Our Alibi Was Trending: A Digital Alibi

By Prashant Mishra

Ayaan Khanna has built a careful life as a climate researcher in a border town in Punjab, avoiding the questions that ended an old friendship. At 27, that restraint collapses when Ayaan finds a police evidence label stitched inside a vintage jacket. The return of a colleague who may be protecting the culprit makes the search both intimate and unreliable. Their evidence suggests that a wellness app has been selling intimate voice recordings as training data. Then an approaching storm cuts the setting off from outside help. To protect the wrongfully accused, Ayaan may have to trade the truth for someone else’s safety. The clue hidden in a child’s map of places adults deny exist proves that solving the mystery forces the protagonist to reveal a secret more damaging than the crime. The emotional counterpoint is an attempt to complete a deceased parent’s unfinished documentary, while a festival deadline leaves no room for delay.