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A Chat with War Photographer Maali Almeida…in the Afterlife

Posted on by Penguin India

Renegade war photographer Maali Almeida has to solve his own murder. Does that sound fun? It would be if there wasn’t so much bloody red-tape to get through. It’s also doesn’t look like anyone alive is actually missing him. Worst of all, it’s all those goddamn memories of war, constantly interrupted by the overly chatty dead folks breezing through the afterlife. Besides, he’s so busy solving his ethical dilemmas that there’s barely any time to solve a murder-even if it’s his own. 

As we meet the photographer in the afterlife in Chats with the Dead, we discover there is so much more to him than just a name. As well as to the stories of all the people who are dead and gone.

Meet (late) Maali Almeida in an excerpt below:

 

Say My Name

You want to ask the universe what everyone else wants to ask the universe. Why are we born, why do we die, why anything has to be. And all the universe has to say in reply is I don’t know arsehole stop asking. The After Life is as confusing as the Before Death, the In Between is as arbitrary as the Down There. So, we each make up stories because we’re afraid of the dark.

The wind brings your name and you follow it through air and concrete and steel. You float through a Slave Island alley and you hear the whispers in every doorway. ‘Almeida . . . Malinda . . .’ Then the wind blows through busy Dehiwela streets and you hear more voices. ‘War photographer . . . activist . . . Almeida . . . Maali . . . missing . . .’

From slave to Dehiwela in one breath, faster than a helicopter ride. At least death frees you from Galle Road traffic, Parliament Road drivers and checkpoints on every road. You ride past the faces of oblivious people ambling through Colombo’s shabby streets, the mortal brothers and sisters of the dearly departed and quickly forgotten. You are a leaf in a gale, blown by a force you can neither control nor resist.

Lankan visionary Arthur C. Clarke said thirty ghosts stand behind everyone alive, the ratio by which the dead outnumber the living. You look around you and fear the great man’s estimate might have been conservative.

Every person has a spirit crouching behind them. Some have guardians hovering above and swatting away the ghouls, the pretas, the rahu and the demons. Some have distinguished members of these latter groups standing before them, hissing idle thoughts in their faces. A few have devils squatting on their shoulders and filling their ears with bile.

Sir Arthur has spent three decades of his life on these haunted shores and is clearly a Sri Lankan. Austria convinced the world that Hitler was German and Mozart was theirs. Surely, after centuries of armed plunder, courtesy the sea pirates from London, Amsterdam and Lisbon, may we Lankans at least help ourselves to one sci-fi visionary?

At Borella junction, a woman in white walks the edge of your periphery and disappears when you focus; a demon toddler squats in a corner and hisses at the young girls waiting for buses; a clovenhoofed ghoul stands at the headlights looking for a motorcyclist to impale. It appears that too many in Colombo have died unwillingly and too few are ready to leave.

One by one, the figures look at you, each pupil a different shade, each iris with its own sheen. The angry flash greens and yellows, the lost glimmer in browns and in blues. The hungry blink in famished purple, the helpers wink in pretentious white. There are also those with red eyes and black eyeballs whose gazes you dare not meet.

Bestselling author of Chinaman, Shehan Karunatilaka is back with a darkly comedic story of life and death – with a brilliant twist. Infused with moments of staggering humanity, this one is a powerful read that exposes the plight of Sri Lanka in the aftermath of a civil war.

 

Could reforms bolster India’s financial fault lines?

Posted on by Penguin India

Upendra Kumar Sinha has contributed significantly to shaping India’s capital markets in multiple roles, including as chairman of UTI Mutual Fund and head of the Capital Markets division in the Ministry of Finance. Credited with the revival of the mutual funds industry and bringing in reforms to protect the rights of investors, Sinha has spent decades leading the financial front of the country towards growth and stability. In Going Public, he shares the landmarks on the journey of a nation striving for economic progress and prosperity.

Read on to know about  four reforms that shaped India’s financial landscape:

 

The UTI[Unit Trust of India] Act and the changing role of the government –

Even though the government had no shareholding or operational control in UTI, it was still perceived to be a government institution on account of its association with IDBI, its tax exemption schemes and other contributing factors vis-a-vis the UTI Act, 1963. The already limited role of the government was curtailed further when, in 1997, the practice of having government nominees in the trustee board of UTI was discontinued on the rationale that UTI should be run by a board of experts.

‘Thus, when the crisis developed in 2001, it came to light that the government had no mechanism for timely and first-hand knowledge. In fact, it was the stand of the government that UTI had kept it in the dark. On this, the JPC[Joint Parliamentary Committee] lamented that the government did nothing to emerge from the darkness. After the crisis, Yashwant Sinha reversed the decision over government nominees…’

 

Amendment to the SEBI[Securities and Exchange Board of India] Act in 2002

The SEBI Act, 1992 allowed the organization to demand records or information from only a limited set of entities but its powers were restricted when it came to prohibiting and investigating misconduct. A game-changing move that strengthened the position of both SEBI and investors was made in the form of the 2002 amendment in the SEBI Act which increased the power of SEBI to deal with misconduct or fraud and led to a crackdown on notorious entities.

