Globalization, connectivity and competitiveness have changed the way we work, conduct business and lead our lives. While there are several positives to this new way, there are, of course, negatives too. One of them happens to be the rising rates of burnout.

People from all walks of life feel they are overworked, chronically stressed, sleep-deprived and anxious, and sense they don’t have balance in their lives. These signs left unaddressed, only lead to regrets. The regret of broken relationships. The regret of neglected health. The regret of not being the person one always wanted to be. The cost is not only to the individual—in the long run, society pays the price.

Listed below are 5 signs of Burnout:

People with burnout exhibit what is called presentism: being physically present but not ‘fully’ there to engage in creative, forward-thinking reflection or good work.

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Psychologically detached from work, people are less willing to help others and also less likely to receive help in return.

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One has to be ‘on fire’ to burn out; people who are not on fire—who are not highly motivated—do not burn out. This makes people with high ambitions and over-commitment streaks more susceptible.

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Those who exhibit negative emotions, who are overresponsive, highly reactive and have low thresholds for emotional reactions, even when faced with minor stressors, are more prone to burnout than others who showed fewer of these characteristics.

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When you don’t feel safe, you are constantly on the edge. You are worried, anxious and fearful. These, coupled with bureaucracy, excessive control and lack of support lead to poor morale and burnout.

Burnout offers a framework and principles to ensure that you continue to have a hard-working and productive life without getting burned out.

Every reporter knows the first rule of journalism: never betray your source. But what if your source turns out to be unworthy of your silence? What if it’s your source who betrays you?

The Messenger by Shiv Malik tells the story of an unlikely friendship between two men looking to change the world: a repentant jihadist and an idealistic journalist. This troubling real-life thriller takes us from their first meeting in a spartan flat in the rough suburbs of Manchester, to a bombing in Pakistan, a dramatic arrest and Malik’s reporting career on the brink of ruin.

Here’s an excerpt from the prologue!

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I put it to you that it has always been like this. A sudden, horrific event occurs – a volcano erupts, a plague breaks out, an economy collapses – and we become overwhelmed by fear. But the event is not what we are afraid of. As soon as it occurs, it becomes the past. It is over. What we fear most is the future; the idea that out of nowhere disaster might befall us again. In these moments we force ourselves to hunt for an explanation, a pattern, lines of cause and effect. We must know why these events have happened to us because we must reclaim a sense
that tomorrow can again be made predictable. Our psychological survival depends on it.

Just imagine even the simplest human interaction being undertaken in a world where we were completely unable to foretell whether the sun will rise in the morning or the air will remain breathable hour by hour. Our minds would not endure more than one day.

The explanations we find for these horrific events do not necessarily have to be correct or true. They just have to serve their purpose – the story must make us feel the world is certain again.

And as history shows us, if the facts do not comfort, a fiction will work just as well.

Our readiness in these instances to accept the reassuring fiction over the uncomforting fact has been the source of some of mankind’s most inhumane deeds. The volcano erupts because the gods are unhappy with us and so we make a human sacrifice.

Disease abounds because the devil has made mischief through his servants and so we hunt for witches. The German economy collapses because traitors are at work and so Jews are rounded up in their millions.

And yet, however inhumane the results, we are quietly grateful for these stories because they allow us to cope. They let us believe that the solution to averting future disaster is within our control. And those who tell us the stories – the shaman, the church, the dictator – are granted impressive powers over us.

This is also how terrorism works.

First the tactician, the military trainers, the explosive experts, the cell leaders, and the suicide bomber band together to induce fear by creating apparently random destruction involving as many people as possible. The more arbitrary the target – the train, the bar, the sporting event, the office block – the more we fear because the harder it becomes for us to predict what tomorrow will hold for us.

The person who follows this is the messenger. He has two further roles which are just as essential to the overall process. His first task is to threaten more of the same. He makes it clear that the future – both immediate and distant – will continue to be ambushed by bloody violence. This is the easy part – these words can be spoken by any thug. It’s the second task that requires the oratorical skill.

Competing against other narratives, the messenger must somehow persuade us to do what he wants – leave his lands, hand over political power, give him money, convert to his religion. He does this by convincing us that we are the ones to blame for the destruction which has just been wreaked; that it is our actions that have brought about these consequences.

At first this may seem an unpromising strategy, but the messenger tells us this because he knows that his narrative holds a particular charm to our ears; if we are the cause of such events, then we must also hold the key to our own security. Who better to bring normality back to our lives than ourselves?

