Katherine Boo

Despite its corny title taken, as Boo and her innumerable reviewers highlight, from an advertising hoarding, Behind the Beautiful Forevers combines fieldwork, ethnography, journalism, and literary flair to devastating effect.1 This effect is perhaps evi-dent in the largely laudatory reviews and more so in the density…


Reviewed by: Subarno Chattarji
Tara Ali Baig

On Growing Up is perhaps the very first book published in India pealing with the processes of puberty. In a warm chatty style, Tara Ali Baig begins by ­giving a thumbnail sketch of the origin of man and then goes on to place man in the context of other creatures of the earth. She then discusses…


Reviewed by: Monisha Mukundan
Atul Kohli

Atul Kohli’s book offers a comprehensive understanding of poverty in India from a political economy standpoint. It covers the growth story of India at the national and sub-national level in its entirety. Broadly divided into three chapters titled as ‘Political Change’, ‘State and Economy’ and ‘Regional Diversity’ the book’s strength lies in its clarity of thought and expression complemented by the use of simple and lucid language…


Reviewed by: Siddhartha Mukerji
Tara Ali Baig

What is sadly lacking in most Indian story books for children is a light touch with language, originality, and a lively sense of the ridiculous. Most children abundantly possess the last two qualities, but I doubt if they find much in this genre to satisfy them.


Reviewed by: Amena Jayal
R. Srivatsan

This anthology of writings, covering a period of fifty years of development thinking from 1954 to 2004, examines some of the debates in development theory that emerged after the Second World War. It is the outcome of research conducted as part of the development initiative of Anveshi research…


Reviewed by: Shravani Prakash