India, Jan. 31 -- A few weeks ago, I went to Varanasi on a pilgrimage. Not to a temple, but to Lamhi, the birthplace of Hindi literature's greatest writer, Munshi Premchand (1880-1936).

Lamhi is a few kilometres north of Varanasi. It was a tiny village when Premchand was born. His grandfather, Gursahay Lal, moved there as the patwari or land recorder, built a mud house and settled in. Gursahay Lal's son, Ajaib Lal, found work as a postal clerk. Premchand, born after three girls (of whom only one survived), was a mischievous child, given to stealing sugarcane and mangoes from fields and orchards, leaving the owners very cross. But what he truly loved, and was excellent at, was gilli danda.

In this way, his childhood was spent, until it f...