Rear Entrance

David Barun Kumar Thomas

Six months in dreary and cold Brussels – and no headway with her handsome colleague Luc – has convinced systems analyst Seetha, brought up in 'steamy' Madras, that she must move on. The British Government's immigration laws allow writers and artists to be granted a visa even if they have no job so Seetha decides that she is a writer – and her first creative assignment is her visa application form. Harish, escaping the slums of India, has slogged hard in Belgium for the last fourteen years and has finally saved enough to fulfil a lifelong dream: watch a cricket match at Lords in London. Amit seems to have everything – except his strict father's approval which he may win if he finds a way to launder the $2 million his father moved out of India 'during the restrictive years of Nehruvian socialism'. To Ratnesh, who hates the Indian caste system and as a Dalit plans to seek asylum in the UK, all's fair in love war and getting a visa. Even using the naive Harish for his own ends. And across the desk from them all, holding their fate in his hands, is British visa officer Doug Evans... who himself does not know what is going to happen at the end of the two days in which these characters' lives, dreams – and visa applications – cross paths.