Story of free India
M. Rajivlochan
India After Gandhi: The History of the World’s Largest Democracy
by Ramachandra Guha. Picador, New Delhi.
Pages 900. Rs 695.
this latest history of contemporary India is a welcome read. Narrating the history of India since Independence, it traces the transformation of India from a colonial nation to the one that was socialist in name, capitalist in cupidity and plain simple Gandhian in its desire to help the downtrodden and involve everyone in governance.

All is nothing but God
Kuldip Dhiman
Vedanta and its Philosophical Development
by A. Ramamurty. D. K. Printworld (P) Ltd. Pages 151. Price not stated.
The sheer depth and poetic quality of the Upanishads make them the highest achievement of the Hindu philosophy and religion. However, the great ideas of this tradition reach very few directly, most of us get a glimpse of them through books like the Bhagavadgita.

Snapshots of tough women
Shalini Rawat
The Illusion of Home
by Raji Narsimhan.
Promilla & Co., Publishers.
Pages 184. Rs 200.
The book takes a look at the world of women separated from their moorings and trying to find their way around. We could also define the book as a collage of stories comprising snapshots of different women, who are really one woman, in differing circumstances but with a common angst.

The facets of human life
Kanchan Mehta
Defining Moments: A Memoir
by Rajendra Shekhar. Rupa & Co.
Pages 263. Rs 395.
A memoir occupies a legitimate place in the spectrum of autobiography. It customarily highlights personalities and actions other than the writer’s own. Likewise, Defining Moments by Rajindra Shekhar, a former DGP of Rajasthan and former director of CBI, focuses on people and episodes/events the author has known or witnessed.

A love no less
Priyanka Singh
Running up the Hill
by Anita Krishan.
Prakash Books.
Pages 152. Price not stated.
people with pets will instantly relate to the incidents in the book, but for others, it may seem like a whole lot of experiences hastily strung together. Anita Krishan wants to tell her story, and fast.

Re-look at the uprising
Rachna Singh
Revisiting 1857: Myth, Memory, History
Ed. Sharmistha Gooptu and
Boria Majumdar. Roli Books.
Pages 218. Rs 295.
A mutiny, a revolt, or a fledgling national movement? This archetypal debate about the 1857 uprising has resounded in the academic corridors for decades.

Voices of the spurned
Yasmin Alibhai-Brown
Enslaved
by Rahila Gupta
Portobello. Pages 318. `A312.99
Rahila Gupta is indefatigably watchful. Like a floodlight, she turns her furious intellect and passion to social injustices, leaving no place for excuses to hide. Many years back she joined Southall Black Sisters, a forceful collective set up to protect Asian and Afro-Caribbean women from domestic violence. 

Early Auden poems discovered
Ciar Byrne
A collection of previously unknown poems, thought to be early examples of the work of W H Auden, have been unearthed in a school magazine. Auden at Gresham's School next week, were discovered by John Smart, a former head of art, who chanced across them while researching the life of another literary old boy.

East and West meet in his work
Shusaku Endo, often termed the Japanese Graham Greene, was the quintessential outsider who explored the themes of grace, faith, betrayal and moral dilemmas, writes Ashish Alexander
Eleven years after his death, Shusaku Endo remains one of the most-read Japanese novelist world wide. This despite not being a Nobel laureate like his contemporary, Kenazaburo Oe, who won the award in 1994 and Yasunari Kawabata who was the first Japanese to receive the coveted prize in 1968.

Bio of barefoot girl
A biography of Shakira, put together by her first promoter, will recount the difficult start to the Colombian pop star's now-wildly successful music career. Shakira: la nina de los pies descalzos - la verdadera historia (Shakira: The Barefoot Girl - the True Story), a documentary based on the book will also be shown on Spanish television before the year's end, the singer's erstwhile promoter, Carlos Vanegas, told Spanish news agency EFE. He added that the book would go on the market in 2008.

SHORT TAKES
Jinnah & the maharaja
Randeep Wadehra
Jinnah and Punjab
Ed Amarjit Singh
Kanishka, New Delhi. Pages xlv+354. Rs 850
It’s a known fact that in pre-P artition Punjab it was the secular Unionist Party that had popular support whereas the fanatical, Jinnah-led, Muslim League was struggling to secure a toehold in the region – something it eventually achieved thanks to British machinations.

• Contemporary and later perspectives on Maharaja Ranjit Singh
  by Radha Sharma
  Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar. Pages: ix+170. Rs 200.

• Sophistry of Dr. WH Mcleod
  by Dr. Amarjit Singh Bal.
  B. Chattar Singh Jiwan Singh,
  Amritsar. Pages xxii+215. Rs 250.

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