Metcalf’s new book charts a new course. If in line with his earlier books like Ideology of the Raj and Imperial Visions, the scope and range of this one are different. It shows how the Indian Ocean area formed a sub-empire under the British, where India had the dubious distinction of being at the centre and an active agent of the empire.
In the opening line of his new history of the Indo-Afghans, Raziuddin Aquil complains that ‘the study of medieval Indian history suffers from what is characterized as Mughal centrism’ (p. 1). He is right at a number of levels, for the problem is not only that the imperial Mughal behemoth has captured the lion’s share of modern historians’ attention, but also that most of the Persian histories of the Indo-Afghans were written during the reign of the Mughals.
The robust and adaptive medical traditions of Tibb-i Unani have contained complex and changing meanings and practices over time. Seema Alavi’s extensive research, including into the oral traditions of her own distinguished Azizi family of hakims based in Lucknow, informs her sophisticated social and cultural history of Unani in north India from the time of the Mughal empire through the British Raj.
The Emergence of the Delhi Sultanate is a voluminous work, considering that it covers only a phase i.e. 1192-1286 ad. It is a refreshing intervention and convincingly breaks the long-held opinion that the Delhi Sultanate was a monolithic, authoritarian, centralized state.
The book under review is part of a series titled A People’s History of India whose general editor is Irfan Habib. It deals with the period between c. 700 and c.350 bc in which several important historical developments have been identified in the spheres of economy, society, polity and religion and each of these is discussed separately in the four chapters of the book.
At the heart of the book are two masterly surveys of the issues at stake in the interpretation of the available linguistic and archaeological evidence. J.M. Kenoyer brings his reputation as one of the most accomplished Harappan archaeologists of his generation and crafts a measured piece documenting what archaeological reason can illuminate and equally demonstrate what constitutes inappropriate questions for the discipline.