'Revolution 2020' Novel Written By Chetan Bhagat : A Brief Discussion

‘"And I hope not just you but our whole country will keep that spark alive."'

(From 'Prologue' to the Novel 'Revolution 2020') 

- Chetan Bhagat 

Introduction : The blog is written as a response to the Thinking Activity assigned by Dr Dilip Barad concerning Chetan Bhagat's novel 'Revolution 2020 : Love, Corruption, Ambition' published in 2011. 

In this blog, we are asked to ponder over few questions in order to bring the best possible approaches to the contemporary novel and furthering this idea of looking at literary works with different perspectives so that the new viable ways of learning can be shown for good to all. 

The answer which we are going to think over as a response to the questions asked with regard to the novel are subjective ones and with best possible knowledge to the time, with passing over time and increasing knowledge, the answers may be updated. 

Introduction to the Author : Chetan Bhagat :

Chetan Bhagat (born 22 April 1974) is an Indian author, columnist and YouTuber. He was included in Time magazine's list of World's 100 Most Influential People in 2010. Five of his novels have been adapted into films. 

Bhagat is also a popular motivational speaker and has spoken at more than 800 organizations in 1000 cities around the world. 

• Chetan Bhagat started writing his very first novel “Five Point Someone” when he was working at Goldman Sachs in Hong Kong in the early 2000s. In an interview, he said he wrote about 15 drafts of the novel and also sent the final manuscripts to several publishers. The manuscript was finally accepted by a publishing house named Rupa Publications in Delhi and was published in the year 2004. This very first venture took him to peaks of fame and popularity. This novel narrated the story of three IIT students who consider themselves to be below average students among other students at IIT. The story was adopted by film director Rajkumar Hirani into a film named “3 Idiots” starring famous Indian stars Aamir Khan, R. Madhavan, Sharman Joshi and Kareena Kapoor. The movie turned out to be one of the most successful Bollywood movies of all time. 

• After the huge success of his first novel, he started working on his second book “One Night At The Call Centre” which was published in the year 2005. The novel went on to become yet another major success. In the first 3 days of its release, almost 50,000 copies were sold. This novel became India's fastest selling book of its time. The book was also adapted into a movie named “Hello” and Chetan along with Atul Agnihotri wrote the script for the movie. 

• Chetan then decided to make writing a full-time career. His third novel “The 3 Mistakes of my life” published in 2008 also became a huge success. This novel became a bestseller and Chetan also became the most successful English-Language writer in India. The Bollywood hit movie “Kai Po Che” is based on this novel. 

• Chetan's fourth novel “2 States”, published in the year 2009 was inspired by his real-life love story. The story is about how he fell in love with a South Indian girl and the troubles he faced in his love life. The book was adapted into a movie with the same name starring Arjun Kapoor and Alia Bhatt and became a massive success. 

• Chetan's later novels named “Revolution 2020”, “Half Girlfriend” and “One Indian Girl” gained a lot of appreciation and commercial success. 

• His novels, “The Girl in Room 105”, published in 2018, “One Arranged Murder”, published in 2020 and his latest novel “400 days”, published in 2021 turned out to be bestsellers. (Source)

Introduction to the Novel : Revolution 2020 :

'Revolution 2020' is a gripping and fast paced novel about love, corruption and ambition. The story delves into the underbelly of a small town, Varanasi, and explores the various hues in the characters of the protagonists in it. Bhagat unearths the darker side of the education system, and for that matter, love too. 

In the small and historic town of Varanasi in India, two boys Raghav and Gopal fall in love with the same girl, Aarti. Both of them are intelligent, ambitious and are the best of friends, but destiny has something else in store for them. One of them wants to use his intelligence to make a lot of money and the other wants to create a revolution; but again, their plans are disrupted by their love. 