‘SEBI could then designate one of its officers as an investigation authority who could not only demand the production of records from  “any person associated with the securities market in any manner” but also keep such documents in its custody upto six months. In case of reasonable suspicion that documents may be destroyed, SEBI was also authorized to conduct search and seizure after getting approval from a court.’

 

 Allowing reforms to allow debt to be raised from the market

In order to reduce dependence on banks it is essential to create alternative sources of funds. One way of facilitating growth is making reforms to allow debt to be raised from the market. SEBI, the RBI and the government have been continuously trying to make provisions for the same by simplifying procedures and bringing in uniformity and transparency.

‘Rules regarding credit rating agencies were made stronger and uniformity was implemented in the rating symbols. At the same time, rules about debenture trusts were tightened. Since credit rating agencies and debenture trustees are also supervised by SEBI, better coordination amongst different players in the chain could be established. The government also helped by allowing pension funds to invest in corporate bonds.’

 

Front Cover of Going Public
Going Public | U.K. Sinha

 

Entrepreneurship with Alternative investment funds (AIFs)

Across the world, a popular method of raising funds for start-ups and new generation companies is Alternative investment funds (AIFs). This unique class of investors raise money from different sources and invest in new and promising private companies based on a prediction of future growth potential. To promote this method of funding, SEBI formulated an AIF Regulation in 2012 and saw positive results.

 ‘In 2016, AIFs invested more than $16 billion in different companies. In 2018–19, the total funds invested were close to $32 billion. Now, even corporates and rich individuals are setting up funds to invest in start-ups. Many of them are also mentoring the assisted companies, besides making financial investments.’

 

 

 

‘It is not unique to India that changes in the laws governing stock exchanges and share market have been enacted only after major incidents of misconduct have taken place, and not preemptively or when these problems were still much smaller and more manageable,’ writes Sinha. However, scams and deficiencies that challenged India’s financial systems led to reforms that strengthened the economy.

 

 

The anonymous letter

Posted on by Penguin India

Celebrated writer and festival director Namita Gokhale is back with her latest novel, Jaipur Journals. This time, she offers us a diverse cast of characters whose worlds collide in the Jaipur Literature Festival: an author who receives a threatening anonymous letter, a burglar with a passion for poetry, a twelve-year-old prodigy, an American woman looking for the vanished India of her youth, a lonely writer who carries her unsubmitted manuscript everywhere with her, and a historian who reunites with a past lover.

As rich as the Festival itself, Jaipur Journals is a metafictional ode to literature. A nod to the millions of aspiring authors carrying unsubmitted manuscripts in their bags, the book is an intimate look into the pretensions and pathos of the loneliest tribe of all: the writers.

In the excerpt below, we give you a glimpse of one of these stories.

*

A volunteer with a round smooth face and dark shining eyes stepped forward to address the group. ‘Excuse me,’ she said, ‘please excuse me, but which of you is Ms Zoya Mankotia?’

Zoya swished her mane of grey flecked hair and lifted one grey black eyebrow in interrogation. ‘You mean me?’ she asked, almost girlishly, almost coquettishly.

‘One of your fans was waiting for you—he left this card which he wanted delivered to you,’ the smooth-faced volunteer said. ‘And I must tell you, Ms Mankotia, that I too am a great fan of yours … I would love you to sign a copy of The Quilt for me.’

Front Cover of Jaipur Journals
Jaipur Journals || Namita Gokhale

She handed over a pale purple envelope, which had Zoya Mankotia’s name written with a purple marker, in a neat italic hand. Inside was a card with a photograph of a kitten wearing a purple ribbon around its neck.

The message was written in capital letters, in purple ink. It was brief and brutal. ‘Miaow Ms Mankotia!’ it said. ‘I can see through you. You faithless bich, I know what you have been up to, how many women you have betrayed. And your pathetic intellectual pretenshuns leave me speechless! And your novel, The Quilt, is a copycat version of Ismat Chughtai’s Lihaf. You plagiarizer, you pornographer . . . Your time is up.’

Zoya’s expression did not change when she read this, although the set of her jaw tightened visibly. She put the card back into the purple envelope and passed it wordlessly to Geetha Gopalan.

‘So who is this mysterious fan?’ Geetha asked in her jolly booming voice. ‘May I read it?’

Zoya nodded. Geetha Gopalan opened the envelope. ‘What on earth is this?’ she asked in surprise.

‘It is an anonymous letter,’ Zoya replied, lifting first one eyebrow, and then the other. ‘Or an anonymous card, to be accurate, a deeply critical pretty kitty card.’

‘An antediluvian troll,’ Geetha Gopalan responded. ‘What a nasty man he must be!’

‘He could be a woman,’ Shonali Sen ventured. The card had been circulated to her and Leila Nafeesi as well.

‘I can never make out if men hate women more, or women themselves,’ Zoya Mankotia said.

‘Purple is a woman’s colour, somehow,’ Geetha Gopalan observed thoughtfully.

‘Oh, don’t please get into these tired gender stereotypes,’ Zoya snapped, her voice combining weariness and anger.

Leila Nafeesi had been quiet all this while. She spread out her fingers to display her long nails, which were painted purple. She had beautiful, pale ivory hands with rings set in silver on all her fingers lapis lazuli, turquoise, jade, topaz. ‘The colour purple,’ she said. ‘By the way, I don’t believe someone with such an elegant italic handwriting doesn’t know how to spell—it’s a pose.’

