GURUJI....
After reading your novels FPS & ON@TCC, I am reminded of Aamir Khan's dialogue from the hindi comedy ''Andaz Apna Apna'', which perfectly reflects what I feel about you. It goes something like this...
''AAP MAHATMA HAIN, GYANI HAIN, SWAMI HAIN, ANTARYAMI HAIN, BALKI MAIN TO KEHTA HOON AAP PURUSH HI NAHIN HAIN................................. MAHAPURUSH HAIN...MAHAPURUSH !!!''
Really DUDE... to express my feelings, I guess I'll have to write an entire novel myself which just keeps speaking about how I felt related with each page of your novel. But frankly speaking, your novels have inspired me to such an extent, that I thought if not a novel, I should at least write a feedback on your site. So after the initial hesitation, I finally managed to scribble a short story which I request you to consider a feedback. It is about how I came across these novels & how it changed my perception about novels.
So here it goes...
Friday, October 28, 2005, 01:30 PM
It was a lazy afternoon at office & I was yawning very badly as we had just finished off lunch.
Friday afternoons have this amazing capacity to take the productivity levels of even the most productive people on earth to the lowest levels. As I sat thinking about what I could do to get myself back on track, I heard a couple of guys discussing about two novels by the same author & were considering one for a birthday gift & another as a parting gift for one of our friends. Given a certain dispassion for novels that I had, I jumped into their discussion & spoke about the wastage of funds collected, how much people charge for writing nonsense, etc. After all I was one of the many contributing to those gifts. They tried to convince me that I read at least the synopsis/prologue of one of the two novels that were lying on their desk. After some constant persuasion, I finally picked up the novels & took them to my cubicle.
I thought I can at least try it, since the novels were really thin & the script size big enough. To add to this I was happy that it costed just Rs.95/-. I was really fed up with the huge software books & novels with small size scripts spanning an average of thousand pages at least. I was happy that someone at least wrote novels for people like me !!!
Five Point Someone. One Night @ The Call Centre. The second one sounds like some porn stuff, I said to myself, as I read the titles. Then I turned the novel around to read the summaries which sounded pretty interesting. I thought I'll read a couple of chapters & get back to work, as I generally lose interest in any novel by then. This had happened to me a hundreds times before, so I was pretty confident of that.
It took a quick look at the watch. It was 02:00 PM. No new mails to check, no meetings, no appointments.. so no option but to read this novel. Let me start work at 03:00 PM sharp, I told myself as I opened the novel. Five Point Someone. Its the national bestseller of 2004, my friend told me from behind. OK.. I said, without protesting much & started reading the acknowledgements, prologue & then chapter 1. Before I knew, I had finished around 75 pages when Ram called me to check out something. He sits next to me & had been wondering what I was reading so keenly. It was almost 03:00 PM & I had no idea of getting back to work until I finished off this novel & I was excited that there was one more to go after that. Somehow he convinced me to get back to work before my manager finds out my newfound passion. I kept the novel aside with great difficulty after assuring myself of making the best use of the coming weekend. I hardly remember waiting so desperately for a weekend in a really long time & it was worth every second. I finished both the novels by Saturday night & it changed my view about novels entirely.
I enjoyed every part of FPS. It reminded me of my life as an engineering student, although I was neither from IIT nor had I ever lived in a hostel; my fears about failures, working parents, money invested in me, parental pressure, losing out on percentage, ragging, advice from seniors, boring lectures by equally dull professors, head of dept. like Cherian, trembling at the thought of exams, shivering during vivas, fully tense study holidays (one thing I hated was the mismatch in the vacation timings of engg & other colleges.. damn it, it was so frustrating really..), blaming the education system, mugging up.. (how I used to envy the amazing capacity that girls had to mug up Maths.. formulae were ok.. but how the hell could anyone by-heart equations with so many greek symbols). The novel also reminded me of how fat & dull I was, my group of 3-4 guys, one like Alok & one like Ryan, how I always wanted to be like someone & did not have an aim of my own, how I always felt I was not upto the mark, good for nothing, confused which side to take in an argument, campus placements, college festivals, trying our level best to woo girls, career/future plans, preparing for aptitude/entrance tests, etc. The only two things missing were 1) Neha.. I still don't have a Neha falling for me !!! & 2) We never went to the extent of trying to steal a question paper although we always wanted to do so !!! Anyways it was great fun & it touched each string within my heart... thats all I can say..
The second one ON@TCC was even better. Since I am currently working, I didn't have to struggle much to relate this book with my own bosses, colleagues, their issues, our discussions on multiple topics, working in shifts, affairs happening around us, break ups, tensions, work pressure, managers & their promises, promotions, appraisals, having fun at movies, malls & pubs, parties, marriage decisions, money, savings, foreign trips, USA, Europe, latest gizmos, cars, bikes, parental pressure, etc. Again I missed anyone like Priyanka falling for a person like me although I could relate the most to Shyam !!!! Whats happening man... Believe it or not, there really was a hot babe like Esha, a married & frustrated girl like Radhika & a stud like Vroom in my group. Military uncle was missing.. so let me consider my Manager to be like him. If any string that would have remained untouched by FPS was covered by ON@TCC...
I sincerely feel you should change your decision to stop writing novels (thats what I read in one of your interview published in some website) & consider a book on Indian software services industry.. covering all that happens. There is so much to software industry, the way an insider sees it & the way an outsider perceives it. The money, the foreign trips, the laptop savvy people, posh & plush office buildings attracts any outsider to this industry. But does one really get all that has lured him to change his track? I think it'll be great fun with millions who can relate to the dreams, hopes, success, failure, nonsense, etc associated with this industry.
Anyways, thanks a lot for patiently reading (in case you have read) all of this (crap) that I have written here. My best wishes for great success with your future plans.. novels, film scripts, anything you do. Just remember that there is at least one person who will read all your novels & watch all your films..
Cheers,
Srinivas
