The Midnight Knock

As the author himself says, this is not a jail diary. Nor is it an account of the Emergency. It is rather a ‘side light’ on the Emergency. Malkani writes about his experience of it—of what he, as a detenu, ‘saw, heard, thought and felt’ in prison. He spent the twenty-one months in three prisons— Hissar, Rohtak and Tihar—where he met a variety of people, from criminals to top-notch politicians. This is a very human document about them—sometimes amusing, sometimes sad, sometimes traumatic. The many hours of solitude in prison gave the author the opportunity to deeply analyse the Hindu-Muslim problem, towards which he has offered new and hopeful insights. The book is sensitively written, full of intimate anecdotes, not without political insight, and makes very interesting reading. It offers not only a personal viewpoint, but a glimpse into the lives of all detenus.