*

To find out more about the letter, and to meet all the other attendees, step into Namita Gokhale’s literary world today!

Escaping the Life I Never Chose- An Excerpt from ‘A Good Wife’

Posted on by Penguin India

At fifteen, Samra Zafar had big dreams for herself. Then with almost no warning, those dreams were pulled away from her when she was suddenly married to a stranger at seventeen and had to leave behind her family in Pakistan to move to Canada.

In the years that followed she suffered her husband’s emotional and physical abuse that left her feeling isolated, humiliated and assaulted. Desperate to get out, she hatched an escape plan for herself and her two daughters.

A Good Wife tells her inspiring story.

Read an excerpt from the book below:

—

I wake to the crackling of bird calls outside my bedroom window, the anemic light of a Canadian spring morning seeping through the curtains. I lie very still, listening. The house is quiet. My in-laws are in the bedroom down the hall. My husband sleeps ten feet below me, in the den. My infant daughter slumbers peacefully beside me. At first, I’m surprised to see her. Why didn’t I put her in her crib in the room next door last night? Why is she still here with me? And then I remember. I rub a painful spot on my upper chest. My heart aches almost every morning, but today my ribs are sore as well.

As my drowsiness falls away, another feeling works its way through my body. A frayed, rippling tension, a growing brittleness: anticipation and fear. At any moment, the cold brick house will come alive, and I will be thrown together with the rest of the inhabitants. If all goes well, Ahmed will take his lunch and walk wordlessly out the front door, and I will start on a long, dull day, locked here in the house with his mother and my daughter. The hours will creep by, broken only by chores, television, empty chat.

But perhaps it won’t be dull. Yesterday was not dull. Or at least it didn’t end that way. And I have come to understand that in this new world of mine, anything other than grey monotony is scary. Anything else is dangerous.

My daughter shifts. I can hear my mother-in-law’s slippers as she begins to pad about her room. It is time for me to go in to say salaam. It is time for me to head downstairs with the baby. It is time for me to make my husband’s lunch. It is time for me to start my dreary routine.

As I rise, I realize that I am saying a little prayer. I am praying for luck. I am praying for another dull day.

Intrigued about what happens next? You will have to read  A Good Wife  to find out!

The Generous Nawab- An Excerpt from ‘Bahawalpur’

Posted on by Penguin India

In the seventy or so years since Independence, much less has been written about the Princely States which acceded to Pakistan than those that remained in India. The name of the once great State of Bahawalpur is no longer remembered among its well-mapped peers over the border in Rajasthan.

Bahwalpur by Anabel Loyd is a record of the conversations between the author and Salahuddin Abbasi who reminisces about his family and sheds light to stories of Bahawalpur’s princes from old records, letters, and the accounts of British travellers and civil servants. The following is an intriguing excerpt from the book:

—

Nawab Bahawal Khan had ruled for long enough to see his enemies fail, fall or die off. He had avoided confrontation with Ranjit Singh through judicious advice to the Sikh leader during his siege of Multan, being rewarded with gifts of an elephant and a shawl, added to several instalments of ‘friendly messages’.

 

Bahawal Khan’s most inveterate enemy, the makhdoom of Uch, died and was succeeded by his son, Makhdoom Shams ud-din and his brother who was recognized by the nawab when he rode to Uch in person to perform the ceremony of placing the ‘Turban of Recognition’ on his head. In 1808, Mountstuart Elphinstone came to Bahawalpur en route to Kabul on the exploratory journey he described  in An Account of The Kingdom of Caubul and Its Dependencies in Persia, Tartary and India.

The Treaty of Tilsit in 1807 between Napoleon and Tsar Alexander I had raised, for the first time, the fear of overland invasion of India by Russia in alliance with the French bogeyman, and the governor general, Lord Minto, sent Elphinstone to Afghanistan, with other envoys to Persia and to Ranjit Singh, to gain promises of cooperation in the event of French incursions.

It is unsurprising that Elphinstone was impressed by Bahawal Khan. He must have been impressive to have successfully maneuvered a path through the hurdles, both of the tribal enmities of his times and greater invading powers. Before ‘we enter on the narrative of the passage of an embassy from the British Government’, it is too irresistible not to digress to Shahamet Ali’s rose-tinted description of England, where the roads of London are ‘paved with stones of various colours’, the town always kept in ‘clean order’ while the suburbs ‘are said to be covered with delightful gardens and noble buildings’ and ‘it is a fixed rule with every citizen, rich or poor, to whitewash his dwelling once a year’. That cloudless image might have surprised those breathing in the Great Stink and living through the cholera pandemic of the time.

Elphinstone described Bahawal Khan when he first met him on 1 December 1808 as a ‘plain, open, pleasant man, about forty-five or fifty years of age, he had on white tunic, with small gold buttons, over which was a white mantle of a very rich and beautiful gold brocade and over it a loongee. About six of his attendants sat; the rest stood round and were all well dressed and respectable’. The following day, ‘the Khan received us in a handsome room with attic windows and ‘conversed freely on all subjects’. He ‘praised the King of Caubul’ but had never seen him and ‘please God he never would’. He was a ‘desert dweller and feared the snows of Caubul’. Instead, ‘he could live in his desert, hunt his deer, and he had no desire to follow courts’. The nawab then demonstrated the skills of his people with a ‘curious clock’ made in Bahawalpur and gave Elphinstone parting gifts of greyhounds, two horses, ‘one with gold and one with enameled trappings’ and a very beautiful matchlock ‘with a powder flask in the English fashion’.

