(27 of 2020) "The Great Indian Novel" is the debut work of Fiction by Shashi Tharoor and he was 33 yrs old when he wrote it. I mention this fact for 2 reasons - I entered into my 30s this year and it is a big deal to me and now I, not so subtly, compare myself to all the well-performing 30s out there. Mr Tharoor’s shoes are too big to fill!! Secondly, the level of ingenuity and creativity displayed by Shashi Tharoor is unparalleled. The book is an amazing mix of Mahabharata and Modern Indian Freedom Struggle where characters and events of both the times have been knitted quite deftly. You would not even know when the character of a chaste Bhishma turns into Gangaji (Paichan Kaun!!) of the Freedom Struggle who restrains from all kinds of amatory activities but would not flinch from sleeping (literally!! Just zzz sleeping) in the company of Sarah-behn. Dhritrashtra of the Great India is educated in the King’s College at Cambridge but is still blind - literally and figurative