Like this, the messenger’s speech suddenly becomes a comfort.

His words become a siren’s song. We want to do as he asks because he promises that life will go back to normal. But unless we resist the temptation, we will find ourselves ruined and sold out by the lowest of our mind’s conceits: fear.

However, like volcanoes, plagues and war, the mechanics of terrorism have proven far more complex than our frightened minds have permitted us to believe. I should know. For the messenger is never all he seems..

Get your copy of The Messenger today!

Rajnath Singh rose from a swayamsevak in the RSS to the chief minister of Uttar Pradesh, and also served as a cabinet minister in the Vajpayee government. Jailed during the Emergency, Singh was the president of the BJP’s youth wing, the Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha. A two-term president of the BJP, Singh ensured the elevation of Narendra Modi as the party’s prime ministerial candidate and delivered BJP’s biggest-ever electoral victory in 2014. Since then, as India’s home minister, he has ushered in a new phase in the country’s security, where both internal and external threats have been minimized. Under Singh, the red menace from Naxalites and Maoists has been nearly wiped out, and the state of Jammu and Kashmir had its first local-body elections in over a decade. His impeccable record in managing the country’s internal security has led Prime Minister Modi to give him the responsibility of handling India’s external security, as seen in his appointment as the country’s defence minister in the newly elected
BJP government.

Here’s an excerpt from the book that talks about how Rajnath Singh brought upon the Anti-Copying Act when became the education minister of UP!

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Kalyan Singh established himself as a tough and able administrator with a no-nonsense approach in hardly any time and this became his signature. There were instances when he jailed criminals, including MLAs, and also fired a minister from his own cabinet for violating his orders.4 He went on to be known for not only the hard stance he personally took, but also of some of the members in his ministry, and the one who stood out was Rajnath Singh.

Singh was given charge of education of a state, which according to experts, had been deeply affected by political considerations and where the education system had become too politicized. Uttar Pradesh was one of the few states in India that still had a Legislative Council—the upper chamber of the state legislature, a body in which teachers had guaranteed representation. Teachers had traditionally been held in great regard in Indian society and, perhaps, that could be the reason why they were also given a special legal status by the Constitution of India which provided for representation to teachers and members who are elected by teachers in the Upper House of the state legislature. UP’s council of ministers since 1952 had always had a representation of teachers, barring once when, in 1967, Chandra Bhanu Gupta as chief minister formed his thirteen-member cabinet that lasted for fifteen days.

The significance of education in the politics of Uttar Pradesh can be gauged from the fact that many chief ministers have been former teachers, beginning with Sampurnanand, Sucheta Kripalani, Tribhuvan Narayan Singh, Mulayam Singh Yadav and Kalyan Singh. Rajnath Singh too had joined a long list of education ministers in the state who had been teachers in the past, for instance, Acharya Jugul Kishore, Kalicharan and Swaroop Kumari Bakshi. During Rajnath Singh’s stint as education minister, teachers wielded considerable influence both within and outside the state legislature. There were other problems plaguing the education system that needed immediate attention.

Even after four decades of freedom from the British and despite an increase in the number of institutions, the education system in India had little to show in terms of achievements as well as what was being taught in schools. The Kalyan Singh government gave more powers to management committees of private-aided schools, initiated self-financing courses and allowed self-financing schools besides transferring the power of pay disbursement to private management.

In addition to wide-ranging alterations in lessons taught at the secondary-school level, including the introduction of Vedic mathematics and the addition of a chapter detailing the contributions of Keshavrao Hedgewar, the founder of the RSS, the teaching community took exception to many of Rajnath Singh’s reforms.8 The introduction of Vedic maths raised many an eyebrow despite the fact that the world over, mathematicians found it helpful for children at pre-primary and primary levels to calculate complex numbers in a shorter time frame and sculpt young minds.9 Questions were also raised about teaching children about the RSS even though historically the RSS had not only been a part of mainstream nation-building activities but had also been invited to participate in the Republic Day parade in 1963 by the then prime minister, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru.

At the same time, the teachers under the Madhyamik Shikshak Sangh (MSS), the strongest teachers union in Uttar Pradesh, were up in arms too. The education minister’s ‘antiteacher’ measures did not go down well and they announced a call for a boycott of examinations. Things came under control only after assurances from the state government that there was no move to change legislation regarding the transfer of secondary teachers from one district to another or empowering the authorities to prolong indefinitely the suspension of any teacher.