Elphinstone added, the nawab ‘has been liberal and kind to us without over-civility or ceremony’, with ‘an appearance of sincerity in everything he said’ and had shown ‘a spirit of kindness and hospitality which could not be surpassed’. Elphinstone was astonished that, unlike other princes he had encountered, they did not have to ‘struggle against the rapacity of the Nawab’, who, on the contrary, ‘would take nothing without negotiation’ and was himself almost embarrassingly generous in his gifts, sending a profusion of sweetmeats, flour, nuts and raisins, ‘a vast number of baskets of oranges’ and, most difficult to accept, five bags of rupees to be divided amongst the servants. 

It appears the ambassador and the nawab were pleased with each other—certainly this meeting and the first treaty of friendship between Bahawalpur and the British was the start of a remarkably close friendship.

Anyone with a penchant for history and politics would definitely consider the book, Bahawalpur an insightful read, shedding light on the troubled history of Pakistan which has clouded a clear picture of it and shrouded its component parts. Give it a read tell us what you think!

 

So Many Gods! Richard Dawkins’ Quest into Faith and Spirituality

Posted on by Penguin India

Author Richard Dawkins was fifteen when he stopped believing in God. Deeply impressed by the beauty and complexity of living things, he felt certain they must have had a designer. Learning about evolution changed his mind.

In Outgrowing God, Dawkins, as a bestselling science communicator, gives young and old readers the same opportunity to rethink the big questions.

Find an excerpt from the book below, where he introduces the historic and current frameworks of god and religion within which we need to rethink questions of faith, religion, and spirituality.

 

Do you believe in God?

Which god?

Thousands of gods have been worshipped throughout the world, throughout history. Polytheists believe in lots of gods all at the same time (theos is Greek for ‘god’ and poly is Greek for ‘many’). Wotan (or Odin) was the chief god of the Vikings. Other Viking gods were Baldr (god of beauty), Thor (the thunder god with his mighty hammer) and his daughter Throd. There were goddesses like Snotra (goddess of wisdom), Frigg (goddess of motherhood) and Ran (goddess of the sea).

The ancient Greeks and Romans were also polytheistic. Their gods, like the Viking ones, were very human-like, with powerful human lusts and emotions. The twelve Greek gods and goddesses are often paired with Roman equivalents who were thought to do the same jobs, such as Zeus (Roman Jupiter), king of the gods, with his thuderbolts; Hera, his wife (Juno); Poseidon (Neptune), god of the sea; Aphrodite (Venus), goddess of love; Hermes (Mercury), messenger of the gods, who flew on winged sandals; Dionysos (Bacchus), god of wine. Of the major religions that survive today, Hinduism is also polytheistic, with thousands of gods.

Countless Greeks and Romans thought their gods were real – prayed to them, sacrificed animals to them, thanked them for good fortune and blamed them when things went wrong. How do we know those ancient people weren’t right? Why does nobody believe in Zeus any more? We can’t know for sure, but most of us are confident enough to say we are ‘atheists’ with respect to those old gods (a ‘theist’ is somebody who believes in god(s) and an ‘atheist’ – a-theist, the ‘a’ meaning ‘not’ – is someone who doesn’t). Romans at one time said the early Christians were atheists because they didn’t believe in Jupiter or Neptune or any of that crowd. Nowadays we use the word for people who don’t believe in any gods at all.

 

Outgrowing God asks pertinent and highly relevant questions on life and human connection. Concise and provocative, it is a crucial guide to thinking for yourself.

Standing By One’s Principles- An Excerpt from ‘Excellence Has No Borders’

Posted on by Penguin India

Have you ever hit a point so low where hope was your only option? Dr B.S. Ajaikumar did too. He lost twenty million dollars and he almost lost his son. He hit a point where he stopped feeling that life was worth living but what brought him back was his zeal to never give up. His innate tendency to test the limits of his mental endurance. His tenacity for his principles. His family. Himself.

Meet Dr. Ajai Kumar in Excellence Has No Borders: 

—-

As a young adult, I was not immune to these social upheavals. With my tendency to stand up for the underdog, my internal volcano seemed to bubble up at the slightest hint of injustice. At St John’s, I was known to be an unapologetic leftist who stood for values. I was just over sixteen years old, the youngest in my class. I do understand that sixteen years was very young to get into medical college. Fortunately, I was able to get several double promotions in my primary and middle school due to new educational rules. I used to sit in the second bench and was very nervous, since it was my first year at university. All the other students in my class were adults, street-smart and hostel boarders.

 

One incident that transpired among the hallowed portals of St John’s changed things considerably. The physics teacher had a bit of an accent and used to pronounce ‘cc’ (cubic centimetres) as ‘sheeshee’. One day, unable to control myself, I ended up covering my mouth and laughing. Face contorted with anger, the lecturer strode up to me.

 

‘Take your books and get out!’

