chunk: Jamal's flashbacks begin with his managing, at age five, to obtain the autograph of Bollywood star Amitabh Bachchan, which his brother Salim then sells, followed immediately by the death of his mother during the Bombay Riots. As they flee the riot, they meet Latika, a girl from their slum. Salim is reluctant to take her in, but Jamal suggests that she could be the third musketeer, a character from the Alexandre Dumas novel (which they had been studying — albeit not very diligently — in school), whose name they do not know. The three are found by Maman—a gangster who tricks and then trains street children into becoming beggars. When Salim discovers Maman is blinding the children in order to make them more effective beggars, he flees with Jamal and Latika to a departing train. Latika fails to board the train as Salim purposefully lets go of her hand, thus resulting in her being recaptured by Maman. Over the next few years, Salim and Jamal make a living travelling on top of trains,