There is no film family quite like the Kapoors. A family of professional actors and directors, they span almost eighty years of film-making in India, from the 1920s to the present. Each decade in the history of Indi films has had at least one Kapoor-if not more-playing a large part in defining it. Never before have four generations of this family-or five, if you include Bashesharnath Kapoor, Prithviraj Kapoor’s father, who played the judge in Awara-been brought together in one book. The Kapoors details the careers and personal lives of each generation’s box-office successes and failures, the ideologies that informed their work, the larger-than-life Kapoor weddings and Holi celebrations, their extraordinary romantic liaisons and family relationships, their love for food and their dark passages with alcohol. Based on extensive personal interviews conducted over seven years with family members and friends, Madhu Jain goes behind the façade of each member of the Kapoor clan to reveal what makes them tick. The Kapoors resembles the films that the great showman Raj Kapoor made: grand and sweeping, with moments of high drama and touching emotion.
Catagory: Society & Social Sciences
Kapoors
Making Dreams Come True
In just over five years of its existence, the Tech Mahindra Foundation (TMF) has helped bring about a significant change in the lives of thousands of underprivileged children and youth. Funded entirely by Tech Mahindra, it has risen to the Herculean challenge of providing them educational opportunities from primary schooling to vocational training. In this endeavour, it has laid special emphasis on those who are more vulnerable: the girl child, the physically challenged and religious minorities. And with each passing year, its philanthropic operations and its successes continue to grow, bringing hope to an ever-increasing number of disadvantaged young people.
Making Dreams Come True provides valuable insights into how a medium-sized private foundation has become a significant contributor to some of the country’s most important developmental goals. Moreover, it is a testament to the passion and hard work of not only the TMF and its personnel but also others involved in this important project of building a more inclusive India.
God’s Own Office
James Joseph was in his late thirties, well ensconced in his job as a director with Microsoft, when he decided to take a family vacation in Aluva, Kerala. His six-year-old daughter tasted a jackfruit from a tree in their own yard and remarked, ‘Daddy, this is so delicious. I wish I could eat the fruits from this tree every year.’
Part memoir, part how-to, this is his amazing story of starting out from the backwaters of Kerala, becoming a corporate captain in America and then finding a way to have a successful career while working out of his village in Kerala.This book also contains tips and techniques for anyone frustrated with living in cities. How do you set up a home office? How do you integrate with the local community? Where do your kids go to school? How do you convince your company to give you this opportunity? God’s Own Office may well inspire you to transform your life.
Mahatma Gandhi
With a new introduction by Makarand R. Paranjape
The life of Mahatma Gandhi is the story of a legend. In Mahatma Gandhi: The Great Indian Way, Raja Rao upends the genre of the literary biography with inventive non-linear chronology, through dialogue and anecdote, situating the physical within the metaphysical, and with a text that is both retrospective and contemporary at the same time. By mapping genealogies and distilling them, Rao focuses on Gandhi’s years in South Africa, the birth of non-violent resistance, and then moves into the epic freedom struggle in India, which brought Gandhi to worldwide renown in his own lifetime.
With an emphasis on the idea of dharma as a framework for Gandhism, both in South Africa and India, this is the story of the man as much as the Mahatma.
The Domestic Life of Gods
In Hindu mythology, the children of Gods and Goddesses—their domesticity—represent the perfect balance of spiritual pursuits and material aspirations that make life worthwhile.
While myth brings beliefs, mythology brings customs. Reading and learning about the domestic life of gods is meant to guide us to lead more meaningful as well as spiritually fulfilling lives.
In The Domestic Life of Gods, Devdutt Pattanaik examines instances of mythology that depict gods living ‘human’ lives and what that signifies. Read on.
The Ascetic and The Householder
Shiva is believed to be a tapasvin in Kailasa and a householder in Kashi. In Kailasa he is a distant ascetic, someone who has no desires, no feelings, no urges. But in Kashi, Shiva experiences emotions, he cares, he is man for a woman. In Kailasa he lives in severe isolation but in Kashi, he lives with his wife as Shankara.
As per Hindu mythology, the restlessness of matter—living an involved, emotionally fulfilling life—is believed to be necessary in the search for stillness, for transcendence. This intriguing back and forth between the two energies that feed each other is what makes the world go around.
Read on as Devdutt Pattanaik, the master of mythology, expertly examines and analyzes the relationship between restlessness and stillness of the mind in The Ascetic and The Householder.
Rama vs Krishna
Both Hindu epics—Ramayana and Mahabharata—seek to establish a certain order in the world. Their heroes, Rama and Krishna, have different ideals and respond differently to seemingly similar situations. However, is there one correct way? Are Rama’s ideals above Krishna’s shrewdness?
Emotions are the biggest threat to the order imposed by dharma. The conflict between the head and the heart is usually the root of all troubles that plague mankind. This conflict usually leads to either social change or cultural decay. But rules and regulations are meant to adapt and change according to time and geography. If that is the case, are we doing a good job adapting our ideals to our dharma?
Read on as Devdutt Pattanaik examines the conflict between cultural demands and natural urges through two of Hinduism’s biggest heroes in Rama vs Krishna.
Dharma vs the Law of the Jungle
“Culture needs to thrive but not at the cost of nature.”
Asuras are different from humans—or manavas—because they usually follow the law of the jungle, where ‘might is right’. This offers no reprieve for the weak, the helpless, or the downtrodden. According to this code, only the fit may survive.
Humans, on the other hand, have the faculty of reason—they can discipline themselves and tame the instinct to dominate the weak. They are expected to follow the code of dharma. But what is it exactly that distinguishes the two codes? Are we really programmed to live according to dharma or do we also possess the urge to live by the law of the jungle? Is a cultured society—one that follows dharma—really better than an untamed society?
Read on as Devdutt Pattanaik explores these questions and more in Dharma vs the Law of the Jungle.
Devas vs Asuras
Every story and every occurrence in Hindu mythology is usually a story about the Devas (good) trying to stop the Asuras (evil) from creating havoc for the mortals on earth. However, neither side permanently wins.
The peace that follows the defeat of an Asura is only a temporary reprieve. Soon, a new Asura appears and repeats the cycle of war. War almost seems like a reaction to peace and vice-versa. In fact, it might appear that the existence of Asuras is almost necessary for the world. Would the world stop existing in perpetual peace?
Devas vs Asuras is an analysis of this very question by Devdutt Pattanaik, the master of mythology. Read on.