 

I sat there in silence, without moving.

 

‘I said take your books and get out,’ he repeated.

 

Finally I found my voice. ‘I’ve done nothing wrong. When I’m not guilty, I won’t go out.’

 

Anger turning to mortification, the lecturer blurted, ‘I will report you to the Father, who is the head of the department of physics!’

 

‘Please do.’ I felt strangely calm.

 

I was reported to the head of the department and summoned by the Father. This was a matter of principle for me. I was ready to stand up for it. 

 

I told the principal, ‘Father, I will not leave the classroom when I’ve done nothing wrong.’

 

I was able to hold my ground, and no action was taken against me. My older classmates began to treat me with respect after this incident. It crystallized for me the importance of standing like a rock by one’s principles. Coupled with my internal volcano of tenacity and my hunger for challenges, this gave my emerging personality multiple dimensions. I would no longer stand with my head bowed when injustice slapped me in the face. I would not take indignities lying down. I would not shy away from taking someone on when they threw down the gauntlet to me. In the coming years, it would be one or more of this triad of personality traits that would come to the fore when it came to life decisions or whenever I found myself at a crossroads.

Dr. Ajaikumar has always stood for what he believes in and has had a tactful, problem solving approach to every hurdle that has stood between him and his goals. His book reflects the strength he’s had to gather to face every hurdle that has been thrown at him.

Read more about him and his experiences in his book, Excellence Has No Borders.

Cozy Up With these Books this January!

Posted on by Penguin India

We are all loving the winter, because it makes for perfect weather to snuggle up with a nice, hot mug of tea (or any hot beverage of your choice) and – of course – a book.  No picture of cozy days is complete without books!

If you feel the same way, we have some great book recommendations lined up for you to add to your weekends:

 

Dearest George


Get ready for the corniest book of the month!

Author Alicia Souza admits she is in love. And she is admitting it in (literary and artistic) style!

Full of real, day-to-day snippets of love, kisses, and marriage – Dearest George captures Alicia’s married life with her husband George. Although, one of the most important agendas was to document on print that George totally made the first move!

*

7 Dream Jobs and How to Find Them

Is  finding a job that makes you happy on your resolutions list?

TedX speaker Chandan Deshmukh takes you on a journey through goals, opportunities, challenges and turning points of any career.

Learn about human personalities and how they’re suited for certain jobs; how to turn your ‘side hustle’ into opportune ventures and, most of all, how to find a job in which you’ll be happy. This book is a must-read for your weekly dose of motivation!

*

6 Secrets Smart Students Don’t Tell You

 

How do smart students succeed?

Do they have any tricks up their sleeves?

Chandan Deshmukh’s 6 Secrets Smart Students Don’t Tell You gives you everything it promises in the title – an achievable and accessible answer to all these questions!

Full of real-life anecdotes, tips, advice and extensive research from smart students – this is a funny but highly informative – not to mention, crucial – read for students and parents alike.

*

Republic of Religion

Thanks to our colonial past, we derive many of our laws and institutions from England. How did India aspire to become a secular country?

Thought-provoking and impeccably argued, Republic of Religion reasons that the secular structure of the colonial state in India was imposed by a colonial power.  This one will get you thinking about the country, nation-building, and our history through new perspectives and insights.

*

Fateful Triangle

How did China shape US-India Relations during the Cold War?

A key question today is whether India and the United States should develop closer ties as a way of countering China’s desire to be the dominant power in the broader Asian region. In Fateful Triangle, Tanvi Madan argues that history shows that such a partnership is neither inevitable nor impossible.

Madan gives us a nuanced, engaging historical context to explore the past and potential interactions between the three countries, and in turn, India’s position within the Asian region.

*

Made in India

What makes Milind Soman tick?

There’s more to Milind Soman than meets the eye (although, as his legions of female fans will agree, what meets the eye is pretty delish).

On the twenty-fifth anniversary of ‘Made in India’ –  the breakout pop music video of the 1990s that captured the zeitgeist of post-liberalization India and made him the nation’s darling across genders and generations – Milind talks about his fascinating life-controversies, relationships, the breaking of vicious habits like smoking, alcohol, rage, and more-in a freewheeling, bare-all memoir.

*


Ambedkar’s Preamble

What role did Ambedkar really play in drafting our Constitution?

Although Dr Ambedkar is universally regarded as the chief architect of the Constitution, the specifics of his role as chairman of the Drafting Committee are not widely discussed.

Ambedkar’s Preamble establishes how and why the Preamble to the Constitution of India is essentially an Ambedkarite preamble. It is clear that its central concepts come from Ambedkar’s writings and speeches. In doing so, it spotlights fundamental facts about modern Indian history – which makes this a highly relevant read today.

*

The Minority Conundrum

What does it mean to be a minority in majoritarian times?

Following from the highly relevant Vision for a Nation last month, The Minority Conundrum gives us the second volume in the series titled Rethinking India – which goes further into exploring what the idea of a ‘nation’ means for India today.

Edited by Tanweer Fazal, this volume identifies vulnerabilities that hinder the quest for the realization of substantive citizenship by minority groups. The essays explore educational attainments; employment prospects; possibilities of equal opportunity; violence of the state and vigilante groups; and emerging questions of citizenship and employment. This one is another powerfully relevant read for today’s times.

*

Sarojini’s Mother

Will Science be enough to settle the puzzle of motherhood for Sarojini?

Sarojini-Saz-Campbell comes to India to search for her biological mother. Adopted and taken to England at an early age, she has a degree from Cambridge and a mathematician’s brain adept in solving puzzles.

Handicapped by a missing shoebox that held her birth papers and the death of her English mother, she has a few leads to carry out her mission and scant knowledge of Calcutta, her birthplace. And there are two equally likely candidates.

*

Bahawalpur

What is Bahawalpur?

In the seventy or so years since Independence, much less has been written about the Princely States which acceded to Pakistan than those that remained in India. The name of the once great State of Bahawalpur is no longer remembered.

This book is based on conversations with Salahuddin Abbasi, grandson of the last ruler of Bahawalpur and born a year before Partition. His memories reveal a lifetime of first-hand experience of the political life of Pakistan.

Author Anabel Loyd uses the stories of Bahawalpur to present a clearer picture of the macrocosm of Pakistan and its rich history.

*

Chats with the Dead

Who is Malinda Albert Kabalana? How did he die?

Renegade war photographer Maali Almeida has to solve his own murder. Does that sound fun? It’s not as though anyone alive actually seems to miss him. On top of that, there are all those goddamn memories of war, constantly interrupted by the overly chatty dead folks breezing through the afterlife.

He’s so busy solving his ethical dilemmas that there’s barely any time to solve his own murder.

Bestselling author of Chinaman, Shehan Karunatilaka brings to you a story of life and death – with a brilliant twist!

*

Kohra Ghana Hai

A read that is both pressing and relevant for our times, Kohra Ghana Hai presents us a powerful collection of poems by Naveen Chourey on mob lynching, Kashmir and on our soldiers.

It is infused with Naveen’s youthful energy and a hopeful vision for the future of our country. Highly readable and accessible, his poetry will definitely leave you thinking.

*

Pataakha

Will they ever learn to live with or without each other?

Based on Charan Singh Pathik’s eponymous story, Pataakha is a translation which includes both the original novella and the screenplay that film-maker Vishal Bhardwaj developed for his 2018 movie. Not only does the book get you to meet sisters Badki and Chhutki again on the page – it also makes for a unique glimpse into the art of adapting a literary work into film.

*

Happy for No Reason

Have we cracked true happiness yet?

In this deeply honest and personal memoir, Mandira Bedi presents to us the regular can’t-get-out-of-bed girl behind the fitness icon –  who is still trying to crack what ‘true happiness’ means. She hasn’t cracked it yet, but tells us in this memoir that she is headed in the right direction by learning to find peace in everything.

Being happy for no reason is both important and achievable. This book is about that.

*

Jaipur Journals

Namita Gokhale pens a part-love letter and part-satire against the rich backdrop of Jaipur Literature Festival.

From a lonely woman who does not want to publish her completed semi-fictional novel to a burglar who is passionate about poetry; from a child prodigy to an author who receives a threatening anonymous letter; the world of Jaipur Journals is filled with a diverse cast of characters that are as vibrant as the Festival itself!

The novel is an ode to the millions of aspiring writers who wander the earth with unsubmitted manuscripts in their bags.

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Going Public

As chief of the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), Upendra Kumar Sinha guided the regulatory body through some of its most crucial years. Successive governments appointed him on this crucial post, making him one of the longest-serving heads of the organization. Under his leadership, SEBI successfully fought a long legal battle with Sahara, and led the crackdown on institutions like PACL, Rose Valley, Saradha and the MPS groups which conducted unauthorized deposit collections.

Going Public: My Time at SEBI is a historic and inspiring memoir about Sinha’s journey through India’s changing financial landscape.

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Excellence Has No Borders

As a fledgling doctor, what would you choose: practising medicine in rural India or going abroad in search of financial security?

In an inspiring personal narrative of his entrepreneurial journey, CEO of HealthCare Global (HCG), Dr. B.S. Ajaikumar details how he has made cancer treatment accessible to all and created a chain of world-class cancer hospitals across India.

Full of insurmountable challenges, survival and powerful life-lessons, this one is a must for anyone looking for inspiration!

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Trending in Love

What really is ‘Happily Ever After’?

Sanam is a carefree, but headstrong young girl. A spat with a politician’s son pushes her to take up the challenge of becoming an IAS. At the same time, a small-town boy, Aamir, is nudged into studying for the civil services too. Both become rank holders.

They meet at the IAS Training Academy, Mussoorie. They fall in love and all hell breaks loose. Their religious differences come to the fore, things take a dangerous turn and there is an explosion on social media.

A heady mix of dreams and desire, this is a story of undying love in the face of our society’s most dangerous beliefs.

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From Oberoi to Oyo

How did the Taj, the Oberoi and the ITC hotels come to dominate the Indian hotel landscape? And what are the challenges thrown by the foreign chains, OYO, the online travel agents and the young start-ups?

Based on Chitra Narayan’s  years of observation of the industry and interactions with key stakeholders, this book takes you through the tumultuous history and evolution of the Indian hotel industry. It is packed with exciting profiles, insights, and strategies; and how the future of the hotel industry could look like.

