GRASS, OR SOMETHING LIKE IT

chetan bhagat did it with the iits. so it’s about time we got some dirt on the iims too.
‘keep of the grass’ is karan bajaj’s debut novel about a 25-years old abcd who decides to return to india (via iim-b no less) in search of his roots. i won’t even attempt at objectivity in this review – the author is an alumni of my institute and i heard about the novel from his classmate. and though the novel isn’t about bit mesra per se, the shades of ranchi are unmistakable.
the plot is a racy run thru a 2-year mba course interspersed with the usual clichés:  search for spirituality, patriotism, placement fever and uhh, plentiful grass. for indians addicted to mba-education, the story is remarkable for showing the slow destruction of a high-flying manager in b-school. the book would have been run-of-the-mill if not for the heavy dose of sarcasm which never fails to humour. the drugs really fuel the twists & turns of the plot and end it on a high.
there’s a genre in literature called chick lit that deals in light-hearted stories of twenty-something women. if so, this books falls squarely into what i would call ‘guy-lit’. i’d put a buy rating on ‘keep off the grass’ because it’s puff worth inhaling. the folks at mosaic media seem to agree with me because they’re turning it into a soon-to-be-released film!