust of the country during the pre-war years, bringing to life their mores and preoccupations. Curiously, it parallels Mulk Raj Anand’s “Private Life of an Indian Prince” – there are so many similarities! Not sure which one got written first. I don’t remember the story too well (I expressly did not re-read any of the books reviewed here, as I wanted to write this homage based on my original impressions), but the two incidents I mention below should give the reader a measure of the book.
In the first, the teenage protagonist, a prince, goes through an initiation ceremony that involves plucking out and eating the eye of a deer cooked whole at a state banquet. Even though horrified at the prospect, he manages this without incident – to the great relief of his family, for whom, a failure on his part would have resulted in a serious loss of face. In the second, the prince, now a young man, buys a hat he fancies on the Mall at Simla, but can not get himself to carry it; he is not used to doing any manual work. So he hires a coolie for carrying the hat for him!
I was fated to read my fourth (and so far, the last) Malgonkar only much later, in 1986. By then much had changed in my life. I had become a householder with a modest salary, and both the time and money for books were short. I no longer had access to the great library of my alma mater. I picked up an Indian paperback edition of “Bandicoot Run” at a railway bookstall only because it was the cheapest book on display, the author was familiar, and it promised to be a “spy thriller”. It did not disappoint. It actually starts where the earlier novels end. “Bandicoot Run” is really many things to many people, besides being a thriller of sorts; it is a sympathetic recounting of how the Englishmen who broke class taboos and stayed back in India after Independence fared; similarly of Anglo Indians as a community; of the preoccupations, the mismanagement and the squalor of 1960’s India; and lastly, the deadly cat-and-mouse game between Indian and Pakistani armies.
True to form, it also has interesting tit-bits of Army life, such as a few hilarious instances of hikmat-mali (Army term for minor misdemeanours), which might have really happened. But most importantly, it is an account of the rot in the Army, recounted through several thinly disguised incidents. Kiran Garud returns in this novel as a General. His career is sought to be destroyed by the unscrupulous General Behl who gets his just desserts at the end.
The most interesting character in “Bandicoot Run” is the protagonist himself. It is the most autobiographical of Malgonkar’s novels. The non-career officer who commands a file morgue during his last days in the army, who is a bit of a shikari with a distaste for misleading even a stranger, the Captain Saab who prides himself in retiring young and becoming a country squire quietly endears himself to the reader.
I was unaware of Malgonkar’s passing till recently, till a chance search brought up his obituary. I felt saddened. I also felt sad that his daughter, an only child, whose arrival and early schooling are so quietly celebrated in “Bandicoot Run”, should precede him.
The obituary and the Wikipedia entry have a few personal details. However, I am surprised by the long list of books, most of which I was unaware of.
Malgonkar was a great writer whose worth and contribution have never been sufficiently recognised and acknowledged. He wrote with great sincerity, passion, and mastery. Nobody else could bring to life the India of mid-20th century the way he did. Like a true gentleman, he quietly made his contribution and stepped aside. What a contrast to the self-advertising and marketing gimmicks of many of today’s writers!
One last word before I close this homage. All my favourite Indo-Anglians have lived long, well into their 90’s !
Mulk Raj Anand Born 1905 Died 2004
Khushwant Singh Born 1915 Died 2014
R. K. Narayan Born 1906 Died 2001
Manohar Malgonkar Born 1913 Died 2010
However, I decided that I would start with the fourth, the officer and the gentleman. Belonging to a princely family of the Maharashtra region, Manohar Malgonkar was commissioned into the Maratha Light Infantry just before the World War II and saw action in Burma. The experiences of these early career days found ample reflection in his first novel, the “Distant Drum”. Incidentally this was also my first Malgonkar novel. I still remember the book – a red clothbound Indian edition with already yellowing pages, borrowed from the library of the Andhra University. It opened my eyes to the wonder that was (and still is, to a large extent) the Indian Army.
“Distant Drum” chronicles important early years in the life of the protagonist, a career officer named Kiran Garud. Malgonkar takes us with him to Burma and shows us the horrors of the Eastern Front first hand; involves us in an indiscretion that leads to the suicide of a brother officer, an Englishman; shows us the dramatic change in the attitudes of people, from politicians to the officer class themselves, with the coming of Independence; introduces the new class of “Indianised” officers then joining the Army, who, in many ways, were the very antithesis of the existing Anglicised officer class; and more than hints at the coming rot in both the country and the Army.
Over everything else, “Distant Drum” is a magnificent recounting of the izzat and elan of life in one of the greatest modern armies of the world at an important time in its history. Its most memorable and poignant scene is the meeting in no man’s land (for a drink !) between Kiran and a Pakistani officer (Salim?). Commissioned into the same regiment before Partition, they were now officially enemies.
