Insider is a nonsensical Mahabharata, says Nayanar

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM, Aug 14: Kerala Chief Minister E K Nayanar has termed former Prime Minister P V Narasimha Rao’s novel, The Insider, a nonsensical Mahabharatha’ which only succeeded in portraying the decayed visage of decayed politics.

In his weekly column Munnottu in party organ Deshabhimani, Nayanar has shot down the claim on the book-jacket that the novel exposes the inner games of Indian politics. According to Nayanar, what was expected to be a ferocious tiger turned out to be a tame cat. The book with countless pages was in fact “literature with excess fat”, Nayanar has said.

Rao’s novel was not an artistic depiction of the society’s soul. In that sense it was a failure. The novel traced the life of the protagonist-politician Anand from his childhood to his ascension to the post of Prime Minister. In between came the Indo-China war, Indira Gandhi’s ascend to Prime Ministerial gaddi, her death, Rajiv Gandhi’s assassination and the like. All these could naturally formpart and parcel of a good novel. However, Rao’s extremely individualistic and faulty perspective of history mars the possibility, Nayanar has pointed out.