Tulsi Badrinath’s Man Of A Thousand Chances

Of fate, karma and a middle-class man

The character cast of Tulsi Badrinath’s Man Of A Thousand Chances sounds more like the setup to a great punch line. What do Mughal emperor Jahangir, the Chief Elephant of the Big Temple, a graduate bride-to-be, and a Chennai pawn agent have in common? The answer is Harihar, one of the more interesting protagonists in recent Indian fiction. A man past his prime, Harihar is the picture of middle class mildness: a museum curator who must marry off a daughter in appropriate splendour. The action opens with Harihar committing a life-defining act — he steals a rare gold coin minted by Jahangir (a coin that was in his possession for safekeeping at the museum), and pawns it. This is meant to be a temporary tap and Harihar fully intends to restore the coin. What follows is an overlap of plotlines that Badrinath would have us believe mimics the operation of karma. First Harihar discovers he is on the verge of financial ruin. Then he finds that it is no small matter to collect the coin even by paying for it, as it has attracted the attention of a predatory numismatologist. Meanwhile, his mousy long-suffering wife has achieved a measure of independence that will change his life. It appears that the universe is teaching Harihar an important lesson, and this isn’t the first time either. The tragic disappearance of his teenage son is a loose thread that dangles through the book, attracting the question of karma like static. Why do bad things happen to good people? Why do good people do bad things? Badrinath writes a compelling novel, only to pull up short and discuss the meaning of karma, which is something of a leap from the entrancing ordinariness she details of sari shops, water tanker episodes, and family jaunts on the beach. Even more jarring are the fantastical historical jaunts Badrinath sends her villain on; they would make a magical realist blush. The prose could be improved: word selection and grammar seem slapdash. Yet Man Of A Thousand Chances somehow endures in the imagination, just as its inviolable hero does looking fate in the eye.