Gopal hails from a poor family and fails to get an admission to the best engineering colleges in the country. Heartbroken, he moves to Kota for a year to prepare for the exams. Raghav comes from a well-to-do family and achieves a good rank in JEE. Delighted, he joins IIT-BHU, one of the premier institutes of India, and embarks on his ambition to become a journalist. Aarti hails from a powerful bureaucratic family, and her aim is to become an airhostess. Aarti falls in love with Raghav while Gopal is at Kota. 

The story starts when Gopal rises as the director of a new engineering college opened in Varanasi, with the power of MLA Shukla, a corrupt politician. He uses the legally strangled land of his uncle to manipulate and build the college. Raghav, on the other hand, completes his engineering and joins the largest selling newspaper Dainik as an intern. He starts shedding light on all the wrongdoings of Shukla and exposes him in public. 

Things take a different turn when Aarti starts developing a soft corner for Gopal. 

Who will win her love towards the end? 

Will Raghav’s crusade against the corrupt system fail? 

Revolution 2020 is a gripping story of love, the corrupt educational system and clashing ambitions. 

Revolution 2020 got mixed reviews from critics and readers. The book turned out to be yet another bestseller from the Chetan Bhagat stable. (Source)

Critical Review : 

'Revolution 2020' is bookended with a Prologue and an Epilogue in which Chetan Bhagat speaks with Gopal Mishra, "the young director of GangaTech College" -- a typical set-up for a Bhagat novel, framing the main story itself, Gopal's story. Sub-titled Love. Corruption. Ambition, it revolves around a trio of friends from Varanasi (formerly Benares): Gopal, Aarti, and Raghav, and the story gets going as they finish high school and Gopal and Raghav's futures are determined by how they did in the All India Engineering Entrance Examination (AIEEE) and the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE). [The novel was published in 2011; in the meantime, the AIEEE has been completely replaced by the JEE.] Getting high marks on the exam is the only path to the elite universities of India -- especially the Indian Institutes of Technology -- the first and most important step to a promising career path. 

Aarti is the privileged daughter of a senior Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer, and her ambitions are limited to becoming a stewardess, but the two boys, from humbler families, know their futures depend on exam success. Raghav does very well, while Gopal comes up just short: on the one hand, given that a million students took the test, his rank of 52,043 doesn't sound too bad -- but it isn't good enough to get him into a premier college. And along with that disappointment comes another that hits him just as hard, as Aarti rebuffs his advances, explaining that: "I don't see you that way." She just wants to be friends -- close friends, as they have been throughout childhood. 

Gopal's mother died when he was young. His now sickly father was a teacher, and they live relatively humbly. For ages they've also been involved in a land dispute, Baba's older brother trying to screw them out of land that is rightfully theirs, and offering far too little in compensation for it. Education seems a way to a better future, so all hopes are riding on Gopal -- and these test results are a setback. 

A slot in a good engineering programme seems to be Gopal's only way out, and so rather than going to a second-rate college he prepares to take the exam again, spending the year in Kota, Rajasthan -- the center of India's coaching institutes, cram schools where students do nothing but prepare for the exams. Some twenty hours away from Varanasi by train, Gopal finds himself fairly isolated there -- and feels even more so when he learns that Aarti has begun dating Raghav. 

Raghav has not even put his golden ticket to best use, choosing first of all to go to a local institution -- and then neglecting his engineering studies in favor of journalism and activism. He is an idealist who wants to change the world -- or at least India -- though his devotion to his causes comes to cause some friction with Aarti, since it means he can't spend as much time with her. 

Much of Revolution 2020 is about the 'Great Indian Education Race', and Bhagat covers a lot of this ground fairly well: the importance of the test results, the cram-schools, and then also the competition among them as well as various colleges for students (with bargaining for discounts and ruthless competition). Education is big business in India, and a fast-growing one -- and this is something which Gopal is able to take advantage of when the original plan -- get a higher score and get into a prestigious engineering school -- falls short again. 

