In the cultural hub of 1880s’ Lahore Kay Robinson has taken over as editor of the Civil and Military Gazette. Assisting him is the young and impressionable Rudyard Kipling, a lonely, impulsive man who dreams of becoming a writer. Kipling’s literary pursuits have been dismissed as fanciful and foolish by his previous boss. But Robinson is different. He encourages the young ‘Ruddy’, allowing him greater creative freedom at the Gazette. As he becomes Ruddy’s friend and confidant, Robinson gains access to intimate glimpses of the Kipling family, where he is smitten by Ruddy’s sister Trix.
Narrated by Robinson, The Kipling File is a moving story of doomed friendship and difficult love recounted against the powerful backdrop of Anglo-Indian life in a Punjab that has begun to stir with anti-colonial sentiment. Through his eyes unfold the turmoils that shaped the author of beloved classics like The Jungle Book and Kim.
In Sudhir Kakar’s luminous prose, Kipling emerges as a man of compelling contradictions-a mercurial genius whose immense talent was in pitched battle with his inner demons.
From adventure to indenture, martyrs to merchants, Partition to plantation, from Kashmir to Kerala, Japan to Jamaica and beyond,
the many facets of the great migrations of India and the world are mapped in India Moving, the first book
of its kind.
To understand how millions of people have moved-from, to and within India-the book embarks on a journey laced with evidence, argument and wit, providing insights into topics like the slave trade and migration of workers, travelling business communities such as the Marwaris, Gujaratis and Chettiars, refugee crises and the roots of contemporary mass migration from Bihar and Kerala, covering terrain that often includes diverse items such as mangoes, dosas and pressure cookers.
India Moving shows the scale and variety of Indian migration and argues that greater mobility is a prerequisite for maintaining the country’s pluralistic traditions.
We’ve become a tribe of tech addicts, and it’s not entirely our fault.
Taking advantage of vulnerabilities in the human brain function, tech companies entice us to overdose on technology interaction. This damages our lives, work, families and friendships. Swipe-driven apps train us to evaluate people like products, diminishing our relationships. At work, we email on an average of seventy-seven times a day, ruining our concentration. At home, light from our screens contributes to epidemic sleep deprivation.
But we can reclaim our lives without dismissing technology. The authors explain how to avoid getting hooked on tech and how to define and control the roles that it plays and could play in our lives. This profound and timely book turns personal observation into a handy guide to adapting to our new reality of omnipresent technology.
When Namita is ten, her mother takes her to Dhondutai, a respected Mumbai music teacher from the great Jaipur Gharana. Dhondutai has dedicated herself to music and her antecedents are rich. She is the only remaining student of the legendary Alladiya Khan, the founder of the gharana and of its most famous singer, the tempestuous songbird, Kesarbai Kerkar. Namita begins to learn singing from Dhondutai, at first reluctantly and then, as the years pass, with growing passion. Dhondutai sees in her a second Kesar, but does Namita have the dedication to give herself up completely to music-or will there always be too many late nights and cigarettes? Beautifully written, full of anecdotes, gossip and legend, The Music Room is perhaps the most intimate book to be written about Indian classical music yet
What are the challenges and perks of handling age-old legacies?
If you come into a position of power through a position of privilege, how do you make sure that you earn respect, more so if you are a woman?
These and many more questions are what Daughters of Legacy seeks to answer through the stories of twelve successful women who grew up with strong business lineages.
While Ashni Biyani, chief ideator, Future Group, looks at herself as a co-creator of the business rather than a just a legacy bearer, Manasi Kirloskar, executive director and CEO, Kirloskar Systems Ltd, admits that she is hugely privileged in inheriting a large business, but also goes on to point out that she could lose everything overnight if she isn’t competent. And Meher Pudumjee’s acceptance as non-executive chairperson of Thermax Global that legacies can sometimes feel like a burden is followed close on the heels by the realization that there is nothing more that one can do except give one’s best.
Chosen from a wide cross section in terms of scale of business, roles and hierarchy these women have not only kept the legacies alive but have also gone on to carve a niche for themselves as individuals beyond their famous last names. Clearly for all of them legacy is far more than mere inheritance.
