The India-Pakistan partition resulted in a sea of emotions in those who witnessed it. The pangs of separation of family members echo to date. Rajeev Shukla, in Scars of 1947, pens down the stories of people and families who faced the consequences of the partition firsthand. One such story is of the Prime Minister of India, Dr. Manmohan Singh, who hailed from the Jhelum district (part of present-day Pakistan). Let’s read an excerpt from the book to find out how partition hit Manmohan Singh and his family.
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Scars of 1947 || Rajeev Shukla
The year 1947 was Manmohan’s final year in school. The matriculation exam took place in the month of March. The communal tension during this time was getting worse every day because of the impending partition of the country. He sat for his exams in an environment filled with harrowing sights of violence; the results were never announced for the exams as Peshawar went on to become a part of Pakistan.
In 1947, the Hindu–Muslim clashes had begun, and they became more and more violent with each passing day. At [Manmohan Singh’s] village, Muslims outnumbered all others and as a result, the village had two masjids and one gurudwara. One day, when the tension between the communities was at its peak, it was decided by the elders of the village that they would sit with each other and try to diffuse the tension with discussions. The elders of the village, who were Hindu, Sikhs and Muslims, were called. However, the youngsters of the dominant Muslim community planned a massacre and killed all the Hindu and Sikh elders, among whom was Manmohan Singh’s grandfather who had brought up young Manmohan and of whom Manmohan was very fond. When his grandfather was killed, Manmohan was living with his father in Peshawar. One of his uncles who lived in Chakwal sent an unfortunate four-word telegram to his brother (Manmohan’s father) in Peshawar that read, ‘Mother Safe, Father Killed’. Manmohan was about fifteen years old at the time and says that he still remembers that dreadful telegram message. He says that on the one hand, this group of young Muslim men tricked and killed his grandfather and on the other hand, in that very neighbourhood, there was a Muslim family who hid his grandmother and protected her from the bloodthirsty mob.
These incidents from his childhood were so deeply etched in his memory that while working for the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development in the United States of America, when he was invited by his friend to Pakistan, he could not resist visiting. His friend Mahbub-ul-Haq had studied with him at Cambridge University in the United Kingdom. He later served as the finance minister of Pakistan. Mahbub used to stay in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, in those days. It was in 1968 that Manmohan Singh visited Pakistan. After the Indo-Pak War of 1965, the relations between the two countries were at its lowest, but Manmohan could not say no to the invitation extended by his very dear friend and visited Rawalpindi, a place he used to visit often in his schooldays. There, he used to visit a particular bookshop and during this trip, it was in the same shop that he found himself gripped by all the nostalgia from his childhood.
After that, he visited Gurudwara Panja Sahib situated in Hassan Abdal (Attock in Punjab, Pakistan) where his naming ceremony had taken place. When he was asked why he did not visit his birthplace, Gah village, which was nearby, his answer expressed the sadness that he had been carrying in his heart for years. He said that he did not visit his village because he did not want to inflict on himself the same emotional trauma by going to the place where his grandfather had been massacred brutally.
During the peak of the violence that had erupted there a the time of Partition, all the houses were burned to the ground; so Manmohan was unsure if there even was anything left to see. His uncle who used to live in Chakwal till 1947 had visited Gah village with a police contingent and had taken the remaining Sikh and Hindu women safely to Chakwal, where they were accommodated in a refugee camp. Manmohan said that not all the women could be saved from the horrendous riots, his own aunt and her mother chose self-immolation to save themselves from being violated by the mobs.
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To read in-depth about the incidents that followed, get a copy of Scars of 1947 from your nearest bookstore or order online.
Whether or not one believes in miracles, some legacies are nothing short of magic on earth. One such life is that of Neem Karoli Baba and his teachings which were carried on by Sri Siddhi Ma.
The following excerpt from Sri Siddhi Ma entails the stories and anecdotes which make up the folkloric profile of Neem Karoli Baba.
Sri Siddhi Ma||Jaya Prasada
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Dressed in a simple white dhoti, with a blanket or a cotton sheet for a wrap-around, Maharaj ji shunned any insignia which would set him apart as a saint or a sadhu. Many a time, as he reclined on his takhat, visitors would walk up to him and ask where they could meet Neem Karoli Baba. His simple reply used to be, “Main koi Baba ko nahi janta. Hanuman ji ke mandir me unse prarthna karo.” I do not know any Baba! Go to the Hanuman temple and pray to him. On other occasions, he would loudly proclaim, “Main kuch nahi janta. Main toh prasad vala Baba hoon.” I do not know anything. I am the Baba who gives prasad!
Baba Neem Karoli, also known as Baba Neeb Karauri, was perhaps the most elusive embodiment of divinity in human form. Accepted and revered as the incarnation of Sri Hanuman, the son of “Pawan” – the god of wind – Maharaj ji too had the attributes of the wind. Sometimes he could be a gentle soothing whiff; at other moments, a hurricane, a whirlwind. But always the bestower of life-giving breath. Nothing could bind him, no one could define him. As we devotees believe, he had no beginning, he has no end. “There can be no biography of him,” wrote his renowned disciple Dr Richard Alpert, later known as the devotee Ram Dass, in his book Miracle of Love. “Facts are few, stories many. He seems to have been known by different names in many parts of India, appearing and disappearing through the years.”
Named Lakshmi Narayan at birth, in the early 1900s, Maharaj ji left his native village of Akbarpur in Uttar Pradesh as a wandering sadhu, when he was only eleven years old. As he travelled to various parts of India, he came to be known by different names. For instance, he was known as Tallaia-wale Baba in Gujarat. This was because in Babania he was seen performing spiritual sadhana under the waters of a small lake, where his temple now stands. The women of the village, with brass pitchers on their heads and veils drawn over their faces, would go to the lake to draw water and would often spot a young mendicant on the shore. On seeing them, Baba would dive into the water and remain submerged for prolonged periods.
Also known as Tikonia-wale Baba and Handi-wale Baba over the years, Maharaj ji then returned home to lead a householder’s life for a few years, after which he left home again. Later, he was known as Baba Lachman Dass in the remote areas of western Uttar Pradesh. Eventually, after his stay in the village of Neem Karoli, he came to be known as Neem Karoli Baba. No one can tell which way the wind blew – but it appears that in the 1940s, from the plains of Uttar Pradesh, Maharaj ji proceeded to the mountains of Kumaon. And with his arrival, the hills began to soon be dotted with Hanuman temples.
An oft-asked question is: who was Neem Karoli Baba? Was he a mystic, an ascetic who aspired for and achieved the highest powers, the siddhis? Was he one of those miracle-sadhus so abundant in India? Or just a grandfather-figure in the homes he visited, fondly called “Hanuman buju” by the children? These varied questions perhaps have varied answers, for Maharaj ji excelled in the art of deluding aspirants the moment they got a glimpse of even a tiny ray of his infinite spiritual depth.
If put to me, this question would have a simple answer: Maharaj ji was divine love incarnate.
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Get your copy of Sri Siddhi Ma from the nearest bookstore or head to Amazon to order.
Many things in life come unexpected, as did the COVID-19 pandemic. The highs of life suddenly turn into lows and everyday events seem to become hard to deal with. During such phases, the present time slows down and one goes back to thinking about their past. As clichéd as it may sound, one eventually finds the light at the end of the tunnel.
