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Ordinary man who becomes catalyst of change

By Madhusree Chatterjee, IANS,

Book: “The Book of Answers”; Author: C.Y. Gopinath ; Publisher: Harper Collins; Price: Rs.499

A laidback Patros Patranobis wants to live an ordinary life with Rose, the woman he has not married, and Tippy, the son he has not fathered. But life changes one day when Patros is given a mysterious metal-bound book – a legacy from a long dead ancestor.

It is “The Book of Answers”, like a sacred scripture, which has the answers to the impasses of the world. But the knowledge is closed to the “aam admi” – the common man. It has to be opened with a key, which is hidden somewhere in god’s own country, Kerala.

Author C.Y. Gopinath, a former journalist-turned-senior UN official posted in Bangkok, has scripted a dark socio-political satire that has an uncanny similarity with the politics India is grappling with at the moment.

“The book is uncanny but it is the right book at the right time. It is the convergence of two unrelated issues,” the writer told IANS.

“I don’t think there is any religion in what is happening now – it is politics. In America, the Christian Church is a religious institution but here what passes in the name of religion in life is not religion,” he added.

“The Book of Answers”, published by Harper Collins, was released by Congress leader Mani Shankar Aiyar Tuesday.

At the centre of the book is dilemma – of the common man’s reluctance to rise to the call of change.

Patros refuses to yield to the pull to make the world a better place by unravelling the answers in the book. He sells the book to a junk shop, from where it finds its way to taxi-driver Tarachand Sagar, a small-time maverick stuntman who lifts weight by the locks of his hair.

“I met the taxi driver, Tarachand Sagar, who could lug 145 kg by his locks, as a young man. I lobbied to get him a place in the Ripley’s ‘Believe it or Not’,” Gopinath said.

The book confers upon the character Tarachand the power to consult god from time to time. Tarachand soon begins to advise the country’s most powerful man, Ishwar Prasad, the convenor, who rises above political colours to wield supreme Orwellian control over the nation, claiming divine sanction from “The Book of Answers”.

From this point onwards, the book turns slightly manic and crowded, with characters flitting in and out.

Goaded by friends and Rose, Patros tries to retrieve the book. The quest lands him in a web of intrigues and Patros becomes an unwilling hero.

He journeys to Kerala to find the key to the locked answers and retrieves it with the help of a Gemini circus woman at Thalasserry, Kutty Lakshmi, who had taught Tarachand to lift weights by hair. He then topples Ishwar Prasad from his hot seat.

But “The Book of Answers” meets an ironic end. Little Tippy hurls it out of the window with the key. “Making lives better does not need a manual,” the child says with the angry wisdom of the young.

“A man who interprets the book exploits others with the knowledge,” said Gopinath, whose forthcoming novel is set in Africa.

“The Book of Answers” around which the novel revolves could be a Bible or the Upanishad – of great value, he said.

(Madhusree Chatterjee can be contacted at [email protected])