Ruby Lal is an award-winning historian of India and professor of South Asian history at Emory
University whose writing has appeared in Time, BBC History, and Literary Hub. She is the author
of Empress: The Astonishing Reign of Nur Jahan, which was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. Her most recent book, Vagabond Princess: The Great Adventures of Gulbadan, was longlisted for the prestigious Cundill History Prize and received praise from the BBC, Wall Street Journal, and Times Literary Supplement, among others. She divides her time between Atlanta, Georgia, and Delhi, India.
Molly Crabapple is an artist and writer whose articles and art have appeared in the New York
Times, New York Review of Books, Paris Review, Rolling Stone, and The New Yorker. Her work
has been nominated for three Emmys, has been longlisted for the National Book Award, and is in
the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art. She lives in New York City.
Varghese K. George is the associate editor of The Hindu based in New Delhi. He has previously worked as the newspaper’s US correspondent, based in Washington, DC, and political editor, based in New Delhi. He has written extensively on politics, political economy, society and the foreign policy of India and the US, particularly the rise of nationalism in both countries in recent years and its impact on their ties with the world.
Prior to joining The Hindu, he was chief of bureau at Hindustan Times. He has also worked for the Indian Express in various roles. His reports have won several awards, including the Ramnath Goenka Journalist of the Year, the Prem Bhatia Memorial Award for Excellence in Political Reporting, the Transparency International Award for fighting corruption and the International Press Institute Award for Excellence in Journalism.
MOHSIN HAMID writes regularly for The New York Times, the Guardian and the New York Review of Books, and is the author of Exit West, The Reluctant Fundamentalist, Moth Smoke, How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia and Discontent and its Civilizations. Born and mostly raised in Lahore, he has since lived between Lahore, London and New York.
Benjamin Elman is Gordon Wu ’58 Professor of Chinese Studies and professor of East Asian studies and history at Princeton University. His books include A Cultural History of Modern Science in China (2006) and Civil Examinations and Meritocracy in Late Imperial China (2013).
Sheldon Pollock is the Arvind Raghunathan Professor of South Asian Studies at Columbia University. His many publications include World Philology (2015) and A Rasa Reader: Classical Indian Aesthetics (Columbia, 2016). He is founding general editor of the Murty Classical Library of India.
Benjamin Elman is Gordon Wu ’58 Professor of Chinese Studies and professor of East Asian studies and history at Princeton University. His books include A Cultural History of Modern Science in China (2006) and Civil Examinations and Meritocracy in Late Imperial China (2013).
Badri Narayan is a social historian and professor at G.B. Pant Social Science Institute, Allahabad. His research interests range from popular culture, social and anthropological history to Dalit and subaltern issues. Writing in English and Hindi, Narayan is the author of The Making of the Dalit Public in North India: Uttar Pradesh, 1950-Present (2011), Fascinating Hindutva-Saffron Politics and Dalit Mobilisation (2009) and Women Heroes and Dalit Assertion in North India (2006). He has also been the recipient of the Fulbright Senior Fellowship (2004-05) and the Smuts Fellowship, University of Cambridge (2007).
Ghyanendra Nath Bajpai, a distinguished leader in Indian business was the chairman of the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI). Earlier, he was the chairman of the Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC). Bajpai is known for his visionary leadership. He has served as a non-executive chairman and a director on corporate boards in India and other countries, received awards for contribution to business and authored several books. He has written four popular books: The Securities Market, Marketing of Insurances, How to Become a Super Successful Salesman and The Essential Book of Corporate Governance. He received a number of awards, most notably the Outstanding Contribution to the Development of Finance Award from the prime minister of India and the W.G. Chirmule Puraskar, 2014 for commendable contribution in the fields of insurance and regulation of stock market.
Bajpai holds a master’s degree in commerce from the University of Agra and a degree in law (LLB) from the University of Indore. He is an avid golfer.
G.B.S. Sidhu is a retired special secretary, Research and Analysis Wing (R&AW). He was one of the key Indian officers involved in the merger of the princely state of Sikkim with the Indian republic in 1975.
Siddharth Singh is an energy, mobility and climate policy expert. He was selected to be a German Chancellor Fellow in 2016-17 under the guardianship of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s office. In the past, he has worked at the Wuppertal Institute in Berlin, Fridtjof Nansen Institute in Oslo and TERI in New Delhi. He has a graduate degree in international studies and diplomacy from SOAS, University of London, and an undergraduate degree in economics from the University of Delhi. The Great Smog of India is his first book.
Miles Taylor is professor of modern history at the University of York. Between 2008 and 2014 he was director of the Institute of Historical Research.
