. It is an extremely popular job profile especially among a very large portion of the youth. Maximum employment is seen in call centers and it is responsible for turning over more than half the youngsters from non-earning to earning members of their respective families.
Although this work may sound as easy as answering calls, there is a lot more that goes on behind this trouble-free looking job. From being pressured to reach their sales targets in the given time to the heart breaking racist comments that they have to smile off politely, these employees have their own portion of issues.
Add to that the body clock has to be reversed too, in order to match the time zones of another continent.
It is precisely these issues that will be seen in Atul Agnihotri's next directorial venture Hello, starring Salman Khan, Sohail Khan, Issha Koppikar, Sharman Joshi, Amrita Arora, Gul Panag and Katrina Kaif.
The film is an adaptation of the book One Night @ The Call Centre by Chetan Bhagat. The foot-stomping music has been composed by Sajid and Wajid.
Says the director, Atul Agnihotri,"Hello is a tale about the events that happen one night at a call centre".
Told through the views of the protagonist, Shyam, it is the story of almost lost love, thwarted ambitions, an absence of family affection, pressures of patriarchal set up, and the work environment of a globalized office.
Shyam is loosing his girlfriend because of his career going nowhere as he trudges his way around in a call centre. His Girlfriend Priyanka, is also an agent at the call centre like him, who is about to be snatched by an NRI techno geek.
There is also an aspiring model ESHA, who is hoping for the break that seems to be always eluding her and the man about town, VROOM, who is into well, things.
The housewife Radhika who is constantly at the receiving end of her mother in law, and a beleaguered grandfather, Military uncle, who has been barred from interacting with his grandchild make up the rest of the call centre agents who see their words crumbling around them as their decisions of right sizing are conveyed by Bakshi, the boss. It is a night when the dreams will finally crumble. Or will they?
For there is that call from GOD!
Narrated as the tale within, a beautiful woman meets the narrator and promises him a story on the condition that he has to narrate it further. HELLO, is one remarkable story in a thousand and one globalizing, urban, Indian nights and is an absolute must see.