In the shadow of New Delhi's towering concrete jungle, where the air thrummed with the relentless honks of rickshaws and the murmur of restless souls, a fleeting romance ignited amid the turmoil of demonetization. It was November 2016, and India's streets pulsed with the chaos of a nation stripped of its currency. Long queues coiled outside banks like serpents of despair, their scales made of shivering bodies and whispered complaints. Among them stood Mr. Chintan Bhagat—India's literary luminary, a silver-tongued orator, a political visionary draped in the crimson mantle of communism. His scarf, a bold slash of red against the gray dusk, fluttered in the breeze as he adjusted his spectacles, his hazel eyes scanning the crowd. Beside him was Dr. Sheena Amin—a #MeToo crusader, a journalist of piercing intellect, her emerald-green dupatta catching the fading light like a beacon of defiance.

Their meeting was a collision of chance—a crumpled 500-rupee note, now worthless, dropped between them.