During a similar time, Stuti Changle’s protagonist in Where the Sun Never Sets, comes to terms with her past that she has been running away from. Read an excerpt from the book to get a glimpse of Changle’s protagonist’s thoughts penned down in her diary.
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Where the Sun Never Sets || Stuti Changle
Today felt just like every day is going to feel in my lockdown life.
Once upon a time, it rained for hours, just like it rained today, heavily, unendingly, unstoppably. Rain might wash the physical world, but with it, washed-out memories resurface. Rains deepen the colours of your surroundings as if you’ve unknowingly switched to 4K HD mode. It also deepens the colours in your mind, unlocking the deepest of desires.
Rain is powerful indeed. And what does rain remind you of? The rain reminded me of the onion fritters Mom would deep fry until they were golden and crisp. The mere thought lit up my face, filling my mouth with water. I closed my eyes for a moment, imagining the crisp fritters between my teeth, chewing them with a crunch. Nishit, my ex-boyfriend, would often give me company. He would also tell me that peacocks teach you to dance your sorrows away in the rain.
The rain also reminded me of masala chai, the kind my landlady prepares in Gurgaon, with ginger, lemongrass and basil leaves added in generous amounts. She is the kind of bitch who calls you up to catch up and when you do so, she gives you a list of things you need to get repaired at your own expense.
She keeps reminding me that I am an orphan and it’s her responsibility to bully me to make me stronger. She believes that my parents would have done the same. She also feels that my elder sister is a bitch to have abandoned me. When I am engaged in bitter conversations with her, masala tea is my guru who preaches finding goodness in everything.
I requested Shyamala Aunty to prepare masala tea and fritters in the morning. I gave her very specific instructions. These days of lockdown have to be the perfect time for me to finish the movie script.
But where to start? Why can’t you talk, my diary?
I entered my attic-style bedroom to start writing the script. I had asked Shyamala Aunty to set up my desk in front of the huge window that overlooks the beautiful Mussoorie hills. It’s going to be a long lockdown after all.
I watched some YouTube videos by Tibetan Zen masters. They say that one must prepare well before a new project. Some changes are necessary while some are not as important. But the room where you engage in creative work has to be organized.
Considering the lockdown situation, all I can say is that it is one of the most unpredictable times. Of course, things will change sooner or later. They must. That’s the hope, and we hang on to it.
But I don’t know how much peace organizing my room will bring me when the world is in chaos.
‘Relax. Focus. Concentrate. Yes. Harder,’ I told myself. ‘Write a few words at a time. Bricks build
castles. And castles stand for ages and inspire people for many years to come,’ I murmured.
…
I sat at my desk wondering if all the days were going to be the same here. You watch the sunrise. The sunset. Sunrise. Sunset. Yet you feel you’re stationary. ‘The sunrise. The sunset,’ I murmured as I had still not written a single word. I put my pen aside.
‘Time never really moves here. That’s the beauty of time in small towns,’ Shyamala Aunty said, breaking my reverie. I hadn’t realized she had entered the room. She sneaks in whenever she likes, and I have hated it since my teenage years.
She continued to mop the floor with a magic mop, even as its engineering was beyond her comprehension. It reminded me of my arguments with Dad, who often said, ‘It is important for everyone to understand mathematics to be able to lead a good life.’
I would always tell him, ‘It is not important to understand an airplane’s engineering to be able to travel in it. You could be a layman and still live a happy life.’
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To know what happens next, get a copy of Where the Sun Never Sets from your nearest bookstores or online.
As the rainy season engulfs everything around you, we bring you some delightful monsoon reads to motivate, inspire, and entertain you. With inspiring stories that will stir your emotions, and enticing reads that will cheer you up as you watch the rain fall, take a look at our July releases!
Writer Rebel Soldier Lover by Akshaya Mukul
Writer, Rebel, Soldier, Lover||Akshaya Mukul
Sachchidanand Hirananda Vatsyayan ‘Agyeya’ is unarguably one of the most remarkable figures of Indian literature. From his revolutionary youth to acquiring the mantle of a (highly controversial) patron saint of Hindi literature, Agyeya’s turbulent life also tells a history of the Hindi literary world and of a new nation-spanning as it does two world wars, Independence and Partition, and the building and fraying of the Nehruvian state.
Akshaya Mukul’s comprehensive and unflinching biography is a journey into Agyeya’s public, private and secret lives. Based on never-seen-before archival material-including a mammoth trove of private papers, documents of the CIA-funded Congress for Cultural Freedom and colonial records of his years in jail-the book delves deep into the life of the nonconformist poet-novelist. Mukul reveals Agyeya’s revolutionary life and bomb-making skills, his CIA connection, a secret lover, his intense relationship with a first cousin, the trajectory of his political positions, from following M.N. Roy to exploring issues dear to the Hindu right, and much more. Along the way, we get a rare peek into the factionalism and pettiness of the Hindi literary world of the twentieth century, and the wondrous and grand debates which characterized that milieu.
Writer, Rebel, Soldier, Lover features a formidable cast of characters: from writers like Premchand, Phanishwarnath Renu, Raja Rao, Mulk Raj Anand and Josephine Miles to Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, revolutionary Chandra Shekhar Azad and actor Balraj Sahni. And its landscapes stretch from British jails, an intellectually robust Allahabad and modern-day Delhi to monasteries in Europe, the homes of Agyeya’s friends in the Himalayas and universities in the US. This book is a magnificent examination of Agyeya’s civilizational enterprise.
Vishnu Purana by Bibek Debroy
Vishnu Purana||Bibek Debroy
The Vishnu Purana is part of a series of eighteen sacred Hindu texts known collectively as the Puranas. It occupies a prominent position among the ancient Vaishnava Puranas which recount tales of creation and the many incarnations of Lord Vishnu. It describes the four classes of society, the four stages of life, and key astronomical concepts related to Hinduism.
Brimming with insight and told with clarity, this translation of the Vishnu Purana by Bibek Debroy presents readers with an opportunity to truly understand the classical Indian mythic texts. Debroy has previously translated the Bhagavata Purana, the Markandeya Purana, and the Brahma Purana.
Banaras Talkies by Satya Vas
Banaras Talkies||Satya Vyas
Bhagwandas Hostel at Banaras Hindu University can be mistaken as being like any other college hostel, but that would be a gross error. For, among the corridors of BD Hostel roam never-before-seen characters: Suraj the narrator, whose goal is to woo a girl, any girl; Anurag De, for whom cricket is life, literally, and Jaivardhan, whose melancholia gets him to answer every query with ‘ghanta’.
Follow the adventures of the three friends and others as they navigate undergraduate life in one of India’s most vibrant colleges, plan to steal exam papers, struggle to speak to women, find friends in corridors lined with dirty linen, and forge lifelong bonds amid bad mess food.
First published in Hindi in 2015, Banaras Talkies has remained on the bestseller list since then. A slice-of-life novel, it captures college life with all its twists and turns. Written with the idiomatic flourish that is the hallmark of Banarasi colloquialism, this comic novel is one of India’s great coming-of-age novels.
