Chetan Bhagat

Over the last couple of years, Chetan Bhagat has come to fame as a youth writer. His novels "Five Point Someone" and "One Night at the Call Center" have been pretty popular. I got an opportunity to borrow these books and have read the latter. His writing style is ok and the comedy is a shade dark in the books. He has tried to depict the current youth culture in India in his books, though I cannot comment on the authenticity of his depiction as I have not been part of it.

The book "One Night at the Call Center" is about a bunch of call center "agents", and their struggles with life. The entire novel takes place within the start and end of a daily (nightly) shift. The book is good in patches, but these purple patches are far and few. The character sketches are commendable. The manager, "Mr. Bakshi"'s jargon is hilarious and is very apt with what happens in real life. The phone call from God is a little too unrealistic for my taste. Overall, I would say that it is a good read if you have nothing else to do and want some entertainment. Also, it helps you get a perspective about how the youth of the country are shaping up, given the current economy and nuclear families.

The message I got from the book was that the youth of India have the intelligence and the imagination to do well, but lack self-confidence and fear failure when it comes to its execution. On a corroborative note, a similar message is actually conveyed in the movie "Rang De Basanti", where Aamir Khan as DJ doesn't want to leave the comfort zone of his college as he doesn't believe that he would be treated with the same respect outside the college walls. Cannot agree more with this message........

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