Malgonkar displays his full faculties in ample measure in this first novel. It was indeed a riveting read for a starry eyed boy from a small mofussil town aspiring to become an engineer.
My next Malgonkar was “A Bend in the Ganges”. The name derives from a quote from the Ramayana. It was a pale green clothbound British edition, Chatto & Windus, much thicker than “Distant Drum”. The story also had a much broader scope. “Distant Drum” must have been well received in the West for Malgonkar to get a Western publisher for “A Bend”, a rare enough honour for an Indian author in those days. “A Bend” chronicles life and aspirations of youth during the freedom struggle and ends with the Independence. The idealistic protagonist is imprisoned in the Cellular Jail in Andamans for his role in a terrorist act against the British government. He escapes during the Japanese occupation of Andamans, lives under an alibi in the South for some time, and returns to his native Punjab only to witnesses the horror of the Partition. The slow breakdown of trust and age-old relations between the two communities is masterfully, unforgettably related.
My next was “Princes”. It was a red cloth-bound, probably also Chatto & Windus. “Princes” is a masterly chronicle of the lives of the feudal upper crust of the country during the pre-war years, bringing to life their mores and preoccupations. Curiously, it parallels Mulk Raj Anand’s “Private Life of an Indian Prince” – there are so many similarities! Not sure which one got written first. I don’t remember the story too well (I expressly did not re-read any of the books reviewed here, as I wanted to write this homage based on my original impressions), but the two incidents I mention below should give the reader a measure of the book.
In the first, the teenage protagonist, a prince, goes through an initiation ceremony that involves plucking out and eating the eye of a deer cooked whole at a state banquet. Even though horrified at the prospect, he manages this without incident – to the great relief of his family, for whom, a failure on his part would have resulted in a serious loss of face. In the second, the prince, now a young man, buys a hat he fancies on the Mall at Simla, but can not get himself to carry it; he is not used to doing any manual work. So he hires a coolie for carrying the hat for him!
I was fated to read my fourth (and so far, the last) Malgonkar only much later, in 1986. By then much had changed in my life. I had become a householder with a modest salary, and both the time and money for books were short. I no longer had access to the great library of my alma mater. I picked up an Indian paperback edition of “Bandicoot Run” at a railway bookstall only because it was the cheapest book on display, the author was familiar, and it promised to be a “spy thriller”. It did not disappoint. It actually starts where the earlier novels end. “Bandicoot Run” is really many things to many people, besides being a thriller of sorts; it is a sympathetic recounting of how the Englishmen who broke class taboos and stayed back in India after Independence fared; similarly of Anglo Indians as a community; of the preoccupations, the mismanagement and the squalor of 1960’s India; and lastly, the deadly cat-and-mouse game between Indian and Pakistani armies.
True to form, it also has interesting tit-bits of Army life, such as a few hilarious instances of hikmat-mali (Army term for minor misdemeanours), which might have really happened. But most importantly, it is an account of the rot in the Army, recounted through several thinly disguised incidents. Kiran Garud returns in this novel as a General. His career is sought to be destroyed by the unscrupulous General Behl who gets his just desserts at the end.
The most interesting character in “Bandicoot Run” is the protagonist himself. It is the most autobiographical of Malgonkar’s novels. The non-career officer who commands a file morgue during his last days in the army, who is a bit of a shikari with a distaste for misleading even a stranger, the Captain Saab who prides himself in retiring young and becoming a country squire quietly endears himself to the reader.
I was unaware of Malgonkar’s passing till recently, till a chance search brought up his obituary. I felt saddened. I also felt sad that his daughter, an only child, whose arrival and early schooling are so quietly celebrated in “Bandicoot Run”, should precede him.
The obituary and the Wikipedia entry have a few personal details. However, I am surprised by the long list of books, most of which I was unaware of.
Malgonkar was a great writer whose worth and contribution have never been sufficiently recognised and acknowledged. He wrote with great sincerity, passion, and mastery. Nobody else could bring to life the India of mid-20th century the way he did. Like a true gentleman, he quietly made his contribution and stepped aside. What a contrast to the self-advertising and marketing gimmicks of many of today’s writers!
One last word before I close this homage. All my favourite Indo-Anglians have lived long, well into their 90’s !
Mulk Raj Anand Born 1905 Died 2004
Khushwant Singh Born 1915 Died 2014
R. K. Narayan Born 1906 Died 2001
Manohar Malgonkar Born 1913 Died 2010
June 12, 2022
This is a story of Satpura Army Regiment as told by Captain Garud.
Interesting account though not compelling!
Interesting account though not compelling!
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews