Gandhi, 1918  flu pandemic and COVID19

Gandhi, 1918 flu pandemic and COVID19

In sheer statistical terms, the 1918 flu pandemic and the COVID-19 pandemic are not comparable.

Faith and judiciary: A case from Pakistan

The mosque was small and was never used as a place of worship. When Maharaja Ranjit Singh took control of the entire Punjab, the Sikhs took over the mosque, placed the Guru Granth Sahib inside it and converted it into a gurudwara. 

Geetanjali Shree first Indian to win International Booker Prize: Will it open doors for translations of great literature in all Indian languages?

Shree winning the International Booker Prize may be a cause for celebration in India and among the world of Hindi publishers. However, as Sanjaya Kumar Singh, a well-known Hindi journalist, writer and editor, said on Facebook, “Indian publishers have contributed nothing to Geetanjali Shree winning the Booker. She won despite them and not because of them.” 

A search for Guru Nanak in Pakistan

Amid Hindu-Muslim antagonism that existed even then, Nanak wanted to show that there is a direct path to God, one that doesn’t travel through temples and shrines. 

More on Books

The troublesome inside story of East Pakistan: A handbook for students and researchers of contemporary history

The greatness of this epic novel is that even while describing the minutiae of day to day politics, Sen never deviates from his grand vision of good governance and humanistic politics which should be free from vested interests and religious bigotry

Indian-American fifth-grader publishes her first book

Fifth grader Ria N. Arjun, an Indian American, recently independently published her book, ‘The Adventure Begins’, a compilation of ten short stories featuring different genres, characters, plots and morals

Innovative and engaging true stories of valour

It was a war well planned and conducted in almost a Kautilyan/Chanakyan mode under the rule of the Congress, then headed by Indira Gandhi

A book about how migrants pay the price when a country is split up

For her novel ‘The Descendants’ (originally written in Bengali as 'Uttorsuri 'and translated to English by Amitava Chatterjee), Pratima Dhar delved into her own experience of migrating from East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) as a kid during the partition of India, and the travails of such families while settling in a new land

A mind-boggling study of literary dialogue between the Asian giants

Chinese scholarship has picked up works written not only in Sanskrit and Hindi, but also in Bengali, Tamil, Urdu and English

A connoisseur's ode to Bengal

If we go by the public perception, it seems the horrors of this partition had visited only our western side. The fact that people in the east suffered, almost as much, is not as well known

War fiction which resembles fact

The novel is based on the life of a young army officer Lieutenant Bharat involved in operations against militants in Manipur followed by Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka during the period 1987-89

Xi’s China is a must-read book

The simple two-worded title of this book Xi’s China is hugely suggestive of the fact that it is the worst version of China in the world so far

Mir Areiba's poems on Kashmir strike a sensitive chord

She is just 19 but carries a sensitive heart reciprocating to all that is happening around her through verses

A kaleidoscopic look at the Indian Armed Forces

Manthan means churning. This Hindi word can be applied to the Indian Armed Forces because they represent soldiers, sailors, and airmen from different parts of India

Know all about the environment-friendly vehicle of the future

This book Charging India: Developing E-Mobility Ecosystem explores various facets of this transition to e-mobility, looking at a macro level of India’s quest for 100 percent electric mobility

My own story relates to evolving global economy: Indra Nooyi's memoir

Indra Nooyi is one of the world's foremost business visionaries, who broke the glass ceiling in global business as a woman of Indian origin and immigrant leading a top American multinational that operates in 200 countries

Of decline, gentrification, and a young girl's coming of age

It was once home to some 130 textile mills employing 300,000 workers but then came the Great Bombay Textile Strike of 1982 over salary increases and wages that prolonged for 18 months and triggered the end of the once-thriving industry

Unravelling the India Covid story

When WHO first declared COVID-19 a global pandemic in March 2020, there was a great deal of apprehension about how India -- the country with the highest TB cases and diabetes, inadequate health infrastructure and a population of 1.3 billion -- would fare

'Presenting the true history of India a torturous process'

Ever since I began taking a serious interest in history from the time I was in the eighth grade and had yet to turn a teenager, I wondered why the focus was only on two 'eras' - the Mughal and the British