AA: Tell us how you started writing Q&A, the subject of this newly released film?
 
VS: Well I was posted in London in 2002-2003. In 2003 my family had preceded me to India. I was already posted out to India and my wife and two sons had gone away to India and I was left in London with two months to go and a plot in my head. That's when I started writing this novel called Q&A and I finished it in two months.
 
AA: How did you get the plot?
 
VS: Basically, I have been a quizzer myself and quizzes have become a ubiquitous part of our culture. You see quizzes on the BBC, then the crorepati phenomenon came and it took over the whole of India. It became the national obsession. I was posted in London at the time and that's when the famous Major Ingram episode happened on 'Who wants to be a millionaire' British edition. The major won £1 million on the show but was subsequently accused of cheating when it was discovered he had an accomplice in the audience who was giving him coded coughs.
 
I thought to myself that if someone with as high a social standing as a major in the British army can be suspected of cheating, why not set a story based on a quiz show and with a contestant who would definitely be accused of cheating. Because we have this latent conceit that those of us who go to Eton and Harrow and Oxford, we know. And our maids and gardeners and these types of people don't know anything. But I have always been impressed by the wisdom that even these people possessed. So the whole idea of the novel was to show that sometimes street knowledge can be as important as book knowledge.
 
AA: But to write from conception to completion all within two months is remarkable.
 
VS: It’s quite strange. The stranger fact is that what you have read is my first draft. I imagine I had conceived the idea three or four months before I started writing it, but it was festering in my mind, it was germinating, it was developing in my head. I wrote it in a burst. In fact in one weekend I did 20,000 words.
 
AA: How did you find a publisher?

VS: In the first month I wrote four and a half chapters and l sent it out to 10 agents – those that l thought would be interested in Indian fiction. I didn't hear back from them. Then I discovered this agent who took me on from the Internet. He didn't even have an agency at that time and later on I discovered that I was his first client. He was looking for authors, he liked my concept and so he signed me on. Then the question was how I finish the novel. That's when I was told I was being posted to Delhi as Director, Pakistan. That was a 9-9 job and I knew that once I was in Delhi I wouldn't be able to finish this novel. But since I had an agent was an added incentive. I worked like a maniac, finished the novel in the next one month and on the 11th September, 2003, I handed over my manuscript.
 
AA: Your agent was a purely chance connection.
VS: Yes, it was chance, luck did play a role. We met on the Net, he liked my work, then he signed me on and on the 11th of September I handed over the complete manuscript. On the 12th of September I was sitting on an aeroplane going back to India.
 
AA: Looking back what technique did you use? Did it just flow naturally, or did you go to some writers' workshop to understand how to structure your plot?
 
VS: No this is the most interesting thing. I never had English Literature as my subject for graduation. Number two, I never attended a creative writing workshop. So I just wrote instinctively and, if you see the structure of Q&A, one of its strengths is the structure. It's a very unique structure. Through the medium of the book I am exposing the private life of my protagonist, Ram Mohammed Thomas, through the public spectacle of who will win a billion. A quiz show. Just as there are 12 questions on the quiz show, so there are 12 chapters in the book. And at the beginning of every chapter he narrates stories from his life and how that enabled him to win a particular question. This is exactly the same framing device that the film has also followed. So the strength of the book is the framing device. The uniqueness of the book is this unique way of telling a story through the medium of a quiz show.
 
AA: And that came to you instinctively?
 
VS: Yes, that came to me instinctively. I knew from the very beginning that the chapters would not be one, two and four. They would be 1,000, 2,000, 10,000 etc going up to a billion.
 
AA: When you were writing it, did you think to yourself, 'I must have a happy ending for Mr Thomas?' Ideas of good and evil?
 
VS: Actually, from the very beginning it was clear to me that this book would have an optimistic ending because Ram Mohammed Thomas has had a very eventful life and the kind of background from which he comes – you could not have him graduate from London University in Chapter 3.  So he has to pass through the bars and chawls of India, the rains of India, work as a servant here, a waiter there, that kind of a thing. His life is one of extreme hardship, extreme poverty, some suffering also. I was clear that there has to be a pot at the end of the rainbow, there has to be light at the end of the tunnel, which is why you have a happy ending.
 
AA: How much of your own personal experience filters through in this book?
 
VS: Well there is nothing autobiographical. I come from a more privileged background than Thomas. But I believe you can write about such characters if you have the quality of empathy.  At core we are all human beings. What separates the rich from the poor? It’s just the presence or absence of certain things. You cannot say that a poor man's feelings or emotions are different from a rich man's. It’s just that a rich man has certain things that a poor man does not have. Take those things out and you can pretty well imagine. That's what I thought. I said if I don't know whether I will get my next meal tomorrow, if I don't know whether I have a roof over my head tomorrow, what will I behave like, what will I do ? That's how I tried to get under the skin of Ram Mohammed Thomas. There's nothing autobiographical about the book, but, yes, some of the perceptions. For example if you see an injustice happening, or you see a social evil, then you try to present that through the medium of fiction.
 
AA: But this empathy with the downtrodden that has come through in your book and elsewhere is not representative of your urban class background. So who gave you these values, where do they come from?
 
