Masala Chai

Vinod Luthra

• 22 mei 2015
• 1230000447409

Samenvatting:

Masala Chai is a fictional romance combined with an explosive exposé of corrupt Indian politicians and their mishandling of poverty. Entwined with many heartfelt stories, it is a saga of intense love, struggle, despair, and ecstasy, which highlights the problems of the indigent slum dwellers in India.

Bharti—a British paediatrician of Indian origin who is born, brought up, and educated in England—returns to India with a mission to help the poor but, above all, to be with the love of her life, Vijay, whom she met on an earlier visit. She is disturbed by the living conditions of the poor in India and the harsh treatment meted out to them.

Vijay painting a financial picture of India and showing concern for poor people remarked, "The growth rate is 11%; malls are popping up everywhere like mushrooms; the metro is expanding; the middle class is getting bigger; people have more money; the rich are getting richer but the indigents are still there caught in a vicious circle of poverty. India is sitting on a pile of barood (dynamite) waiting to be ignited. The pundits of politics and the politicians do not understand that you can only push the poor so far, and when their backs are against the wall, they will fight back.”

Amidst the exhilarating love making sessions, Vijay and Bharti decide to pursue their common goal to help the indigent not realizing that their mission to help the poor would turn into a struggle of survival and in that struggle she would nearly lose the love of her life in a terrorist attack. Cruel hand of fate snatched away her happiness shattering all her dreams of wedding.

Their quest to help the poor is misunderstood by a local minister as a bid to defeat him in the upcoming election. Politics can be a dirty game in India. Some politicians support and shelter criminal gangs and use them to intimidate the poor to secure votes. Perceiving Vijay’s growing popularity and fearful of losing the elections, the enraged minister orders his hoods to incinerate the slum with gasoline bombs. Vijay, burnt badly, hurt and unconscious is admitted to a hospital without a name tag along with hundreds of slum dwellers.

Believing that Vijay is dead, Bharti’s father advises her to let go of him and to return to England. She refuses to believe that Vijay is dead as she feels his presence in a vision of their lives together and sees him lying desolate and unconscious but is convinced that he is still alive.