April 2004
AMERICAN PRIDE AND POWER, The Hindu
The best second-hand bookstore in India is located not in Kolkata’s College Street but in my home town, Bangalore. This is Select Bookshop, which was founded in 1945 by a lawyer named K. B. K. [...]
March 2004
A VICEROY’S READING LIST, The Hindu
The Oriental and India Office Collections of the British Library house a vast number of manuscript collections relating to India. These include the records of the Secretary of State of India, the correspondence of Viceroys, [...]
AN ELEVEN OF THEIR OWN, The Telegraph
My favourite cricketing story, patriots will be pained to hear, has a Pakistani playing the lead role. Not against India, though, but against the West Indies. On a hot day in Bridgetown many years ago, [...]
HINDU POPES, The Telegraph
When the Babri Masjid was demolished in December 1992, a prominent Mahant of Ayodhya called it the first step in making the town the ‘Vatican of the Hindus’. I was recently reminded of that statement, [...]
February 2004
COMPOSING A CULTURE, The Hindu
Writers in Kannada have won seven Jnanpith awards, a record equalled only by one other language, Hindi. But then there are many more speakers of Hindi. And of the seven Kannada awardees three did not [...]
January 2004
HINDI CHAUVINISM, The Hindu
I have recently been reading the debates of the Constituent Assembly of India. These are a treasure-trove; invaluable to the scholar, but also well worth reading by the citizen. Among the topics debated by the [...]