FIRST LOVE
According to both Bhagat and first-person narrator, Govind, Vidya is different than many other young Indian women. (Indian guidebooks relate that the gender roles in South Asian society are historically much distinguishable--more evidentially different--from one another than they are in the West.)
Near the end of the novel, Baghat indicates several times that would-be mother-in-laws would find Vidya as a bride-to-be quite daunting. She approaches the world with a character and drive uncommon for women in India. She almost always speaks what is on her mind and advocates a strong recognition of right for youth to make their own individual choices in how to live their lives. Although she is Govind's tutor, she quickly becomes his tutor in courting and thinking critically about some facets of his own life which he has heretofore tried to ignore.
On the other hand, as the novel unfolds this courtship is fairly slow as public distance among the sexes is promoted in Indian tradition (and how societal norms continue to function in India to this very day). For example, although Govind is several years older than Vidya, he does everything he can throughout the book to maintain the illusion that he is simply tutoring Vidya in maths--nothing more.
Vidya is the one who normally has to set up dates, even if it is under the guise of shopping for a new science book. This is the way it still is for most Indians today. Dating is just not done by most in India--even now in the 3rd millennium. Dating could affect a woman's virtue in the eyes of family, friends or society in much of India.
On the other hand, there is another pressure for secrecy in the relationship between Vidya and Govind that even westerners can comprehend. This is because, even in the West, there are certain commonly accepted concepts or codes of trust in any friendship. One of these codes is simply: Do not try and date your best friend's sister, especially behind his or her back.
I am referring here to Ish's love and trust for Govind. In fact, both Ish and his family have placed great trust in Govind. Govind is seen as part of the family--so to speak--helping to raise their daughter to succeed in the competitive entrance exams of India's university system.
In short, Govind constantly feels bad and conflicted for his deceit, and he is ashamed when Omi first confronts him with his indiscretion while on their trip to Australia. (This occurs when Omi discovers Govind has spent much of their meal money for that day on a long phone call back to Vidya in India.)
It appears clear that the storyteller Bhagat and his first-person narrator Govind, believe the first of the three big mistakes in Govind's life has to do with falling in love with his best friend's sister.
SOLUTIONS AND CRISES
The first big historical crisis to intervene in the lives of the protagonists in this novel by Bhagat is the Great Gujarati Earthquake--the first major natural catastrophe of this decade, a decade which has seen the Great Tsunami of Christmas 2004 in the Indian Ocean, Hurricane Katrina in the USA and the Kashmiri Earthquakes of 2005, and the floods in India and Bangladesh of recent days.
In the weeks preceding the natural calamity in Gujarat, the cricket shop, under Govind's management, had been preparing to move into a new popular mall. Just prior to the tremors, Govind and partners put down an expensive deposit on the new store.
Serendipitously, neither Govind nor his partners were in the mall at the time of the quake. The mall and all of the newer buildings in the area were flattened. Readers are educated by Bhagat to the fact that the older parts of Ahmadabad survived the quake quite well. We are told that shoddy and illegal construction are partially to blame for many of the other collapsed structures which left hundreds of thousands of Gujaratis homeless. Govind is terribly distraught--having lost a great deal of savings and loaned monies through the collapse of the mall. His friends console him and the business continues at the small shop, located on the ground's of Omi's family-run temple.
Meanwhile, we are shown a world of rising Hindu nationalism in this same period. This is because Mama, Omi's father, sympathizes with the cricket shop's losses and seeks to recruit all three owners to join him in his religious Hindu and political workshops, study camps, and demonstrations. Mama lets them rent the shop without payment for many months while the trio get back on their feel
Due to the fact that they have accepted Mama's generosity in taking on shop space and loans, Govind, Ish and Omi end up being more active than they desire at such Hindu events--including being asked to spy on Muslim and non-sectarian political groups & speakers over subsequent months.
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