If the field of education had become a springboard for successful politicians and a fecund garden for political activism, it had also spawned an industry with cheating in examinations as its mainstay. In 1992, Rajnath Singh presented the historic anti-cheating law that declared cheating in examinations a cognizable offence. The Anti-Copying Act, 1992, promised changes aimed at clearing the system like never before, whereby students caught cheating could be jailed. This was accompanied by the simultaneous deployment of police in all examination centres across the state and its effect was more than palpable. The percentage of students clearing the UP board high school exam came down from 57 in 1991 to under 15 in 1992.

Singh was told in no uncertain terms that his action would have far-reaching implications, or, in other words, his political future was at stake. Even at the time of framing and, later, tabling the Act, there were well-wishers who sprung to advise the first-time minister. Some of them went to the extent of hinting that the CM could probably try to fire from his shoulder and the credit, if it worked, would be Kalyan Singh’s while all the brickbats, the more likely outcome, would come his way. But Rajnath Singh had no doubt about the measure. As a teacher, he had often found students not being inspired enough to do the right thing and the only way to bring about a change in the manner the young approached not just studies, but life, in general, would only be possible if they assumed greater responsibility, and what better place to start but one’s own self.

To find out what happens next, get your copy of Gautam Chintamani’s Rajneeti today!

A series of murders have taken place in Parsupur, the capital city of Parsuvarta. Kasyapa and Agastya, two students training to become priests, are asked by their guru to investigate the deaths.

It is an age when Vedic gods are worshiped, religious sacrifices are performed regularly, commerce flourishes and kings are guided by their loyal head priests. But beneath this façade of order lie prejudices and political rivalries, jealousy and power games. This is why the murders, which at first seem to be unconnected, soon lead in the same direction. It is now up to Kasyapa and Agastya to find out the common thread and identify the killer.

Read an excerpt from The First Aryan below:

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Kaśyapa’s involvement in the intrigues of the royal family and the priestly circles started that morning. Though he had not wanted it, he was dragged into the middle of a series of extraordinary events that were about to unravel in the kingdom of Parśuvarta.

It all started in the capital city, Parśupur, which was located on the gentle inward curve of the Sarasvatī. There were walls, one hasta thick, on the other three sides of the city. Its area was approximately one eighty-first of a square yojana. The city had three gates—one in the south, about one-third the wall’s distance from the river; another in the north wall, halfway into the west–south-west angled section; and the third in the west wall, halfway into the south–southeast section of the wall.

Eleven of Vasiṣṭha’s twelve students were there, in the study hall outside his house. The younger ones were poring over the alphabet and mathematical tables. Kaśyapa and three of his fellow students were working on astronomical and logic treatises. They would first recite the appropriate verses, as they had been taught by their guru, discuss the meaning and implications among themselves and ask their guru or a senior student questions in case they had doubts. Two older students were working on the theory of sacrifices and the esoteric sciences. It was early morning and Kaśyapa was feeling sleepy. However, he toiled on.

Suddenly, he heard somebody mention a senior student, Atharvan’s, name and looked around to notice that he was missing. He asked aloud, to no one in particular, ‘Where is Atharvan? He should have been here by now.’

‘Maybe the guru sent him somewhere on an errand? Maybe he is back at his house? Was he unwell?’

The study hall was in a thatched shed next to their guru’s house. This was no ordinary shed. It was from here that their guru, Vasiṣṭha, had given the kingdom some of its most accomplished priests and scholars. He trained them rigorously—they had to undergo twelve years of basic education, and then a few more of specialized education if they displayed special talent for any of the subjects.

Kaśyapa shivered slightly. It was winter and the woollen shawl he had around him was not warm enough. A feeble sun was just starting to peep through the trees around Vasiṣṭha’s house. There was a cold breeze that entered the shed through the gaps in the wooden planks that made up its walls.

The smell of burning ghee and soma wafted in from the sacrificial field nearby. It was a smell they had grown up with and had got used to. There were other smells in the air too—the smell of the guru’s wife’s cooking and the distant, though distinct, smell of the river in the air. Kaśyapa listened to the cacophony with a smile, as the sound of several students memorizing their lessons seemed to have grown louder. It reminded him of frogs croaking during the rains.

Just then, Bhārgava got into an argument with one of his peers. ‘Well, the gods either respond to our sacrifices or they don’t. We have to decide which.’ The other student was persistent in his scepticism, ‘They certainly do. I have no argument with that. But . . .’

