Book Review

Articles

• Review of Postmodern Gandhi & Politics, Ethics and the Self Re-reading Gandhi’s Hind Swaraj | Chotelal Kumar
  12 January 2024, by Chhotelal Kumar

  BOOK REVIEW
  by Chotelal Kumar
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  Postmodern Gandhi and Other Essays
  Gandhi in the World and at Home
  by Lloyd I. Rudolph and Susanne Hoeber Rudolph
  The University of Chicago Press | 2006 - 272 pages
  ISBN-10 : 0226731235
  ISBN-13 : 978-0226731230
  https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/P/bo4343100.html
  o o
  Politics, Ethics and the Self Re-reading Gandhi’s Hind Swaraj
  Edited By Rajeev Bhargava
  Routledge India | 2022 - 370 Pages
  ISBN 9780367488598 (…)

• A Classic on Indian Magic | M.R. Narayan Swamy
  15 April 2023, by M R Narayan Swamy

  BOOK REVIEW
  Jadoowallahas, Jugglers, and Jinns:
  A Magical History of India
  by John Zubrzycki
  Pan Macmillan India — Picador India Pages: 508 ISBN 9789386215352 __0__
  Magic, in case you did not know, is as old as India. Indeed, the blurred boundaries between magic, mythology and religion continue to be the defining feature of Indian enchantment, the origins of which go back to the start of the Harappan civilization nearly 5,000 years ago. Australian diplomat-turned-writer John (…)

• Nehru to Najibullah: A Journalist’s Story | M.R. Narayan Swamy
  15 October 2022, by M R Narayan Swamy

  BOOK REVEIW
  Reporting India: My Seventy-Year Journey as a Journalist
  by Prem Prakash (ANI)
  Publishers: Ebury Press (Penguin Random House) Pages: 225; Price: Rs 699 ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 067009398X ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0670093984 __0__
  Jawaharlal looked so tired after the 1962 war with China that he almost fell asleep while answering questions from journalist Prem Prakash. “I had to touch him gently to wake him up and tell him I could not present the Indian prime minister to the world in that (…)

• A Haunting portrait of forgotten Agariyas of Kutch: A Review of Anita Agnihotri’s "The Touch of Salt" | Bhavna Harchandani
  9 November 2024

  [fond noir][blanc]BOOK REVIEWblanc]fond noir]
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  A touch of salt
  By Anita Agnihotri
  Translated by Arunava Sinha
  Penguin Books
  2024 / 180 pages
  ISBN 9780143465812
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  Reviewed by Bhavna Harchandani
  Anita Agnihotri’s "The Touch of Salt", masterfully translated by Arunava Singh, is a poignant and evocative novel that sheds light on the overlooked lives of salt cultivators in the Little Rann of Kutch, Gujarat. The eleven-chapter book critically examines the historical (…)

• Will Yogi Adityanath get to rule India? | M.R. Narayan Swamy
  21 January 2022, by M R Narayan Swamy

  BOOK REVIEW
  Yogi Adityanath: Religion, Politics and Power - The Untold Story
  by Sharat Pradhan and Atul Chandra
  Penguin Random House
  288 Pages
  Nov/2021
  ISBN: 9780143442431
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  Will Yogi Adityanath be the Prime Minister of India one day? Does the monk-turned-Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, India’s most populous state, qualify for the coveted job? If journalists Sharat Pradhan and Atul Chandra are to be believed, this could become a possibility; in any case, Adityanath, (…)

• Beyond the Fences: A Rationale for Cohesive Development | Sanjoy De, Atanu Sengupta
  20 April 2025

  [fond noir][blanc]BOOK REVIEWblanc]fond noir]
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  Birth of an Alternative Development Paradigm: Unfolding of Transformative Mode of Production
  by Sunil Ray
  Germinal Publications Pvt. Ltd. (Publisher of frontier weekly)
  2024. 250 INR.
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  Development is the buzzword of today. Everybody speaks of it as if it is the only religion and pursuit of the modern day. In his populist book Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, Yuval Noah Harari (2015) argued that the ability of man to (…)

• Restoring Peace and Democracy in Chhattisgarh: Inherent Message of a Political Memoir
  27 November 2015, by Gabriele Dietrich

  BOOK REVIEW
  Inside Chhattisgarh: A Political Memoir by Ilina Sen; Penguin Books India; 2014; pages: 307; Price: Rs 399.
  This is an extraordinary book, based on an unusual life-journey, rooted in search of solidarity and democratic transformation of society. It is unfortunate that Ilina and Binayak Sen have been in the national and international limelight because of the trumped-up Binayak Sen case and the subsequent “Free Binayak Sen Campaign” which was, of course, very positive. This (…)

• The Looming Shadow of the 1866 Famine in Orissa | Suranjita Ray
  29 April 2023, by Suranjita Ray

  A Haunting Tragedy Gender, Caste and Class in the 1866 Famine of Orissa by Bidyut Mohanty ascertains understanding famine as a process to comprehend who starved during the famine and why. The book engages the reader in understanding the Orissa Famine in 1866 that had its worst impact on the poor, in particular the agricultural labourers, weavers, salt workers and fisher folks, invariably belonging to the lower castes who were marginalised and deprived. The growing consciousness of the (…)

• Review of Hoxha, Artan R.. Sugarland: The Transformation of the Countryside in Communist Albania | Andrew Pfannkuche
  22 March 2025

  [fond noir][blanc]BOOK REVIEWblanc]fond noir]
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  Sugarland: The Transformation of the Countryside in Communist Albania
  by Artan R. Hoxha
  Central European University Press
  2023. xi + 293 pp.
  (cloth), ISBN 9789633866160.
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  Reviewed by Andrew Pfannkuche (Universit

• Review of Bala Ramulu Chinnala’s Development Strategies and Governance in India | Srinivasulu Karli
  22 November 2025, by Karli Srinivasulu

  [fond noir][blanc]BOOK REVIEWblanc]fond noir]
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  Development Strategies and Governance in India:
  Predicaments and Challenges
  by Bala Ramulu Chinnala
  Routledge
  2025
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  Reviewed by Srinivasulu Karli
  Post-independent India