Spies, Lies & Allies: The Untold Story of Chatto & Roy

The Untold Story of Chatto & Roy

Excerpts:

Q: How did the book first take shape, and what was the process that led to its creation?
A . There are a number of reasons. After “Lady Doctors” did quite well, I received several offers to write about the first women lawmakers, engineers, lawyers and so on. But I didn’t want to be boxed in as a writer only covering forgotten women. I wanted to do something completely different in tone and subject.
While exploring ideas, I came across the story of Virendranath Chattopadhyay , brother of Sarojini Naidu. Unlike Sarojini, who followed the Gandhian path, Virendranath was a revolutionary and anarchist, pursued by the British Secret Service across Europe. He lived in the UK, France, Berlin, Sweden, and finally the Soviet Union, where he was executed during Stalin’s Great Purge.
I also discovered his rival, MN Roy , better known in West Bengal as a co-founder of Indian communism. He too had a dramatic life—pursued by intelligence agencies, becoming a protégé of Lenin, and escaping Soviet Russia just before Virendranath’s execution.
Though there are scholarly works on both men, I realised no popular history combined their stories. So I set out to do just that—write an accessible, engaging book for the ordinary reader rather than an academic audience. That’s where it all began.

Q. How did you first stumble upon Chatto’s story? Your investigative work shows there was contemporary evidence of his disappearance. So, what was your entry point into uncovering it
A. I can’t take much credit for this—it wasn’t really investigative journalism. Scholars have long written about Chatto, and I acknowledge their work in my book. It’s not a secret, though perhaps not widely known in India beyond academic circles. There’s also been discussion on social media—long tweet threads, for instance—and that’s probably where I first came across the idea.
What I realised, however, is that while his story is known in scholarly circles, we lack accessible popular histories of such figures. In India, when we talk about revolutionaries, most people know Bose or Bhagat Singh, but not others like Chatto, who were largely erased or forgotten.
From there, most of my research happened at the British Library in London, where I’m fortunate to have access. I found valuable material on both men—particularly Roy, who wrote prolifically and left behind books and letters that gave me another important source.

Q. What drew you to Chatto and Roy, and why do you think their stories have been overlooked in Indian history?
A. My own background of moving around a lot drew me to stories of people who lived across borders, and both Chatto and Roy were true cosmopolitans and internationalists. They spoke multiple languages—Chatto knew 14 or 15—and moved in circles with figures like Lenin, Stalin, Sun Yat-sen, Rosa Luxemburg, Lala Lajpat Rai, Gandhi and Nehru. That immediately fascinated me.
As for why they were overlooked, there are several reasons. First, Chatto’s execution in Stalin’s Great Purge in 1937 was concealed for decades; his fate only came to light in 1991 when the KGB archives were opened. Even his family thought he had simply died. Second, both men lived abroad and wrote largely in foreign languages, so their work was inaccessible to most Indians. Third, they clashed with Gandhi, Nehru, and even Sarojini Naidu—Chatto once called his sister a puppet of Gandhi and Nehru—so naturally they were pushed to the margins.
Ultimately, both were brilliant but uncompromising, and I describe them as “magnificent failures.” They achieved a great deal, but their refusal to play the political game ensured they were sidelined from mainstream Indian history.

Q. Your write how figures like Chatto and Roy moved across continents, shaped by and entangled with the Soviet Union, Britain, and British India. How did you bring all these three threads together?
A. This book was a huge challenge because of its vast scope—three main countries, but also Mexico, Germany, France, Sweden and others. I don’t think I’ve entirely succeeded in capturing everything, simply because there were too many strands. My aim was not to include every single thing Chatto or Roy said, or every major character they encountered—otherwise the book would become unreadable. I kept it to under 300 pages and focused instead on conveying their human side.
For me, this book is about what it is to be human: to try, to fail, to try again, to make mistakes, to have toxic relationships and repeat them, to struggle and still keep going. That was the essence I wanted to bring out in Chatto and Roy.
I was especially glad about a review by Vappala Balachandran. As a former officer of the Indian secret service, he had known some of these figures personally, like ACN Nambiar. He wrote that the book captured both the tragic plight of Chatto—trapped and eventually executed by Stalin—and the humanity of these two men. That meant a lot to me, because my goal was not to overload the reader with detail, but to make these complex lives accessible and deeply human.

Q. With such a vast cast of characters and events across different countries, how did you keep track of it all and still build a coherent narrative while ensuring accuracy?
A. Honestly, I don’t quite know how I managed. I worked with index cards and structured the book so that one chapter focused on Chatto and the next on Roy. That back-and-forth was intentional—I wanted readers to see what each was doing at opposite ends of the world. The chapters aren’t strictly chronological either; I begin each one with an anecdote to hook the reader before moving into the narrative.
It was difficult to keep track of so many strands, and in hindsight I think the book could have used a dramatis personae or a timeline. I may add that in the next edition. But by the time you finish a book, you’re so exhausted you just want to hand it over to the publisher.
This was also a huge project written on a very tight deadline—about 15 months. I know some factual slips and typos crept in, which I hope to correct in the next edition. It really was a challenging endeavour, and I’m not sure one ever feels fully satisfied.

Q. Is there is a second edition on the way?
A. I hope so. I mean, the book is still sort of, you know, having reviews and finding its feet. And one thing I'm noticing is that I think it's mostly men who are reading this book, which I have no objection to, but it's a change from Lady Doctors , which I think mostly women read.

Q. T hat' s the change in the feedback depending on the men and women. What have you discovered?
A. I’m not sure, but a lot of dads are reading this book. Some call it a dad book and say they’ll give it to their fathers. I intended it for everyone, but many readers tell me their dads would love it. That’s fine—I have no issues with dads or anyone else reading it.

Q. Writing this as someone who enjoys crime fiction, how do you decide the perspective to use? And what elements of crime fiction appeal to you as a reader?
A. I am obsessed with crime fiction. Most of what I read is crime fiction. But this book was influenced mostly by journalism, because I tried to make it very readable and simple. There is a lot of communist philosophy in Roy’s life, but I did not want this to be a book about philosophy.
Every chapter starts with an anecdote, and then I go on to the factual things like where they were born or what they did. Anecdotes make popular history readable. My past in journalism influenced that, because in journalism you always need interesting anecdotes and quotes. Roy had many, as did others around him. For example, when he founded the Mexican Communist Party, which is unusual since he was an Indian, an observer wrote there were “six men and a calico cat.” Quotes like these convey whole relationships.
Crime fiction influenced the pacing. With history, you need to keep it fast and snappy, or the reader will stop. So, I avoided long philosophy, endless dates, or proceedings of the Communist International. That’s why I began the book with Chatto’s execution. A review of the book said I borrowed this opening from Day of the Jackal. I found this criticism odd because I haven’t copied anybody; I was just writing it as it was. I didn’t realise the similarity, since those are novels and mine is history.