Shajarur Kanta

Shajarur Kanta (Bengali: শজারুর কাঁটা, romanized: Śajārur Kā̃ṭā, lit. 'The Quills of the Porcupine') is a Bengali mystery novel written by Sharadindu Bandyopadhyay in 1967. The murderer kills people using porcupine quills thrust from behind into the heart.^[1]

Plot

The story starts with the death of a beggar, found dead with a porcupine's quill embedded to his heart. The police initially dismiss any foul play when a few more people end up dead in the same way. Byomkesh is asked to investigate when a man is injured grievously, but survives the attack.

The man is Debashish Bhatto, a rich businessman, who has recently married Deepa in an arranged marriage. Byomkesh discovers that everything is not what it seems, especially when the gathering at Nripati Laha's allows him to interact with Debashish's friends and Deepa's family. Deepa's past is intricately entwined with her present, threatening to ruin her and Debashsish's life. Who was the murderer? Why?

Characters

• Byomkesh Bakshi
• Ajit Bandyopadhyay
• Satyabati
• Debasish Bhatto
• Deepa Bhatto, wife of Debashish
• Udaymadhab Mukherjee, grandfather of Deepa and Bijoy
• Neelmadhab Mukherjee, father of Deepa and Bijoy
• Prabal Gupta, lover of Deepa
• Sujan Mitra, an actor
• Nripati Laha
• Bijoy Madhab Mukherjee, brother of Deepa
• Kharag Bahadur, footballer
• Kapil Bose
• Mother of Deepa and Bijoy
• Dr. Sen
• Dr. Gupta

Adaptations

Television

• This was one of the stories in the 1993 TV series Byomkesh Bakshi titled "Sahi Ka Kanta",^[2] that were recreated for broadcasting on Doordarshan, the Indian National Network, by Basu Chatterjee, and immediately went on to become one of the most memorable episodes.
• The story adapted into another TV series in 2014 named Byomkesh, which aired on the Bengali channel ETV Bangla.

Film

• A film of the same name was made in 1974.
• Another version of the film is made in 2015 with the same name.^[3]

Web series

• This story was adapted for season 3 of the web series, Bomkyesh, by Anirban Bhattacharya. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byomkesh_(web_series)

References

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