Gopal continues to pine for Aarti -- and to measure himself against Raghav. With Raghav focused on journalism, his academic and then career path is one that doesn't pay immediate dividends -- financially, or in terms of status. But Gopal lucks into an opportunity that puts him on the fast track -- an opportunity that is on the one hand cheap and easy (other than the disputed family land, his investment is limited to his time and effort), on the other hand comes at a huge cost, as far as personal integrity goes. (Source)

Points to Ponder On :

1. : Social Realism in the Novel 'Revolution 2020' 

Answer : The theme of Social Realism is the crucial one in the novel 'Revolution 2020' as initially captured in subtitle which is 'Love, Corruption, Ambition' and how it can be seen in present day attests to the fact that Bhagat has captured these themes in all the characters as follow : 

Love :

Aarti (Selfish Love Like Pendulum which Inclines to Whom having Money and High Social Status) : The character of Aarti can be seen as a pendulum of clock oscillating to and fro between two points, here the two points are Gopal l and Raghav, Aarti gets attracted towards Gopal for his wealth and to Raghav for his revolutionary spirit

In the mind of Gopal, he constructs the great image of Aarti as he says : 

"Drama queen! It was only half a slice of chocolate cake!’ I thought. Anyway, that’s how I, Gopal

Mishra, met the great Aarti Pratap Pradhan." 

This is how Gopal loves her, more is there for her in him. 

Gopal is confused whether Aarti loved him or not which can be seen in the following dialogues between them at the clothe-store : 

‘Thank you for coming. I would not have known what to buy,’ I told her. 

‘Have you taken cooking vessels? Forgot, no?’ 

‘I am not going to cook. They have a tiffin system.’

Aarti ignored me. She went to the utensils section and picked up a large steel bowl and held it up. 

‘For emergencies,’ Aarti said. ‘If I came to Kota with you, I’d cook for you everyday.’ 

Her fair hands held up the shiny vessel. The picture of her cooking in my kitchen flashed in my head. Why does Aarti make statements like these? What am I supposed to say? ‘I’ll manage fine,’ I said. 

The shopkeeper made the bill. Aarti looked at me. She hypnotised me every time. She was turning

prettier every week. 

She took my wallet and placed it back in my shirt pocket. She placed a finger on my lips. 

Why do girls send confusing signals? She had rebuf ed me on the boat the other day. Yet she comes

to shop with me for boring clothes hangers and doesn’t let me pay. She calls me three times a day

to check if I’ve had my meals. Does she care for me or not? 

The idea of seeing woman as a trophy to be won by man in patriarchal society is also reflected. The prejudice against woman as considering them only as a house-maker or we can say a legitimate housemaid would not be wrong in this case as Gopal imagines her to be cooking for him in their kitchen, this is the reflection of patriarchal mindset in the character of Gopal.

Perhaps this is why Simone de Beauvoir in her 'Second Sex' (originally published in French language in the year 1949) in two volumes observingly asserts that "One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman." 

Gopal : (Intelligent Patriarchal Lover) : The character of Gopal can be seen as him being an intelligent patriarchal lover who loves Aarti but initially fears to tell her. His views towards her is patriarchal and he wants to achieve her as a trophy won in contest of survival in the world. In the following dialogues with Bhagat when he is asked that what he likes most in Varanasi, he replies "Aarti." : 

I walked out with the young director of GangaTech College, Gopal Mishra. His black Mercedes

whisked us away from the crowded Vidyapath Road. 

‘So you saw the temples and the ghats?’ Gopal asked. ‘That’s all Varanasi has, anyway! 

‘Yeah, I went to the Vishwanath Temple and Dashashwamedh Ghat at five in the morning. I love

this city,’ I said. 

‘Oh, good. What did you like best about Varanasi?’ 

‘Aarti,’ I said. 

‘What?’ Gopal looked surprised. 

‘The morning aarti at the ghats. I saw it for the first time, all those diyas floating at dawn. It was

out of this world! 

Gopal frowned. 

