Padmavati, the village hostess's body is found in a sacred chamber of the Kali temple. Men wanted her; women hated her; while some men wanted to keep their liaisons hidden.
But who had the motive, the means and opportunity to kill her?
Padmavati charged by the hour - her laughs, her understanding, her empathy, her advice - everything was available only in return for payment, which made her,in the Sarpanch's eyes, a little more than a trader.
'Look,' the priest Krishna Shastri said, pointing to the letters around him . 'Satyam, Shekhar, Seetaramaiah - how many men did she have in her grasp? How many? '
The onus of solving the case puts head constable Venkat reddy in a quandary. He has never even solved petty crimes and here he is faced with murder!
If this were a novel, the constable thought vacantly, would the reader think of him as a worthy detective? Would anyone bother reading about a bungling, confused constable pretending to be a detective? The equation before him is simple; seven suspects,seven motives, one murder.