Review of the novel one night @ call centre by chetan bhagat

Among the breed of Indo-Anglian novelists, Chetan Bhagat carved a niche for himself in the world of literature with his first novel ‘ Five Point Someone’ which was highly praised and critically acclaimed all over India. His second novel ‘ One Night @ Call Centre’, is based on a contemporary scenario at the call centres that have mushroomed all over the subcontinent.

The plot of the novel unfurls on a wintry night, when the author is travelling from Kanpur to Delhi and shares the near-empty compartment with a beautiful young girl. The author considers to be a stroke of good luck as he admits that ‘ not everyday when you sit in an empty compartment and a young pretty girl walks in and offers to narrate a story to beat boredom on the precondition that the author uses it as a plot for his next novel.’

The novel is a story within a story. Shyam, the narrator and the protagonist, along with Vroom, Priyanka, Esha and Radhika and the military uncle are the six people chasing their dreams, hopes and aspirations as employees of the call centre. On a certain night, they receives a call from none other than God and their lives change forever. By the time the novel ends, the author is stalled in his compartment seat and is mesmerised by both the young lady and her beauty.

The novel with its gripping plot has the power to change reader’s pre-conceived notion about the Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) industries and its over three hundred thousand employees as high school dropouts or dimwitted idiots sitting near a computer in centrally air-conditioned enviroment and earning handsome salaries they don’t deserve. The novel lays bare the truth that call centre employees are in reality highly energetic and enthusiastic people pursuing their dreams and aspiration. It also emphasises that working throughout the night for days on and is neither child’s play nor a cakewalk but an assignment of high responsibility, challenge and tenacity.

So, basically the themes involve the anxieties and insecurities of the rising Indian middle class, including questions about career, inadequacy, marriage, family conflicts in a changing India, and the relationship of the young Indian middle class to both executives and ordinary clients whom they serve in the United States. There is an aspect of self help in the book as the author invites readers to identify aspects of themselves and their lives that make them angry and that they would like to change.

Chetan Bhagat’s characterisation is brilliant and the author awards equal importance to all the characters of the novel. The characters undergo a change as the plot develops.