The Idea of India

Rating:
Summary: Hard work
Review: A big let down this one. Sunil Khilnani is clearly the sort of tiresome know-all NRI who writes about India with only academic knowledge: he knows nothing of the real India, and his writing comes from book-learning not observation. You get the feeling he is trying to jump on the Indian-writing-in-English bandwaggon, but is just not up to the job. And his writing is dead on the page. Don't believe the blurbs on the cover: this one is really hard work.

Rating:
Summary: Indian politics:subtle,sophisticated & articulate analysis
Review: I believe that this is one of the most intelligent and articulate books on Indian politics ever written. Sunil Khilnani, a professor of politics at Cambridge, brings unyielding subtlety and sophistication in a book which well matches the complexity and contradictions of Indian politics. He artfully demonstrates and corrects such simplistic and prevalent misconceptions as surrounding the nature and origins of India's early state-led industrialization or the nature of its democracy.

A somewhat longish extract will illustrate the subtleties of various concepts that the author elegantly develops in this magnificient work:

QUOTE In India, democracy has had to function in a society of peculiar complexity where many different temporal and historical plans coexist. Indian continues to be a predominantly agrarian society, whose people are not indifferent to religion, and where the individual does not have a strong political or social presence. But towering over that society today is the state. This state is far from supremely effective: it regulalry fails to protect its citizens against physical violence, it does not provide them with welfare, and it has not fulfilled its extensive ambitions to transform Indian society. Yet it is today at the very centre of the Indian political imagination. Until little over a century ago, the social order of caste had made the state largely redundant...The past fifty years have trenchantly displayed the powers of the state and of the idea of democracy to reconstitute the antique social identities of India - caste and religion - and to force them to face and enter politics.
UNQUOTE

If you have wondered why so many books have failed to effectively unravel and interpret the intricacies of political evolution of this entity called India, Khilnani's analysis will be a welcome eye opener.

Rating:
Summary: Indian politics:subtle,sophisticated & articulate analysis
Review: I believe that this is one of the most intelligent and articulate books on Indian politics ever written. Sunil Khilnani, a professor of politics at Cambridge, brings unyielding subtlety and sophistication in a book which well matches the complexity and contradictions of Indian politics. He artfully demonstrates and corrects such simplistic and prevalent misconceptions as surrounding the nature and origins of India's early state-led industrialization or the nature of its democracy.

A somewhat longish extract will illustrate the subtleties of various concepts that the author elegantly develops in this magnificient work:

QUOTE In India, democracy has had to function in a society of peculiar complexity where many different temporal and historical plans coexist. Indian continues to be a predominantly agrarian society, whose people are not indifferent to religion, and where the individual does not have a strong political or social presence. But towering over that society today is the state. This state is far from supremely effective: it regulalry fails to protect its citizens against physical violence, it does not provide them with welfare, and it has not fulfilled its extensive ambitions to transform Indian society. Yet it is today at the very centre of the Indian political imagination. Until little over a century ago, the social order of caste had made the state largely redundant...The past fifty years have trenchantly displayed the powers of the state and of the idea of democracy to reconstitute the antique social identities of India - caste and religion - and to force them to face and enter politics.
UNQUOTE

If you have wondered why so many books have failed to effectively unravel and interpret the intricacies of political evolution of this entity called India, Khilnani's analysis will be a welcome eye opener.

Rating:
Summary: Hard work
Review: In an era that abounds with superficial books on South Asia, Khilnani's is an insightful and sensitive book, though perhaps somewhat out of sync (and this is not a criticism) with the contemporary Indian urban middle-class mood, which delights in denigrating all things perceived as "Nehruvian"; some of the other reviewers have categorized Khilnani as part of the "old school" of Indian historiographers, vaguely dismissed as "leftists"or "Nehruvians"; nothing could be further from the truth: while the book displays an empathy with Nehru's idea of India, it is far too sophisticated to accept that conception as anything more than one of a number of competing ideas, albeit one that has exercised great power over many in the country's urban elite. Hindutva is another such idea of India, and Khilnani offers a nuanced appraisal, far removed from both the fascistic infatuations of the right and the unthinking denunciations of those on the Indian left. Finally: the book is particularly useful on Indira Gandhi, and Khilnani persuasively links her "mass democratisation" of the late 1960's and 70's to the rise of both the saffron parties and the lower-caste mobilizations of the last fifteen years, though the most intellectually stimulating chapter remains the one on the architecture of the colonial city, conceptualized by Khilnani as, among others, the site where colonialism was acted out, the site, in other words, of the Indian's subjection.

Rating:
Summary: A sensitive and nuanced appraisal
Review: In an era that abounds with superficial books on South Asia, Khilnani's is an insightful and sensitive book, though perhaps somewhat out of sync (and this is not a criticism) with the contemporary Indian urban middle-class mood, which delights in denigrating all things perceived as "Nehruvian"; some of the other reviewers have categorized Khilnani as part of the "old school" of Indian historiographers, vaguely dismissed as "leftists"or "Nehruvians"; nothing could be further from the truth: while the book displays an empathy with Nehru's idea of India, it is far too sophisticated to accept that conception as anything more than one of a number of competing ideas, albeit one that has exercised great power over many in the country's urban elite. Hindutva is another such idea of India, and Khilnani offers a nuanced appraisal, far removed from both the fascistic infatuations of the right and the unthinking denunciations of those on the Indian left. Finally: the book is particularly useful on Indira Gandhi, and Khilnani persuasively links her "mass democratisation" of the late 1960's and 70's to the rise of both the saffron parties and the lower-caste mobilizations of the last fifteen years, though the most intellectually stimulating chapter remains the one on the architecture of the colonial city, conceptualized by Khilnani as, among others, the site where colonialism was acted out, the site, in other words, of the Indian's subjection.

Rating:
Summary: Is democracy right for India?
Review: India, as many misty eyed Indians might claim is a great culture. These idiot savants espouse the greatness of Aryan India: Vedic culture etc., the glorious Hindu period, Buddha, Aryhabhatta, and the Indus Civilization. What these half wits are unwilling to admit is that to define India is a feat by itself. Thus,I would argue along with the author,is that the Persians (Taj Mahal and the ghazals), the Arabic invasions (architecture) and the English Empire (English, railways and National Unity) are all part of India as their Hindu and pre-Hindu predecessors. I applaud Khilnani for willing to engage his readers in such contentious topics such as the definition of India and the paradox of India as the largest democracy and its caste system. How can a country with a large population subjugated by poverty also have a contender with Hollywood for a place in the entertainment world. Indeed,is democracy right for India? Are countries like China,India and Russia best suited for governments with authoritarian tendencies? Would India have been better if Nehru had not imposed Stalinist ideology on a primarily agrarian society? Would India be better off not as a single entity called India but Nation states with self-governing bodies like the United States? Would the South be better off as a partition than having an alien culture rule it? Finally, what is an Indian? Is it a South Indian Brahmin, a Kashmiri, a Sudra, a Sikh, a Malyalee or a tribal person from the Andaman and Nicobar islands? Read this book. Khilnani provokes one, especially those in the West (who think that every Indian is a disciple of Ghandhi's principles) and those of the nationalistic persuasion (BJP and the whole wretched lot) to examine of what India means as a nation state.

Rating:
Summary: Interesting Essays on Modern India
Review: There's been a spate of world class Indo-Anglian fiction over the last two decades (Salman Rushdie, Amitav Ghosh, Vikram Seth, Upamanyu Chatterjee, Vikram Chandra, Rohinton Mistry, Anita Desai... the list grows at an increasingly rapid pace). However, I've long lamented the dearth of (quality) non-fiction in the Indo-Anglian stable. The only notable book over the last decade that comes to mind is V.S. Naipaul's "India: a Million Mutinies Now." This paucity of decent non-fiction might explain why I was so taken with Sunil Khilnani's "The Idea of India". I found it absolutely riveting, so much so that I finished the book in one reading. This monograph is actually a collection of four essays on the following topics: "Democracy, Economics, Cities, and Who is an Indian?"

I have a confession to make. I read a lot (perhaps more than is good for me). And while I'm no evangelist, I think "The Idea of India" deserves a wide audience. This is not a full-fledged review, given current constraints of time. I definitely plan to revisit Khilnani at some point in the near future, for a more detailed analysis. For now, think of this as a "quick and dirty" recommendation, based on a casual first read.

For starters, "The Idea.." is rather well written -- elegant prose without any of the tendentious word tricks that a couple of other non-fiction South Asian writers seem so fond of. His writing is far removed from the simplistic clichés on India that are all too easy to come by, given the sheer complexity and diversity of the topics. Khilnani makes a heroic attempt to project (some of) the subtleties and shades of the issues under consideration, while maintaining a coherence and internal flow.

His essays are the product of a thoughtful mind, rather than a potted journalistic attempt to bring out something to sync with India's 50th Independence anniversary. Has quite a few incisive comments and penetrating insights, worthy of debate and discussion.

Also, Khilnani's done a fair amount of dogged research -- intensive as well as extensive.

On the flip side, on a couple of times Khilnani's conclusions seem a trifle flat. For instance, "Cities": lots of background material, fabulous research, and engaging perspectives on India's major cities: Bombay, Bangalore, Chandigarh, Ahmedabad and Delhi. However, the ending seemed a bit open-ended and dangling. Not to be crude, but I was left with the question: "OK, so the point is..?" For all the elegance, Khilnani's sentences at times seem a tad long, with a whole bunch of qualifiers and subclauses nested within. (Is this some form of South Asian Oxbridge tradition, perhaps? Witness Amit Chaudhuri & Salman Rushdie. Comments, anyone). Maybe I'm overly critical here, weaned as I've been on Russell and The Economist leaders. But would Khilnani have sacrificed the multi-shading that he so obviously is striving for, if he'd resorted to shorter, simpler sentences? A question to be tabled and explored in a fuller review. These quibbles of mine should in no way detract from the overall merits of Khilnani's effort. If you're looking for a good book on India, you could do worse than begin with "The Idea of India". Hopefully, this book will serve as the harbinger of more such quality non-fiction within the Indo-Anglian fold. After all, one would like to think that we deserve better stuff than the mishmash of a Shashi Tharoor (India: From Midnight to the Millennium) or the grating pretentiousness of a Gita Mehta (Snakes and Ladders).

Let me know what you think. I'd love to hear your take on this book. And on any other non-fiction of similar calibre.

Rating:
Summary: Thoughtful and elegantly
Review: There's been a spate of world class Indo-Anglian fiction over the last two decades (Salman Rushdie, Amitav Ghosh, Vikram Seth, Upamanyu Chatterjee, Vikram Chandra, Rohinton Mistry, Anita Desai... the list grows at an increasingly rapid pace). However, I've long lamented the dearth of (quality) non-fiction in the Indo-Anglian stable. The only notable book over the last decade that comes to mind is V.S. Naipaul's "India: a Million Mutinies Now." This paucity of decent non-fiction might explain why I was so taken with Sunil Khilnani's "The Idea of India". I found it absolutely riveting, so much so that I finished the book in one reading. This monograph is actually a collection of four essays on the following topics: "Democracy, Economics, Cities, and Who is an Indian?"

I have a confession to make. I read a lot (perhaps more than is good for me). And while I'm no evangelist, I think "The Idea of India" deserves a wide audience. This is not a full-fledged review, given current constraints of time. I definitely plan to revisit Khilnani at some point in the near future, for a more detailed analysis. For now, think of this as a "quick and dirty" recommendation, based on a casual first read.

For starters, "The Idea.." is rather well written -- elegant prose without any of the tendentious word tricks that a couple of other non-fiction South Asian writers seem so fond of. His writing is far removed from the simplistic clichés on India that are all too easy to come by, given the sheer complexity and diversity of the topics. Khilnani makes a heroic attempt to project (some of) the subtleties and shades of the issues under consideration, while maintaining a coherence and internal flow.

His essays are the product of a thoughtful mind, rather than a potted journalistic attempt to bring out something to sync with India's 50th Independence anniversary. Has quite a few incisive comments and penetrating insights, worthy of debate and discussion.

Also, Khilnani's done a fair amount of dogged research -- intensive as well as extensive.

On the flip side, on a couple of times Khilnani's conclusions seem a trifle flat. For instance, "Cities": lots of background material, fabulous research, and engaging perspectives on India's major cities: Bombay, Bangalore, Chandigarh, Ahmedabad and Delhi. However, the ending seemed a bit open-ended and dangling. Not to be crude, but I was left with the question: "OK, so the point is..?" For all the elegance, Khilnani's sentences at times seem a tad long, with a whole bunch of qualifiers and subclauses nested within. (Is this some form of South Asian Oxbridge tradition, perhaps? Witness Amit Chaudhuri & Salman Rushdie. Comments, anyone). Maybe I'm overly critical here, weaned as I've been on Russell and The Economist leaders. But would Khilnani have sacrificed the multi-shading that he so obviously is striving for, if he'd resorted to shorter, simpler sentences? A question to be tabled and explored in a fuller review. These quibbles of mine should in no way detract from the overall merits of Khilnani's effort. If you're looking for a good book on India, you could do worse than begin with "The Idea of India". Hopefully, this book will serve as the harbinger of more such quality non-fiction within the Indo-Anglian fold. After all, one would like to think that we deserve better stuff than the mishmash of a Shashi Tharoor (India: From Midnight to the Millennium) or the grating pretentiousness of a Gita Mehta (Snakes and Ladders).

Let me know what you think. I'd love to hear your take on this book. And on any other non-fiction of similar calibre.