It is another working day in Amritsar, and Ramchand is late again. He runs through the narrow streets to Sevak Sari House in the heart of one of the city's old bazaars. There, among the Bangladeshi cottons and Benaras silks, Ramchand and his fellow shop assistants sit all day patiently rolling and unrolling yards of colored fabric for wives and daughters of "status families" and for the giggling girls who dream of dressing up in silk but can only afford cotton.One afternoon, Ramchand is sent to a new part of the city and is jolted out of the rhythm of his narrow daily life. His glimpse into this different world charges him with an urgent sense of possibility. And so, armed with two battered English grammar books, a fresh pair of socks, and a bar of Lifebuoy soap, he attempts to recapture the hope that his childhood had promised. But soon these efforts turn his life upside down, bringing him face to face with the cruelties on which his very existence depends. Read Less