Four years back, Chetan Bhagat's debut Five Point Someone met raves while heralding the arrival of popular fiction in contemporary Indian literature. Insular in their demographic and victim of scathing reviews, the first two books of the unabashed youth-writer caused ripples in the often cavalier GenNext and reserved for him a place in the book trade phenomenon. His debonair prose, often allotted the epithets - lucid and blithe, deals with teenage angst and is markedly character-driven.

He has been flogging his new book - The 3 mistakes of my life, which commingles religion and cricket and has three ambitious youngsters as protagonists- through the means of a book tour around the country. A marketing maniac, Bhagat approached Big Bazaar for the marketing tie-up that would see an interaction of his with an audience along with a book reading session. Inherently an entertainer, Bhagat declares, "What I want to do is entertain people, and I want to do it by writing nothing serious or highbrow." His second novel also roped in a plenitude of revenue after scoring for itself global rights.

Bhagat has been a craze and has managed to build for himself a label of sorts. While amiss in the livre de poche, according to literary critics are the intricate writing techniques, what Bhagat himself calls – ‘literary style of writing’, it hasn't eclipsed readership and the auteur manages to reign in epic number of readers, mostly young adults, with his Salinger-esque narration and confessional content. And now the writer, who is chary of his brand image, seats himself comfortable as an iconic figure in the pop culture.

His love for entertainment also dovetailed into him playing scriptwriter for the movie Hello, which is based upon the flick-lit One Night @ a Call Centre and is directed by Atul Agnihotri and stars a hefty cast comprising Salman Khan, Sohail Khan, Katrina Kaif, Sharman Joshi among others. Five Point Someone is also being adapted into a movie tentatively titled Idiots, by Rajkumar Hirani. He is also currently looking forward to penning a script for Imtiaz Ali.

The neo-writer analyses his market and chooses themes that would interest and would help evolve his readership. Anyone who has read literary fiction would assume that this is pandering to the market and to youth- his major target audience. But Bhagat clarifies, "I put it as researching what people like to read and writing about it. It’s all part of the formula for writing an unputdownable and wouldn't I feel good when a reader exclaims at me that how did I know certain things about him." This he manages by putting in honest, down-to-earth views on the pages of his stubborn bestsellers.

His novels have raked in a mountain of moolah and culled for him a fanbase, unheard of in Indian literature. But it hasn't moved the critics who persist to pick on his alleged formulaic plots and marketing skills unseemly of a writer, Bhagat dismisses it with a sour look and a sneer, "The critics were in denial of me when I came out with my first book, overlooking my presence. The second book gathered a lot of criticism but the books sold and isn't that what matters?" He staves off the criticism by persistently reminding himself the sales figures.

But what remains to be seen this third time around is whether the critics cut him a break.

( Chetan Bhagat was in Big Bazaar, Kothrud where he read from his book The 3 mistakes of my life and indulged in discussion with a houseful of fans about his writing and the hot off the press novel.)