Around India In 80 Trains

When we arrived in India all we saw were film posters for 3 Idiots and were deafened by the soundtrack on every stereo. So we went to see the Amir Khan film, loosely-based on Bhagat’s book. Five Point Someone refers to the grade point average sought after by students from I.I.T – India’s most prestigious engineering college – the equivalent of M.I.T as any Indian will tell you.

Hari, Ryan and Alok are three college roommates who do the usual mugging and vomiting required by the Indian schooling system until Ryan decides to take control. Fed up of the pressure to come top and get a good job, the absence of fun and the suppression of individual thought, Ryan lays out a new set of rules for the group which have both excellent and disastrous consequences. They soon learn that a fine balance between work, aloo paratha breaks and running around with the professor’s daughter need to be tweaked before success is on the cards.

Since his first book, One Night at the Call Centre, Bhagat has been enveloped further and further into the hearts of India’s younger generation, happy that someone has finally laid bare the truths that the older generation pretend don’t exist. Yes, they have sex with their – deep breath – GIRLFRIENDS! And they do get stoned on the college roof while listening to Pink Floyd and swigging from a bottle of Smirnoff, and yes, girls can and do get the same grades and better paid jobs than their male colleagues.

However, Bhagat’s loose slang and chatty style have riled the Tagore generation who don’t rate him. In truth, his writing style isn’t his forte, but he is an excellent storyteller and his books are easy reads – and sometimes that’s all you want.