Kaśyapa interjected, ‘Why can’t it be in between? They respond to some sacrifices and don’t respond to others. Logically, there needn’t even be a disjunction between these two propositions. It is not always an either/or situation.
There can be any number of options in between. Let’s not fall into the trap of a false dilemma. We don’t need more reasons for conflict.’

One of the senior students said, ‘Keep quiet. You don’t understand these things. Are you saying that it is always something in between?’

‘No, I am not suggesting a false compromise either. But whatever be the situation, logically, the gods have no choice.They have to give us what we ask for in our sacrifices. Our guru has told us this many times.’

‘Yes. That is what our guru told us. You, on the other hand, are far too young to argue on the matter.’

‘Well, think about it. If you are fed enough, even if you are a god, you will be happy, won’t you?’

Bhārgava was not happy. ‘You are irreverent. I have half a mind to report you to our guru. Now, shut up and do your astronomy.’

Kaśyapa turned to his fellow pupil, Agastya, and said, ‘It is known that the planets go around the earth. It can be proved by the fact that . . .’

They were interrupted by their guru’s wife, Arundhatī, bringing in their morning snacks.

The First Aryan is a one-of-its-kind murder mystery set in the Vedic times.

Rhea Mukherjee’s debut novel, The Body Myth features Mira, a teacher living in the heart of Suryam, the only place in the world the fickle Rasagura fruit grows. Mira lives alone, and with only the French existentialists as companions, until the day she witnesses a beautiful woman having a seizure in the park. Mira runs to help her but is cautious, for she could have sworn the woman looked around to see if anyone was watching right before the seizure began.

Mira is quickly drawn into the lives of this mysterious woman Sara, who suffers a myriad of unexplained illnesses, and her kind, intensely supportive husband Rahil, striking up intimate, volatile and fragile friendships with each of them that quickly become something more.

Through Mira’s observant, deeply introspective viewpoint, The Body Myth, explores the questions that haunt all of us at some point, how much do our bodies and minds respectively influence our experiences, history of trauma and the nature of love.

Here are some raw moments from the book that will make you want to turn the page for more!

The exploration of the mind and body connect and the rendering of the body as a source of both agony and healing.

Do we trust what our body is telling us? And how separate is the body from the mind, if at all? Sara’s mental state appears to have a real physiological effect as well. In Mira’s. Mira is drawn to Sara both spiritually and physically, and her sexual relationship with both Sara and Rahil, Mira begins to emerge from intellectual cocoon that she has sought refuge in after her husband’s death and begins to find that she can enjoy simple pleasures once again.

“Emotional pain can be so severe, so profound, so soul breaking that it must reflect on the body. But I couldn’t seem to find my scars when I stood in front of the mirror. Perhaps they disguised themselves moving across my body like a flea on a cat.”

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 The seamless blending of existentialist philosophy into what Mira considers her very mundane life.

The post-war philosophers play unexpected roles in The Body Myth, Mira’s recovery from her husband’s death is due to her reading a shelf full of them, Foucault pops up in her correspondence and conversations with Sara, and De Beauvoir plays a hilarious role in the loss of her job.

“You might think it was teaching that saved me from the blunt darkness that comes with the loss of a spouse. It was not, I almost committed suicide true, but it was Camus, Sartre, Foucault and De Beauvoir who led me back to life. These philosophers who embraced the absurd made my pain feel silly.”

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The faint but tantalizing element of magical realism.

The very mundane but fictional town of Suryam in which the book is set is given a distinct edge of the surreal by being the only place in the world where the exotic Rasagura fruit grows. While the Rasagura’s significance is never explained, its description has a heightened sensual lusciousness. ‘Soaked berry with a hint of mango’ sounds truly celestial!

“We had one other thing that no other town, city or village had, the Rasagura fruit. Pink on the outside, yellow on the inside, speckled with tiny brown seeds, Rasagura thrived in Suryam’s microclimate and no other.”

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The exquisite rendering of both the physical and mental aspects of grieving.

Mira’s anguish at her young husband’s death, a pain so sharp she takes a full year to recover, is explored in wrenching detail.

“Like I had no idea what had happened when in fact I could remember every little insult I’d screamed, every word I’d said to Ketan’s dead body. My anger was only artificially tamed. I could feel myself being medicated like a hot water bag on top of a raging, crampy, menstrual tummy.”

