Paper
no.13 The New Literature
Sem-
4
Roll
No. 17
Email:
italiyaminkal@gmail.com
Batch:
2018-2020
S.B.Gardi
Department of English, MKBU
Portrayal of middle class modern youth in Bhagat's ON@TCC
~ Introduction:
After the grand success of “Five Points to Someone”, Chetan Bhagat,
author of blockbuster novel came up with his “One Night @ the Call Centre” in
2008. This novel holds mirror to the society that reflects the realistic
problems of real India. In most of his novel, he is dealing with the realistic
problems of real India. Unlike R.K.Narayan's Malgudi and Hardy's Weseex, his
novel set in real world India. His ON@TCC is a study of reciprocal relationship
between society and modern youth whereas each and every characters appears with
realistic burden of work and with having a frustration due to pressure of work.
This pop novel talks about modern Indian and about the challenges faced by
modern youth in the process of moving from old tradition to new one.
It is a witty dark novel that spins around six
call centres employees work together in connexions in Gurgaon who has not been
happy with their messy life until and unless the time they find the call's from
god which helps them in giving meaning to their life. In this novel through the
portrayal of these six characters Chetan Bhagat not only caters the experiences
of all call centre employees about their dreams, pains and exploitation but
also offers a solid vision to the young people who have certain goals in their
life. It seems that Chetan Bhagat keenly observes the surrounding before
dwelling his pen on the paper, perhaps this is the reason that enables him to
bring in limelight the problems of young generation
While reviewing Bhagat's ON@TCC, Shashi Tharoor also stated that...
"...pitch-perfect... Keenly focused on nuances and detail... One night @ the call centre has struck a chord with India's young...
The book touches upon the nerve of the call centre
generation, particularly in 2005 when the phenomenal success of BPOs continued
and started offering quick employments with comparatively high wages.
Nowadays jobs crisis among
educated youth has often been described as a ticking bomb. Almost around the
half of India's 1.3 billion population is below the age of 25 and it clearly
indicates the joblessness of Indian skilled youth. According to the survey
taken by Kotak Institutional Equities,
"Unemployment rate is highest among youth with education until diploma(37%), graduate (36%) and post graduate and above (36%), suggesting the lack of opportunities for a highest skilled workforce"
The financial condition of
middle class youth is major concern of Bhagat in most of his novels. In ONE@TCC
all the six characters carries a particular problems that can be related to
common youth of India as all of them became victim of pathetic financial
condition of India. It seems that here Bhagat's representation of India may
state, though being a graduated or post graduated, Indian youth suffers from unemployment.
They don't get job as per their expectation or their skills are not being
valued by others. In such situation Call Centre can represent a good entry
point for young generation to enter in working life.
"I waved goodbye to everyone, but no one acknowledge me. It wasn't surprising; I am only cared for so much. Every cousin of mine is becoming a doctor or engineer. You can say I am the black ship of my family. Though I do not think that expression is correct. After all, what's wrong with black sheep- don't people wear black sweaters? But you get an idea of the status in my clan."
At the very beginning of
the novel Bhagat portrays the need of doing a job for Shyam in particular and
young generation in general. These lines are very important to understand the
troubles of Indian youth. For them job is necessary, without job they don't
gain any respect and ultimately they are ignored by people or they aren't paid
much attention. Indeed ignorance is the biggest threat which today's youth is
facing. If their dreams and aspirations are not paid much attention, they start
to feel inferior or misjudge their own values and abilities. This is very well busted
out by the character of Shyam who hasn't paid much attention due to having no
job. There are many Shyam in our country, who are considered as Black Sheep by
their own family members. They are humiliated just because they haven't any
job.
Need for Money
If there is money in your wallet, the world gives you some respect and lets you breathe.
Exactly, this the same
happens with Shyam, he joined call centre job in order to remove that very much
tag of Black Sheep. Moreover, the younger generation is also suffers because of
having inefficient family income and that urge them to do job instead of
completing their study. This very problem of younger generation is highlighted
through the depiction of various character.
