The COVID Test

By Alok Jha

"A Covid Story that is certain to leave the readers in splits. It's the early days of the lockdown. The Deputy Commissioner of Excise has framed an exhaustive list of dos and don'ts, including strict quarantine rules for groceries. When he learns that his brother-in-law had attended a party, he reviews his own brief encounter with his wife's bro

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ukiyoto Publishing
• Release date: Jan 4, 2022
• ISBN: 9789360495022

Book preview

The Covid Test

Alok Jha

Ukiyoto Publishing

All global publishing rights are held by

Ukiyoto Publishing

Published in 2022

Content Copyright © Alok Jha

ISBN

All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in a retrieval system, in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.

The moral rights of the author have been asserted.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out or otherwise circulated, without the publisher’s prior consent, in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published.

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To,

My English Teacher, (Late) Mrs Swapna Saha

On a sultry April morning, the back porch of the bungalow, allotted to Chintamani Pandey, Deputy Commissioner of Excise, was resembling a war zone.

A woman in her mid-forties, who was of wheatish complexion and who had worn on her pink Palazzo a parrot green cotton tee, had positioned herself inside a white circle. Her brown-streaked hair was held loosely with a red band. A red mask in floral print had concealed much of her attractive features, with only a spot of vermilion showing where the middle parting of her hair was.

The woman alluded to above, who was also wearing white rubber gloves in her hands, was the better half of the Deputy Commissioner. In front of her  stood a wrought iron table upon which  grocery bags and two plastic baskets in red and blue were kept. A hand sanitizer was also lying on one end of the table.

With a frowning face, Mrs Pandey was taking out the contents of the bags and putting them in the baskets – fruits  and vegetables in the red basket; rest into the blue one.

At a safe distance from his wife stood the Deputy commissioner, who was around fifty years of age, of medium height and lean muscles, his long face covered with a blue surgical mask. Upon his Olive Cargo shorts, he was wearing an Orange Printed Crew Neck T-shirt, the upper half of which was bathed in sweat.

After coming from the market, he had directly reached the back porch, where his wife had instructions to receive him in her safety gear.

He