Amriter Mrityu

Infobox short story |
name = Amriter Mrityu
author = Sharadindu Bandyopadhyay
title_orig =
translator =
country = India
language = Bengali
series = Byomkesh Bakshi
subject =
genre = Crime
preceded_by = Monimondon
followed_by = Shaila Rahasya

"Amriter Mrityu" is a detective story by Sharadindu Bandyopadhyay featuring Byomkesh Bakshi and Ajit. This story was published along with 19 other stories in Sharadindu Omnibus Volume II.

Plot summary

The story starts with Byomkesh Bakshi and Ajit investigating a government issue in a small village. Nearby, in outskirts of a forest near by a group of children are arguing among each other. One of the boys Amrit proclaims that he had been to the forest previous night while following his wandering calf and had seen a ghost riding on a black horse through the forest. The other boys chide him saying that he is lying and challenges Amrit to go in the forest and mark a tree as proof. Amrit accepts the challenges and goes to the forest. After sometime, the boys hear a gun shot and run inside the forest. There they see Amrit dead on the ground.

The boys knowing that Byomkesh is in the village goes to him and asks for his help. Byomkesh agrees to help the children but he is not happy with the police commissioner who never discussed the murder with him. In response the police commissioner says that he should concentrate on the government investigation and leave the petty crimes to the police. Byomkesh is not happy with it and even has a small argument with the commissioner.

Later in the evening, Byomkesh goes to the murder scene with the children. He doesn't see any chalk mark and deduces that Amrit was killed before he could his mark. Nearby, he notices a house which belongs to Sadanand Sur who has been out of village for last 6-7 days. Just then he sees horse footsteps around the place. When enquired the children tell Byomkesh that nobody has black horse nor a gun. At the same time they see Sadanand returning to the village. He tells that he has been to Kolkata for some business work. Telling that he walks towards his house. Couple of moments later, Byomkesh and the boys hear a bomb blast coming from Sadanands house. They run down to the spot and see Sadanand lying on the ground dead with injuries inflicted by the blast.

Byomkesh investigates around and finds that the bomb was kept as a booby trap. He deduces whoever set up the bomb knew that Sadanand would be coming soon and placed the bomb. Byomkesh also suggests that Amrit death was linked to the killing of Sadanand and whoever wanted to kill Sadanand killed Amrit too.

Byomkesh asks the police for the post mortem and the goes on to meet the conductor of the village station. The conductor clearly remembers Sadanand going to Kolkata on train 713 down. He also mentions that Sadanand was a very genial person and has a married sister staying in a nearby village with her husband.

Byomkesh then goes along to meet couple of important person in the village. First on the list is Vishwanath Mullick who has 7-6 horses though in the conversation he denies having a black horse though he tells that another businessman in the village Badridas Marwari has a black horse. They also come to know from his manager that Sadanand was a good person and he had borrowed Rs. 1000 from Vishwanath to start a dispensary in Kolkata but no record was kept for the transaction.

Post-mortem report of Amrit comes out and its found that the bullet was shot from a revolver which was used by Americans during World War II when they had a military barrack in the village. After the war, they left behind the ammunitions and now people sell them in the black market.

They go on and meet Badridas Marwari but he lies to all the questions.

Byomkesh then decides to go and meet Sadanands sister and makes sure that everybody knows about it. In the station they see Badridas coming and returning after seeing Byomkesh. They also meet Vishwanath who is in station to deal with some business matter. Just as the train starts, we realise that it was a plan by Byomkesh to tell everybody that he was going out of village. Actually, he plans to get down in the next station and goes back to the village as he is convinced that the solution to the mystery lies in the village itself and he hopes to capture the killer the same night.

Back in the village, Byomkesh groups the children and goes to the forest. There he assigns each of them a job to lookout for. After some time, they see that a person comes riding on a black horse, goes near a tree and does something with one of the branches.

Next day Byomkesh visits Vishwanath and arrests him for the murder of Amrit and Sadanand Sur.

In the ending scenes, Byomkesh discloses that Vishwanath used to illegally deal with ammunition and he used to hide them near Sadanands house. It happens that Sadanand comes to know about it and blackmails Vishwanath. Initially, Vishwanath pays him Rs. 1000 but later on decides to kill him. So he plants the bomb in his house. It was at this time when he was planting the bomb that Amrit saw and he had no choice but to kill him.

TV adaptations

* This story was one of the selected stories televised in Hindi by Doordarshan by Basu Chatterjee, featuring Rajit Kapoor.