**A small ride into the wonderland called IIT...**. Review on Five Point Someone - Chetan Bhagat

Hello friends…

Here I am …with another review of a book which almost everybody has already read. (I am always a late comer na!!..hehe, well…better late than never :-P)…”Five point someone”- by Chetan Bhagat…

Well…as the book tells, “this is not about how to get into IITs …”, this book is actually neither about how to get into IITs nor how to survive in IITs…this is not a book which gives you advices on what to do and what not to do in IITs…this is a simple book where a story is narrated about 3 below average IITians and their lives…their adventures…their night mares…their success…their failure…Everybody write stories about successful people, but Chetan Bhagat thought of writing story of average people because average people are not the toppers but toppers can come under the category called average people…that is, in mathematical terms…toppers are sometimes the subset of average people…(very confusing!!!)

Story:

So, the story moves around 3 below average IITians belonging to mechanical branch…Hari, Ryan and Alok…3 different persons, having different reasons to join IIT and different views and expectations from life. The writer speaks through Hari, you may call him to be the protagonist, but as per as the story goes, you will find out that actually three of them play important roles and the story would have been incomplete without any of them.

Hari…though the writer speaks through him, but he never revealed anything about his family background, his ambitions, and the reason for so many things happening with this character. Somehow, this character was telling everything about others while remaining silent about his life. When I read the story, there were so many things I wanted to know about this specific character but those things were never revealed. Just this much…a good student during his school carrier, so he got through IIT…his father is a colonel…has a weak point that whenever he faces any viva, he cant utter a single word though he knows the answer very well (the writer has given a hint that this thing happens because something had happened in his past but doesn’t reveal the fact.). Hari is in love with Neha, the only daughter of the HOD of mechanical Engg branch of his college.

Alok…this person comes from a poor family. His father was a painter and even Alok was once thinking of becoming an artist. But due to an accident his father is bed ridden now with right side of his body being paralyzed. His mother is working but it is very difficult for her to afford even a normal life due to a large expense for Alok’s father’s medicines and all. So Alok thought of doing IIT, reading sincerely so that he will get a good and high salary job and he will keep his family happy and his sister can get married.

Ryan…a very dynamic and active person, but he hates just to mug up the things and get a good percentile. He wants to work on his innovative ideas. Always complaining about IIT’s life style…where students don’t get any extra time to work on their ideas and come up with something new…they only mug up things to write in the exams and secure good marks.

After coming to IIT, they became friends and life started as usual. But they always got below average marks… (Five point something). So the story is all about these three fellows and the four years they spent in IIT.

My views:

Well…though I am not an IITian, but I am also from an engineering background. I know how we used to read for the exam purpose only. We just wanted to read so that we will get good marks and ultimately will get a good job. I am not a “five point someone”…but you can call me a “eight point someone”(hehe!!). I have personally felt that whatever I did it was in the curriculum only. Never got time to do what I am good at. Well… this may call to a very big discussion. So let me better avoid it. :-)

All together this book is a very “easy to read and simple to understand “type of book. Nothing complex…just read it…enjoy it…see through the minds of 3 below average IITians. May be I can call it to be a small window opening to the lives of these people. They shared their thoughts, their fears, their funniest incidents, their darkest days, their secrets, their fantasies…normally everybody has these things in his or her life. But we never get time to sit by anybody and listen to them speaking about these things. When we read these types of books we realize in how many ways we are similar to these people. At some point we may feel as if we are the characters of this story. Human beings are so similar…yet so different….they are born, they grow older, they dream, they try to fulfill their dreams, sometimes they succeed, sometimes they fail, then at the end of the day they leave this earthly body… but what they dream is different form one another, how they go towards their dreams is different. A topper is also a human being and an below average student is also a human being. The second person’s life has also to tell a lot of things to other people. He also gains a lot of experiences from his life. Then why always stories are written upon the first person??? So whatever I am, wherever I stand in the queue, I am always unique and I always have something to tell the world…only if anybody listens!!!