‘What?’ I said. ‘Isn’t Varanasi’s aarti beautiful?

‘Yeah. Yeah, it is ... it is not that,’he said, but did not elaborate. 

Here we can see that Gopal allusively refers to Aarti (human) by calling Aarti (rite) is best he likes about Varanasi. His not elaborating the further details about his love towards her to Bhagat shows his hesitation and the failure he faced in achieving her as a trophy in the game of being rich. 

Raghav (A Lover-cum-Revolutionary) : Raghav - as alike Gopal - loves Aarti. As the narrator, Gopal gives the glimpse of love between Aarti and Raghav which he did not like earlier, but as the 'denouement' is reaching, he resolves to free himself from the love towards Aarti and wants her to be married to Raghav whom he considers as a rival in the race to win Aarti. The dialogues suggest : 

‘They weren’t funny. And what’s this best friend business?’ I said. ‘We’ve been best friends for eight

years, though you still haven’t bought me a chocolate cake’

‘And Raghav?’

‘Raghav is only a friend. I talk to him because you are close to him,’ Aarti said.

I kept silent.

‘Chill now, Gopal. How’re things at home?' she said.

‘Screwed up as always. How are you?’

‘I’m fine. Dad insists I finish college before I try any of this air hostess business. But you can even

become one straight after class XII;

‘Go to college. He’s right,’ I said.

‘Which college can I join with my marks? I am not smart like Raghav and you.’

‘Raghav is smart, not me,’ I corrected her.

‘Why? Because of the mock-test? You are so stupid,’ Aarti said.

‘You are stupid.’

‘We are both stupid, fine? Did you have dinner?’

She had asked me this question every night for the last five years. I wanted to stay mad at her, but

could not. ‘I did, thanks’

‘What thanks? Stupid. Go to bed now, sleep and don’t think about the entrance exams’

‘Aarti,’ I said and paused. 

This is how early clues are seen in Gopal's implied manic love towards Aarti and a bit of concern for Raghav. 

Several characters symbolizes corrupt politics, blind dash for capitalist hight, and love for duty or the person. We find lacuna that the novel ultimately ends with love overpowering revolution as Gopal intentionally ditches or rejects Aarti so that Raghav and Aarti can get married. Here, Raghav represents the revolutionary spirit of the new India or the youth who can beat the social evils such as corruption, capitalist educationalism, and poverty-driven human-decadency.

2. : Significance of the Title : 'Revolution 2020' 

Answer : The significance of the title dies when revolution is toppled over by love.

The title 'Revolution 2020' seems to be the beacon of hope as the novel has been written in the year 2011. 

Title of any work is the text which prefaces the implied essence of the work. In the novel 'Revolution 2020,' no such implication is given as it directly suggest the theme of the story or around which the story revolves. This superficiality is something that makes Bhagat shallow author, more of a fun-writer than a serious-one. 

The title entails the futuristic hope in seemingly dystopian setting of the novel. In the novel, several times the reference of revolution comes; when Aarti and Gopal converse with each other, Aarti remembers Raghav and his revolutionary spirit : 

I gave her my glass. ‘How much does he get paid for this Dainik job?’ I said. I had to know how much Raghav made. 

She took a few sips and kept the glass for herself. ‘A third of what Infosys would give him,’ she said. 

'Wow. And his parents are okay with it?’

'No way! They went ballistic when he told them. It isn’t just about the money, he isn’t using his engineering degree. They are still upset.’ 

‘So?’ 

‘So what? He doesn’t care. He feels the revolution begins at home. Society changes only when individual family norms are challenged.’ 

‘Revolution?’ I said. 

‘Oh yeah, he is quite into that. The Great Indian Revolution. Oops, I finished your drink. I am so sorry,’ she said and touched my arm in apology 

'It’s fine. I’ll make another one. And you are cool with his career choice?’ 