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The sensitive and nuanced exploration of a polyamorous relationship.

Mira’s intense attraction to Sara, borders on extreme admiration and fascination whereas her sexual relationship with Rahil appears comparatively casual at first. Though Rahil sleeps with Mira he makes it evident that his Sara’s happiness is priority. He also seems almost resentful of Mira’s independent connection with Sara. The uneasiness, the envy, and the mutual attraction-the strange codes of this strange triad are fascinating as they unfold.

“The language of forbidden love has no common book. It’s a series of coded sentences, its meaning created in the head of an individual and choked out to the other. Words that dangle between lovers, each of them finding the meaning they want to hear at the time. And what I wanted to hear that it was okay to love Sara. It was okay to love her and find support and sexual intimacy with her husband at the same time.”

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The exploration of trauma through the multiple sources of pain explored in the novel.

There are the buried traumas of childhood caused by a depressed and suicidal parent and by excessively coddling parents in the other, there is the more recent and raw grief of the loss of a husband, and the trauma of the body—of an intensely debilitating and inexplicable illness, of physical pain and open sores and wounds. Running through it all is the thread—is the mind or the body the source and site of trauma?

“Could bliss last forever after you had a lifetime of pain to provide you with context?”

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The delicate exploration of the subjective and shifting nature of reality.

The idea of reality as a matter of perspective and the theme of ‘fakeness’ is extensively explored—is intellectualism fake, is Sara ‘faking it’ or is truth simply a function of belief? Can we completely trust either our own bodies or minds?

“For you to understand that untruths, labels and freedom all come together eventually you must walk at my pace.”

Get your copy of The Body Myth today!

The Magic Weight-loss Pill by Luke Coutinho and Anushka Shetty, is an anthology on the benefits of sustained lifestyle changes to have a healthier life. The book gives out various ways of dealing with the problems of excess weight, chronic diseases such as diabetes, hyperthyroidism, kidney and liver stones. By explaining the very reasons of the beginning of such diseases to talking about some of the easiest habits which people can inculcate in their lives to achieve their health goals, this book is a must-have for every health freak!

Following are a few things about the successful Holistic Lifestyle Coach, Luke Countinho that you ought to know!

Luke Coutinho is a Holistic Lifestyle Coach practising in the field of Integrative Medicine.

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Apart from creating personalized wellness plans regarding weight and disease management and being a motivational speaker, Luke Coutinho along with his team of qualified doctors and trained nutritionists are known for providing expert care when it comes to cancer. 

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The Mumbai based holistic lifestyle coach, Luke Coutinho believes that lifestyle changes is the key to prevention and healing. He started off by counselling people on various subjects such as lifestyle, health and exercise. He now has a global presence with his clientele across New York, Dubai, London, Middle East and many more. He truly believes that “The New Religion is Lifestyle”.  

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Luke Coutinho and his team work in an integrative manner where the patients continue with their doctors treatment while they work on building their immunity & making a lifestyle change so that they can possibly heal with ease.

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Luke Coutinho is a firm believer of the powerful intelligence of the human body and its ability to heal itself. He believes that no one – whether a nutritionist or a doctor ever heal people. They simply enable, fix, guide, etc. It’s the human body that finally heals itself. If we give the human body, mind, and spirit – the foundation it needs to do what it does and knows best, we can provide a platform of recovery or healing.

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Luke and his team are currently involved in training and working closely with nutritionists and doctors of Tata Memorial Hospital of Cancer Research to enhance nutrition and lifestyle amongst patients and with autistic kids and adults as well.

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Luke Coutinho co-authored the well-known books The Great Indian Diet with Shilpa Shetty and the bestseller – The Dry Fasting Miracle – From Deprive to Thrive.

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Luke Coutinho is an active proponent of meditation, advocating about its benefits in combating stress. Luke Coutinho talks at global events across the world on health, lifestyle, disease, children’s health and integrative and lifestyle medicine. From WPO, YPO, EO, FICCI, ICA to schools, colleges, private events and corporates, he uses this platform to inspire, share knowledge and coach people into the right lifestyle. 

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Luke has a strong social media presence where he uses platforms like Facebook, Instagram and Twitter to educate and impart learning to the public. His talks are holistic in nature and revolve around disease, prevention, recovery, spirituality, life coaching, remedies for skin, hair, beauty, exercise, sleep, in general, lifestyle medicine.

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Luke Coutinho was included in 2018’s GQ 50 Most Influential Young Indians.  

