Interview | Why author Prayaag Akbar is less angry and more worried now Premium

Prayaag Akbar's new novel, Mother India, delves into contemporary India through the lives of two protagonists, exploring societal concerns.

Prayaag Akbar’s slim new novel, Mother India (HarperCollins), is a worm’s-eye view of contemporary India. Through the lives of his two protagonists — a right-wing content creator called Mayank and a salesgirl, Nisha — Akbar explores some of the prevailing concerns of our political and social landscape: fake news, misuse of technology, extreme weather events, and the dire consequences of them all. This is a story of fiction written against the backdrop of familiar facts. Akbar’s previous award-winning novel, Leila, was converted into a Netflix series, directed by Deepa Mehta. The Goa-based writer, who is a visiting associate professor at Krea University, talks about the book, the changing aspirations of today’s youth, and his own worries. Edited excerpts:

There wasn’t a specific event. I was interested in writing about how two young people would negotiate this new world, this new economy that we live in. How does a young person who wants to make it big today, who has hopes and aspirations, as all young people do across economic backgrounds, negotiate the political, economic, and cultural landscape? I know technology plays a big part in this. Young people today, especially the age group that I write about, 21-22-year-olds, have grown up in the world of technology and social media. That was my starting point.

I also teach. I get to interact with youngsters who are very intelligent, well-educated, and hardworking. They are very well-tuned into the world of technology. But I also see how it has affected their mental health. They are more resilient in some ways and less so in some other ways. I am very impressed by how knowledgeable they are and I see that as a function of growing up in the age of the Internet. If you’re really interested in something, you can go find out more about it. Many of my students have deep pockets of knowledge in something they are really interested in. We didn’t have that in my growing up years.

That’s an interesting question in the light of the public spectacle of the recent Ambani wedding. Would this have been possible about 15 years ago? Doesn’t this signify a massive shift in our cultural values and what we consider acceptable? India is still a desperately poor country. They (Ambanis) spent about ₹80 crore on just bringing singer Justin Bieber here. That is an inconceivable sum of money to anyone else in India, including people who are comfortable. The fact that they are not being publicly vilified for it is a sign that India celebrates this kind of achievement. The aspiration is to be that: get rich or die trying. It is the American capitalist ethos that has got embedded in Indian culture, and perhaps Mayank, Nisha and Siddharth (in the novel) are like that too.

The story starts with the people. The bridge incident that you mention has to do with Mayank’s father and his death. When I was a journalist, a bridge collapsed and I was reporting on it. My boss asked me to not mention the name of the company that had constructed the bridge. I was perturbed by that. The concern was much more about which contractor had messed up. Sometimes you find things from the past that work well for your story. I was clear that Mayank was born in 2001-2002. I weaved the bridge incident into his story. But you can’t just find news items and string them together. I focus on my characters and see what is happening to them.

I think I have matured. I don’t feel as angry about the world as I did then. I have a son and that builds a level of contentment. Now, it’s more worry about the future, about what my son who carries a Muslim name like me will face in the future if right wing-nationalism keeps going on...

In the book, there is Mother India, there is the activist’s mother, Mayank’s mother, even the dog’s mother, which is a different kind of motherhood. There are different kinds of mothers in the world. There are no right and wrong approaches to motherhood. We place tremendous burdens on our mothers. They occupy an outsized role in our imagination: the giver of life, the benefactor, the personal protector of happiness, the provider of sustenance. And they never stop playing these roles. It is an idealisation.