His forefinger pointed first to a lump of common abkari, black in colour and hard in texture; then it passed on to a ball of madak, a gluey mixture of opium and tobacco: See: this is the cheap stuff that people smoke in chillums. Next, using both hands, he took out a small lump, still in its poppy-petal wrapper, and touched it to her palm, to show her how soft it was: This is what we make in the factory: chandu. You won’t see it here, the sahibs send it across the sea, to Maha-Chin. It can’t be eaten like abkari and it can’t be smoked like madak.
