Feluda was born and spent the formative years in Dhaka and the rest with his mother in Kolkata till she passed away early yet he never talks about either. Why?

We know a lot about his life. His father was a remarkable person. "A ten-year old boy used to stick his hands into the burrows of foxes and pull out their little ones. This boy was Joykrishna Mitter, and when he grew up, he became a teacher of Sanskrit and Maths at Dhaka Collegiate School. But he was not your typical school teacher. He had a built body and was good at all kinds of sports, including wrestling and swimming. He died quite young, leaving behind a son aged nine. The son inherited his father's physical strength, mental faculties and daredevilry in equal measure, growing up to become the most popular sleuth of Bengali fiction: Prodosh C. Mitter, a.k.a. Feluda." Diptakirti Chaudhuri. The Hindu. 2016

That is an incredible person but it's also interesting that he never discusses the own early life and times particularly his childhood. He felt comfortable enough to share info about his dad but his silence about growing up in Dhaka and his mom is almost meaningful. Why this reticence?

Who exactly was he?

Feluda entered the public space in 1965 and he was almost 30 years old so it's safe to say he was born around 1935. Let's say it was 1937 making him 28 years in 1965. His dad was a school teacher in Dhaka and by the 40s, it was obvious to many members of the Hindu middle class that East Bengal had already become 'separate' and a new elite was raising and the old educated elite were no longer as welcome as before. The 1937 election was a turning point bringing in the Haq-Suhrawardy combo to power, the first non-British native administration in almost 200 years. And the rest was clear to most so migration out of East Bengal to Kolkata began around then.

But he was nine when his dad passed away so that would be 1946. Did they leave immediately for Kolkata? Feluda never says anything but he wasn't exactly a typical refugee in distress of the 1947 type there. His comfortable bourgeois life is obvious. But he never speaks about Dhaka. After all childhood memories are terribly important for any and must have played an influential role in his life too including the construction of his intellect. What makes him silent about it? Or is it the departure trauma that holds him back to almost 'deny' he ever had a childhood?

"Feluda himself studied in Scottish Church College and represented his college in cricket in Lucknow. Feluda's favourite cigarette, the oldest brand in India, manufactured by Vazir Sultan Tobacco Co. Feluda's revolver - the Colt. 32 snub nosed New Police Detective Special, manufactured circa 1958."

"Blessed with a photographic memory, he is ambidextrous. He represented Calcutta University in cricket as a left-arm spinner and is also a whiz at word games and puzzles. He came first in the 'All India Rifle Competition', though his preferred weapon is the more discreet Colt .32 (not to mention, the even more discreet grey matter). When his Colt is not available, he can match his Kung Fu skills to those of a Bollywood action director. He has translated two biographies of nineteenth-century explorers into Bengali."

All this and no childhood?

The mystery of missing women in his life

Not only is romance absent in Feluda's life but he never even discusses it. In fact, very few women are even visible in his life. He lives in a bachelor's comfort zone - cousin and servants - and has managed to polish off his women relatives as well. Never even discusses his mother which considering he is the archetypical Bengali, he should be swimming in her praise every moment or at least memorializing her all the time. But now, his silence about his family strikes a scary cord in his careful readers. Trauma again?

Is it possible that Feluda never came to terms with his departure from Dhaka, a young boy leaving many of his friends and his past behind. True, most would be like him - middle class Hindus - of whom most would have gone to India like his family but they are never seen in his home, no mention either. He is no longer in touch. And memories are made of not just people but "things, places, friends, faces..." and they were left behind.

And most probably it was much worse for his mother who was in many ways forced to relocate and never stopped longing for Dhaka in her Ballygunge home. And Feluda had to deal with twin traumas, of his own and that of his mother's.

Feluda grew up and works in Kolkata but Dhaka plays a secret and silent role that began in his formative childhood years and continued as he continues to hold sway over Kolkata and its environs in his later years.

Wish I was born 15 years earlier. Then I could have remembered the time we met and had iced lolly bought from the street corner vendor and discussed life in general standing under Dhaka's own sky. Ah well....