Guide notes for "The Very Difficult Diwali of Sub-Inspector Gurushankar Rajaram", by Jeff Soesbe
https://daybreakmagazine.wordpress.com/2009/10/13/the-very-difficult-diwali-of-sub-inspector-gurushankar-rajaram/
Discussed on 14 March 2019
Notes by Wordsmith Jarvinen

Sub-Inspector Gurushankar Rajaram was patrolling at the start of the story. What about this immediately makes this near future science fiction?

"On the unicopter’s monitors the city-wide SHIVA surveillance system presented a constant stream of dangerous situations, courtesy its Bayesian threat analysis algorithms, for Raja to evaluate."  So an analysis based on current sensor inputs and a priori probability.

There were two events making this a particularly hard day to maintain order. Diwali (festival of lights) and the fifth anniversary of the death of Dev Khan.

Particularly for this story, what aspect of Dev Khan was most important?  (activism)

What does "Firecrackers were too much like gunshots for SHIVA, every bang another HIGH PRIORITY WEAPONS FIRE to be checked" tell us about SHIVA.
(that it has local sensors, not just remote cameras from space, although the comment indicates lack of loud sound discrimination)

“Hm.” In that single sound Raja heard a thousand words about his past behavior. Already the conversation had taken a bad turn. Change the subject, perhaps. “How is the situation inside the compound?” (re relationship with wife)

What was the main crisis of the story?

How were the officials going to handle it?

What weapon was used to bring down Raja's copter?

What two strategies did Raja try?

What was Officer Chaterjee's role in the second strategy?