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Luke Coutinho was awarded the Elle award for the Best Health Expert of the Year 2018 and Best in the Industry (Nutritionist) by Vogue in the year 2018. 

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Luke is a co-founder of GOQII & RESET – Holistic Living Concepts. Luke believes that holistic living is a drug that prevents, heals, builds a great body and mind, motivates, inspires and helps you connect with your core element. 

Get your copy of Luke Coutinho and Anushka Shetty’s The Magic Weight Loss Pill today!

In Vedic Wedding Book, A.V. Srinivasan brings the best of his experiential wisdom as a Hindu priest and scholar in the US in uniquely accessible explanations of each ritual of the traditional ceremony, along with a wealth of knowledge about their origin, variations and significance. One of its kind, this book will help you understand and appreciate, as well as execute, the traditional Vedic wedding ceremony and get a flavour of India’s wedding culture, its true meaning and significance.

Here is an intriguing excerpt from the book that explains the tradition of Kanyadaan!

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Kanyaadaan

This important ritual begins with a call to the audience to bless this moment. This and similar requests throughout the ceremony not only engage the audience but convey the message that the assembled are witness to an important commitment being made at the mandap. Everyone present is requested to respond with ‘tathaastu’ at the end of each phrase:

Permissions

ayaṁ muhūrtassumuhūrtostviti bhavānto mahānto
anugṛhṇantu
kartavye asmin śubha vivāha karmaṇi bhavānto
mahānto adhibruvantu
oṁ puṇyāhaṁ bhavanto adhibruvantu
oṁ ṛddhiṁ bhavanto adhibruvantu
oṁ svasti bhavanto adhibruvantu

May you, the great assembled, grant this present time to be
auspicious.
May you, the great assembled, express that this wedding task
be auspicious.
May you express this day to be auspicious.
May you express this to be successful.
May you express your blessings.

With this set of permissions granted, the kanyaadaan ceremony begins:

kanyāṁ kanaka sampannāṁ kanakābharaṇairyutāṁ
dāsyāmi viṣṇave tubhyaṁ brahma loka jigīṣayā
kanye mamāgrato bhūyāt kanyeme deviparśvayoh
kanyeme sarvato bhūyāt tvaddānānmokṣamāpnuyāṁ
viśvambharāh sarvabhūtah sākṣiṇyah sarvadevatāh
imāṁ kanyāṁ pradāsyāmi pitṝṇāṁ tāraṇāyaca
kanyāṁ sālaṅkṛtvā sādhvīṁ suśīlāya sudhīmate
prayatoham pradāsyāmi dharma kāmārtha siddhaye

May I offer to you, the embodiment of Vishnu, this, my
daughter, foremost among all young women, by my side,
covered with golden ornaments, so that I may obtain
salvation in Brahmaloka.

With all the gods and these witnesses, in order to liberate
my ancestors and to achieve dharma, artha and kama, I give
away this gift, my daughter who is virtuous, intelligent and
beautifully adorned.

Upon these statements of purpose the priest arranges the palms of the principals as follows:

1. On the outstretched palms of the groom, place the palms of the bride and on these place those of the bride’s
father.

2. Now keep a coconut smeared with kumkum and haldi on the topmost palm.

3. The bride’s mother is now positioned behind the three such that she is facing the audience squarely.

4. As the priest (or the bride’s father) chants the following mantras, the bride’s mother pours water over the coconut in a thin stream and the audience is requested to say ‘tathastu’ at the end of each phrase.

5. A child is positioned to hold a bowl below to collect the water, which is poured until all the phrases are
chanted.

During this sequence, the mangalasutra is taken around by a family member to be blessed by the elders present.

śrīrūpiṇīṁ imāṁ kanyāṁ śrīdhara rūpiṇe
tubhyaṁ ityukta udaka pūrvāntāṁ
kāyenavācāmanasā dadāmyasmai
kanyā tārayatu
puṇyaṁ vardhatāṁ
saumanasyamastu
akṣataṁ cāriṣṭañcāstu
dīrghamāyuh śreyah śāntih puṣṭih tuṣṭih cāstu
yachreyastadastu
yat pāpaṁ tatpratihatastu
puṇyāhaṁ bhavanto bruvantu
svasti bhavanto bruvantu
ṛddhiṁ bhavanto bruvantu
śrīrastviti bhavanto bruvantu

With this in my mind, and with this ritual and before the ceremonial water is poured,
May I offer you, who are in the form of Vishnu, my daughter
in the form of Lakshmi.

