The monsoon had not yet slipped fully into the memory of summer; still, the scent of wet soil clung to every dusty lane, every narrow row of bricks, everywhere the city breathed in and out the musk of rain yet to come. Calcutta in 1939 was a city straining against itself, like an unfinished poem that kept searching for its final line, and everywhere you turned there was sound, so much sound; the shouts of vegetable sellers on Burrabazar Street, the rhythm of bicycle bells on grey tar, the whisper of shirts flicking against drying washlines, like wings gently beaten against the wind.

Somewhere in a ramshackle haveli near College Square, the Unseen Witness waited. He was small in stature, but carried in his pockets the weight of a thousand unspoken prayers. He smelled of stale tobacco and boiled rice, and for a moment, in the cool, pre-dawn hush, the city seemed to hold its breath along with him. Before him lay a piece of paper as pale as a moonless night; it bore the elegant, deliberate strokes of a mind burdened with longing, a letter written by Subhas Chandra Bose himself.

Bose’s handwriting was deliberate and lyrical, as if each word sang like a dim, distant bird, caught between dawn and dusk. The room was stifling, even at the early hour, yet the air hung with a curious blend of sandalwood and sweat, as though every wall had been soaked in the anxieties and hopes of suffragettes, scholars, and young men who dreamed of freedom with the ache of hunger in their bones.

The letter read like a hymn to unity, a plea for bridge-building between people whose visions of India were different but whose hearts throbbed with the same drumbeat of liberty. Bose’s vowels and consonants pulsed with his restlessness, as though each sentence might leap off the page and run into the streets, calling out to anyone who knew what it meant to be shackled, yet hopeful.

And yet the letter had not been sent. It lay folded, like a reluctant secret, in the hands of the Unseen Witness who had been entrusted to carry it that morning through the maze of grey brick and rattling black trams, to a courtyard where iron gates stood between hope and history. He was told that the world would change if only this letter reached its intended ears; that voices once divided might find a shared rhythm and march together toward an impossible sunrise.

He watched dawn seep into the night; he watched the city yawn open its eyes; he watched the sky turn from bruise-colour to a hard, brilliant blue. He walked through narrow lanes, past women who carried water pots on their hips and men who sat on unused kerbs staring at the horizon with hollow eyes. The sound of life was immense; the cadence of footsteps on broken tar, the distant toll of temple bells, and everywhere the undercurrent of an unsteady wind rustling newsprint flapping in open windows.

But by the time he reached the dusty avenue that led toward the RSS courtyard, the letter was cold in his pocket, like a dormant ember that had forgotten how to glow. Here, there was a different rhythm to life; boots on footpaths, shouted instructions, the metallic creak of gates swung open and shut by young men shaped by drill and discipline. Their faces were resolute, their eyes gleaming with a strange fire; they spoke of service, of brotherhood, of protecting the soul of a country that didn’t yet know how to free itself. Their words had cadence, their tongues moved swiftly, and everywhere he could hear the secondary whisper, the sound of chants repeatedly rising and falling, like waves urging a ship unseen toward an eternal shore. But no one came to take the letter.

He waited, heart thudding like a tabla in the still air. He watched polished boots scuff the ground with purposeful steps; he heard the echo of orders given and carried through corridors that seemed to converge toward an invisible centre. The sky was streaked pink and gold, as if the dawn itself were watching this exchange of will and fate. But no one asked him who he was, nor what he carried. No one inquired about the letter burning a small, invisible hole in his coat pocket, where the ink had begun to smudge with the anxiety of being unread, unheard, unseen.

Hours collapsed into an uneasy afternoon. City noise marched on outside, the clipped accents of rickshaw pullers, the clatter of wooden carts carrying firewood, the shrill calls of vendors hawking jasmine garlands. Somewhere, a gramophone played a slow, scratchy tune, notes colliding with time like ships seeking harbour in a sea of static. The man felt every sound with unbearable intensity, as though each one was a tether to some distant promise that refused to be hushed.

In that moment, he thought he understood what it meant to carry history in silence. He lingered until shadows began their slow crawl back across the ground. The courtyard emptied with the final clang of the temple bell, and at last he slipped away unnoticed, as though he were a shade dissolving at twilight. The letter remained with him, folded and rising and falling with the breath of his own regret.

On the walk home, he passed a blind man sitting under a banyan tree, fingers grazing the weary braille of an old harmonium. The man struck a chord so thin and fragile that it seemed too slight to be heard; yet birds lifted from the branches, startled into flight, as though the sound had summoned them from some deep sleep. The Unseen Witness paused, closing his eyes, letting that fragile chord resonate through his body, through the memory of the unposted letter in his pocket.

The city pulsed around him, breath and clang and soft lament all tangled together; a child cried in the distance, a dog barked at nothing, the wind shifted and whispered secrets through the eaves of shuttered windows. Somewhere beyond, in the heart of a city that would soon be caught in the ferocity of a war not yet fully named, people lived fragments of stories, unaware of the shape they were making together.

At his lodgings that evening, he reached for the letter and smoothed its creases with the tenderness of someone brushing an eyelash from a beloved face. Words and sentences, once effulgent with promise, now seemed mournful with absence; they spoke of unity, of understanding between souls separated by ideology, by fear, by walls both spoken and silent.

He tried to fold the letter gently, but his fingers trembled, and the paper cracked at the crease. For a moment, it seemed that the letter itself sighed, as though it knew it would never find its home.

And yet, before sleep claimed him, he wrote in his own hand a few lines at the bottom of Bose’s letter, not meant for any eyes but his own: If a dream loses its messenger, may it find another heart to carry it onward.

He folded the letter one final time, placed it inside his coat, and closed his eyes to the sound of night settling over a city that was still learning the full weight of its own longing.

---

Copyright © 2026 TRISHIKH DASGUPTA

This work of fictionised history, written by Trishikh Dasgupta, is the author’s sole intellectual property. It draws inspiration from lesser known moments, silences, and contested intersections in the life and times of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose and the Indian freedom movement. While this story can be read and experienced independently, it also forms the first part of a six story narrative arc, where each piece stands alone yet together offers a deeper, layered understanding of Netaji’s journey, convictions, and enduring mysteries. Some characters, incidents, places, and facts may be real, while others are imaginatively reinterpreted.

All rights are reserved. No part of this story may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including printing, photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, send an email to the author at trishikh@gmail.com or get in touch with Trishikh on the CONTACT page of this website.

---

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Trishikh Dasgupta

Adventurer, philosopher, writer, painter, photographer, craftsman, innovator, or just a momentary speck in the universe flickering to leave behind a footprint on the sands of time... READ MORE