Chetan Bhagat free essay sample

Chetan Bhagat is a famous Indian author who penned down novels that hit the market with great success. He is an alumnus of the Indian institute of technology (IIT), India’s foremost university for engineering science and research. He arrived on the country’s literary scene with a bang through his debut novel, Five Point Someone, a fictional account on life in the IIT campus. All of his novels were bestsellers since their release and have been filmed by famous Bollywood directors. Chetan Bhagat is considered a youth icon rather than just as a author. With his humorous way of depicting stories, he has inspired reading habits in many young Indians. He is also a good columnist and writes columns for many leading newspapers. According to him, novels are entertainment tools through which he expresses his views and opinion about society and the youth. Though he is vehemently criticized for being artless and tacky, he enjoy the greatest readership currently, throughout the length and breadth of the country. His latest book Revolution 2020 became an instant best-seller, like all of his previous works. Development issues and national issues are addressed through columns. Chetans columns are written in a way that directly points out the issues within our country and in many times it has even triggered discussions in the parliament. He is not only a good writer but also a motivational speaker and has given many motivational speeches at many colleges, organizations and companies. Personal Life: Chetan Bhagat was born in New Delhi in a middle class Punjabi Family on the 22nd day of April, 1974. His father was an Army man and his mother, a government employee. The major part of his education was done at Delhi. He studied in the Army Public School, Dhaula Kuan, New Delhi during the years 1978 to 199 after which he chose to do Mechanical Engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Delhi. After pursuing engineering he took up a management program offered at the Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Ahmadabad. Being an outstanding student, it was no wonder when he was recognized as the Best Outgoing Student of his batch by IIM Ahmadabad. He later got married to Anusha Suryanarayanan in 1998; she was his fellow student at IIM-A. Chetan then went to Hong Kong along with his family and worked as an investment banker with Goldman Sachs. He worked in Hong Kong for eleven years and then shifted to Mumbai and started writing. It was his passion. He has six novels against his name: Five Point Someone (2004), One Night @ The Call Center (2005), The Three Mistakes Of My Life (2008) , Two States (2009) and Revolution 2020 (2011), What Young India Wants (2012) . By chance or by choice, titles of all his novels had numbers associated with them. He now leads a happy life with his wife and twin sons Ishaan and Shyam. Chetan loves to live a simple life watching cartoons with his children who wish to become super heroes. He is an NRI and he is a Singapore citizen. He is a health conscious person and practices yoga regularly. Career : Chetan Bhagat published his first novel Five Point Someone in 2004 and this very first venture took him to the peaks of fame and popularity. The book depicted the story of an IIT student who considers himself to be below average than all the other students in IIT. This book won the Society Young Achievers Award and Publishers Recognition Award. The story was adopted into a film directed by Rajkumar Hirani and starred famous Bollywood stars like Aamir Khan, Madhavan, Sharman Joshi and Kareena Kapoor. His second book was One Night At A Call Center and this too was a great success. This book was made into a movie and was named Hello and Chetan himself wrote the script. The movie was noted by the special appearance of Bollywood star Salman Khan and was an average hit. His next novel has cricket as the major theme. It is named Three Mistakes of My Life. His fourth book is named Two States. His fifith novel is Revolution 2020. His sixth novel is What Young India Wants. Contribution: Chetan Bhagats contribution to the field of entertainment is noticeable. He never confined his literary talents to just writing novels. As a responsible social person, he also writes columns in newspapers, citing and dwelling on various social and national issues. Many of his columns were noticed by parliamentarians and triggered serious discussions in the Indian Parliament. He has addressed issues like corruption by sending an opening letter to Sonia Gandhi and also has spoken about the political issues that revolved around Baba Ramdev. The ‘SPARK’ speech was given by him at the orientation ceremony at Symbiosis, Pune for the new batch of BBA Students. ‘Becoming One With The World’ was another famous speech given by Bhagat at the HT Leadership Summit, Delhi. Apart from the aforementioned speeches, Bhagat also