VS: This is a difficult question to answer. You are asking why I am what I am and one really cannot give a straight answer. It's a product of so many things like the place where you were born and brought up, the kinds of friends you had, the kind of life you led, the experiences you had. I don't see myself as unique in this case. I am sure there are lots of people from privileged backgrounds who can feel empathy for those less fortunate and that is a quality needed in India because sometimes we are accused of being apathetic, that there is this wide gulf between rich and poor and there are two sides of a coin that will never meet. That's wrong. The quality of empathy can bridge that gap and, yes, you cannot go and make every poor man a rich man, but you can share your thoughts with them. The quality of being human which unites all of us can bridge these superficial differences.

AA: Civil servants tend to be quite detached. How have you managed to retain your human qualities?

VS: I have always believed that people respect you for what you are. The fact that you have written a book and that it has become successful can add to what you are. But while people will respect you for your ‘chair’, they also respect you for your human qualities. I think it’s very important that you maintain a perspective in life. I have not allowed fame to go to my head or whatever because after all these are ephemeral things. You know you do one good book and your next book can be a complete bomb and you are back to square one. People ask me this question, ‘Mr Swarup would you think of quitting your day job and becoming a full time novelist’. I dismiss that question because for me it’s not an either or other thing at the moment. I think I can wear two hats at the same time and I think I can wear them comfortably. Of course you have to make compromises when your head is battling with ideas and you have to attend the National Day of Myanmar. You have to go for the National Day because that’s part of your job. The job has made you what you are, so you cannot put that aside. And yet at the same time you have free time at your disposal which you can utilise. Some people utilise it in playing golf, I utilise it in writing.

AA: I think it’s Einstein who once said, ‘Stop thinking of being a man of success and become a man of worth.’ Does that have a resonance with you?

VS: I have not heard this quote, but I would be very happy if that were the epigraph of my life.

AA: Did you expect to get a film out of your book?

VS: No, actually I did not know whether it would get published – that’s the first thing – or whether it would be translated. Now it’s been translated into 36 languages. We signed the Slovenian rights yesterday. So that in itself was a revelation to me because I thought I’d written a very Indian book. It’s written in an Indian idiom, its set in India. As a first time writer I had no idea. I said why the hell someone in Sweden would want to read a book about Ram Mohammed Thomas living in India. It’s only later I realised once again that feelings and emotions are universal. You may be Swedish or Indian or whatever, but at core you are all humans and it’s a human story that attracts people across. Film of course was the farthest thing from my mind, but yet Film 4 picked up the book 15 months before it was published. They saw the potential in it and many people have said that the book is very visual. You can actually see the things happening in front of your eyes. So I think that really added to its charm, but the essential charm was that it was an underdog story told in a very unique narrative.

AA: Have the book and the film made you a very wealthy man?    

VS: People keep asking me this question and the answer is no, not in dollar terms I can assure you.

AA: What have you done with your royalties? Have you paid off your debts, bought a house?

VS: No I have not done anything. Look it’s a misnomer. People think you get hold of a whole lot of money in one go. No. It keeps coming to you in dribs and drabs. As I said, it’s just been two years, it’s not as though I have a truck load of royalties every two months or whatever. It’s all very new to me and I’m still enjoying it.

AA: Is writing of this sort compatible with being a civil servant?

VS: Yes, that’s the advantage of living in a democracy. It gives you the freedom to express your thoughts. Obviously, there are certain limitations to being a civil servant. You have to write with a somewhat hesitant pen, I would imagine. But, at the same time, it gives you the flexibility to express your thoughts in the way you want to – as long as you do not offend anyone’s sensibilities.

AA: To the best of my knowledge the Indian Foreign Service has never before had as successful an author as you in its ranks. This must be a first. Have you encountered much jealousy?

VS: No, no. There are lots of people in the Foreign Service who have written; yes it’s incidental that my book has been a greater success for reasons that I am not entitled to know. But the cake is big enough for everyone to enjoy. I write very different kinds of books. Pavan Verma (Director General of the Indian Council of Cultural Relations) writes non- fiction books, Navtej Sarna (Indian Ambassador to Israel) writes historical fiction. So the canvas is wide enough for everyone to paint it with their own brushes. There shouldn’t be any feeling of jealousy or envy.

AA: What’s next for you?

VS: Well, I’ve written two books and a third is bubbling in my head and it’s an international thriller set outside India for a change. So I’m conceptualising that at the moment. I had a two book deal, so this was the fulfilment of the two book deal. So I’m off the hook as far as contractual obligations are concerned. So now I can take my own sweet time in writing the next one.

AA: The second book Six Suspects, is this being taken on by the BBC?

VS: The BBC had acquired the film rights and we’ve had a meeting to discuss the options. It’s a very complex book and it can either work as a six part mini series on TV, or it can work as a feature. That’s the fundamental question they need to resolve.

AA: Do you want to stay a civil servant or would you consider a full time career as a writer?

VS: As they say, a swallow does not a summer make. Having written two books, I am still diffident describing myself as a writer. I am a diplomat who writes. So in the near future I certainly see myself as part of the diplomatic service, but what happens after that, where life takes me, we cross the bridge when we come to it.