Amma... I will be late home. I am not leaving this place without getting his autograph,” says a voice behind me at Odyssey book shop. The book shop is a sea of youngsters. They hold a copy of This Love That Feels Right close to their heart. They are determined to get them signed by the author, even if that means facing the music back at their homes and hostels.
“Kindly be patient. He has arrived at the airport,” announces the compere. The kids adjust their selfie cameras and check their hair and wait for the man of the evening, Ravinder Singh who is in Coimbatore to launch his latest book on forbidden romance, This Love That Feels Right.
Ravinder strides into the shop like a star. The kids look at him with so much awe. Some even stand up when he arrives. It is like being in a classroom, I think to myself. The girls and boys sit separately, maintaining a respectable distance from each other. “I am taken aback seeing the number of people who read. I am going to sign all of your copies! And, I will allow you to take a picture with me, provided you post it on Twitter and tag me on it!”announces Ravinder.
A short video plug on the book is screened before Ravinder starts his interaction session. You are taken straight into a dinner scene, where two couples openly talk about infidelity, trust and companionship, but also question the concept of marriage. Meanwhile, we see Ravinder on the television in their living room talking about his book. One of the ladies explains to her friend, “I am reading his book. It’s quite interesting,” pointing at a copy of This Love That Feels Right lying on the table.
It was at a dinner with his friends that Ravinder got the idea to write about love outside marriage, he says. Almost all his male friends who said it was okay to admire other women and be open about it to their wives changed their views after a peg or two. They now said that that they would hide the attraction from their wives. “I realised there was a need to write about this. This hypocrisy intrigued me,” says Ravinder.
His new love story, which he calls “forbidden love”, unfolds in urban India, where couples hack each other’s accounts and steal passwords. The protagonists are Naina and Manvika, one a shy wife of a workoholic businessman and another, a bold media person. The book is a debate between the two women on love outside marriage. Both of them fall in love with other men.
Ravinder feels attractions are natural and that he cannot sense the logic in covering this up from your spouse. He refers to mythology where Sage Gautama’s wife Ahalya, allows herself to be seduced by Indra the king of gods. We are mere mortals. So why should push this under the carpet?”
During the interaction Ravinder was bombarded with questions and appeals for relationship advice. Ravinder shared tips on how to handle break ups. “It is not the end of the world. You had a life before. Try to get that back.” One young man wanted to know if he could safely gift his book to his soon-to-be-wife; another said she proposed to her crush after reading Ravinder’s books. While a third coyly said she could not sleep for several days after she had read his book.
The question-answer session ended and the selfie-with Ravinder session followed. He asked them to queue up to get their books signed. I wriggled my way through the excited teenagers for a short interview with the writer. The compere pulled up a chair for me and we chatted. He said he had not taken any stand in the book about extra marital affair and nor was he making a case for it. “The characters are the left and right part of my brains constantly debating about this.” When asked why he chose a woman’s perspective, he said a female character show much more sensitivity in voicing her needs, desires and expectations.
Ravinder said says there was a bit of the woman in him. “I am all for women sharing equal rights as men. But, I am also for that one per cent of men who are suffering.” He said he was fine with criticism as long as it did not get personal. His coming from a ‘zero literary background’ was a blessing, he says. “I feel my perspective is fresh. I am not here for a niche crowd. I just want people to read my story.”
Looking back as I left the shop, I saw that there were many people in Coimbatore who were going to read his story. The long line did not look like it was going to shrink any time soon. And Ravinder looked happy as he took another selfie with the queue, rolled up his sleeves and got ready to deal with another battalion of gushing teenagers.
