The Ministry of Utmost Happiness

This blog post is a response to a thinking activity task on 'The Ministry of Utmost Happiness' given by our prof. Dr.Dilip Barad Sir. To know more about this task, CLICK HERE.

I tried to cover the main points included in the novel in letter-writing form. CLICK HERE to read.

The Reader’s Digest Book by S. Tilottama and Screenshots by ChatGPT. CLICK HERE to read 

• About the Novel: 

The Ministry of Utmost Happiness is the second novel by Indian-Anglian author Arundhati Roy. The first well-known novel 'The God of Small Things won the Booker prize, and this novel was also nominated.

There are 12 chapters. Each Chapter has significantly connected with each one while we come to know about the plot structure. These chapters' names are: 

1. Where Do Old Birds Go to Die?

2. Khwabgah

3. The Nativity

4. Dr. Azad Bhartiya

5. The Slow-Goose Chase

6. Some Questions for Later

7. The Landlord

8. The Tenant

9. The Untimely Death of Miss Jebeen the First

10. The Ministry of Utmost Happiness

11. The Landlord

12. Guhi Kyon

• Arundhati Roy: 

As an Indo-Anglian author, Roy's writing is more realistic of the contemporary time in India. Her flashback method of telling the story, metaphors, irony, and paradox is very well captured by her. Critics also said that in 'The Ministry of Utmosts Happiness' her political overpowering in the novel let the story in dull mode or perhaps the essence of the title may be not very much clear.  

Here is the list of characters as comes in the novel: 

