Arundhati Roy

Chaotic, slangy, messy, superficial. The audacious and most condemning review yet of the most-awaited Indian novel of this decade unsettled many book lovers when it came out early this week. Reviewer Eileen Battersby minced no words in her scathing attack of the book, shredding an effort of 10 years, piece by piece, word for word. Closer home, actor and BJP MP Paresh Rawal ruffled feathers when, last week, he tweeted asking for the same author to be tied to the now, infamous Indian army jeep, instead of the 'stone pelter' from Kashmir, who was paraded as a human shield. The immediate trigger was a fake news story attributed to the author, where she allegedly condemned the Indian Army.