Shifting Sands

“My grandfather was a bandit,” 67-year-old Bhom Singh boomed from his elevated position on an unmade matrimonial bed fashioned from plywood, while his courtiers and clients sat on the rough floor of his kotri, a room in which guests—male guests—are received. The kotri, in the village of Sanawara in Rajasthan’s Jaisalmer district, was a windowless cell, but morning light streamed through the open door, exposing empty beer and bootleg-liquor bottles in the corner. An ornate ensemble of bed, sofa and easy chair, carved out of desert teak, completed the furniture.

Singh’s grandfather was locked away in a jail in Bahawalpur—now a border town in Pakistan—for twelve years. “On his way back, he traded a male riding camel for two female camels. One of the females got lost, but the other one he brought back to Sanawara and started breeding,” he said, after taking a deep drag from his hookah. “Before that, only the maharajas were breeding camels while we ordinary folk totally relied