Revolution 2020

Revolution 2020 by Chetan Bhagat 

  Introduction about 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.

Chetan also writes about youth and national development issues in India. His notable works are as follows:-

• Five Point Someone
• 2 States: The Story of My Marriage
•  The 3 Mistakes of My Life
• Half Girlfriend
• One Indian Girl

Brief summary

This book was published on 5 October 2011 which follows the story of two friends separated by their ambitions and passions yet connected by their love for the same girl Arti. While Gopal, who has experienced the harsh realities of life due to poverty aspires to become rich, his friend Raghav is a boy from a well-off family who desires to create a revolution in India by fighting corruption.

Gopal gets a low ranking in the AIEEE exams while Raghav is among the toppers. Gopal moves to Kota to join reputed coaching classes to help with his ranking. Raghav becomes a celebrity in the town after he passes the IIT entrance exam. Aarti falls for Raghav during Gopal's absence. Aarti and Gopal chat online, and Aarti reveals her relationship to Gopal, who is heartbroken. He studies hard but gets a low ranking in the AIEEE exam for the second time. His father dies shortly after. Raghav decides to become a journalist and pursue a career in a newspaper publishing house. Meanwhile, Gopal is contacted by a politician who wishes to build an engineering college on the highly valuable land that Gopal's family owns. Gopal agrees to the deal, and joins the system of corruption in India in order to build the college with the politician's black money.

Raghav starts his own newspaper, Revolution 2020, to change the world and expose the corrupt system in India. After another expose, Raghav's newspaper is shut down by politicians and thugs, and he loses almost everything. Raghav is still passionate about his activism and forgets about Aarti. Gopal seduces Aarti who returns his love, giving in to years of suppressed feelings. Aarti falls in love with Gopal, and begins to cheat on Raghav. Gopal then decides to disclose to Raghav that him and Aarti are a couple. Gopal goes to Raghav's office but a chance encounter with a poor farmer and his kid who had come to Raghav for help shakes him up and he realizes the folly of money, power and wealth. He decides to let go of Aarti perhaps realising they were never meant to be together and Raghav would always remain Aarti's love. He with the help of politician invites two prostitutes as a part of his birthday surprise and ensures Aarti witnesses it, making her hate him forever. He anonymously helps Raghav get a job, and suggests he become a politician (MLA) to bring about the revolution he desired. Aarti and Raghav thereafter got married.

Gopal becomes a rich and successful businessman, but is still heartbroken over Aarti.

 1)Social realism in the novel.

In this novel Chetan Bhagat tells about social evils, corruption and problems of young generation with the different characters like Aarti, Raghav, Gopal etc .The main thing is corruption a deep rooted poison of society. Corruption, the dark side of Indian society that is  generally accustomed to, manifests itself in the rotten educational system, coupled with the dishonesty. The novel projects the picture of unfair society in which the Indian youth are struggling to fulfill their ambitions. The novel sheds light on the very current topic of  corruption in education. Chetan Bhagat criticizes how the educational institutes become business center. Gopal’s journey from the poor middle class to the young rich person shows the corruption in education system.

 He has observed unfair practices right from the beginning of the land acquisition to erection of building and fulfilling the admission quota. With the support of MLA Shuklaji, he has kidnapped the four year old grandson of Ghanshyam and demanded to leave the possession of land. Thus, they have acquired the land by force and converted this agricultural land into commercial purpose that is to run educational institute by paying bribe worth twelve and half thousand rupees to the deputy corporator. Gopal offered two lakh rupees to the head of the AICTE approval committee and twenty-five thousand rupees to each members of the committee to get approval. The fake demolition of the illegal construction is the best example of corruption chain. Because of the article of illegal construction by Raghav, the VNN officials have started to demolish the construction with bulldozers. 

Gopal has rang the phone to Shuklaji and begged for help. The MLA Shuklaji has settled down the matter by paying the bribe of rupees two lakh to the VNN officials and has arranged a fake demolition to deceive the people. After all, the building is erected. Moreover, the management has fixed the School Principals to recommend Ganga Tech College to their students and for this they have given ten thousand rupees per admission as commission. Prof. Shrivastav’s way of evading income tax, missing lectures and getting payment etc. this all shows the contemporary social realism in the novel.

2)Significance of title Revolution 2020.

we can interpret title in two different ways which is as follows:-

The title is written in such a way which  include 'Love' in this story of Revolution. The title of the novel is inspired by IPL Cricket league which is played in Twenty20 format. 3)Do you think that an opportunity for 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? Yes, according to me if Raghav would be narrating a story then he would be looking forward towards the welfare of society or we can say change. Because he wanted to become journalist and even he became and was even good at studies he cleared all his exams .Raghav get a job, and suggests he become a politician MLA to bring about the revolution he desired. If he would be narrating then his point view would be totally different from Gopal their won't be corruption. Word Count:- 1,076