Kannur, a sleepy coastal district in the scenic south Indian state of Kerala, has metamorphosed into a hotbed of political bloodshed in the past few decades. Even as India heaves into the age of technology and economic growth, the town has been making it to the national news for horrific crimes and brutal murders with sickening regularity.
What makes this region so susceptible to vendetta politics and such deadly violence? How is it an anomaly in Kerala, the state with the highest social development parameters in India? Born in Kannur and brought up amidst some of the tallest political leaders of the state, author Ullekh N.P. delves into his personal experiences while drawing a modern-day graph that charts out the reasons, motivations and the local lore behind the turmoil. He analyses the numbers that lay bare the truth behind the hype, studies the area’s political and cultural heritage, and speaks to the main protagonists and victims. With his journalistic skills and years of on-the-field reporting, he paints a gripping narrative of the ongoing bloodbath and the perceptions around it.
Ullekh’s investigations and interviews reveal a bigger game at work involving players who will stop at nothing to win.
In her bestselling novel Aftertaste (over 5000 hardback copies sold), Namita Devidayal provides a captivating account of a baniya family settled in Punjab headed by a matriarch, Mummyji, who is in hospital after a stroke. The Todarmal family, glued together by money not love, includes the weak and emasculated Rajan Papa who is desperately in need of cash; Sunny, the dynamic head of the business with an ugly marriage and a demanding mistress; Suman, the spoilt and greedy beauty of the family who is determined to get her hands on Mummyji’s best jewels; and Saroj, Suman’s unlucky sister, who has always lived in her shadow. Each one of them wants Mummyji to die
Enter the secret world of your wild pets!
Ever wondered why this world’s called a rat race?
Why does your teacher call you the chatter bird of the class?
How did those dratted lice get in your hair?
Let’s find out the answers to these and more in this exciting one-of-a-kind backyard-jungle book. Wilderness and wildlife aren’t just confined to the forests; there is a whole lot of wild in our own backyards! Some of these critters are awake with you in the day. Others wake up when you go to bed…
Discover the hunters and the hunted, the diggers and the tunnellers, the raptors and the roaches, roaming around under our very noses.
Say hi to them and take a look at their home, which, incidentally, is also ours.
Birbal and Akbar had just taken out their swords. Birbal was holding his high in the air. Ash and Tara stopped and stared at each other, awful realization in their eyes.
‘The sword!’ said Ash.
‘Its tip is poisoned!’ said Tara.
The Palace of Silence looms eerily over the town of Rajaraman in Rajasthan. Once the bustling abode of King Rajendra and his large family, it is now enveloped in deafening silence. The king and the royal family are never to be seen; and a shadowy stranger has got the town under his control.
Meanwhile in Agra, celebrations are afoot. A group of travelling performers is visiting from south India and Akbar wants to turn the occasion into a grand event rounded off with an elephant race. He decides to send Ash and his friends to his old ally King Rajendra’s kingdom on an important errand. Making their way on the dangerous highways of medieval India, the boys reach Rajasthan. But they are greeted by an eerie, empty palace inhabited only by a sinister servant and a cruel prince. Is this their journey’s end, or just the beginning, as they gradually uncover a plot being hatched that is as chilling as it is cunning …
The call of the wild
Hudhud is horrible to everyone. He polishes off his classmates’ lunches, plays cruel pranks on his teachers and troubles innocent creatures. Until his strange new history teacher decides to set him straight.
The lesson? A curse! Now Hudhud must roam the vast earth . . . with-and as-the greatest migratory animals. His goal? To find the answer to all wrongs. And so begins Hudhud’s remarkable journey: as a blue whale calf separated from his mother in the deep; as a trusting caterpillar who befriends a hunting spider; as a competitive caribou on a perilous trek; as an Arctic tern too scared to fly . . . But fly across the world he must, if he hopes to ever return home.
Follow Hudhud on this surreal trip, through the Arctic Ocean and the Sahara Desert, among fragrant flowers and tall grass, and find out all about the inner lives of some majestic animals and the wonders of the wild.
