Neighbourly Concerns
Deb Mukharji
BANGLADESH: TREADING THE TALIBAN TRAIL by Jaideep Saikia Vision Books, New Delhi, 2006, 272 pp., 495
May 2006, volume 30, No 5

It is encouraging that several books on Bangladesh have appeared in recent months. There have been few publications on Bangladesh in India, and perhaps fewer from abroad, to be seen on the shelves. For India, this is regrettable on two counts. Firstly, we should know more about a neighbour of nearly a hundred and fifty million people whose territory adjoins the most sensitive region of India for over four thousand kilometres, and, secondly and consequently, whose internal developments have an inescapable fall-out on India. Bangladesh: Treading the Taliban Trail is an important contribution towards understanding some of the major contemporary issues between India and Bangladesh as also some significant internal developments. The title caters to the concern of the day about the growth of Islamic fundamentalism in Bangladesh.

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