delivers speeches at various programs held by media houses and newspapers such as ‘The Times of India’, ‘Dainik Bhaskar’ and many more. Writing Style: Chetan’s style of writing is simple with vivid descriptions and linear narratives. Most of the protagonists in his novels are named after Lord Krishna such as Shyam, Krishna, Hari, Govind and Gopal. All his novels released so far has a number associated with each of them: 5 in the first novel , 1 in the second one, 3 in the third, 2 in the fourth and 2020 I the fifith novel. When asked about this numerology behind each novel, Chetan replied smartly, â€Å"I’m a banker. I can’t get numbers out of my head. † Awards and Accolades: During his childhood and student life Chetan Bhagat won several awards like Best Outgoing student at IIM Ahmadabad. He won the Society Young Achievers Award in 2004 and the Publishers Recognition Award in 2005. Chetan Bhagat also a found himself place in the Time magazines list of Worlds 100 Most Influential People in the year 2010. In the year 2008,Chetan was stated by The New York Times as â€Å"the biggest selling English language novelist in India’s history†. Five Point Someone What not to do at IIT was his first book. It is one of the highest selling English novels published in India, and remained on the bestseller list until now since its release in 2004, tied along with other novels by Chetan Bhagat. Despite poor critical response, it was greeted with popularity, and brought Bhagat a large following. It was adapted into a play by the theatre group Madras Players. This book was adapted into a movie, called 3 Idiots, though Chetan Bhagat has stated that he was not involved in the scriptwriting in any way. This book has been translated into Hindi and is published by Prabhat Prakash. It set a record by being purchased by 30,000 people in one month, and has gone on to become a top seller in Hindi. The novel is set in the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi, in the period 1991 to 1995. It is about the adventures of three mechanical engineering students (and friends), Hari Kumar (the narrator), Ryan Oberoi, and Alok Gupta, who fail to cope with the grading system of the IITs and come to be known as five pointers due to their perennially low 5 point something GPAs. The book is narrated in the first person by Hari, with some small passages by his friends Ryan and Alok, as well as a letter by Haris girlfriend Neha Cherian. It deals with the lives of the three friends whose elation on making it to one of the best engineering colleges in India is quickly deflated by the rigor and monotony of academic work. Most of the book deals with the numerous attempts by the trio to cope with and/or beat the system as well as Haris fling with Neha who just happens to be the daughter of Prof. Cherian, the domineering head of the Mechanical Engineering Department. While the tone of the novel is humorous, it takes some dark turns every now and then, especially when it comes to the families of the main characters. Most of the action, however, takes place inside the campus as the boys, led by the ever creative Ryan, frequently lamenting how the internationally lauded IIT system has stifled their creativity by forcing them to value grades more than anything else. 2. One Night @ the Call Center or [emailprotected] is a novel written by Chetan Bhagat and first published in 2005. This book has been translated into Hindi and is published by Prabhaat Prakashan. This is the second best-selling novel from the award winning author. The novel revolves around a group of six call center employees working in Connexions callcenter in Gurgaon, Haryana. It is filled with a lot of drama with unpleasant things happening to all of the leading characters. The story takes a dramatic and decisive turn when they get a phone call from God. Noted Bollywood film director Rohan Sippy had bought the rights from the author Chetan Bhagat, but later Sippy let the rights pass on to director Atul Agnihotri, brother-in-law of Salman Khan. The movie version of the novel is titled as Hello. The story begins with a train journey from Kanpur to Delhi, During the journey, the author meets a very beautiful girl. The girl offers to tell the author a story on the condition that he has to make it his second book. After a lot of hesitation, the author agrees. [emailprotected] is a tale about the events that happen one night at a call center. Told through the views of the protagonist, Shyam, it is a story of almost lost love, thwarted ambitions, absence of family affection, pressures of a patriarchal set up, and the work environment of a globalized office. Shyam loves Priyanka, Vroom loves Eesha, Eesha wants to be a model, Military Uncle wants to talk to his grandson; they all hate Bakshi, their cruel boss. Claimed to be based on a true story, the author chooses a person named Shyam Mehra (alias Sam Marcy) as the protagonist, who is one among the six call center employees featured. 