2 States

Title: 2 States

Author: Chetan Bhagat

Genre: Romance

Published: 2009

Pages: 269

"Love marriages around the world are simple: boy loves girl. Girl loves boy. They get married. In India, there are a few more steps: boy loves girl. Girl loves boy. Girl's family has to love boy's family. Boy's family has to love girl's family. Girl and boy still love each other. They get married."

2 States is a story about a girl named Ananya and a boy named Krish, who are madly in love with each other and belong to two different states of India. The couple desperately wants to marry each other but because they belong to two different states, they encounter an obstacle in the journey of their love life before marriage. It is a tough battle for them.

This story unfolds the strenuous storms that most of the people or lovers in India have to go through before their marriage. In this story, both- the girl and the boy don't want to hurt their parents. As it is believed according to the Indian tradition that, children should always respect and obey their parents and showing disrespect is the greatest sins of all that a child can do to his parents, they find it arduous to convince their parents for their marriage. It is easy to battle and fight and get the thing desired by you, but convincing someone for the same thing is much harder than that and this is exactly what happens with both of them.

They get the idea to run away and marry each other but they put away that thought when Ananya is struck by another thought of a dream that she always had as a child, of seeing a smile on her parents face on the day of her marriage. I am sure that any Indian who has a taste for reading, will love it; because it clearly depicts the way the Indian people act when they are unwilling to give up with their old traditions due to which young lovers have to suffer. But, I must say that this story is a mixture of both- problems and humour. The journey that they have to begin with, to convince their parents is the main part of the story; which keeps the reader interested in the book.

The author has provided each minute detail on Krish's feelings when he met the new people and that is something which involves humour, making the story a combination of both- seriousness and humour. It displays the way people behave and the things which make them distinct, inspite of living in one country but two different states. The two states which they are associated with are totally opposite. Krish is a Punjabi (North Indian) and Ananya- Tamilian ( South Indian). 

It is a good book to read for youngsters today, wherein, the world is rapidly becoming advanced with social media and we have people who find their match even from different states. I feel they can very deeply relate this story to themselves. In today's world, where we frequently speak about revamping our mentality and accepting new ideas and implementing them, it serves as a great example for people and also conveys the message to change their mind set and not to force their decisions on their children.