Shunya by Sri M
Shunya||Sri M
He appears out of nowhere in a sleepy little neighbourhood in suburban Kerala. He calls himself Shunya, the zero. Who is he? A lunatic? A dark magician? A fraud? Or an avadhuta, an enlightened soul? Saami-as they call him-settles into a small cottage in the backyard of the local toddy shop. Here he spins parables, blesses, curses, drinks endless glasses of black tea and lives in total freedom. On rare occasions, he plays soul-stirring melodies on his old, bamboo-reed flute. Then, just as mysteriously as he arrived, Shunya vanishes, setting the path for a new avadhuta, a new era. This first novel by Sri M is a meditation on the void which collapses the wall between reality and make-believe, the limited and the infinite. With its spare storytelling and profound wisdom, it leads us into the realm of ‘shunya’, the nothingness of profound and lasting peace, the beginning and end of all things.
Where the Sun Never Sets by Stuti Changle
Where the Sun Never Sets||Stuti Changle
‘A story about finding hope in the darkest of times that will brighten your day!’
If you find someone’s diary, would you dare open it?
Well, if you chance upon your old diary, would you dare read through your past?
Iti is forced to move back to her hometown of Mussoorie amid worldwide lockdown to work on her first movie script. Iti’s chance encounter with her first love, Nishit, reunion with her estranged best friend, Shelly, and nights spent reading her well-kept diary, make her best memories and worst nightmares come to life. She has always run away from her past, but now has no choice.
Will reading her diary prove to be an adventure worth taking for completing the script? Will life be the same? Ever?
Set in the COVID-19 lockdown, from the national bestselling author of On the Open Road and You Only Live Once, Where the Sun Never Sets is a riveting personal account of unforgettable childhood dreams, turbulent teenage years, complicated close relationships, human resilience, and the never-ending journey of growing up.
Apprenticed to the Himalayan Master by Sri M
Apprenticed to a Himalayan Master||Sri M
In this tell-all autobiography, Sri M writes about his fascinating journey as a young man from the southern coast of India to the mystical Himalayan Mountains. At the age of nineteen and a half, he felt an irresistible urge to go to the Himalayas in quest for his great Master. He finally met his Master at the Vyasa Cave, beyond the Badrinath shrine. After spending three and half years with his Master, wandering freely across the length and breadth of the Himalayan ranges, he was instructed to go back to live in the plains and lead a normal life. He started working for a living, fulfilled his social commitments and prepared himself to teach others all that he had learned and experienced. This book reveals the spiritual journey of a young lad from Kerala, who by his sincerity and dedication evolved into a living yogi. Sri M shares his knowledge of the Upanishads and spiritual insights born out of first hand experiences in his autobiography. Apprenticed to a Himalayan Master will make for an engaging and riveting read for those interested in the life and teachings of Sri M.
India’s Money Heist by Anirban Bhattacharya
India’s Money Heist||Anirban Bhattacharyya
From the creator-producer of Savdhaan India, the producer of Crime Patrol, and the bestselling author of The Deadly Dozen: India’s Most Notorious Serial Killers, comes the true story behind one of India’s biggest and most sensational bank heists.
31st December 2007. New Year’s Eve. A sleepy town in Kerala called Chelembra finds itself in the national headlines for India’s biggest bank heist to the tune of a whopping Rs 8 crore which included 80 kg of gold.
A crime that was supposedly inspired by a Bollywood blockbuster, this is the sensational story of that heist seen from both sides of the coin-the planning and execution by the mastermind criminals, and the difficult, yet thrilling, investigation by the Kerala police team led by P. Vijayan.
Constructed from extensive first-person interviews of the police team that solved the crime and the confession details of the criminals, this is the true story of how India’s biggest bank heist was executed and the cat-and-mouse game that ensued.
Yoga Also for the Godless by Sri M
Yoga Also for the Godless||Sri M
Practitioners of the ancient science of yoga have long contended that you don’t have to be a Hindu, in the conventional sense, to practise yoga, even though its origins lie in India. Renowned spiritual teacher, author, social reformer, educationist and global speaker Sri M goes a step further in this new and path-breaking book-he proves that, let alone belonging to a particular religion, one doesn’t even need to believe in God to be a true yogi. One of the best-known Vedantic scholars of our times, he draws on his deep knowledge of ancient Indian scriptures to prove that the godless are as capable as the God-inspired of reaching the pinnacle of self-realisation and bliss through yoga.
Based on a profound understanding of Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras, this is a step-by-step guide to the theory and practice of yoga for those who seek to know it better, and also for the young and the millennial, who may be stepping out for the first time. In lucid prose, with photographs for visual aid, Sri M takes us through the most complex notions of breath, body and posture with admirable brevity and clarity.
Live Your Best Life by Dr. Amrinder Bajaj
Live Your Best Life||Dr.Amrinder Bajaj
Understanding Menopause for a Wiser, Happier and Healthier You.
Jezebel by KR Meera
Jezebel||K.R.Meera
Jezebel, a young doctor in Kerala, struggles against the cruel realities of a patriarchal world-realities that not even her education, resolve or professional brilliance can shield her from. Her already contentious divorce proceedings go suddenly awry, and her unhappy marriage holds complex secrets. In K.R. Meera’s blistering new novel, which takes the form of a courtroom drama to show us the rich inner worlds of its characters, we see Jezebel reflect on her life and its pivotal points as she takes the stand. Through her memories, we see her grow from a reticent, serious young woman to a rebel who refuses to bend to the conventions of society.
Like the Biblical story of Queen Jezebel, who was much maligned as a scheming harlot and infamously thrown to her death from her palace window, Jezebel is a novel that asks if independent women can ever live lives that are free of judgement K.R. Meera’s hypnotic prose, in this elegant translation from the Malayalam by Abhirami Girija Sriram and K.S. Bijukumar, makes resonant allusions to the Bible in powerful ways that elucidate the correlations between legend and the protagonist’s life while also exploring how sexuality and gender roles are manipulated by the dictates of society.
Madam Sir by Manjari Jaruhar
Madam Sir|| Manjari Jaruhar
After an unexpected turn of events upended the homemaker role her parents had planned for her, Manjari Jaruhar overcame extraordinary odds to become the first woman from Bihar to join the country’s elite police cadre.
A masterclass in courage, resilience and leadership by a woman who broke new ground and thrived despite being viewed with disbelief and derision by her colleagues, Madam Sir is a stirring account of a sheltered girl’s rise to the top echelons of the Indian Police Service.
Set against the backdrop of significant events such as the Bhagalpur blindings, the 1984 anti-Sikh riots and Lalu Prasad’s reign in Bihar, Madam Sir looks at the IPS from the inside, through a woman’s eyes.
This is a story that will inspire you to pursue your dreams and infuse you with the spirit to reach impossible heights.
The Life and Times of George Fernandes by Rahul Ramagundam
The Life and Times of George Fernandes||Rahul Ramagundam
The Life and Times of George Fernandes chronicles the story of George, who rose from the streets of Bombay to stride the corridors of power. In this extraordinary biography, Rahul Ramagundam opens a window to George’s political evolution and traces the course of the Socialist Party in India from its inception in 1930s to its dissolution into the Janata Party in the late 1970s. In the process, this book explores the trail of India’s opposition parties that worked to displace the long-ruling Congress Party from its preeminent position.
A Thousand Kisses Deep by Novoneel Chakraborty
A Thousand Kisses Deep||Novoneel Chakraborty
Humiliatingly rejected by Haasil, even after she thought she had him, Pallavi sets forth on a self-destructive path, seeking one life-thrill after the other. All she desires is to heal the wounds that haunt her every move, not allowing her to be herself. Neither can she forget Haasil nor can she reach him any more. That is, until she meets . . . Palki, Haasil’s ex-wife who is presumed dead by the world.
