This is the debut novel of Bindu Dalmia , a well known guest columnist for mainstream media organisations. Narrated through the protagonist Akshraa, The Dairy of a lutyen’s Princess chronicles a typical middle class girl’s journey in life over five decades.
The author, through Akshraa, portrays the story of a girl’s trial and tells the reader how some things in life are never as simple as they seem. Brought up in Calcutta, 18 year old Akshraa falls in love and marries her childhood sweetheart, soon to realise that love doesn’t last forever. One of the major themes in the book is the crippling effect of patriarchy. Akshraa’s father preferred ‘bores’ when it came to the discussion of marriage as they made for stable spouses and would not turn out to be philanderers.
While choosing a life partner, it is seldom a predictable and linear progression of emotions, as it’s difficult to sometimes control the flow of circumstances. As is said — Marry in haste, repent at leisure and restart the charade of life a second time! In her mid-thirties, she restarts her life with her young son in Delhi — the city of power, navigating through the conniving traps and the social curriculum vitae that demanded excellence in looks, lifestyle, pedigree and performance.
Working by Warren Buffet’s mantra — love what you do, and you will never feel you have worked a single day in your life, she carves a professional niche for herself as a marketing head at HCl, a startup which was the perfect canvas for Akshraa to channelise and nurture her professional creativity. She soon finds that when work and exercise are pursued with passionate zeal, they become a ‘constant’ amidst the variables of life.
life takes another turn when she ties the knot with Surya Prakash, from one of the first business families of India; a relation that comes with its own set of trials and tribulations. lutyen’s — a suffocatingly splendid world, trapped with illusions and afflicted by obsessions. Its inhabitants suffer from the severe dysfunctional disorder of OTT (Over the Top) dressing. It’s a city of shopping addicts. The rat race among the glitterati serve as comic relief.
The author expresses her views on life with some hard hitting yet refreshing perspective. She highlights the importance of self-worth and narrates how empowerment Akshraa had “gotten over the human need of feeling complete only if one was in a relationship” as working to optimal capacity gave her the same emotions of reward and a sense of self-worth, not dependent on anybody else but one that stemmed from her own creativity and grit. Because that’s how life is; what matters is that at the end of the day you pick yourself up and take the next step because that makes all the difference.
The author beautifully portrays the reality of Indian women. Where an ambitious women who dreamt big was most men’s nightmare. And women with both education and money equaled power which threatened the very foundations of a male dominated society; or the male ego so to speak.
The author after experiencing the constraints of bird in a golden cage syndrome, felt that it was important for her to give a larger message to womankind, that you should trust your own prowess and in the incredible powers that each of us is gifted with. After all, you alone can stand up for yourself and so building a life more gratifying to one’s inner self is more fulfilling than defining your worth through the standards of a man-woman relationship. Financial stability and financial independence are two pillars that every woman needs. As the author says “If you learn to control your finances, you won’t find yourself stuck in jobs, places, or relationships that you hate”.
When a person truly falls in love with oneself, the dependency on a spouse, friends or society, is dispensed. Hobbies and work turn into essentials for survival. And nurturing the mind, body and soul turn far more rewarding than being trapped in materialistic indulgences.