May my daughter gain protection. May holiness prosper. May
there be joy. May she be whole. May she live long, flourish,
be at peace, well-nourished and content. May prosperity
prevail. May any ills be struck down. May you grant this day
to be a happy one. May you bless her well-being. May you
grant her abundance. May you grant her respect and status.

An immensely accessible guide, The Vedic Wedding Book will take you to the roots of the Hindu wedding ceremony, on a journey of its evolution from the Rig Vedic times to the present day.

Rhea Mukherjee’s debut novel, The Body Myth features Mira, a teacher living in the heart of Suryam, the only place in the world the fickle Rasagura fruit grows. Mira lives alone, and with only the French existentialists as companions, until the day she witnesses a beautiful woman having a seizure in the park. Mira runs to help her but is cautious, for she could have sworn the woman looked around to see if anyone was watching right before the seizure began.

Mira is quickly drawn into the lives of this mysterious woman Sara, who suffers a myriad of unexplained illnesses, and her kind, intensely supportive husband Rahil, striking up intimate, volatile and fragile friendships with each of them that quickly become something more.

Through Mira’s observant, deeply introspective viewpoint, Rhea Mukherjee evokes the lives of three extraordinary characters in an ordinary Indian city, exploring but never fully revealing, their desires, motives and beliefs.

Here’s a look at the main protagonists from the story!

Mira

Mira, a young teacher, at a progressive international school, turned from her corporate job after a near-breakdown following the death of her young husband, Ketan. She is perceptive, contemplative and introspective, and views her experiences through the prism of the existentialist philosophers. A fraught childhood with a once-loving but depressive mother has made her too aware of the frailties of the mind.  After a strange chance encounter with the mysterious and magnetic couple, Sara and Rahil, she is drawn into a complex relationship with each and both, that leaves her simultaneously vulnerable and fulfilled. Mira’s focus shifts from the mind to learning more about the body-her own and theirs’ and its frailties, strengths and its significance.

“You might think it was teaching that saved me from the blunt darkness that comes with the loss of a spouse. It was not, I almost committed suicide true, but it was Camus, Sartre, Foucault and De Beauvoir who led me back to life. These philosophers who embraced the absurd made my pain feel silly.”

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Sara

Sara is the mysterious centre of the story, and the obsession for the other two characters. Sickly, suffering, and yet incomparably attractive, her magnetism is as palpable to us as it is to Mira. Seen from Mira’s initial viewpoint she seems almost ethereally beautiful, a beauty enhanced by her suffering. Sara, the daughter of two devoted parents and wife of a devoted husband has been suffering for years with unexplained seizures, headaches, physical aches, mouth sores, fatigue and anemia, among other symptoms—symptoms that she pays close attention to. Yet, she retains her beauty, her perfection in everything including housekeeping and her fascination with Sufi philosophy. Even as the complex pieces of Sara’s issues take on a more discernible pattern, she remains an enigma to the end with her reflections on Sufi mysticism, on the collective soul, and her extended philosophies on the mind-body equation. Is she ‘fake’ in the most outright sense of the word or are illnesses of the mind as physically debilitating as those of the body?

“Our bodies are like the world, Mira. Beautiful, hysterical, hypocritical, mysterious, poor, and temporary. Mine just happens to be all of those at once.”

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Rahil

Rahil appears the perfect husband, a painstaking caretaker to his wife, almost far too understanding of his wife’s frailties, moods and mysticism. Or is there a dark side to his too, too complacent acceptance of his wife’s illnesses. Does he simply not think too much or is there a sinister aspect to a man who needs dependence to such an extent? However even as he enters into a sexual relationship with Mira, he prioritises Sara above all. Even as the individual relationships between Mira, Sara and him become a ménage a trois, Sara’s needs, and concerns come above everything else. He alternates between a sexual relationship with Mira and an uncomfortable jealousy of her emotional connect with Sara. Does he draw a certain satisfaction from having his wife so dependent on him, or is he simply guilty of indulging her complacently, finding it easier to satisfy her whims than navigate the complexities of her mind?

“Almost as if Rahil was a caretaker, a watchman, to the relationship between Sara and I. But one thing was clear, Rahil’s primary responsibility and priority was Sara.”

Read Rheeas Mukherjee’s The Body Myth to know how Mira, Rahil and Sara’s lives intertwine in this complicated love story!