Talking to Palki, Pallavi realizes she has found the ultimate weapon to destroy Haasil: the one man who changed her life and persona forever. She plans a deadly set of events that catch Haasil, Palki and his current love, Swadha, unaware. As the dice of destiny is rolled, the question looms: will Pallavi destroy Haasil irreversibly using his once true love, Palki, or will she, for once, come to terms with her deep love for him? A Thousand Kisses Deep is an emotional whirlwind depicting modern layered relationships, lost love and how, sometimes, destiny’s plans are quite contrary to what we have been coveting all our life. As Haasil, Pallavi, Palki and Swadha go about life seeking their personal answers and solace, they realize love, after all, is still not done with any of them . . .
Bhagat Singh by Satvinder Juss
Bhagat Singh||Satvinder Juss
A timely antidote, this meticulously researched biography is an expansive foray into the life of Bhagat Singh. The volume deliberates upon his family from before when he was born, examining along the way the role that various episodes, policies and people played in shaping the identity of a legendary revolutionary, while also delving into his opinions on important questions of the time. It shines a bright light on the oft-ignored personal influences that made Singh who he was, along with the issue of his contested identity in today’s politics. This is the definitive Bhagat Singh biography of our times.
Sone Chandi ke Buth by KA Abbas, edited by Syeda
Sone Chandi Ke Buth||K.A.Abbas
Sone Chandi ke Buth is a collection of writings on cinema that includes the observations, thoughts and
reflections of Khwaja Ahmad Abbas. Originally written in Urdu by the well-known journalist, screenwriter and film-maker, it has now been translated for the first time into English.
Where the Cobbled Footpath Leads by Avinuo Kire
Where the Cobbled Path Leads||Avinuo Kire
Where the Cobbled Path Leadsis a folk fantasy novel, interweaving fantasy fiction with Naga spirit stories and folklore.
Eleven-year-old Vime is struggling to come to terms with the demise of her beloved mother. She has a special place she frequents-a cobbled footpath near her house which leads to a forest. On the day of her mother’s death anniversary, not wanting to return home, Vime follows the cobbled footpath all the way to the deep end of the woods and discovers that the trail leads to a magnificent tree. She falls asleep under it only to wake up and find that the footpath has disappeared. Tei, a forest spirit, helps her relocate the missing pathway.
This book examines the social and cultural infrastructure that sustains Sindhi business and its trade networks. It provides a rich historical context to the narrative by tracing the origin of Sindhi Trade to the annexation of Sindh in 1843, when it was incorporated into an expanding global economy. The book also locates Sindhi business within the dynamics of the contemporary Indian diaspora and features several success stories both from India and outside. The book emphasizes the commercial inventiveness, spatial mobility, and adaptability of Sindhis—-the qualities crucial to building successful cosmopolitan businesses.
Lilavati by Govardhanram Tripathi
Lilavati||Govardhanram Tripathi
An exemplar of Indian literature-the only and heart-rending biography of a daughter by her father
In a moment of rare passion Govardhanram Madhavram Tripathi, author of Sarasvatichandra, exclaimed ‘I only want their souls’. He was referring to the souls of his countrymen and women, which he sought to cultivate through his literary writings. Lilavati was his and Lalitagauri’s eldest daughter. Her education and the writing of Sarasvaticandra were intertwined. She was raised to be the perfect embodiment of virtue, and died at the age of twenty-one, consumed by tuberculosis. In moments of ‘lucidity’ , she spoke of her suffering and that challenged the very foundations of Govardhanram’s life. In 1905 he wrote her biography, Lilavati Jivankala. This is a rare work in biographical literature, a father writing about the life of a deceased daughter. Despite Govardhanram’s attempts to contain Lilavati as a unidimensional figure of his imagination, she goes beyond that, sometimes by questioning the fundamental tenets of Brahminical beliefs, and at others by being so utterly selfless as to be unreal even to him.
Lilavati: A Life is a cross between literature in translation, social and political history, and women’s studies. Tridip Suhrud’s introduction dwells on the themes of the cultivation of selfhood, of nation and the ideal of sacrifice, which is sure to resonate with contemporary readership, especially women.
The 10 New Life-Changing Skills||Rajesh Srivastava
The earlier 3 Industrial Revolutions (3IRs) created blue collar and white-collar jobs, which required people to carry out instructions, not question authority and follow time tested systems and processes.
Now, we are in the midst of the 4th Industrial revolution (4IR), also called Industry 4.0. It is creating ‘green collar’ jobs, which need people to ‘think, reflect and act’. To develop these abilities and perform the green collar jobs efficiently, it is critical that professionals develop certain skills -the 10 new life-changing skills:
1. Creativity
2. Innovation
3. Critical Thinking
4. Framing the Right Question
5. Smart Problem-Solving
6. Lifelong Learning
7. Storytelling
8. Influence Without Authority
9. Humanness
10. Entrepreneurial Spirit.
This book will introduce readers to these skills, which they can apply in their businesses and professions to come up trumps.
A meditation on grief, These Errors are Correct is Jeet Thayil’s most intimate work to date. In poems of tenderness and rage, time blurs into a continuous present visited by Billy the Kid, the Buddha, Lata Mangeshkar, Jesus and Beethoven, by unnamed protagonists for whom faith and addiction are interchangeable, and by a remote god-like figure who will ‘lick / your wound with his infected tongue’. A range of fixed and invented forms–rhymed syllabics, terza rima, ghazals, sonnets, the sestina, the canzone, stealth rhymes–make for a virtuosic, haunting collection. Originally published in 2008, the book has been out of print since 2010. With illustrations by the author, this new edition returns to the reader an essential and timeless book of poems. These Errors are Correct won the 2013 Sahitya Akademi Award.
A collaboration between Jeet Thayil and The Burning Deck, the track on the back flap appears as ‘Aquatic’ in These Errors are Correct, and as ‘The River Under the River’ on The Burning Deck album Where My Leaves Come to Rest. You can find the music of The Burning Deck on Bandcamp/Soundcloud & Spotify.
India is witnessing a major change in the way we look at money. Having reached the middle income status as a country, a vast section of the youth is now aspiring for higher financial goals. This large population is breaking away from its parents in almost every way, including financially. But the new generation of Indians entering the workforce demand more knowledge on their investments. They constantly grapple with complicated questions surrounding money: What do they do with their money? How do they plan for their future? Most of the time, they get bad advice. Mutual funds have not really delivered meaningful returns, stock selection is extremely complicated and sophisticated investments like PMSs, AIFs, etc., are only for the wealthy.
This book tries to help these young investors by offering them a framework they can use to create wealth in the long run. Using the wisdom and experience of Indian’s top personal finance professionals, the book answers critical questions, such as: Should I rent a house or buy a house? Passive investing versus active investing? Stocks versus mutual funds? Debt funds or FDs? And finally – crypto or no crypto?
Out of the box thinking, ruthless pragmatism and an innate ability to understand, define and then redefine the game of cricket are probably the hallmarks of Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s cricket. From hitting countless sixes in his school ground in the sleepy town of Ranchi to finishing a run chase with another towering six in a World Cup final against Sri Lanka, Dhoni’s journey is undoubtedly one of the most iconic of our times. Many have tried to decode his mystique, and yet, every account seems to have fallen frustratingly short of capturing the essence of the man.
