Kitabi Keeda discussion

It took the whole group many weeks to finish this book. By far this was the most time taking book for the group as a whole. Sattu had finished it the earliest.

The consistent opinion was that it is full of satire. At every point there is satire. And most of it feels like standup comedy. All of us wanted to underline the good lines of this book to recall later but couldn't do so because that involved underlining the whole book. The book is full of punch lines and the satire is aimed not only at the poor peasant but the rich businessmen and the powerful politicians and the unlawful police.

It was called hard-hitting writing. There were references to and satire on even the classics like Kisan and Do Beegha Zameen. It was felt that we need more writers like this.

This book showed the post independence India and its problems. The character names were difficult to remember. Absurd Father son relations are shown where a father is unable to digest food if there is not any physical fight between them. It is straightforward and written in a street-style. Although calling it street-style might be oversimplifying the whole book. In essence the book feels authentic.

There was a round of discussion on why it was named Raag Darbari. In one of the opinions it was mentioned that Raag Darbari was sung at court to appease the king and this book might be an indication towards such Raja-Praja culture that still existed post independence.

The book seems relevant even today because of a similar oppression existing in a different form today. The media is controlled by the ruling party and there are no open discussions. At that point when India just became independent and was understanding how governance happens this book served to fuel discussions and criticism, important pillars for democracy.

One thing the book starkly brings out is the lack of reverence. Shivangi loved it and this was one of the clear takeaways for her. She felt that bowing down to ministers and making PM into a God were acts of reverence. She suggested that the book shows how one can find humor in every small thing and that one should have an eye for criticism and a bit of irreverence.

All in all we all loved the book. One downside of this piece was that there was absolutely no mention of women in this book or the role they played post independence either in the governance of state or of home. Aditya suggested that maybe he was trying to make a comment on the state of women by not mentioning them but later we all agreed that that seemed less likely. It would have been better if women were brought into the plot and were shown as participants in the situation.