Author Archives: Thebookreviewindia

It is common fare for books on cultural anthropology to begin with statndard kowtowing to Clifford Geetz and Edward Said. Past the introductory chapter, most often they succumb to the very pitfalls that Said and Geetz warn them about. Images of Afghanistan is cultural anthropology at its finest as it tries throughout to maintain…

As befits a book that celebrates form in its myriad manifestations, the book is accompanied by beautiful illustrations that buttress the formulations the author sets out to do. In essence, what is stated by the author in the introductory chapter and then subsequently demonstrated through a delineation of specific forms ranging…

As Director General of the Archaeological Survey of India (1902-28) and then Officer on Special Duty (1928-34), John Marshall carved out an extremely important place for himself in the history of Indian archaeology. His tenure is associated with increasingly systematic excavation and conservation activity…

A few months ago, I had as my co-passenger Anu Pillay, a doctor working with Medica Mondiale, in Liberia. Medica Mondiale is a world wide organization founded to assist women traumatized by rape, especially in war situations. A South African of Indian origin, Anu spoke of horrifying degrees of sexual abuse that women…

Alamgir Muhammad Serajuddin’s book provides a comprehensive idea of judicial activism that has taken place in south Asian regions especially India, Pakistan and Bangladesh in recent times. The methodological framework explains the concept of judicial activism and creativity and emphasizes the role of the courts as an agent of social change…

Identities and Histories is an insightful and passionate book about the emergence of women as political subjects. The book moves away from questions of nationalism, modernity and reform which framed earlier bodies of feminist history-writing in India. This earlier body of work had shown us how the nation and indeed the political itself were historically…

In eloquent and insightful expose of economic diplomacy principles and practices, Kishan S. Rana and Bipul Chatterjee succeed in crafting a book that will stimulate and inform anyone interested in this previously opaque realm of international relations. The economic dimension of diplomacy constitutes an increasingly…

Migration, Remittances and Development in South Asia explores the impact of migration on development in South Asian countries and makes recommendations for benefiting more from out-migration and reducing its ill effects. It recommends policies for each of the eight countries and the region as a whole…

The thesis of Thenuwara’s book is ‘good money’ creates wealth and growth while ‘bad money’ would retard this—an observation made by Copernicus in 1529 A.D. The underlying theme of the book is the need for a Central Bank to conduct an independent monetary policy and thereby keep inflation low, which is essential…

Manas Bhattacharya is a Senior Technical Specialist at the ILO. The book under review is the output of the High-Level Tripartite Meeting on the Nexus of Growth, Investment and Decent Work for South Asian Sub-region, organized by the ILO in 2007. The seven papers in the volume have been contributed by economists from across the South Asian Region…

The inception of the WTO in 1995 was expected to ensure reduction of trade barriers, thereby causing freer movement of merchandise products and commercial services across international borders. However since the failure of the Seattle Ministerial Meeting of WTO in 1999, it was quite clear that the days of trade frictions are far from over…

The Great Recession, which began with the financial crisis of 2007-08, though partially addressed, is still with us. Yet the expectation it generated, that given its severity it would trigger the implementation of measures aimed at reining in finance and pre-empting similar crises in the future, remains largely unrealized…

This year marked the 150th birth anniversary of the Nobel Laureate Rabindranath Tagore that also coincided with six decades of establishment of diplomatic relations between the two major and rising Asian neighbours India and China and the 90th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Parties in both these countries…

One of most serious problems that the ruling elites faced in the ex-colonial and newly independent countries is the integration of ethnic, religious, linguistic and diverse groups living within a territorial state structure created by the colonial masters for their own convenience through their policy of divide and rule…

Few will disagree that the energy crisis is the least of Pakistan’s concerns at the moment. However, Pakistan’s energy access to its population has better figures to that of India (Pakistan has a Energy Development Index ranking ahead of India). Yet the problems plaguing the energy situation there is very different from India…

Most of the books on Indian Cinema which have appeared so far rest content with a chronological listing of films made, simplistically categorized, and garnished with high sounding but essen­tially superficial analyses and evaluations.

Kalpana Sahni’s selection of reminis­cences on Tolstoy translated for the first time into English, brings to life the 19th century literary scene in Russia. This book is an attempt to show the many­-sided personality of Tolstoy through the memoirs of his relatives, friends, acquain­tances and contemporaries. Tolstoy’s 150th birth anniversary coincided with the pub­lication of hitherto unpublished material on him, in the USSR.

I slam and Society in Pakistan: Anthropological Perspectives is a collection of 15 ethnographic essays, edited by Magnus Marsden, and brought out as part of the series Oxford in Pakistan Readings in Sociology and Social Anthropology. Although the chapters are collated from different journals and edited books and written over a period of 15 years…

Any organized study on the religious and radical groups of Pakistan is perhaps the most relevant; in this, a study of two entities—the Jamaat-e-Islami and Jamaat-ud-dawa is perhaps the most important, for both are extremely organized. Though the critics would argue that despite being the most powerful religious political party…

As images of Benazir Bhutto sinking into her SUV, on that fateful date of December 2007, flashed all over the world, Amir Mir let a silent prayer in his mind. He found out in a matter of few hours, along with millions across his country, that even the most heartfelt prayer could not save Bhutto from her demise…