Instead, in Do Different, we offer diverse perspectives on the man: from a fellow wicketkeeper and competitor reminiscing on Dhoni’s early years; to MSD’s first agent with his perspective on the journey of brand Dhoni; to an international fast bowler who played with MSD since his first-class days and then starred for him in the Indian Premier League.
From the matches and moments that defined Dhoni in the IPL, in international cricket and even off the field, to his life beyond the game of cricket, this is your ultimate MSD book.
Nehru and the Spirit of India|| Manash Firaq Bhattacharjee
Jawaharlal Nehru was Plato’s philosopher king, who ‘discovered’ an India that remains an undiscovered possibility. Nehru and the Spirit of India is a critical and nuanced perusal of his intellectual and political legacy.
From the ‘politics of friendship’ between Nehru and Sheikh Abdullah, Nehru’s defense of secularism in the Constituent Assembly Debates, to what propelled Nehru to curb free speech in the First Amendment, Manash Firaq Bhattacharjee draws from political history to illuminate fierce debates in India today: Kashmir, the CAA, and hate speech. Be it contemporary events like the miracle of Ganesha drinking milk and the use of Vedic astrology in Chandrayaan-2, or the agonising suicide of a doctor, the author examines the fractured nature of Indian modernity, which Nehru had suggestively called a ‘garb’. Bhattacharjee bolsters Nehru’s view that India is enriched by the encounter of cultures and that we must not discard the past, but engage with it.
As a second-generation refugee, Bhattacharjee argues for a ‘minoritarian’ approach to national politics. Breaking ideological and disciplinary protocols, he compels us to learn from the insights of poets and thinkers. Lucidly written, this provocative book offers an original perspective on Nehru and Indian history.
Tech entrepreneur Mukesh Bansal has been a lifelong student of human performance optimisation. He has studied the science behind it, and worked closely with high performers across business, sports and entertainment, to understand what it takes to transcend apparent limitations and achieve true potential.
Through his entrepreneurial experience and studying the field of health and fitness, Bansal came to understand the enormous power of plasticity: the ability of the human brain to rewire itself at will as we develop new skills. He also realised that high performers across domains rely on common tools that were embraced by ancient wisdom and are validated by modern science. Knowing that high performance is not a matter of genetics or luck is highly empowering.
No Limits distils Bansal’s findings on talent, deliberate practice, mindset, habit, willpower and learning. It is a guide to maximising one’s potential with well-defined strategies. So, no matter what you do, you can be a superior version of yourself, performing at increasingly better levels, constantly reaching higher.
Penguin Random House India has acquired the English translation of award-winning writer Satya Vyas’s best-selling Hindi novel Banaras Talkies. First published in Hindi in 2015, its English translation with the same title will release in July 2022. Translated by editor and translator Himadri Agarwal, Banaras Talkies will be released under the Ebury Press imprint. It is currently available for pre-order on all major e-commerce websites.
Pegged as one of India’s best campus novels, Banaras Talkies follows three friends as they navigate undergraduate college life, plan to steal exam papers, struggle to speak to women and forge friendships that will last a lifetime over bad mess food. Readers can soak in the nostalgia of their own campus experience through this book.
The slice-of-life novel captures the struggles, aspirations, and lives of young Indians. Set in one of India’s most vibrant colleges, the Banaras Hindu University, it has been written with the idiomatic flourish that is the hallmark of Banarasi colloquialism.
Talking about the upcoming translation in English, author Satya Vyas says, ‘Banaras Talkies is an award-winning Hindi bestseller. This ‘hostelgic’ fiction has entertained readers in Hindi for years. It’s of immense pride to me that we can now reach out to new readers in English through Penguin Random House.’
Himadri Agarwal, the translator of the book, adds, ‘Translating Banaras Talkies has been a journey of love, laughter, and adventure. I was honoured to translate it, and I can’t wait to see what English readers think of the book.’
Elizabeth Kuruvilla, Executive Editor, Ebury Publishing & Vintage, Penguin Random House India, says, ‘Banaras Talkies is a witty novel that takes readers on a laughter-filled ride back to their college corridors, bantering with friends, conspiring to skip classes, the heartbreaks and lucky successes in love, and the ever-looming pressure of having to one day leave college and “get serious about life”.’
Milee Ashwarya, Publisher, Ebury Publishing & Vintage, Penguin Random House India, says, ‘Banaras Talkies by Satya Vyas in Hindi has entertained readers for several years, and I hope that the English translation by Himadri Agarwal receives the same love and adulation. Congratulations to Satya and Himadri. I am proud to publish the book.’
Author Bio:
Satya Vyas is an award-winning author of five bestselling books, including Banaras Talkies, Dilli Durbar and Chaurasi. Born and brought up in Bokaro in Jharkhand, he has H established his identity in audio and screen writing, as well as opened a new path in Hindi writing. The web series Grahan is based on his book Chaurasi. Along with writing, he also takes creative writing classes in various learning apps.
Translator Bio:
Himadri Agarwal is an editor, translator and a reader. She currently works at Yoda Press and will soon be starting an English PhD at the University of Maryland, College Park. When not buried in a book or busy with work, she enjoys playing Dungeons & Dragons, eating junk food, or doing both things at the same time.
Many people would understand the nostalgia of a first crush. For filmmaker Onir, this rush of pure emotions happened twice. Throughout I Am Onir and I Am Gay, the author seamlessly entwines his sexual identity with his life, especially his childhood days of moving around and being boundless.
The following excerpt is the first chapter in its entirety.
I Am Onir & I Am Gay||Onir with Irene Dhar Malik
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First Crush
I met him in 1984, when I came to Calcutta (now Kolkata) for my higher secondary studies. There’s a lot about those two years that I try to forget—the disillusionment of the young boy coming from a Himalayan small town to a big city, whose excitement had quickly transformed to disappointment and anxiety—but I will always remember him. In this city that I used to visit every year during the winter vacation and that had seemed full of welcoming relatives, I now desperately searched for accommodation and ended up in many scary or awkward living arrangements.
We didn’t even have television in Bhutan at the time a fifteen-year-old me moved to Calcutta. The protectionist policies of the Bhutanese government ensured that it was the last country in the world to allow television, which was as late as 1999. Calcutta was overwhelming and, in many ways, I was the proverbial smalltown boy experiencing big-city blues. I quickly realized that I wasn’t going to get admission in any of the well-known schools as my ICSE marks were abysmally low by Calcutta standards. Anything above 60 per cent was considered first division and therefore something to celebrate back home in Thimphu, but my marks were woefully inadequate here. Those were not yet the days when students scored 99.9 per cent, but a 90 per cent didn’t hurt anybody, as we found out the following year when my brother easily secured admission into La Martinière for Boys. As for me, I finally got admitted to St Augustine’s in the rather dingy Ripon Street neighbourhood of Calcutta. It was a tiny and somewhat cramped school at the time. The stairs were grimy, the classrooms small and windowless.
I think we were about ten or twelve students. Though they must have, like me, not been academically brilliant, my classmates were all very kind and generous, and that made all the difference. Of the teachers I don’t have many memories, except that I was so enamoured by my biology teacher Miss Mukherjee that biology quickly became my favourite subject. I still haven’t forgotten her gentle voice and kind smile.