3. The 3 Mistakes of my Life is the third novel written by Chetan Bhagat. The book was published in May 2008 and had an initial print-run of 420,000. This book has been translated into Hindi and is published by Diamond Pocket Books. The novel follows the story of three friends and is based in the city of Ahmadabad in western India. This is the third bestselling novel by Chetan Bhagat, making him the best selling English Novelist in Indias history. The movie version of the novel is Kai Po Che! directed by Abhishek Kapoor. The novel, written as if based on real events, is set in the year 2000, when a young boy in Ahmedabad called Govind dreams of starting a business. To accommodate his friends Ishaan and Omis passion, they open a cricket shop. However, each has a different motive: Govinds goal is to make money; Ishaan desires to nurture Ali, a gifted batsman; Omi just wants to be with his friends. During the story the characters have to deal with religious politics, earthquake, riots, unacceptable love and their own mistakes. 4. 2 States: The Story of My Marriage commonly known as 2 States is a 2009 novel written by Chetan Bhagat. It is the story about a couple coming from two different States in India, who face hardships in convincing their parents to approve of their marriage. The novel is said to be inspired from the real life story of the author and his wife Anusha SuryaNarayanan who are from Delhi and Tamil Nadu, respectively. This is the second Chetan Bhagat book based largely on his life, with the other being his first book Five Point Someone. He wrote this novel after quitting his job at an investment bank. The story is about Krish and Ananya who hail from two different states of India, are deeply in love and want to get married against their parents wishes. The story begins in the IIM Ahmadabad mess, where Krish, a Punjabi boy from Delhi sights Ananya, a Tamilian girl from Chennai, quarreling with the mess staff about the food. They become friends in a few days and decide to study together every night. In time, they become romantically involved. They both get good jobs, and have serious plans for their wedding. The story is based on how they struggle to convince their parents for the marriage, and eventually succeed in doing so. It is narrated in a first person point of view in a humorous tone, often taking digs at Tamilian and Punjabi culture. The plot is loosely based on the life story of Chetan Bhagat and his wife Anusha, who are from Delhi and Tamil Nadu, respectively. 5. Revolution 2020: Love, Corruption, Ambition is a 2011 novel by Chetan Bhagat. Its story is concerned with a love triangle, corruption and a journey of self-discovery. The author has stated that the novel is based on the rampant corruption apparent in the Indian youth educational system, with the choice of Varanasi as a setting emerging through a special connection to the city following his visit. He further said it is one of our oldest cities, and people there now have modern aspirations. I thought the contrast would be interesting. The city also has a lot of character. Gopal loves Aarti who is his close intimate friend. His love is unrequited when she becomes Raghavs, his friends, girlfriend. Gopal, who is poor and couldnt attend a top college because of his lower grades, builds an engineering college and becomes rich. Meanwhile Raghav after graduating from a top college campaigns for social progress as a journalist exposing scams. Raghav in his work neglects Aarti who starts to go out with Gopal. Raghav also by making enemies becomes poor. Aarti finally returns Gopals love for her and they decide to marry. However, Gopal in the end destroys his relationship on purpose with the love of his life, Aarti, and helps Raghav with his career so Raghav can marry her. He did this so Raghav can become a Member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA), since Aartis family has political clout and it was believed whoever Aarti married could easily become an MLA. He wanted Raghav to become an MLA to help him in his mission to reform Indian society. 6. What Young India Wants is the only non-fiction book by Chetan Bhagat published in the year 2012. It is a compilation of his speeches and essays. It has various topics ranging from Indian society, Indian politics and young Indians. The book received positive reviews from critics. The book revolves around Bhagats thoughts and innovations on how to improve the Indian economy through social reforms. The book criticizes the dis-function of the Indian government as well as moralities regarding the current condition of India. Bhagat writes about how India can be a progressive society in the future. He talks about the rampant corruption in India and how society should change to rid it. The theme is central to his dream of a free and forward thinking India.