Nawaid AnjumDateline: August 17, 1988. A C-130 Hercules carrying Pakistan’s military dictator, General Zia-ul-Haq, crashes. Twenty years after that mysterious crash, Pakistan-born and London-based journalist and playwright Mohammed Hanif reimagines the "conspiracies and coincidences" that sprang up on Zia’s death in his brilliant debut, A Case of Exploding Mangoes, published by Random House.A powerful story of love, betrayal, tyranny and revenge, the novel spins a dark, humorous tale out of one of the subcontinent’s most enduring mysteries which has been critically acclaimed for having shades of Sara Suleri Meatless Days, Joseph Heller Catch 22 and Kurt Vonnegut Slaughterhouse Five. After Pakistan Air Force pilot Ali Shigri’s father, one of Zia’s colonels, commits suicide under suspicious circumstances, Shigri sets out to avenge his father’s death.While the novel is ostensibly bold in its narration ISI is referred to by a character as "Inter Bloody Services Bloody Intelligence", Hanif is far from agreeing that it will "unruffle feathers" in Pakistan. "It is a little love and adventure story with some jokes in it and I think it will be read in that spirit," says Hanif, who heads the BBC Urdu Service.As for the conspiracy theories shrouding General Zia’s death, the author says he "loves" all those theories. "I took some, added some of my own and wrote this book. And after I had finished, this 80-year-old American dude who was the US ambassador in India at the time, came up with a completely new theory. He says the Israelis did it and the state department declared him an almost-loony for bringing up the subject. I think it must be true. And I am hoping another one, an even better one will come along soon," says Hanif, who holds that while Pakistan may still be struggling with Zia’s ghost, August 17 is not a big day on anyone’s calendar.Hanif, who graduated from the Pakistan Air Force Academy, knew the setting of his novel only too well. "It’s personal in the sense that I came of age in that period. But I must say I probably learnt more about the Air Force watching Top Gun than I did being in the Air Force. So, I would say that fiction doesn’t always need to get fixated on personal. There is always other fiction to get inspiration from," he says.Having moved to London a decade back, Hanif last visited the country of his birth in April this year. "I was in Karachi when suddenly riots erupted in downtown Karachi. I felt immediately at home. The only new thing is that when robbers stop you at gunpoint in Karachi they ask for your cellphone. But then we didn’t have cellphones when I moved to London," says Hanif in a lighter vein.In the last few years, there have been some nice novels from Pakistani authors settled abroad Kamila Shamsie, Nadeem Aslam, Moni Mohsin et al. Have they helped in building Pakistan’s literary character as nations are defined by their narrations Hanif holds that Pakistanis like a good story, just like anyone else. "And probably more so because there are not enough good stories about them. There are one hundred and sixty million Pakistanis and very few writers. All the writers you mention come from very different backgrounds and write about diverse subjects. There are obviously many more who write in Urdu, Sindhi and Punjabi as well who have a wider readership. But I am not sure Pakistan has a literary character as such. TV character, may be, or pop music character, but sadly no literary character as such," he explains.As for Mohsin Hamid, whose The Reluctant Fundamentalist was shortlisted for the 2007 Booker Prize, Hanif says, "It’s a very striking book. And the only debate that I have heard about this book is that whether it’s better than Moth Smoke, which again was a very striking book. So, Mohsin is competing against himself. His books have always started conversations, debates. And there are not very many books anywhere which can accomplish that."What does Hanif think of the baggage of identities in a world that has shrunk to become a global village "I think of it as just that: baggage. Whenever my baggage is opened at customs, they usually find laundry, unread books and Indian DVDs," says Hanif, who has written plays for the stage and screen, including a critically acclaimed BBC drama and the feature film The Long Night, an urban "dystopia of drugs, sex and dislocation" produced and directed by Hasan Zaidi. Hanif holds that a bi-cultural experience is not of any great importance for a writer as people become bi-cultural for "mundane" reasons like jobs and children’s education."I have read very fine writers who died in the very house they were born in. I think Nayyar Masud, who is probably the finest post-Partition Urdu writer, was born in Lucknow and still lives there. And if you read his short stories, you’ll never mention the word bi-cultural. He can create these incredible worlds for you. And I think that’s what writers do, conjure up worlds," says Hanif.