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India has long been an outlier in its South Asian neighbourhood, with its inclusive Constitution and functioning democracy, so what accounts for so sharp a turn in recent years that the very centre has shifted considerably? In ‘Our Hindu Rashtra’, Aakar Patel argues that what has happened in India over the last 30 years ‘is the telescoping of a majoritarianism already present; it was not as overtly and as aggressively pursued as it is being now, but it existed’. He asks and answers the key question: what possibilities exist for a return?

His personal life has been marked with the greatest sorrows that could ever befall a man. His 50-year political life has landed him at the White House, the most powerful office in the world. American journalist Evan Osnos captures President-elect Joe Biden’s journey that has been shaped by drama, but has been powered by a willingness to confront his shortcomings, errors and reversals of fortune. The author projects Biden as flawed, yet resolute, and tempered by the flame of tragedy — a man who just may be uncannily suited for his moment in history.

When Swedish statistics mastermind-researcher Hans Rosling was diagnosed with cancer in February 2016, he was left with a lot to write and just a year to do that. He soon decided upon writing two books. The first one was ‘Factfulless’ (now a bestseller), about the reasons why people find development on a global scale so hard to grasp; this one, is about him and how he reached that understanding. The memoir is full of stories about meeting people who opened his eyes, made him step back and think, mapping the journey of the young scientist who went on to become a revolutionary thinker.

Founded in 1920, Delhi’s Modern School has been an integral part of the history of India’s national capital. In his book The Modern School (1920-2020) — A Century of Schooling in India, historian Rakesh Batabyal chronicles its extraordinary journey over time as well as its ennobling influence over generations. In this centenary history of the school, which has produced people of distinction in every walk of life, the author attempts to place the school within the intellectual and social developments in colonial and post-Independence India.