Bad Man written by Gulshan Grover with Roshmila Bhattacharya is the inspiring story of the rise of the most successful villain on the Bollywood screen. Telling his story in his own words, Gulshan Grover illuminates his life, the films, the journey, the psychological and personal toll that it took on him in a bid to sustain ‘bad man’ image, the competition and many more challenges that he faced while making it big in the film industry.

Here we tell you a few incidents that shaped Gulshan Grover in becoming one of the most sought after and seasoned actor that we have all come to know!

Gulshan Grover hailed from a humble household and so, learnt the importance of hard work and sincerity from a very early age. Managing his academics at school while doing a part-time job grounded him into realizing the significance of struggling and this is the lesson that he has carried with him throughout his successful journey in the world of cinema.

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Gulshan Grover’s passion for acting grew further when he joined the Fine Arts Society of his college, Shri Ram College of Commerce. Mr. Grover, along with his friend Sunil Sethi, who is now a well known name in Indian Fashion industry, took part in various plays together. This made Mr. Grover a popular actor at college.

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As a child, Gulshan Grover did not have access to watching many movies but managed to watch a few movies of Manoj Kumar, Dev Anand and Dharmendra, which mesmerized him. These were the movies which made his passion for acting stronger over the years.

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While in Mumbai, Gulshan Grover went through an unsuccessful series of attempts trying to get a break in a film. He soon realized the struggles that well-known actors such as Dharmendra, had to go through. He realized the scope of him making it big in the industry was difficult as hundreds of others were vying for the same opportunity and thus, decided to alter his strategy according to his unique capabilities.

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After coming back to Mumbai for a second time to pursue his dreams, Gulshan Grover realized that he needed to approach in a more organized way towards this aim. He realized that he needed to be more patient with his struggle and therefore, joined an acting course to counter his weaknesses, which further helped him in his career.

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While doing an acting course, Gulshan Grover soon realized that he was more suited to intense roles rather than the trope of the romantic-hero. The course helped him realize his strong points and he further polished his skills to become the Bad Man, that we have all come to know.

Get your copy of Bad Man today!

The Magic Weight Loss Pill by Luke Coutinho and Anushka Shetty, is a book that emphasises the crucial part lifestyle plays in controlling diabetes, hyperthyroidism, kidney and liver stones and excess weight. Listing the reasons of these few diseases, the book also proves to be instrumental in getting one closer to their health goals without the rigour of a strenuous diet or fitness regime.

The “magic weight loss pill”, as the author, Luke Countinho describes, is the change in one’s lifestyle. This inexpensive and organic way of losing weight requires only three things to be followed: consistency, discipline and, when one fails to follow the changes strictly, acceptance and then making an effort to inculcate those changes again.

Here are a few pointers that constitute the habits and lifestyle changes for the magic weight loss pill:

Switching to having only raw foods until lunch is a great way to combat your weight issues. By the virtue of raw food being detoxifying in nature, raw foods like – fruits, vegetable juices, soaked nuts and seeds, flush out toxins and fat from your body.

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The technique of how you breathe is important in losing weight too. This is a simple and inexpensive way of taking deep and long breaths thereby increasing your intake of, what the author calls ‘vitamin O’. It helps in the breakdown of fat in the body and makes it easier for intestines to absorb the nutrition from the food. 

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Today many people are deficient in Vitamin D3. It is a crucial vitamin for the body as it strengthens the bones, increases immunity and also helps I the weight loss process. Some of the best sources that are rich in this vitamin are – mushrooms, Brussels sprouts, sprouted mung, fish, egg yolk and chicken. 

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Practicing a regimented meal plan with regular intervals between each meal is of utmost importance. After every 3-3.5 hours, one should make it a point to eat something. Failure to do so may result in issues such as acidity and indigestion. 

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As the human body gets used to expecting food at certain times of the day, one should never deviate from their appropriated time to have their main meals. This is known to aide in the process of digestion of the food, maintains hormonal balance and also facilitates in the process of weight loss. 

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Another healthy habit to inculcate is the proper chewing of one’s food. As it is a step which precedes the food digestion process, it also helps in reducing the risk of heartburn and acidity consequently making a person eat less.

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The accumulation of belly fat is known to be directly related to the high intake of alcohol and alcoholic beverages. Having these drinks in moderation is the key to reducing this belly fat.

Reach your fitness goal with Luke Coutinho and Anushka Shetty’s A Magic Weight Loss Pill