The 3 mistakes of my life-Chetan bhagat-book review

Bought the recently released Chetan Bhagat’s “The three mistakes of my life” from Odessy and finished reading in Half a day. Here’s a quick book review and some flaws I found in the book.

Just like the previous Chetan Bhagat books, 5 point someone and 1 night @ call centre, the three mistakes of my life also makes an interesting reading-Is a story of 3 Gujarati youngsters in first person narration of Govind Patel . Stated to be based on real incidents and syncs with real life incidents like Gujarat earthquake, 9/11 attack, Godhra sabotage and riots etc, as well as some cricket matches. The book effectively portrays the thinking process that goes on in young minds and clubbed with unique style of Chetan’s storytelling and effective customization with local culture, events etc makes an excellent read.

Quick outline of the story:

Story-line runs in 3 tracks:
Govind Patel is a young Gujarathi boy who has scored centum in Mathematics and aspires to be a great business man. He sets up a sports goods shop with his friend and partner Ish and Omi. Ish is a cricket fanatic, a district level player turned coach. Omi is from a priest family but not interested in becoming a priest. Track-One is how Govind aspires big, manages to grow his business and goes through its ups and downs. Gujarath earthquake ruining his over 1 lakh investment for a shop in a newly built mall is termed mistake number 1.

Govind also gives maths tuitions to earn money and he is asked to give tuition to Ish’s sister. Vidya needs some help understanding maths and Govind becomes her private tutor. Track 2 is how their private tuition progresses to friendship, love and more, before finally getting caught by Ish resulting in collapse of their friendship and Govind branded as a traitor. Govind violating an unwritten protocol & falling in love with his best friend’s sister is termed mistake number 2.

Ish spots a young Muslim boy named Ali who due to superfast reflex able to make mental calculations at unbelievable speeds using which he can hit sixes of every ball. The third track of the story line is as to how they struggle to make this gifted boy a superstar, buy coaching him, taking him to Australia and protecting him during communal riots. A split second delay by Govind in making a specific move which could have saved Ali from a hit is termed mistake number 3.

Are these really qualify as mistakes? All of us lose money due to bad decisions and unexpected circumstances. Most of us fall in love (one sided at least) and at some point in our life we do think and act selfish. Not feeling anything unique about these mistakes. What do you feel?

Book gives real near life description of why many students hate maths, a kind of inside view of election politics and Gujarath riots, the challenges and differences people face while chasing big dreams and more, all in all giving you your money's worth. The story begins with Govind writing an email to Chetan after consuming sleep pills as a suicide attempt due to his 3 mistakes. Chetan finds and meets this guy and story begins from a flashback. Excluding the death of several people during riots (including Omi, his cousin and Mama) the story otherwise has an happy ending.

My most interesting lines from the book-
Page 86-Vidya and Govind go to market to buy guidebooks for former’s exam
“What is this?-Vidya said as she tried to lift the book with her left hand. She couldn’t. She used both her hands and finally took it six inches off the ground. ‘No seriously, what is this? An assault weapon?” -I will discuss this topic in little more detail in a separate post soon.

Because the story is supposed to be based on real incidents, I found few odd things in the story:

The 3 mistakes of Chetan Bhagat-in this book
Mistake One
The whole Ali story looks suspicious to me-here’re my points:
a. Can anyone really fool an entire set of stadium officials with one VIP visiting card? Ali is taken to Goa stadium and Govind flashes a visiting card to the security guard, stating he is a rich businessman and wants to get an Australian player as brand ambassador. Security guard in turn consults a set of officials and lets them in to VIP stand after detaining Omi. Isn’t that ODD? When VIPs visit some places do guards detain someone from their team? Stadium officials just let them sit in VIP stand? Why didn’t they introduce these people to someone from the team-say team manager or someone for further talks? When a business man wishes to hire a celebrity for endorsement they approach the celebrity through proper channels-not by bumping into them while they play. Throughout the storyline no one else (Indian and Australian press, neighbourhood elders etc) notices Ali’s ability?

b. 30 mins after the match these guys take over the stadium and let Ali face 6 balls-No one ever questioned them/noticed Ali’s ability to hit sixes? Ground staff, photojournalists, management, Aussi/Indian team members, security...

c. Govind orders passport and visa on phone with a travel agent as if he is ordering a domestic air ticket-That is odd-passport takes nearly 2 months to arrive and includes police verification and other formalities. A schoolboy from a small town goes to Australia and no one around knows the purpose? (local press, neighbors, school staff, friends etc)

I somehow feel Govind might have just told “we tried to show Ali to Australian team” and Chetan cooked up rest of the story, including Australia visit.

Mistake Two
Page 214 of the book says they watched riot scenes on NDTV. Godhra incident and subsequent riots happened in feb 2002 while NDTV 24x7 and NDTV India were launched on 14 April 2003 (Proof)Certainly they couldn’t have seen Godhra riot scenes on NDTV-must have been some other channel but Chetan just mentioned NDTV. 

(Note: New Delhi TeleVision(NDTV)  was operating as a content provider for other channels-they didn't have their own channel in 2002. May be we can give a benefit of doubt to Chetan)

Mistake Three
a. During 2000-2002, mobile phones were not that common. They were just making their presence felt but hadn't reached the mass. Rich people flaunted it while upper middle-class had, may be one cell phone per family. In this story almost all characters carry a mobile, which sounds a bit unusual. 

b. Earthquake is not end of everything-A clever business man like Govind couldn’t think of options like-seeking refund from Mall owner (of advance rent and deposit paid) or compensation from insurance money etc? Or wasn’t the mall built again post earthquake? Govind could have claimed his space then?

Verdict: Read Chetan’s books as if you’re watching Bollywood movie. Might be entertaining for the duration you spend watching/reading but not much room for logic/reasoning. Narration is excellent, retains "what will happen next?" momentum and the book is economically priced (Rs. 95) Keep your thinking hat aside, read, enjoy, move on.

CB is also marketing this book smartly by triggering a referral scheme-Read first few pages of the book and refer 3 friends to read another few pages...

Note: Author's photo sourced from his official website. Chetan Bhagat on Wikipedia here

My other book reviews: 

* Book Review-it happened in India by Kishore Biyani 

* Book Review- Not a penny more not a penny less- Jeffrey Archur 

* Book Review-Merchants of Deception- Eric Scheibler

* Music Book reviewRaga Chintamani