"I could have done my B.Ed. right after my college. But I wanted to save money first...So untill, it is two Hundred Call a night, night after night."
-Priyanka (ON@TC)
Priyanka, Radhika and Esha are such characters who came into this job in order to gain some money. At the same time Bhagat also portrays the money mindness of younger generation. Their deep desire to cop up with trendy fashion world.
" Because I need the money. My Friends have a lifestyle that I have to keep up with. Money lets me come to place like this."
- Varun (ON@TCC)
Though Varun is the one who wanted to be Journalist, by some force or by his desire to earn money he chooses to be call centre employee. Whereas Esha joined call centre as her two inch smaller hight doesn't
allow her to be model.
Bossism culture of
workplaces
Along with this Bhagat is
also talking about the Bossism culture, due tow which employee at their work
places always remain under the pressure, frustration. As Sigmund Freud pointed
out that people mostly dream about the things their fear the most. At the starting
of the novel Shyam has an omen dream which indicates gruesome image of boss in
young people's mind or the corrupt nature of boss at their working place. Shyam
says...
"I was in the water while my boss Bakshi was in a boat next to me. He was pushing my head down in the water."
- Shyam (ON@TCC)
Generation gap
All of the Bhagat's
characters are ordinary youth of modern time struggling to make their say in
current competitive world. Along with that issue of job and economy, the major problem
that youth has to face is that they are always disregarded by their parents or
that struggle between old and young generation due to having generation gap.
Bhagat also highlighted this problem through the relations between Military
Uncle and his Son. Though they are father and son, they are living physically
apart and mentally as well. No matter however times Military Uncle tries to
stay in touch with his son but generation gap doesn't allow to happen so. Once
when Militry Uncle sent some pictures that he has taken at a zoo to his
grandson, he got bitter reply from his son that totally shredded him.
"Dad...you have cluttered my life enough, now stop cluttering my mailbox. I do not know what come over me that I allowed communication between you and my son. I don't want your shadow on him. Please stay away and do not send him any more emails. For, literally or otherwise, we don't want your attachments." (37)
Representation of Indian middle class girl
Bhagat's realistic vision
enables him to used current scenario as his background and portrays the
realistic problems of modern youth. Priyanka is the other character through
which Bhagat uncovers the Indian mentality and attitudes towards love and
marriage. Priyanka loves Shyam but she dumped him because of two reasons. The
very first is that her mother wants her to marry with NRI Ganesh and she agrees
to do so. This presents the condition of contemporary concept of conjugal
relations. If the parents are happy youth can marry with beloved, and if they
aren't happy they can't. And of course! If they like any match for their
children, they are forced answer the positively. The second reason is that
Ganesh is more rich than Shyam. In Indian concept, marriage is based on money
rather than love. Vroom rightly comments,
"Girls are strategic. They'll talk about love and romance and all that crap - but when it comes to doing the deal, they will choose fattest chicken." (62)
Though Priyanka said that she deeply loves Shyam, in actual she is the one who agrees with her mother's decision. But her decision to marry Ganesh doesn't remain the same at the end of the novel. Likewise, many other boys, Ganesh is the one who cheats her by hiding his bald head and giving her an altered photo. In his work female characters are always portrayed as bold, modern and vocal about their needs. The old days of docile and mild women were gone, in Bhagat's world women are emerging out as independent and trendy one who doesn't bear the wrong doing or never afraid of being vocal about their rights.
Struggle of middle class Indian women
Through the character of
Radhika Bhagat represents the struggle of middle class married-women. She used
to work at Connexions to maintain the economy of in-law's house and also does
the household works the whole day. Though she is an independent girl, she
struggles to stay in ultra-traditional inaw's family. The modern Indian society
has two layers: one follows the occidental culture and other follows the
oriental culture. Through the struggle and problems of Radhika, Bhagat criticised
the orthodox rigidity of Indian mind set. Though willingly Radhika was doing
everything for Anuj, she was cheated by his own husband and ultimately that
leads her to break psychologically and physically as well.