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Sixteen Stormy Days

Sixteen Stormy Days narrates the riveting story of the First Amendment to the Constitution of India. It talks about one of the pivotal events in Indian political and constitutional history, and its first great battle of ideas.

Passed in June 1951 in the face of tremendous opposition within and outside Parliament, the subject of some of independent India’s fiercest parliamentary debates, the First Amendment drastically curbed freedom of speech; enabled caste-based reservation; circumscribed the right to property and validated abolition of the zamindari system; and fashioned a special schedule of unconstitutional laws immune to judicial challenge.

Drawing on parliamentary debates, press reports, judicial pronouncements, official correspondence and existing scholarship, the book challenges conventional wisdom on iconic figures such as Jawaharlal Nehru, B.R. Ambedkar, Rajendra Prasad, Sardar Patel and Shyama Prasad Mookerji, and lays bare the vast gulf between the liberal promise of India’s Constitution and the authoritarian impulses of her first government.

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The Magnificent Diwan

The Magnificent Diwan is the definitive biography of arguably India’s most influential and powerful statesman of the nineteenth century; one decisively shaped Hyderabad’s political and economic history for nearly three decades.

It was Salar Jung who, by his reforms of the medieval oligarchy that was Hyderabad, ushered the state into the modern era.

The book is not is not merely a chronicle of his life but also a history of Hyderabad-both social and governmental-and gives the reader an encompassing view of the man who has been called the founder of modern Hyderabad.

 

Which one(s) will you be picking up? Let us know in the comments below!

 

Story of the Much-Loved Flautist: Hariprasad Chaurasia

Posted on by Penguin India

As it listens to the sounds you create

The entire world stands in awe

Forgetting themselves each one asks

Is this the scent of flowers, or a flute that plays? 

In the age of record stores, it was rare to go into a record shop and not see a recording of Pandit Hariprasad Chaurasia, the master of the bansuri or bamboo flute. One of India’s most popular artistes, he is in Mumbai today, Paris tomorrow and San Francisco the day after.His mesmerizing flute can be heard in many of Hindi cinema’s most popular songs, in a composition by the former Beatle George Harrison, as well as in recordings with renowned musicians from across the world. Sathya Saran’s Breath of Gold will inspire and introduce everyone to the story of this amazing artist.

Not convinced? Read on to know more about Hariprasad Chaurasia:

 

 

By combining tradition with innovation, Pandit Chaurasia expanded the scope of expressiveness of the bansuri and was, thus, awarded a plethora of awards, including the Padma Vibhushan. (Source: India Today)

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If it were up to his father, he would have been a wrestler.Yet, he broke away from the life that was chosen for him and wrote his own destiny.

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In his early teens, Pandit Chaurasia took lessons in Hindustani classical music from noted Benares vocalist Raja Ram. After hearing one of his performances, Bholanath, a well-known flutist, made Chaurasia his disciple and made him go through eight years of rigorous training. (Source: Britannica)

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Pandit Chaurasia also studied with Shrimati Annapurna Devi, daughter of Ustaad Allauddin Khan. In Bombay, he also got the additional exposure of performing in one of India’s cultural centers. Through years of experimentation and dedicated practice, Pandit Chaurasia brought global recognition to the bansuri. (Source: IAAC)

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Hariprasad Chaurasia has also been a guru to innumerable students in his Mumbai and Bhubaneswar gurukuls, and at the World Music Department, Rotterdam Music Conservatory, the Netherlands, where he is artistic director.

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Hari- ji, as he is fondly called, never gives up, and nothing can keep him from his music. Not the trembling of his hand, not a sudden shortness of breath. He overcomes it all with the strength of his will and his ability to laugh off every hurdle age places in his path.

 

 If you want to know more about this musical genius check out Breath of Gold.

Why You Should Read ‘Tales from the Kathasaritsagara’

Posted on by Penguin India

Do you know the story of Phalabhuti, who narrowly escaped a grisly fate?

Or of the kind-hearted Jimutavahana, who was willing to give his life to save a snake from death?

These are just some of the many tales that make up Somadeva’s Tales from the Kathasaritsagara, a classic work of Sanskrit literature that is full of memorable characters. Adapted and wonderfully retold by Rohini Chowdhury, this is a timeless classic that will entertain and enchant readers everywhere.

Not convinced yet? Rohini Chowdhury pens down why this book is special to her below:

 

For as long as I can remember, the Kathasaritsagara has been a source of joy and wonder for me. Full of clever women and brave men, its stories have never failed to delight and divert. Its title, which means ‘the ocean of the rivers of story’, immediately brings to mind the image of innumerable rivers of story and their tributary tales flowing into a vast ocean, which at last becomes filled with stories of every kind imaginable. Its title is no exaggeration, for this great work contains within it more than 350 tales told across eighteen books in some twenty thousand stanzas.  It is, for its size, the oldest extant collection of stories in the world and is almost twice as long as Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey combined.

