Library Junction

Revolution 2020 is the story of three childhood friends: Gopal, Raghav, and Aarthi. The story is setup in the holy-city of Varanasi. Gopal and Raghav are schoolmates from the childhood and share the same bench in school. Aarthi is also from the same class. Gopal loves Aarthi from the school days.

The story’s narrator is Gopal. I am not going to tell you the entire story and be a suspense spoiler.

Gopal comes from a filmy-Indian-middle-class background. Raghav is from an almost well to do family, where as Aarathi comes from a kind of bureaucratic and political family. Three of them have their own ambitions in life. Gopal wants to be a rich man, Raghav wants to change the world, Aarthi wants to become an air hostess.

After the failure in getting through JEE and AIEEE exams, Gopal is forced by his father to repeat the exams next year. But Raghav secures a good rank and joins the top college in Varanasi. Aarthi falls in love with Raghav.

What happens when Gopal returns to Varanasi after his one year stint at cracking the entrance exams is the main part of the story. Apart from losing his love, he couldn’t find a seat in engineering to fulfill his father’s dream.

How Gopal chooses corruption as an aid to become a successful person while Raghav tries to change the world(read as India) with his revolutionary ideals is what the middle pages of the book are all about.

In the ending, things kind of change though, and you will be left to yourself to wonder who is right and who is wrong. Except for a faint hint in the end, Chetan doesn’t really judge what Gopal does is good or bad.