Gurgaon lanes look straight out of Desperate Housewives

It’s very important to be able to see the world with as much humour as possible because everything can be so horrifying,” says author Diksha Basu. And one gets reminded of how Mr Jha — protagonist of her debut novel The Windfall — squirms at the thought of a luxury car delivery boy seeing him in his not-so-luxurious house in East Delhi.

Basu explores the lives of Mr and Mrs Jha, as the two shift from a middle class neighbourhood to the posh NCR suburb of the Capital, Gurgaon.

Alongside, the book chronicles Delhi’s past to present journey. “Delhi is a crucial character in my book, as much as [any of] my human characters. Part of it is also influenced by upstate New York, where I also spent my childhood,” she says.

Beyond materialism, insecurities and personal wealth, Basu is also influenced by the Capital. “I grew up in Delhi and then shifted [out] in 1994, but came back to India to spend time, here every four to six months,” says the Delhiite turned New Yorker, who admits having witnessed the “explosion of wealth in the 1990’s”.

She even contrasts Delhi and Gurgaon explaining, “Gurgaon is both physically and metaphorically separated from Delhi. The lanes look straight out of [TV series] Desperate Housewives.”

Having acted in a film, A Decent Arrangement (2011), alongside Shabana Azmi, she was always interested in writing. “When I was acting, I was sick of waiting for decisions that were made by others. I wanted a career that was in my control,” she says.

But writing is no easy job. Basu admits, “Writing is slow, lonely, challenging and [a] difficult profession. Spending hours [at a stretch] at your laptop [is] the hardest part. But it’s so nice to bring the book out to the world.”

Her passion has got wings as her book has been auctioned, and filmmaker Shonali Bose — director of Margarita with a Straw — is developing it into a plot.