I also remember my Bangla teacher, even though his name escapes me. I remember him because I was terrified of him. My Bangla was atrocious, having started learning the alphabet only when I was in Class 9, and it was by some miracle that I passed my ICSE Bangla paper. At St. Augustine’s, I used to hate my Bangla teacher and his classes. After I cleared my Class 12 Bangla paper, the man I had been so terrified of wore a broad grin as he patted me on the shoulder and said, ‘I never thought a gadha (donkey) like you would pass, I’m so relieved.’ I realized that he was perhaps actually fond of me and had been so severe with me only because he hadn’t wanted me to fail.
It was during those years that I had what I can call my first crush. He was tall and dusky, with thoughtful eyes and sensuous lips, and he had somehow decided to take me under his protective wing. He not only made sure no one bullied me, but also helped me cross roads and board buses. I couldn’t manage to cross the busy Calcutta streets on my own, nor board the crowded buses or trams before and after school. Very often, I used to walk long distances just to avoid getting into a crowded bus.
So yes, he was the one who would hold my hand or navigate me through the streets of Calcutta, his arm around my shoulder. I had no idea then what being gay meant. But unlike my Bhutan schooldays, I did not fall in love with any girl in my Calcutta school. There was an element of physical attraction with one of my classmates, but there was no emotional involvement at all with that boy. Stolen moments of touching and kissing in cinema halls, classrooms, deserted parks. There was no shame or sense of wrong in me, just the acknowledgement that sex was supposed to be something hush-hush; and we were discreet, like most boys and girls were those days.
I was aware that what I felt for my tall and dusky friend was different, but I didn’t give much thought to that difference. Life went on, and we sat for our ISC exams. We knew that we would soon go our diverse ways, our paths dictated by education and career choices.
One afternoon, it was just the two of us in his flat. We sat on the floor in his room, next to each other, our backs resting against the bed, talking about many, many things, as teenagers tend to do during languid Calcutta afternoons. I don’t really recall the exact flow of events, but I remember his white vest and the lungi he wore, and I can still remember his smell. At some point he put his arms around me, drawing me close to him, and asked me if I would like to touch him. This was not my first sexual experience, but I was nervous that afternoon, maybe because I had felt that unspoken and as yet unexplored feeling of love. This wasn’t the first time I had kissed someone, but whenever the reference to the ‘first kiss’ happens, it’s him that I think of. Of that sweaty afternoon and my limbs intertwined with his long limbs. When I walked back home that evening, everything had seemed pleasantly hazy. Yes, I know it sounds like a clich., but maybe that one time in my life, I did experience that cliché of being blissfully in love.
Much like in the falling-in-love sequences of the Hindi films that I’d grown up watching, his image was omnipresent for the rest of the day, superimposed over all details of my mundane existence.
At 7 a.m. the next morning, there was a knock on my door. When I opened the door, I was surprised to see him standing there. He didn’t want to come in but asked me to step out so that we could talk for five minutes.
Standing in the narrow lane outside the tiny Calcutta flat I then shared with my siblings, surrounded by the din of morning chores being executed in the surrounding middle-class households, I heard what he had to say. ‘Look, I thought about it, and whatever happened yesterday shouldn’t have happened. It was wrong, and what we did is a sin. I want you to erase that memory and so will I. And since that alone is not enough, I think it’s best that we don’t meet for the next ten years.’
He walked away. I was so numb that I didn’t utter a word as I watched him turn around and leave. No parting hug, not even a wave . . . he just walked away.
It was not then, but a couple of days later, when I was walking near Dhakuria Lake, that the truth suddenly hit me, and I could not stop the tears. The year was 1986, and I was seventeen. I realized for the first time that my love was not acceptable to the world I lived in and that something that was priceless to me was considered sinful by others. I didn’t understand why, but I was filled with a sense of emptiness, a great sadness, because I knew that this was not fair.
A couple of years later, I happened to pass by the building where he lived. Perhaps it was by design, but I don’t think so. After a lot of hesitation, I went up to the building watchman and asked about him. The entire family had emigrated to the US.
We never met again.
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I Am Onir and I Am Gay is available for pre-order.
When one thinks of Pride Month, we understandably visualize the rainbow. But symbolism is only the tip of the iceberg. Through stories both fiction and nonfiction, we are able to best empathise with and see the nuances that shade the seven colours of the flag.
Celebrate Pride with our list of recommendations. Keep scrolling to find your perfect queer read!
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I Am Onir and I Am Gay by Onir with Irene Dhar Malik
I Am Onir & I Am Gay||Onir with Irene Dhar Malik
The award-winning filmmaker Onir, whose directorial debut, My Brother Nikhil (2005), broke new ground in LGBT representation on the Indian silver screen, opens up fully for the first time. From his childhood days in Bhutan to when he was a young man with no connections in the Hindi film industry who dreamt big and fought to carve a niche for himself, Onir takes the reader through his struggles and triumphs to offer an intimate glimpse of his fascinating journey to success. I Am Onir and I Am Gay is a raw, eloquent and inspiring memoir about confronting and transcending frontiers. Written with his sister Irene Dhar Malik, this emotionally gritty and unabashedly honest personal story is a pathbreaking narrative of hope, love and the pursuit of dreams.
Hungry Humans by Karichan Kunju
Hungry Humans||Karichan Kunju
This translation of the groundbreaking Tamil novel Pasitha Manidam, first published in 1978, offers deep insight into the conservative and caste-conscious temple town of Kumbakonam, viewed here with dispassionately cold clarity as a society that utterly fails its own.
Ganesan returns, after four decades, to the town of his childhood, filled with memories of love and loneliness, of youthful beauty and the ravages of age and misfortune, of the promise of talent and its slow destruction. Seeking treatment for leprosy, he must also come to terms with his past: his exploitation at the hands of older men, his growing consciousness of desire and his own sexual identity, his steady disavowal of Brahminical morality and his slowly degenerating body. Sudha G. Tilak deftly builds upon Karichan Kunju’s prose to expose this world, raw, real, without frills or artifice.
Tell Me How To Be by Neel Patel
Tell Me How To Be||Neel Patel
Renu Amin always seemed perfect: doting husband, beautiful house, healthy sons. But as the one-year anniversary of her husband’s death approaches, Renu is binge-watching soap operas and simmering with old resentments. She can’t stop wondering if, thirty-five years ago, she chose the wrong life. In Los Angeles, her son, Akash, has everything he ever wanted, but as he tries to kickstart his songwriting career and commit to his boyfriend, he is haunted by the painful memories he fled a decade ago. When his mother tells him she is selling the family home, Akash returns to Illinois, hoping to finally say goodbye and move on.
By turns irreverent and tender, filled with the beats of ’90s R&B, Tell Me How to Be is about our earliest betrayals and the cost of reconciliation. But most of all, it is the love story of a mother and son each trying to figure out how to be in the world.
Eleven Ways To Love: Essays
Eleven Ways To Love: Essays
People have been telling their love stories for thousands of years. It is the greatest common human experience. And yet, love stories coach us to believe that love is selective, somehow, that it can be boxed in and easily defined. This is a collection of eleven remarkable essays that widen the frame of reference: transgender romance; body image issues; race relations; disability; polyamory; class differences; queer love; long distance; caste; loneliness; the single life; the bad boy syndrome . . . and so much more.
Pieced together with a dash of poetry and a whole lot of love, featuring a multiplicity of voices and a cast of unlikely heroes and heroines, this is a book of essays that show us, with empathy, humour and wisdom, that there is no such thing as the love that dare not speak its name.
