Book Review: The House That BJ Built

Book Review: The House That BJ Built

Author: Anuja Chauhan

Publisher: Westland

Pages: 432

Rs: 350

The quietude at 16, Hailey Road in the first few pages of The House That BJ Built is deceptive, just a prologue to the madness that is to follow. This is the second in the much-awaited Thakur Girls trilogy, and this time Anuja Chauhan fixes her stern gaze on Delhi's pet obsession with property, moving on from the newsy 1980s of Those Pricey Thakur Girls.

Slyly and steadily, she lifts the curtain to reveal a Delhi centred on cutting up stretches of land to ensure fistful of hissas for everyone, zealously aided by sunglass-clad construction sharks and hair-flicking lawyers. For the most part, discussion is driven by property - rates, feasibility et al. And while, like the religious Thakur sister Chandu, everyone seems to be shaking their heads over obscene property rates because "money is mael", privately, when the rates run into hundreds of crores, there is nothing that will come in their way of getting some.

Like the ageing Ashoka Narayan Thakur, the wily whore-loving, booze-guzzling younger brother of Laxmi Narayan Thakur, who will defame his own mother if need be just so that he can grab some land from his brother's hissa next door.

Laxmi Narayan Thakur, or BJ as they fondly call him, is old and somewhat senile. Mamataji is long gone, and the Thakur girls are all living in different parts of the world; Allahabad, Mumbai, New York. He lives with Bonu Singh, the orphaned daughter of his second-born Binodini, who died in an accident along with her husband and son Monu, while travelling to Delhi to beseech her father to fund another of her husband's businesses after one of the failed ventures.

BJ knows his days are numbered, and wants to leave without having the girls to fuss over the property. As the girls gather after his passing and are offered a delicious deal from Steesh, the youngest Thakur girl, New Yorker Eshwari's once-wronged Hailey Road lover, they are drawn into a somewhat tragi-comic tussle over the property.

One of their hurdles is Bonu herself, now an 'entrepreneur' who runs an illegal 'manufacturing unit' of knock-offs of designer outfits from the house, selling them for a tenth of the real deal. Smarting from the neglect of her 'mad' mausis, and from the memories of how hurt her mother was because they refused to sell the house when she wanted to, Bonu refuses to sell the house until she wants to. The words of her mother, "I won't sell. Even my jutti won't sell. And if I die na, then even my gosht won't sell!", ring every time one of her mausis hurt her.

Trying to stop her in her tracks is Samar, who is the stepson of the ravishing and knowledgeable oldest Thakur girl Anjini, and is an avant-garde Bollywood filmmaker. The moment he enters Hailey Road, he's smitten with Bonu, while she is flooded with childhood memories of an irresistible crush on him. He has a film to shoot (on the Thakurs oh Hailey Road, of course), divide the property amicably as per his dying grandfather's wish, and try and help not falling for Bonita, or Bonu, while he's at it.

Chauhan's male protagonists are as good as they come. Strong, hot, charming, and most importantly, inherently good. (Yes, of course, Dylan makes an appearance, and rustles up a mean mutton biryani right then.)
Bonita Singh Rajawat, on the other hand, is not your next-door female lead. She's calculative, confused and is hurting from all the neglect that makes up her childhood. Natraj pencil keeping her hair in place, Bonu commands her unit, finishes BJ's poetry, and haggles over metres of gota in Old Delhi with equal gusto. She's not the Delhi girl Delhi would like to project, but she's just so Delhi.

All the usual suspects walk in, Gulgul mama, who now has a 'jim' and is a lawyer, the Tring-Trings, the tenants at the Thakur Annexe, Zeeshan, the Bollywood star, Susan Adams, Samar's fashion designer girlfriend, and Chachiji, who during a profound moment from the book, says, "I toh feel so much for these poor chinkies and handicaps ki I can't tell you! You want chips?"

Chauhan, whose earlier works have all been bought up by established production houses, says that a third is in the works. The House That BJ Built is a fortress of snorts, giggles and abundant laughter. Chauhan is arguably the funniest Indian writer at this point of time. The only slouch in this tight universe is Bollywood, which does not seem to be Chauhan's forte.

Small miracles aside, these Hailey Road characters are people we might at every street corner. Their failings, pettiness and that slight goodness are not unreal. The actors in Samar's movie, Bollywood stars Zeeshan and Preeti, pale in front of the Hailey Road crowd.