Chetan Bhagat and Birbal Jha

Patna, Nov. 24: A scholar in Patna has accused Chetan Bhagat of plagiarising his play into Half Girlfriend, the writer’s latest novel.

Birbal Jha, the director of British Lingua, a spoken English institute in Patna, released his bilingual play, Englishia Boli, last year in August.

This morning, Jha said: “In January this year, I gifted a copy of the play to Bhagat when he visited my institution in Patna to interact with the students and faculty members.”

Bhagat’s latest offering, quite a favourite with youths in Patna, Half Girlfriend was released in October. The same month, Notre Dame Academy organised a book fair on its premises where copies of the novel flew off the shelves.

Jha has decided to drag the writer to court for lifting the novel’s theme from his play.

He said: “I am sending a legal notice to Bhagat for plagiarism. The book is educational, created in the form of a drama revolving around social issues and the benefits of learning English. The play has been written with the aim of educating the financially underprivileged students of Bihar who have problems in speaking English with ease.”

Jha’s allegation is not the first barb at Bhagat from Bihar. Earlier, residents of Dumraon had also taken to the streets in protest against his depiction of their hometown in the book.

At 8.37pm on Sunday, he tweeted: “Plagiarism is a serious charge, and one can simply compare two published works and see if it exists. Nobody bothered to do that.”

Englishia Boli revolves around the journey of a village boy in Bihar, Chandra Prasad, who moves to New Delhi. Chandra cannot speak English and feels alienated in the city because of it. He decides to learn the language and succeeds — he lands a job in a company where he meets future wife, who had in an earlier encounter slapped him.

The story ends with the couple tying the knot, reinforcing the idea that personal and professional happiness are intrinsically linked to English-speaking skills.

Bhagat’s story is on Madhav Jha, a youth from Dumraon, and his pursuit for his love Riya. Madhav is also quite bad in English.

The descendants of the formerly princely state have also threatened to sue Bhagat for making allegedly uncharitable remarks about them in his novel.