1. Ziauddin - the blind imam 
2. The Man who knew English 
3. Anjum (Aftab)- protagonist, Hermaphrodite
4. Jahanara Begum - Aftab's Mother
5. Aftab/Anjuman/Anjum 
6. Hazrat Sarmad Shaheed - a Jewish American merchant who had traveled to Delhi from Persia in pursuit of the love of his life later he diverse toward spirituality. His tiny dargah is set near Jama Masjid. 
7. Abhay Chand: lover of Sarmad Shaheed
8. Ustad Hameed Khan - a musician who taught Hindustani classical music
9. Mulaqat Ali - Aftab's Father, hakim, was a doctor of herbal medicine, and a lover of Urdu and Persian poetry.
10. Hakim Abdul Majil - founded a popular rand of sherbet called Rooh Afza. 
11. Dr. Ghulam Nabi - a sexologist 
12. Bombay Silk, Bulbul, Razia, Heera, Baby, Nimmo, Mary, and Gudiya all hijras who lived together at Khwabgah 
13. Ustad Kulsoom Bi - a guru of Khwabgah. 
14. Mary - only one Christian in Khwabgah 
15. Gudia&Bulbul - both were Hindus 
16. Bismillah - formerly named Bimla managed the kitchen and guarded Khwabgah 
17. Razia - not a Hijra but she was a man who liked to dress in women, had lost her mind as well as her memory 
18. Nimmo Gorakhpuri: Aftab’s first real friend in the Khwabgah, the youngest of them all and the only one who had completed high school had run away from her home in Gorakhpur where her father worked as a senior division clerk in the Main Post Office.
19. Dr. Mukhtar - suggested another doctor for Anjum's surgery, more reassuring than Dr. Nabi 
20. Dr. Bhagat - another doctor suggested Anjum, checked Zainab while she was ill.
21. Zainab - around the three-year-old girl, Anjum found her on the steps of Jama. Masjid and adopted her. 
22. Saqib: Anjum's brother 
23. Zakir Mian - the Proprietor and Managing Director of shop A-I Flower, a friend of Mulaqat Ali 
24. Bibi Ayesha - Anjum's older sister who had died of tuberculosis
25. Ahlam Baji - the midwife who'd delivered Anjum, a woman on whose tombstone it said (in English) 'Begum Renata Mumtaz Madam'. Begum Renata was a belly dancer from Romania who grew up in Bucharest dreaming of India and its classical dance forms. 
26. Roshan Lal -  Headwaiter of the Rosebud Rest-O-Bar who visits Renata Mumtaz’s grave.
27. Mr.D.D.Gupta - an old client of Anjum 
28. Saddam Hussain - a Chamar, second permanent guest at Jannat Guest House, real name was Dayanand 
29. Payal - Saddam's horse 
30. Sangeeta Madam - boss of Safe n' Sound Guard Service (SSGS) 
31. Anwar Bhai - ran a brothel, one afternoon he came with his daughter's (Rubina) body to a graveyard. (the hospital returned her body with the eyes missing) 
32. Sehrawat - Station House Officer at the Dulian police station who claimed illegally that his father and his friends were 'cow slaughter' it was the cause that his father killed by the mob, Saddam looked for revenge by killing Sehrawat, later he thought to not kill him. 
33. Neeraj - Saddam's friend, from his village who helped him to get a job in the mortuary, the driver
34. Me.Aggarwal - bureaucrat and aspiring politician 
35. Dr. Azad Bhartiya - against the capitalist empire, real name is Inder Y. Kumar. He continues his 10-year fast and runs a newsletter called "News & Views".
36. Tilottama: was a student at the Architecture School, a friend of Biplab Dasgupta, Nagaraj Hariharan, and Musa Yeswi, whom she met during their drama when she worked on sets and lighting design for the play ( Norman, Is That You?) mistress of Nagaraj, later divorced him, she loves Musa. 
37. Nagaraj Hariharan: the closest friend of Dasgupta from school to university, a student of history along with Gupta, a top-notch journalist who works in Kashmir. Tilo marries Naga as suggested by Musa for strategic reasons and later abandons him, a corrupted journalist, his works were favored by the Government of India
38. Musa Yeswi: a reticent Kashmiri man, who joined a militant group, a classmate of Tilo, and boyfriend of Tilo.
39. Chitra-Chittaroopa - Biplab's wife, ( Brahmin Wife) 
40. Rabia and Ania - daughters of Biplab and Chitra 
41. R.C.Sharma - Ram Chandra Sharma - a colleague of Dasgupta at Intelligent Bureau. Naga's 'handler'
42. Imran - a young Kashmiri Police officer who had done some exemplary undercover work for Biplab and his team.
43. Amrik Singh - 'Spitter', Major, A military officer in charge of counter-insurgency operations in Kashmir. Murderer of Jalib Qadri, a well-known lawyer, and human rights activist. Amrik Sing subsequently seeks asylum in the US claiming to be the victim of the tortures he has inflicted on others. In the novel, he is considered a bad apple. 
44. Biplab Dasgupta (Garson Hobart) - a Brahmin, Deputy Station Head, India Bravo (radio code in Kashmir for the Intelligence Bureau), friend of Tilo, Naga, and Musa. The landlord of his apartment. (probably down south),played a role as Garson Hobart in 'Norman, Is That You?'.
45. Jalib Qadri: a well-known lawyer and human rights activist, was killed by Amrik Singh, that was confessed by Singh's wife.
46. Commander Gulrez - Musa 
47. ACP Pinky Sodhi - CRPF Officer, known for her violent interrogation techniques, which seem at odds with her beauty.
48. Balbir Singh Sodhi - brother of Pinky, a senior police officer who had been shot down by militants. 
49. Auntie Meera - the mother of Naga, a teenage widow, comes from the rom Rajput royal family. 
50. Ambassador Shrivashankar Hariharan - father of Naga. 
51. Loveleen Singh née Kaur - wife of Amrik Singh 
52. Manpreet - Loveleen's friend, a journalist in Srinagar 
53. Miss Jebeen (second) - child of Commander Revathy, adopted by Tilo and Anjum (or even Jannat Guest House/Graveyard) 
54. Ashfaq Mir - Deputy Commandant of Shiraz Cinema JIC. 
55. Aijaz - the youngest son of Mulaqat Ali’s older brother, Qasim, who had moved to Pakistan after Partition and worked for the Karachi branch of Rooh Afza. He was captured in an operation in an apple orchard near Pulwama. Interviewed by Naga.
56. Abu Hamza - commander of Aijaz, was a Pakistani.
57. Maryam Ipe - Tilo's mother, belonged to an old, aristocratic Syrian Christian Family, she does not publicly acknowledge her daughter, who suffered from COPD. 
58. Dr.Jacob Verghse - Head of the Department of Critical Care, a medic with the US Army.
59. Jiten. Y. Kumar: Dr, Azad's older brother who lived on the pavement of Jantar Mantar. 
60. Arifa Yeswi - Musa's wife, mother of Miss Jebeen first
61. Miss Jebeen - daughter of Musa and Arifa
62. Hassan Lone - a friend of Musa and his neighbor 
63. Ikhwan Salim Gojri - a friend of major Arikh Singh, later he was killed by him.
64. Sepoy S.Murugesan - the Untouchable, the Dalit soldier S. Murugesan whose body is sent home to Kerala. A statute is built in the village in his memory. But soon the statue is destroyed because a Dalit cannot be celebrated; his sacrifice is not Indian, he just does not belong to the nation; he is intrinsically incapable of heroism.
65. Showkat Yeswi (Godzilla) - Musa's father 
66. Tavleen, Harpreet,Gurpreet, Loveleen and Dimple - four sisters of Amrik Singh
67. Junaid Ahmad Shah- an Area Commander of the Hizb-ul-Mujahideen
68. Mr. S.P.P. Rajendran - a retired police officer who held an administrative post in the architectural firm when Tilo worked for. 
69. Khadija – An associate of Musa who travels with Tilo
70. Comrade Revathy Maase – Mother of Miss Jebeen the Second

Sources :

Original Text

knopfdoubleday.com

sydneyreviewofbooks

Here is the table format. Roy used Facts in Fictional stories and their impacts. 

Fact Real Life Socio-Political Events	Fiction Their lives adapted by these events
2002 Gujarat riots	Zakir Mian’s death, Anjum safe
Dalits died or bitten in the name of Cow Slaughters	Dayachands father died through mob as the name of cow slaughter
So many people died in the name of Jai Shree Ram!	Dayachand’s father and his friend were killed by hindu mob
The Bhopal Gas Leak Tragedy	Mentioned in Dr. Azad’s ‘MY NEWS & VIEWS
Anna Hazare Movement 2012	Tubby Gandhian -soldier-turned-village[1]social-worker, who had announced a fast to the death to realize his dream of a corruption-free India, in TV Shows
	statue of Sepoy S. Murugesan, the rifle on its shoulder went missing family tried to file a complaint, but the police refused to register a case