Our Self-Written Obituaries – Indrajit Hazra (1971-2022), Mayur Vihar Phase 1
The sixth death.
[Text by Indrajit Hazra; photo by Arunava Sinha]
Indrajit Hazra was a fine exponent of the one-liner and, like Nature, he abhorred a vacuum, especially in conversations. More of a stringer of situations than a novelist, his books brought joy to dozens, who saw him less as a serious writer and more as someone who desperately wanted to be taken seriously as a writer.
Mr Hazra’s first love was reading and writing plays — although he disliked watching them being performed. Probably as a result, he didn’t write a single complete play but left only fragments, one line at a time. These would later be compiled by an admiring reader as a collection of conversation-changers.
Mr Hazra had written 11 novels, two in Bengali, out of which only six (all in English), were published. His Suffer, Little Children almost was made into a film, a medium that he found “far more astonishing than books because movies literally recreate worlds rather than just describe them”.
Mr Hazra was fond of football, as it gave him the sense of belonging to something more than “just the insides of my head”. He worried about procrastinating and had planned to write a novel on it. A lover of sleep, he left his death right till the end, committing suicide on his 51st birthday. He left a note – ‘I’m done. I’ve run out of one-liners’ – and a widow, but no children or pets.
Our Obituaries invites Delhiites across the world to write their obituary in 200 words. The idea is to share with the world how you will like to be remembered after you are gone. (May you live a long life, of course!) Please mail me your self-obit at mayankaustensoofi@gmail.com.
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