"I have my own history. I was evicted from Kashmir like many thousands of others. But when I went to Bastar and when I looked at other conflicts and what it was doing to other people, my own misery faded in comparison; because even in the worst of my situation, I had not touched the kind of pain and marginalisation I touched while travelling in the hinterland of India"
- Rahul Pandita, author, Our Friends In Good Houses, talks to Manjula Narayan about drawing from his journalistic work in his first novel, points of similarity with Neel, the book's protagonist, the vibrance of his female characters including the Maoist guerilla Gurupriya, who stays with the reader long after the book is put away, and how, besides being a study of one man's search for home, this is also a snapshot of contemporary India with its great dreams and unfulfilled yearnings.  

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