There is an educational institution near Calcutta where the students—most from well-to-do, middle-class families—wear spotless white dhotis, bathe in outside stalls and start their day with meditational chanting while monks in saffron conduct classes. It is easy to fit the world of Saikat Majumdar’s novel into its walls, the rituals, the drapes, the subduing of the flesh and the discipline. Though whether its swamis are scented with cardamom is debatable.