It was composed around 1070 CE by a Kashmiri Shaivite Brahmin called Somadeva. In a short poem at the end of his work, Somadeva states that he was the court poet of King Anantadeva of Kashmir, and that he composed his Kathasaritsagara for the amusement of Queen Suryavati, wife of King Anantadeva, to distract her mind from its usual occupation of ‘worshipping Shiva and acquiring learning from the great books.’ The Rajatarangini, a chronicle of the kings of Kashmir written by the historian Kalhana in 1149 CE, tells us that the reign of King Anantadeva was one of political unrest, court intrigues, and bloodshed. In 1063, King Anantadeva surrendered his throne to his eldest son Kalasha, but recovered it a few years later. In 1077, the king once again gave up his throne, but this time Kalasha openly attacked his father and took all his wealth. In 1081, the king killed himself in despair, and Suryavati threw herself onto his funeral pyre and perished. It is likely that it was sometime between Anantadeva’s first and second giving up of his throne that Somadeva composed his Kathasaritsagara, possibly around 1070.  The Rajatarangini, by independently corroborating the reign of Anantadeva, supports the existence of Somadeva as a real, historical person, and helps us determine with some certainty the time when he composed his great work.

Indian texts were rarely the product of a single individual’s imagination, but were usually put together using stories from various sources and told by different storytellers. Somadeva, too, did not invent the stories that make up the Kathasaritsagara – many of its tales are also contained in much older works, such as the Buddhist Jatakas, the Panchatantra, the Ramayana, the Mahabharata, and the Puranas and had probably been in existence for centuries, preserved and transmitted orally long before they were ever written down or became a part of Somadeva’s text. Somadeva himself tells us that the Kathasaritsagara is drawn from a much older, and greater, collection of tales called the Brihatkatha, or Great Tale. This greater collection of tales, says Somadeva, is now lost.

Somadeva’s genius lies in the manner in which he has threaded the separate, often unrelated, stories together within the main story, to create a work that engrosses and enchants from the very beginning. Some of the stories take us by surprise, such as that of the clever man who made himself a fortune from a dead mouse. Others, such as the story of the talking bear who refused to betray a friend, make us stop and reflect – on deceit, trickery, and honour. But mainly, the stories entertain and divert. The world of Somadeva’s Kathasaritsagara is rich and vibrant, full of kings, thieves, conmen, merchants, and courtesans. There is war and romance, intrigue and heroism, wit and, sometimes, even wisdom. Like Vishnusharma’s Panchatantra, the Kathasaritsagara is concerned with life and living, but unlike the fables of the Panchatantra, the stories of the Kathasaritsagara teach no moral lessons. Nor are the tales bound by any dominant theme, religion or point of view, but ramble without plan or any purpose except entertainment through their magical world. This makes the work unique in Sanskrit literature.

The Kathasaritsagara has been translated and retold several times since it was written. One of its earliest translations was commissioned by the Mughal emperor Akbar, who came to know of the Kathasaritsagara on a visit to Srinagar after his conquest of Kashmir in 1589 and shortly afterwards ordered it to be translated into Persian. This translation was also lavishly illustrated. Unfortunately, most of the original manuscript was lost and today only nineteen illustrations survive from this translation, scattered in museums and private collections around the world.

The Kathasaritsagar remains unparalleled in its appeal and the undiminished popularity of its tales over the centuries. Its stories are found all over the world – in the more or less contemporary Arabian Nights, in Celtic folklore, and in collections such as the fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm. Its influence can be seen in later works such as Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales (1387 CE) and Boccaccio’s Decameron (1353 CE).  In continuing to inspire modern writers such as Salman Rushdie with his novel, Haroun and the Sea of Stories, it remains one of the most influential and best-known non-religious works of Sanskrit literature.

When Puffin’s Sohini Mitra asked me whether I would be interested in retelling, in abridged form, Somadeva’s great work for the Puffin Classics series, I was overjoyed, for I could not imagine a more delightful task. I have based my retelling of the Kathasaritsagara mainly on C.H. Tawney’s English translation published in 1880 by the Asiatic Society of Bengal. For the purposes of this abridged retelling, I have chosen the stories so that they represent, as far as possible, the extent, scope and structure of the whole of the original.  Perhaps my favourite story in this selection is that of the carpenter-king, Rajyadhara, and his robot subjects. Though written almost a thousand years ago, it can hold its own against any modern sci-fi tale. Another favourite of mine is the action-packed story of Shringabhuja and Rupashikha, variations of which are found in Norwegian, Sicilian, and Scottish folklore. And there is of course the Vetalapanchaviṃshatik, the twenty-five tales of the Vetala and King Trivikramasena familiar to almost every child in India. Of these riddles, I have included only a few of the most interesting.

By the time Somadeva wrote his Kathasaritsagara, Buddhism had all but disappeared from the Indian subcontinent. In Kashmir, Shaivism was becoming increasingly important, but unlike most of the rest of India, Buddhism still had a significant presence there. Somadeva thus lived and wrote in a climate where multiple religions and philosophies co-existed peacefully. Somadeva dedicates his work to Shiva, but also includes within it, stories about Buddhism and the Buddha, indicating the place that Buddhism occupied in the social and cultural landscape of Kashmir at the time. The story of Ratnadatta and how he learns the meaning of the Buddha’s teachings is a particularly powerful little story, and which I felt deserved a place in this selection.

Given its importance and the universal appeal of its stories,  Tales from the Kathasaritsagara is, in my opinion, the perfect introduction to the wonders of Sanskrit literature for young readers.

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