My First  English Novel : A Fascinating Trip to Humans Manufacturing Site

                                                             Background note  

As I grew in years, I either witnessed or learnt through different sources how tentacles of evil, in all its manifestations,  have expanded on earth to cover all directions both  vertically as well as horizontally. Sometimes it seems to me how correct  William Shakespeare was in his assessment when he  asserted in his play, the Tempest “Hell is empty and all the devils are here.” Later I came across a quotation attributed to Russian writer and philosopher, Fyodor Dostoevsky “ Humans are the cruelest creatures  of all because they can smile while destroying.”. I found it  endorsing  my assessment in my novel “ A Fascinating Trip to Humans Manufacturing Site”  that humans are animals like animals of the jungle; but, what  makes them more ferocious surpassing  ferocity of the animals of the jungle are ironically the two  precious divine  gifts : the  brain, and the vocal cords to speak.}    

The immediate inspiration to write this novel, however,  came from the   simple words of American poet, essayist  and philosopher, Ralph Waldo Emerson:

“The sun shines and warms and lights us and we have no curiosity to know why this is so; but we ask the reason of all evil, of pain, and hunger, and mosquitoes and silly people.”

 The Book  was at display at the New Delhi World Book Fair at Pragati Maidan from 4^th   to 12^th January 2020; not only won prestigious Golden Book Award 2025 but also Web-Series Worthy Story Teller awards 2025 by WRITER  TODAY. The author for this  book was earlier honoured by DELHIWIRE.com as Top 50 Most Influential Authors of 2024. 

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                                  The  Brief  of The Novel                                                                    

The novel  ‘A Fascinating Trip to Humans Manufacturing Site’,  is a concept book, a philosophical  Sci-Fi fantasy,  where an unexpected dream reveals itself as an encounter with divinity  which shows up as an organized, bureaucratic hierarchy. It   seeks to   probe  inside of humans, filled as they are with strains of  different animals,  with a view to explore the capricious nature  of human   behaviour and actions. It seeks to examine   what prompts  each human being to behave and act the way they do;  how it is that a person or  groups of human beings turn  to be  evil incarnates surpassing  ferocity  of the most ferocious animals of the jungle and act as  the worst enemies of none else but  their own  fellow human beings. The reason we know   is  that  humans are animals like animals of the jungle. But, what perhaps makes them more ferocious surpassing  ferocity of the animals of the jungle are ironically the two  precious so called divine  blessings: Gift of the  brain, and the gift of vocal cords to speak. This, welded with  other allied  human  strains, forms the main thread of the story. The plot runs in   three parts, ‘ Take Off’,  Highjack’, and   ‘ Hangover’. 

‘Take off’’ is the built up for the second part, ‘Highjack’ which is the main stay of the novel. The main protagonist catches the flight to be on way to Port of Spain and would be joined at Heathrow by two of his colleagues, Sidhartha and Maneesha. As the flight takes off, he gets engaged initially in a casual  conversation with co-passengers which turned into serious discussion on crucial national issues  with the intervention of a senior lady journalist, Sarita, who later  becomes the part of the team at Heathrow. As the trolley of hospitality arrives, he  sits relaxed. Having sipped couple of drinks on the rocks, and having taken the meals to the full, he finds  his eyes closing restlessly to fall in slumber. He vaguely remembers  to have struggled to focus on television screen with drooping eyes and found the images vanishing with  the falling down of his eyelids.  But in slumber, a fresh switch is pushed  which throws him into  the bright new colourful  world in a long-protracted dream……….

The second part begins with  the main protagonist slipping  into fast sleep and,  in his dream, finds himself being hijacked in a cute little aircraft where he hears an announcement for   emergency  landing.  But the aircraft, instead of being in a landing mode,  keeps flying higher and higher to   finally   land   at a place where travellers  are  overtaken by an  aura of  soothing divine  flavour.  The  group  of travellers   is then  escorted on a peculiar  vehicle passing through  ‘Gateway to Divinity’ to reach a  conference hall where  the group is shaken by the  shock and surprise  when it is told by  the top  boss  that this group of highly talented twenty persons is purposely brought to the  abode of God to be prepared to serve on earth a definite   purpose necessitated by divine  perception that   evil  on the earth has been assuming  such an alarming proportions  that   winding  up of existing world  and to   create a  new divine  order seemed only viable solution.  But before deciding to wind up the world , it is decided to give the existing system a chance by  sending a well-trained group back to earth to fulfil the divine  mission.  The group is then  taken round on a familiarization trip to places like a  safari and then finally to ‘Divine Research & Development Centre’  where  hundreds of hands are seen   engaged in human manufacturing operations  at the  ‘Humans Manufacturing Site’. 

After  a long question and answer session, the main protagonist  suddenly wakes up  and   looks  around with eyes clouded with severe  impact of a long-protracted dream as he finds himself sitting in his original aircraft.  He finds it difficult to dismiss the whole thing as a mere dream  because every word that he heard there and every place that he visited  made sense like divine revelations. 

 After the plane has landed at Heathrow, he unloads himself of the burden of the unusual dream  after his meeting with Sidhartha and Maneesha at the waiting lounge where Journalist Sarita joins them. They hear the sequence  of the dream, get into the exercise of  analyzing it threadbare and decide that  its contents are too serious and sensible to  be dismissed as a mere dream .After a long discussion,  Sarita, who  treats it as  a  scoop, takes it upon herself the responsibility to take it  forward in consultation with his editor  after returning home  in India and what she does, supported by his editor,  really  turns it into a story of the year which,  with massive engagement of global media,  gets floated all over the world.      

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