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A simple story of two friends Saleem and Rahman who grow up in a University town in north India, ""Encounters"" movingly conveys how the arbitrary use of law and order during times of great unrest, riots and curfews, disrupts childhood and its normal lessons. The story is written by Rahman after the death of Saleem in a police encounter, as Rahman tries to make sense of his life and decides whether to follow his closest friend along the road to radicalization. Much of the story is also about Abbasi Sahib, or Abbujaan, Saleem`s father and a teacher of Constitutional Law at the Aligarh Muslim University. The novel traces Rahman and Saleem`s encounter with law as an ideal, taught and treasured by Saleem`s father, and law as it becomes a tool in the hands politicians as they try and define India along religious lines. The novel is a story of Rahman`s life in a small city, his work at a roadside mechanic`s shop, his friends and his aspirations of being able to live in a society in which he is not defined and limited by sectarian allegiances. Encounters traces the stories of the people in Rahman`s life as they have crossed the invisible lines of religion and sect, and the price that they pay by doing so.ISBN - 9788183860291
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