It is not like blood was oozing out.murder is only a peg on which I hang my story. People take 4-5 pages to describe scenes of physical intimacy. If I have it written it, it is never in graphic detail. “They have become its staple ingredients but I have never focussed on sex and violence. He agrees that mystery has become a genre which cannot dispense with sex and violence. He doesn’t commit crime out of choice or for personal benefit.” I created an anti-hero in such a way that people were sympathetic towards him. “There was always an element of repentance and remorse. There is no fear of law.” Pathak insists that the never glorified crime. “Criminals are becoming increasingly audacious. He says people want to read about crime because they see it happening around them. Now except for chapattis, I can cook almost everything,” he gushes.
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And after some trial and error, I learnt it pretty well. “Some years back when my wife fell ill, I decided to learn cooking. My reply has always been what Chekov used to say – a good woman doesn’t make for a good story.” We order vegetarian and non-vegetarian kabab platters but Pathak sticks of fish fillets. “Many feel that my female characters are always of dubious character. Pathak admits that his female readers often criticise the portrayal of women in his novels. I am what I am, not because of my publishers, but because of my direct link with my readers.” Over the years, the comments became more effusive. Once my wife read one of those, and I felt why should she suffer because of my writing. They would start respectfully and then suddenly switch to colourful language. “I used to get a lot of fan mail on postcards. In came Vimal, a Robinhood kind of twisted character, making Pathak a household name. That also clicked and he started relishing the idea of chiselling tales of anti-heroes where characters spoke in a unique concoction of Hindi, Urdu, Punjabi and English. I created other protagonists only for the sake of variety.” He created Sudhir who was the complete anti-thesis of Sunil.
“I intended to write more, but my readers started complaining of sameness. “I created Sunil, an investigative journalist, in 1963 when this term was not in vogue in India.” Sunil lasted for 122 novels. He persisted with it, and eventually the sale picked up. I was asked to reconsider my decision but I didn’t relent.” Somehow it was published, but for the next two years there was no second novel. I was immensely ridiculed, even by my publisher. It occurred to me, that I should make an investigative journalist the hero of my novel.
“I didn’t want to toe the line of all the famous writers. Looking back, Pathak, who shot to fame with “65 Lakh Ki Dakaiti”, says when he started the protagonist was usually a CBI officer or a police inspector. He informs “Conman” is doing well and is weaving another tale around road rage. You can’t speak to the mystery writer in a hushed tone because age has diminished his sense of hearing but his understanding of the pulse of his reader is as strong as ever before. Health doesn’t allow the 78-year-old to indulge into a hearty meal but he still gives eight hours to writing. Now television soaps have taken over that space,” says Pathak as we settle for a leisurely chat at Made In India, the Indian speciality restaurant of Radisson Blu MBD in Noida. At that time homemakers used to read books after completing their household chores. Films didn’t release every day, but books could come out every day because there were 60-70 publishers. That was the time when people were dependant on books and films for entertainment. “When I started writing in early ’60s, there used to be many writers and many publishers. “I am the only one left in this trade because I diversified in time,” says SMP, as he is known among his countless fans, referring to the gradual demise of Hindi pulp fiction. With almost 300 books to his credit, the veteran writer of Hindi crime fiction is more than just a prolific writer. Surendra Mohan Pathak allows me to touch his overworked digitus medius, which at its prime helped him write 40 pages a day. Over the years, one has met many authors but none made me feel the dent in his finger.
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