Shikhandi, and Other Tales They Don’t Tell You by Devdutt Pattanaik
Shikhandi||Devdutt Pattanaik
Queerness isn’t only modern, Western or sexual, says mythologist Devdutt Pattanaik. From Shikhandi, who became a man to satisfy her wife; Mahadeva, who became a woman to deliver a devotee’s child; Chudala, who became a man to enlighten her husband; Samavan, who became the wife of his male friend and many more. Playful and touching—and sometimes disturbing—these stories when compared with tales of the Mesopotamian Gilgamesh, the Greek Ganymede, the biblical Sodom or the Chinese ‘cut sleeve’ Emperor reveal the unique Indian way of making sense of queerness. Devdutt Pattanaik’s new book builds on profound ideas that our ancestors shared but which we have rarely inherited.
Red Lipstick: The Men in My Life by Laxmi Narayan Tripathi
Red Lipstick||Laxmi
The first inklings and stirrings of lust that Laxmi remembers came from noticing big, strong arms, the hint of a guy’s moustache over his lips, billboards that advertised men’s underwear. Laxmi found this puzzling initially. Was there a woman inside him who couldn’t really express herself because of some last-minute mix-up that god did at the time of his birth? Struggling with such existential questions, Laxmi Narayan Tripathi, eminent transgender activist, awakens to her true self: She is Laxmi, a hijra. In this fascinating narrative Laxmi unravels her heart to tell the stories of the men-creators, preservers, lovers, benefactors, and abusers-in her life. Racy, unapologetic, dark and exceptionally honest, these stories open a window to a brave new world.
Besharam by Priya Alika Elias
Besharam||Priya Alika Elias
Besharam is a book on young Indian women and how to be one, written from the author’s personal experience in several countries. It dissects the many things that were never explained to us and the immense expectations placed on us. It breaks down the taboos around sex and love and dating in a world that’s changing with extraordinary rapidity. Like an encyclopedia or a really good big sister, Besharam teaches young Indian women something that they almost never hear: it’s okay to put ourselves first and not feel guilty for it.
Part memoir, part manual, Besharam serves up ambitious feminism for the modern Indian woman.
A Gift of Goddess Lakshmi by Manobi Bandopadhyay
A GIft of Goddess Lakshmi||Manobi Bandopadhyay
When a boy was born in the Bandhopadhyay family, all rejoiced. A son had been born after two girls and finally, the conservative father could boast about having sired a son. However, it wasn’t long before the little boy began to feel inadequate in his own body and began questioning his own identity: Why did he constantly feel like he was a girl even when he had male parts? Why was he attracted to boys in a way that girls are? What could he do to stop feeling so incomplete?
With unflinching honesty and deep understanding, Manobi tells the moving story of her transformation from a man to a woman; how she did not just define her own identity, but also inspired her entire community.
An Unsuitable Boy by Karan Johar
An Unsuitable Boy||Karan Johar
Karan Johar is synonymous with success, panache, quick wit, and outspokenness, which sometimes inadvertently creates controversy and makes headlines. But who is the man behind the icon that we all know? Baring all for the first time in his autobiography, An Unsuitable Boy, KJo talks about the ever-changing face of Indian cinema, challenges and learnings, as well as friendships and rivalries in the industry. Honest, heart-warming and insightful, An Unsuitable Boy is both the story of the life of an exceptional filmmaker at the peak of his powers and of an equally extraordinary human being who shows you how to survive and succeed in life.
Love Bi The Way by Bhaavna Arora
Love Bi the Way||Bhaavna Arora
Rihana is a painter who is trying to find inspiration in love. Zara is a businesswoman trying to make a niche for her company in a male-dominated world. Rihana is fire, Zara is ice; Rihana is openly sensual, while Zara is more cautious with her heart-they are opposites that attract. They are different people bound together by their house, called Cupid, and their pet golden retriever, Tiger.
But Rihana finds herself a string of sexy men, while Zara emerges out of her shell and meets an actual prince who sweeps her off her feet. Can these relationships last? And what road will they take when love happens bi the way? As both of them navigate their fulfilling careers and try to leave behind troubled pasts, they find solace in each other.
What makes organizations successful in the long run?
Is it money, projects, or growth?
According to Piyush Pandey, the advertising legend of India, emphasizes the importance of building an organization where every single member is aligned to the same extraordinary goal of creativity. Community building, an integrated audience, and an environment that fosters and promotes individual creativity without compromising on the essence and ideals of the company is crucial for success in the long run. Read this excerpt from Open House with Piyush Pandey to know more!
Open House||Piyush Pandey
“I must say that while Apple, indeed, is extraordinary, there are many other companies that have done reasonably well in building a company, products, brands and communities. Off the top of my head, I could name Nike, Coke, Burger King, Mondelez and, closer home, Pidilite and Asian Paints. Perhaps Google would be another.
In each of these instances, the principles are the same.
Apple’s employees, anecdotally, love going to the office. They seem free to express themselves, and seem unhampered by rules and structures.
And yet there is a system; it’s not that it’s free for all. They have created an environment of creativity seemingly freed from constraints to express oneself. In most companies, for example in network agencies and other communication companies, rules and procedures are created to prevent chaos or the unpredictable. Apple, from the time they began with the 1984 release of the Mac to the second journey under Steve Jobs, was unsatisfied with the normal or the staid – they wanted extraordinary products and took extraordinary punts in the quest for the extraordinary products.
The success with the iPod gave them the courage to invest more in experiments and risks and the products that followed ensured that success.
Companies such as Apple spend an extraordinary amount of time – and money – in creating the culture that fosters out-of-the-box thinking. We admire the company because of the successive successes that they’ve had. And we will continue to admire them till they continue to succeed.
The product basket, thanks to the near monopoly market that they enjoy in the early stages, sees them enjoying high margins – which in turn allows them to invest in the next big idea.
Such companies are almost like close-knit families. The rules exist but are unwritten and unsaid. However, the ‘ecosystem’, the family, is, as a collective, aware of problems and unhappiness and challenges that particular members of the family might be experiencing.
A critical party of the ecosystem is the partners of the business; they’re also family and need to be treated as such. The role that Lee Clow and TBWA Chiat Day played in the success of Apple has been described many times by Jobs himself. Apple has worked with Lee’s team literally since inception.
These are unusual, but visionaries like Jobs chase their dreams and not bow to the pressures of the stock market. That allows them to take a long-term view of their product portfolio and their brand – something very few have the courage to do.
I’ve had the pleasure of working with some brands for over 20, 30, 40 years. The ones that easily come to mind are Fevicol, Asian Paints, Cadbury Dairy Milk, many HUL brands. Other companies who have invested in their partners becoming long-term ‘family members’ include Amul.
The performance of these brands is there for all to see.
Can another Apple be born? Only if we see another Steve Jobs. Is Tim Cook the new Steve Jobs? That answer will help us understand if there is indeed an ecosystem that can win every time, or whether it was the vision of Steve Jobs. Apple’s performance post the passing of Steve Jobs suggests that there is, indeed, an ecosystem that works.”
As living, breathing, and thriving humans, we often believe a common pretense: we are the most superior form of life. Sometimes people refer to organisms, especially humans, as ‘perfectly designed’, but our aquatic ancestors had to twist and stretch and rework what they already had. You can’t get to the perfect solution for being a human from that fishy starting point!