Esha Singh presents the girl's desire to be model or to look like actress. She is the face of modern young girls who used to go to disco and drink vodaka and tries their best to maintain their figure. Though she hurted her parents to be model, his short height becomes hurdle in her success. She never become a successful model. In such a way Esha represents a modern girls' passion for new fashion trends and desire for urban lifestyle. It also showcases the reality that young ladies have to face more difficulties to become famous than their male counterpart in our society. The harsh reality of Urban global world is that in the field like modelling, it demands to sacrifice the purity of girl to achieve her goal. An aspirant model leaves her home town and parents to achieve her goal but the cut-throat competition in the world of celebrities makes her to sacrifice her virginity. Then even she was not able to achieve her goal. It is the harsh reality of world.
Esha Singh presents the girl's desire to be model or to look like actress. She is the face of modern young girls who used to go to disco and drink vodaka and tries their best to maintain their figure. Though she hurted her parents to be model, his short height becomes hurdle in her success. She never become a successful model. In such a way Esha represents a modern girls' passion for new fashion trends and desire for urban lifestyle. It also showcases the reality that young ladies have to face more difficulties to become famous than their male counterpart in our society. The harsh reality of Urban global world is that in the field like modelling, it demands to sacrifice the purity of girl to achieve her goal. An aspirant model leaves her home town and parents to achieve her goal but the cut-throat competition in the world of celebrities makes her to sacrifice her virginity. Then even she was not able to achieve her goal. It is the harsh reality of world.
Moreover, it showcases youth’s command over Information and technology or the ability of young people to handle all the technical works which helps the country to play an important role in Business Process Outsourcing. But at the same time it proves as a new form of labour or aural racism. Infect this process proves as a transformation of Indian urban labour into a global proletariat. Call centres plays a vital role in unmooring local identities to construct transnational labour identities for a neo-colonialist workplace. Though call centre serves as platform to earn high wages, in comparison to foreign country Indian middle class youth earn less wages.
“We get paid well, fifteen
thousand a month. Fuck,
that is almost twelve Dollars a
day. Wow, I make a
as much a days as a US burger
boy makes in two hours.
Not bad for my college degree.
Not bad at all.”
~Vroom (ONE@TCC)
Ultimately, this mental labour works turns
into mental pain which seems more gruesome. The young generation tries to
escape from these by taking sleeping peels or by going into bars. In the novel
we have Esha who is taking sleeping peels to get rid of frustration whereas
Vroom tries to escape from it by riding his bike at its optimum.
Conclusion
It seems that Bhagat tries to
pinpoint every problem faced by middle class Indian youth from joblessness to
frustration due to working culture. Keen observer of India, Chetan Bhagat
highlights many problems of middle class youth such as exploitation at the
workplace, evil boss, job insecurities, desire for posh life, unsatisfactory
with the lives, pre-marital affairs, love-break up, sexual relations, hope,
success and failures of 21th century. Each and every character in the novel
seems as ordinary as middle class youth and represents their struggle for
survival in modern times. Truly, Bhagat’s ON@TCC is a depiction modern middle
class youth of modern India.
References:
Pandya, Nishant.
"CHARACTERS @ THE CALL CENTRE IN CHETAN BHAGAT’S ONE NIGHT @THE CALL
CENTRE." Scholarly Research Journal for Humanity Science & English
Language 6/29 (2018): 8.
<http://oaji.net/pdf.html?n=2017/1201-1539424786.pdf>.
Bhagat, Chetan. One
night @ the call centre . New Delhi : Rupa Publication India Pvt. Ltd.,
2005.
Ravi, Shamika. View: Here's what we know for sure about jobs in India. n.d. 18 April 2019. <https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/economy/policy/heres-what-we-know-for-sure-about-jobs-in-india/articleshow/68916626.cms?from=mdr>.
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