Ruth Vanita (Author)
Ruth Vanita taught at Delhi University for twenty years and is now professor at the University of Montana. She was founding co-editor of Manushi 1978-90. She is the author of several books, including Sappho and the Virgin Mary: Same-Sex Love and the English Literary Imagination (1996); Love’s Rite: Same-Sex Marriage in India (2005); Gandhi’s Tiger and Sita’s Smile: Essays on Gender, Sexuality and Culture (2005), Gender, Sex and the City: Urdu Rekhti Poetry in India 1780–1870 (2012); Dancing with the Nation: Courtesans in Bombay Cinema (2017). Her first novel, Memory of Light, appeared in 2020.
She is the author of over sixty articles on British and Indian literature, and has translated many works of fiction and poetry from Hindi and Urdu to English, most notably Chocolate: Stories on Male-Male Desire by Pandey Bechan Sharma ‘Ugra’ (2008). She divides her time between Missoula and Gurgaon.
Saleem Kidwai (Author)
Saleem Kidwai is a historian and independent scholar, who taught at Ramjas College, Delhi University, for twenty years. He has published several academic essays on medieval and modern India, and translated several works, including Song Sung True: A Memoir by Malka Pukhraj and a collection of Syed Rafiq Hussain’s short stories, The Mirror of Wonders. Apart from the author herself, he is the only person to have translated the novels of Qurratulain Hyder, Chandni Begum and Ship of Sorrow.
R. GOPALAKRISHNAN (Gopal) is an author, speaker and corporate adviser, with three parts to his career of over fifty years: first, thirty-one years in Hindustan Unilever, ending as vice chairman; second, seventeen years as director, Tata Sons; and third, since 2016, as author and corporate adviser. Currently, he is the non-executive chairman of Castrol India, and independent director of Hemas Holdings PLC, Sri Lanka. He is also distinguished professor at IIT Kharagpur, and executive-in-residence at Mumbai’s prestigious SP Jain Institute of Management and Research. He has so far authored fifteen books, notably, The Case of the Bonsai Manager, When the Penny Drops, A Biography of Innovations and Crash: Lessons from the Entry and Exit of CEOs. Gopal greatly welcomes feedback and comments on this book at rgopal@themindworks.me.
R. NARAYANAN began his career in Coca-Cola and Nestlé, followed by extensive experience in advertising. Since the 1980s, Narayanan has been deeply involved with start-ups. He founded and ran a company to make and market Big Fun, a chewing gum product. His next venture was to create a machine or business system to dispense dosa, just like hamburgers, an offering that he branded as Dosa King. He then became a passionate participant in angel investing and mentoring.
Rabindranath Tagore, Renaissance man, reshaped Bengal’s literature and music, and became the first non-European to win the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1913. He introduced new prose and verse forms and the use of colloquial language into Bengali literature, thereby freeing it from traditional models based on classical Sanskrit. He was highly influential in introducing the best of Indian culture to the West and vice versa, and was a living institution for India, especially for Bengal.
Devdutt Pattanaik is a medical doctor by education, a leadership consultant by profession and a mythologist by passion. He has written and lectured extensively on the nature of sacred stories, symbols and rituals and their relevance in modern times. His books with Penguin India include The Book of Ram, Myth = Mithya: A Handbook of Hindu Mythology, The Pregnant King, Sita: An Illustrated Retelling of the Ramayana and the Devlok series of stories for children. Devdutt’s unconventional approach and engaging style are evident in his lectures, books and articles. To know more visit www.devdutt.com.
Ranjeev C. Dubey is a corporate lawyer, author, public speaker, business columnist, blogger and keen hobbyist. He has published two other books, Winning Legal Wars and Bullshit Quotient. His interests include travel and food journalism, photography, videography, miniature railways, radio-control helicopters and off-road wilderness journeys.
Prerna Singh Bindra is India’s leading wildlife conservationist and writer. She served as a member, National Board for Wildlife and its core Standing Committee (2010-13), and also on Uttarakhand’s State Board for Wildlife. Prerna has written more than 1,500 articles on nature and wildlife and has authored the book The King and I: Travels in Tigerland. Her anthology on contemporary wildlife writings, Voices in the Wilderness, was released in June 2010.
Prerna is editor of the journal TigerLink, and is guest faculty for a module for popular writing at the National Centre for Biological Sciences. Prerna has recently set up a trust, Bagh (bagh.org).
Prerna’s primary focus is protecting wildlife habitats and critically endangered species. She lives in Gurgaon but her heart, she says, resides in the forest.
Established in 1969, World Wide Fund for Nature-India (WWF India) is one of the country’s largest and most respected conservation organizations. WWF India is a part of the WWF International network, which has a presence in over 100 countries across our planet. Historically, WWF India started as a wildlife conservation organization with a focus on protecting particular species of wild flora and fauna. Over the years, however, its perspective has broadened to reflect a more holistic understanding of conservation issues that the country faces today, such as the survival of species and habitats, climate change, sustainable livelihoods, sustainable business practices and environmental education. An initiative of WWF India and TRAFFIC India, Wild Wisdom is India’s only international-level wildlife quiz.
Yasmin Khan is a British writer and historian. She is an associate professor of history at the University of Oxford and a fellow of Kellogg College. Her first book, The Great Partition: The Making of India and Pakistan won the Gladstone Prize from the Royal Historical Society in 2007 and was longlisted for the Orwell Prize in 2008.
Aditi De is a Bangalore-based author, dreamer, traveller, editor (though not necessarily in that order). She loves children and the world of the word. In 1989, she launched Junior Quest, the popular magazine from the Chandamama group, and later edited the Open Sesame children’s supplement at the Deccan Herald. Her books include A Twist in the Tale: More Indian Folktales (Puffin India). She has written children’s columns for Chatterbox magazine, Deccan Chronicle and Young World.