Explaining Life Through Evolution||Prosanta Chakrabarty
“Your body is a disaster. I don’t care if you look like Padma Lakshmi or Michael Jordan. We are all hunks of water-logged flesh, hanging off of sticks of collagen and calcium, made up of teeming pockets of bacteria that are held together by strings of blood all covered in an oily skin bag. We are frail naked apes with giant lollipop heads with exposed and vulnerable dangly bits that are so ill-equipped for life that we get tired after standing up still for ten minutes.
Why? Again, we are literally fish out of water.
We are taught to think we humans are perfect: no less than the pinnacle of evolution. Hogwash. The only thing we got going for us are our big brains, and we use those brains just enough to think we are better than everything else and to build things to make us feel important but that will also destroy the planet and ultimately ourselves—time for some humility.
It isn’t all bad. We do have the advantage of getting more oxygen directly from the air than from water (which has a lot less oxygen), but gas exchange is more difficult through lungs than with gills. But we mess that up too by using the same tubing for breathing as for feeding, and we have just a little piece of flappy tissue (the epiglottis) to keep food from going down the wrong pipe. And that never fails— (choke, choke) right. I’d rather have the body of a crappie (the fish) than our crappy bodies.
We can see in our bodies the evolutionary connections we have with more recent ancestors too. We still have the remnants of a tail (which is just an extension of the spine) as the coccyx; and we get goosebumps to raise non-existent fur on our bodies (which we lost in becoming ‘naked’ apes). Yes, we had hairy ancestors with tails, but no, not from monkeys. Unlike a common popular myth, we did not evolve from monkeys. We share a common ancestor with monkeys that led to both tailed monkeys and to the tail-less great apes (of which we are one).”
Evolution isn’t as linear as we think it to be. If you’re keen to know about the complex history of evolution, and how we came to be, get your copy of Explaining Life Through Evolution now!
How does a Parsi lawyer, deeply influenced by the principles of Roman Catholicism, fall in love with a Bahá’í and go on to become the Attorney General of India for a Hindu nationalist BJP government? How does a boy with a broken leg, who studied in a Gujarati-medium school, and lost his father at the age of nineteen, go on to mount a heroic defense of the Janata government’s decision to dissolve Congress state legislatures (in 1977) in the Supreme Court? How does a lawyer with a humdrum customs and excise law practice, whose grandfather sold horsedrawn carriages in Bombay, become a U.N. human rights rapporteur, and repeatedly defend the fundamental right to free speech and expression in the Supreme Court of India?
Let’s read an excerpt from Abhinav Chandrachud’s latest book Soli Sorabjee, Life and Times: An Authorized Biography.
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Soli Sorabjee || Abhinav Chandrachud
A lawyer’s first brief is always considered to be very memorable. Sorabjee’s first brief was given to him by a Parsi attorney, Naval Vakil, a partner at Little & Company, a firm which used to heavily brief his senior, Kharshedji Bhabha. It was not a very serious brief. Sorabjee just had to ask Justice S.T. Desai for an adjournment in the case. Vakil sent Sorabjee the brief along with a thoughtful note. It said: ‘I hope it leads to more success.’ However, in this, his very first case at the Bombay High Court, Sorabjee failed. The judge refused Sorabjee his adjournment.
Even so, Sorabjee marked a fee of two ‘gold mohurs’ for his appearance in the case, equivalent to thirty rupees. Since the colonial period, Bombay advocates marked their fees in gold mohurs, where one gold mohur was worth fifteen rupees. Even today, it is common to see fees being marked in gold mohurs or ‘gms’ on the Original Side of the Bombay High Court.
Sorabjee’s practice started slowly. Between 1953 and 1955, in the first ten important cases that he appeared in (i.e., cases that were either reported in the law reports or written about in the Times of India), Sorabjee was led by a senior and did not offer any independent arguments in court. Naturally, the senior advocate he was ‘led by’ most often in his cases in the early days was his own senior, Kharshedji. By 1957, however, around 4 years into his practice, Sorabjee started arguing cases on his own in the Bombay High Court. Between 1953 and 1970, before Sorabjee became a senior, he argued 63 per cent of the important cases that he appeared in himself. In other words, even as a junior, the majority of the briefs that Sorabjee received were those in which he had to stand up in a packed courtroom, face the judge, make his arguments, and try to obtain a favourable outcome for his client. This number rose substantially after he became a senior advocate. Between 1971 and 1975, after Sorabjee became a senior and up to the eve of Indira Gandhi’s Emergency, Sorabjee argued 81 per cent of the important cases that he appeared in himself. Like Kharshedji, Sorabjee appeared mostly on the Original Side of the Bombay High Court. Like him, Sorabjee appeared both before a single judge and division bench in equal proportions.
There is no doubt that Parsi connections helped Sorabjee. He grew up in a wealthy, well-connected Parsi family. He was privileged. He did not have to worry about earning money in the early days of his law practice, to pay rent or to support a family. He studied in schools that had a high proportion of Parsi pupils. He got into the chamber of a prominent Parsi advocate, Kharshedji, his cousin’s husband. He got his first brief from a Parsi attorney. However, that is as far as Parsi connections could take him. In order to succeed at the Bombay Bar Association, Sorabjee had to perform well as a lawyer, in the absence of which his benefactors would soon have abandoned him. Most of the judges and clients were non-Parsis. Between 1953 and 1975, for instance, in the 132 reported cases in which Sorabjee appeared, only 22 (16 per cent) had a Parsi judge on the bench.
Sorabjee started getting noticed by the judges of the Bombay High Court a few years into his practice. In 1957, Chief Justice M.C. Chagla, a non-Parsi judge, appointed Sorabjee as an ‘amicus curiae’ or ‘friend of the court’ to assist the court in a divorce case under the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955. Chagla must have seen a spark in Sorabjee and tried to encourage him by appointing him as an amicus. Chagla concluded his short judgment in the case with the following line: ‘We are thankful to Mr Sorabjee who assisted this Court as amicus curiae.’ In many cases, Sorabjee did things that might have helped him gain the trust of the court. He cited judgments against himself—informing the court about cases that were decided against the point that he was making. Judges therefore knew that Sorabjee was not the kind of lawyer who would obtain favourable orders by hiding things from them. He made concessions in court, giving up legal points that he felt were not worth arguing. In a case in 1969, for instance, the additional judicial commissioner in Goa noted in his judgment: ‘Shri Sorabjee, appearing for the petitioner, candidly conceded, and I think very appropriately, that the petitioner had not been able to substantiate the allegation of mala fides.’ In important cases, he went to the court prepared to argue a series of well-articulated propositions. All this earned him praise from the bench. In one case in 1965, which he argued against the rising star of the Kharshedji chamber, Fali Nariman, Justice V.D. Tulzapurkar remarked: ‘[B]oth Mr Nariman and Mr Sorabjee submitted arguments with great ability’. Nariman and Sorabjee appeared against each other often, each one getting the better of the other in nearly equal proportions.
Between 1953 and 1975 Sorabjee had a large customs and excise practice (an ‘excise’ tax was a tax on goods produced or manufactured in India—it was replaced by the ‘goods and services tax’ or GST in 2017). About 26 per cent of his work at this time was in that branch of law. However, his other large practice areas included labour cases, company cases, landlord-tenant disputes, tax cases, commercial suits, cases involving evacuee property or land requisition and cases concerning foreigners or passports.
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