Author Archives: Thebookreviewindia

Peggy Mohan, linguist and historian, argued that language is a powerful way into history and not an ‘adult’ subject. Teaching ten-year-olds about migration pushed her to rethink assumptions, from why farmers migrate to how ‘surplus males’ reshape linguistic landscapes. Children’s questions about Ashokan Prakrit or Devanagari sounds have sparked some of her deepest research. She emphasized, ‘Kids don’t want to be patronized. They can do the more difficult things that sometimes we can’t do.’

Manu was part of The Book Review family since he could read and write. He began by writing reviews as a child for the Children’s special issues. As he grew up, his intense passion for drawing led to his designing brochures and covers for The Book Review, and one of them was for the January 2016 issue when TBR turned 40. Uma had asked him a few months ago to design the cover for the January 2026 issue when TBR turns 50,

If we look at some of the case-studies examined in the book, the contours of the argument become clearer. Lady Smuggler (1987) is an action heroine film produced by Shamim Ara Productions (headed by star Shamim Ara), co-produced with the Bangladeshi star Babita.

There is hardly any enigma in the life and professional career of Soumitra. A consummate actor, equally proficient in cinema and theatre, Soumitra knew the difference that these two art-forms demanded. He was also fortunate to have been mentored in his early years by Natyacharya Sisir Kumar Bhaduri who gave a new life to Bengali theatre, and later by Satyajit Ray.
Satyajit-Soumitra collaboration has been much discussed in discourses on cinema.

1975 marked the rise and decline of leading stars and ‘super’ stars. The ‘anti-hero’, ‘rebel’ image caught the imagination of the audiences, in particular the youth. The characterization and portrayal of heroines underwent a significant change from the stereotypical signifying the changing, modernizing influences affecting the till-then conservative society. They could be shown as having a distinct personality;

An interesting aside: when my father, TCA Rangachari went to Paris as the Ambassador of India in the mid 2000s, he made it a point to call on Raza. The practice till then was to invite artists to ‘meet’ the Ambassador. My father thought otherwise—after all, such artists were themselves ambassadors of India, though of a different kind.

Even occasional listeners of Carnatic music may be familiar with the pot occupying the stage. After the great success of Vikku Vinayakam, the ghatam has become a part of the pantheon of percussion instruments in classical and experimental music. Sumana is part of that extraordinary narrative, of courage

Helle Jørgensen is an honorary research fellow at the Department of History, University of Birmingham. She analyses the urban landscape of Pondicherry as a postcolonial palimpsest by examining its three symbolically significant features: first, the memorial traces of the mid-18th century French Governor-General Joseph François Dupleix; second, the sole Hindu Manakula Vinayagar Temple in the ‘White Town’;

From chapter 16, the reviewer has compiled an arbitrary list of Mumbai’s planning agencies, plans (some with World Bank support), and acts: the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (MCGM); Bombay Building Repairs and Reconstruction Board (1969); Maharashtra Slum Improvement Board (1973), later renamed Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority (1976); the Development Plan (1964); Maharashtra Regional and Town Planning Act (1966); Bombay Metropolitan Regional Planning Board (MMRDA, 1967),

In the second essay, Ramnarayan S Rawat demonstrates the significance of the 16th century Dalit saint-poet Ravidas, whose legacy inspired the Chamar led Sant-Mat community of north India in the 1920s to seek paths to dignity. Through the mediation of the spiritual leader Swami Achutanand

…I have attempted, foolhardily, to document and narrativize the pathologies of the hyper-visible yet perennial blind spot that is the world of elite ‘savarnas’, who critique everyone and everything but never themselves. No matter what method I use, this venture is doomed to fail in many savarna eyes. They will inevitably find clever and creative ways to dismantle its mediocrity in ways that I cannot imagine.

Can we reach an understanding of reality through only language models and with perhaps a little plus of something else? I would have liked the authors to have given us some overview of these and other issues, rather than simply reproducing the marketing hype of AI, particularly from those who seek continuous investments in their companies, such as Sam Altman of OpenAI. Remember how

Dr Bhuyan’s decision to return to Assam was fuelled by familial responsibilities but more by his desire to build a research-intensive environment in his beloved State. At Cotton College, Dr Bhuyan oversaw the construction of the first two-storeyed structure of the new Physics building.

As a genre, ghazal poetry is performative, highly conventional and its public recitation (mushaira) is governed by an elaborate protocol that has evolved over centuries. The poet does not recite the two lines of a couplet in quick succession; he will recite the first line, often making a proposition, then there will be a meaningful pause, allowing for repetition and appreciation by the audience through wah wah and mukarrar, and then when the suspense is at its apex, deliver the second line almost like a punch that will bring the proposition to a logical end, even though that logic may, sometimes, be far-fetched.

Jerry Pinto’s crisp and meaty introduction opens The Diamond-Encrusted Rat Trap: Writings from Bombay. ‘The 1970s were Bombay’s 1960s,’ he recalls Imtiaz Dharker’s words. The book gathers Jussawalla’s prose from 20 years, beginning 1980. There are articles, reviews,

The portrayal of Shivaji himself is layered and complex. Unlike in nationalist hagiography, Shivaji here is charismatic yet humanly vulnerable, ruthless to his enemies yet calculating, aware of legitimacy even as he embraces brutality when necessary. The novel situates him in a dense web of shifting alliances—with Bijapur, the Mughals, local chieftains, and coastal powers—thereby emphasizing that sovereignty is relational,

Does each of us human beings experience an identity crisis? Perhaps not to a cataclysmic degree where it could become existential. However, at some point in all our lives, we do, hopefully, seek to know ourselves better. And what truly constitutes this ‘me’ that we seek deeper understanding of?

These stories explore a range of themes, including forced relocations, destabilized social relations, caste-related violence, harsh political realities, and larger identity questions. They are all deeply rooted in cultures and belief systems that have been lost, redefined, defied, and reclaimed. The protagonist, who narrates most of these eleven stories, revisits his village, his childhood, and his people from a different perspective, in the light of not only his personal experiences but also the general, larger, and global changes that have influenced even the minutest details of everyday life.

Issues of migration are addressed in Nakul Mallik’s ‘Illegal Immigrant’. The formation of Bangladesh spurred the movement of Madhab’s family from a nation in formation to India and back. Extreme poverty once again pushes the family to migrate to India. Madhab settles down with Shefali but is picked up as an illegal immigrant and sent back to Bangladesh, a pregnant Shefali is left alone to fend for herself.

The story ‘Madhu’ touches upon a theme we all like to believe to be a thing of the past, untouchability. As much as all of us would like to believe that we have moved past this inhumane concept, reality hits us in the face with a woman and her cup that no one else touches.