A mechanical engineer from IIT Delhi, the best outgoing student from IIM-A, a leading investment banker from one of the top banks, settled in Hong Kong, decides to show the world that he has great writing acumen, and comes up with a book that has been rated as a bestseller for the past five years.

This is Chetan Bhagat, with his masterpiece Five Point Someone.

Five Point Someone, or FPS, as people call it, is a work of fiction, with the inspiration derived from his college days. Though not a true story, any student will immediately be able to connect to the theme. Such is the beauty of his writing.

After giving the world this bestseller, Bhagat went on to write two more bestsellers, One Night At The Call Center, which deals which is a story about what happened one night in a call center, and Three Mistakes Of My Life, which deals with a group of friends opening a cricket shop, faced with obstacles like riots and earthquakes.

His second book, One Night At The Call Center, was the main idea behind making the movie Hello, for which Bhagat was the scriptwriter.

The book Five Point Someone, is set in the IIT Delhi campus, and mainly revolves around the lives of three Mechanical students, who are from completely different backgrounds and stick on to each other till the very end.

Since Bhagat himself was a student in the same institute, he knew the exact setting and how things work there. That worked in his advantage and the fact that he was present in the same place, not exactly in the same situation, was the major inspiration behind him writing the book.

The tone of the book is mainly humorous and entertaining, but is also glum at times, when the families of the students are introduced. The characters are introduced with great subtlety and the shift from one chapter to the other is smooth. The author has a distinctive writing style, one that keeps everyone guessing till the very end.

The theme of the story is about the adventures of three students, Hari , Ryan and Alok, who struggle to come to terms with the grueling schedule and workload of the IIT’s.

The whole story is narrated by Hari, who is the protagonist. He struggles to come to grips with the prevalent competition and hence secures a lowly five point something GPA.

Alok, the second of three friends, is from a very modest background. His father is paralyzed and hence his mother and sister are heavily dependent on him to look after the family. Unfortunately, things don’t turn out as expected and he too finds himself with a five point something GPA.

Ryan, an NRI, makes up the trio. Undoubtedly, the most creative and handsome of the three, he is a mischievous guy. Although financially sound, he hardly speaks to his parents, due to some differences. He, though being the wittiest among the three, finds himself with the lowest GPA.

Professor Cherian is the head of the mechanical engineering department and a terror.

The students tremble at the sight of him. He cannot stand the sight of Hari and later finds out that his daughter had an affair with Hari.

Neha, the cute and bubbly girl, living in the staff quarters, is Hari’s girlfriend and most importantly Prof. Cherian’s daughter. She gives insightful leads into the mysterious disappearance of her brother which forms a major chunk of the climax.

The story starts off with the three friends in first year, undergoing the horrendous ragging sessions. Ryan saves the day for Alok and Hari. This is when the three of them get to know each other and is the start of their five year long friendship.

The three of them move around the campus and sometimes venture out into the city, to watch movies, on Ryan’s kinetic Honda. The year passes in a jiffy, and even before they can realize, they find themselves at the bottom of the class.

Alok, clearly perturbed by the happenings in first year, pledges to study harder and make up for the bad showing in the previous year. He keeps reminding himself that his family is heavily dependent on him to get a high paying job. He starts studying with Venkat,the class topper, with the idea of bettering his grades, much to the dismay of Ryan and Hari. Things don’t quite work out as expected and Alok again finds himself with his five pointer friends.

Meanwhile, Hari, discovers his romantic side when the bumps into Neha one morning. The two hit it off and frequent ice cream parlors and even go for long walks.

The years pass by and the grades show no improvement. The three start having vodka on the roof on weekends and Hari even went drunk to Prof. Cherian’s viva. This greatly angered the head of the department and Hari knew that any more wrongdoings and his life could be as bad as hell.

With the pressure of falling grades getting to them, the three decided to cheat their way to better their grades. They planned to get the papers from Cherian’s office but one ill- timed phone call by Alok ruined it all.

The three were summoned to the disciplinary committee meeting and were handed a semester’s suspension.

This is when Ryan, who hated the prevalent system in the institute, finally found the right Professor for him in Prof. Veera, who allowed the three to research in his labs and even helped finish their courses on time.

Neha, Hari’s girlfriend, told him about how her brother ended his life after being tormented for not having got into the institute by her father.

All these events then led to the climax, where Prof. Cherian thanked Hari for helping him uncover the story on how his son died, Alok got a job and Ryan continued his research with Prof. Veera, hoping that something big would come along his way.

The trio ended up with decent deals, something they would not have even dreamt of after the suspension.

The story, with all its twists and twirls, opens up very nicely in the end giving the reader a sense of satisfaction after having read the book.