'Of course, I believe one should follow their passion. Am I not working towards mine? So an air hostess isn’t the same as a revolution, but still, that’s me.’ 

‘What exactly is this revolution?’ I said, irritated. 

‘Well, Raghav believes there will be a real people’s revolution in India one day, that’s his thing.’ 

‘Why?’ 

‘Ask him, he will explain it to you. Wait, I will get us more drinks.’ 

At the ending lines of the novel, there comes the word of hope from Gopal as he tells to Bhagat in epilogue that one day there will be a revolution in India : 

He shook his head. I figured out now why he had hesitated to come to Ramada to drop me. I checked the time. I had a flight in two hours. I had to rush to the hotel, pack and head to the airport. 

'I have to leave,’ I said. He nodded. He came out to drop me to the car. 

‘The revolution will come,’ Gopal said. ‘We will have a better nation one day ’ 

‘I know,’ I said. 

‘You also write about it. Once GangaTech becomes big, I will try to fix the system. I am sick of giving envelopes to people.’ 

"We have to change things,’ I said. 

‘Everyone must sacrifice for it,’ Gopal said. 

‘Yes, I agree,’ I said as the driver started the car. 

‘Bye, sir,’ Gopal said as I left.

Here in the end, the hope - which has never come true as we see this another three-year-time which is 2023 now - remains just a utopian dream dreamt by every single citizen of India as Gopal does in the fictional and superficial utopian novel 'Revolution 2020' written by well-known contemporary and neo-traditionalist writer Chetan Bhagat.

3. : Do you think that an opportunity of a good novel is wasted because the story is told from Gopal's perspective? Can it be better if narrated from Raghav or Aarti's perspective? How would ut be better if it was narrated from Raghav or Aarti's perspective? 

Answer : As the very question asked expects the subjective answer, I would like to involve 'I' in this particular answer. 

First of all, the question contains two interlinked questions into it which are as follow : 

- Do you think that an opportunity of a good novel is wasted because the story is told from Gopal's perspective? 

- Can it be better if narrated from Raghav or Aarti's perspective? How would it be better if it was narrated from Raghav or Aarti's perspective? 

Now answering the first part, I would opine that despite being told by the solo perspective of Gopal, the story allows readers to think on the dangers of a solo-narration which includes questioning to the authenticity, taste, biases, prejudices, mental as well as physical condition, and the time of the narrator who is Gopal here in the novel, this proposition leads us to the Post-Modernist concept of questioning the authority especially in literary discourse. So, if the reading of the novel is done through the application of Post-Modernist lens of "Deconstruction" as sir Jacques Derrida has propounded that "Language bears within itself the necessity of its own critique." As far as narrative technic is concerned, we can analyze it with the tool of narrative time and discourse time given by sir Gérard Genette, we find that narrative time ends in one single day whereas discourse time begins from the age of 10 years to the of 26 years of Gopal, 16 years of discourse time. So yes, the story loses its charm in terms of detailing the characters but also has the beneficial side to it as it prompts the reader to doubt and question the drunkard and unscrupulous Gopal's narration about himself and other characters. 

Now looking at the second part of the question, we can just presume that if Aarti was the narrator of the novel, the story would be resembling to that of the children's fairy tales as she reflects the superficiality and accepted girlishness in her actions, thoughts, and behaviour. As far as Raghav's position as narrator is concerned, we could get the deep and juvenalian satirical novel having plenty of political, social, and cultural allusions infused within the plot of the novel as he is the only one who is truly dedicated to the revolution in order to fix the corrupt ongoings amongst politics, society, religion, and other minor aspects of the culture. Another thing which makes him more reliable in matter of narration - though never completely - than Gopal and Aarti is that he is sedate and adamant towards his revolutionary determined objective. 

Conclusion : The whole narration of the novel seems more of a word-play than a serious allusive account, thus as Bhagat is famous for his technique to bring smile to his readers's faces, he succeeds in making it true through the novel 'Revolution 2020.'