Before there was the CPM

Suchetana Chattopadhyay teaches history at Jadavpur University, Kolkata, India. She studied at Jadavpur University and at the Mecca of South Asia Studies, SOAS (School of Oriental and African Studies), University of London. Her new book, out from Tulika Books, New Delhi, is An Early Communist: Muzaffar Ahmad in Calcutta 1913–1929.

From an occasionally employed, lower middle-class Bengali Muslim intellectual on the borderline of starvation in the city, he was to become ‘the chief accused’ at the Meerut communist trials started by the colonial government in 1929. What was the road travelled before challenging imperialism ‘from the dock’? In 1913 Muzaffar Ahmad (1889–1973) was just one more individual adrift in the sea of migrants arriving from rural Bengal to Calcutta. His ambition was to be a writer. Yet in the vortex of metropolitan upheavals, his life would take a completely different turn. Taking Muzaffar Ahmad’s early career (1913–29) as its chronological frame, this book examines the dialectical interplay between social being and a wider social consciousness in late colonial Bengal which drew a section of Muslim intellectuals to communism.

Muzaffar’s life converged with a significant phase in the social and political history of India and the world: 1913 marked the eve of the First World War, while the Wall Street stockmarket crash set off the Great Depression in 1929. During this period, especially after the success of the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917, socialist ideas and communist activism became politically familiar in different parts of the globe. In the post-First World War climate, many alienated urban intellectuals – from Cairo to Shanghai – stood at the crossroads of established identities and radical currents. Informed by working class protests from below and a leftward turn in the literary/cultural fields, many in India were also moving away from the political routes open to those from their social background to combat colonialism and identifying with alternative visions of decolonization.

By tracing this process in the context of Calcutta through Muzaffar Ahmad’s transitions, the little investigated history of the left in Bengal prior to Meerut is unravelled, and is related to the convergences between individual radicalization and the emergence of a new political space in a colonial city. The connected histories of communism, port-cities, Bengal Muslims, workers, intellectuals, youth, migration, colonial intelligence, early left organization, radical prose, local/ regional activism and internationalist currents are also probed in this context.

In our History and Biography sections, in hardcover, 320 pages, Rs 600, ISBN: 9788189487775 

Bent

Vadehra Art Gallery offers the first monograph on this important Indian photographer features selections from each of his major series,  a comprehensive overview of Sunil Gupta’s work to date, Sunil Gupta: queer.

Arguably India’s best-known working photographer, Gupta is also a well-known artist, curator, and writer. For decades he has explored narratives of contemporary gay life in India and other parts of the world; tackled issues of gender and sexuality; and documented his own experiences living with AIDS. This volume chronicles Gupta’s divergent series, which range from narrative portraits to fictional photo essays. Beautifully reproduced, these photos include his renowned series “The Pre-Raphaelites”; heart-rending images of children living in an HIV-positive care center; 1970s street scenes from New York City’s West Village; and his groundbreaking portraits of gay men, women, and transgender individuals living in his native country and struggling against homophobic laws and culture. Subversive, whimsical, personal, and political, Sunil Gupta’s photographshave done much to raise awareness about—and overcome the taboos of—homosexual life throughout the modern world.

By  Saleem Kidwai and Keith Wallace, this recent book (140 pages in hardcover) is priced at Rs 2500.  In our Photography and Gender sections, ISBN: 9783791350998 

Bright Sun, Brighter Star

NFDC, the National Film Development Corporation of India is the central agency established to encourage the good cinema movement in the country. The primary goal of the NFDC is to plan, promote and organize an integrated and efficient development of the Indian film industry and foster excellence in cinema. Over the years NFDC has provided a wide range of services essential to the growth of Indian cinema. The NFDC (and its predecessor the Film Finance Corporation) has so far funded / produced over 300 films. These films, in various Indian languages, have been widely acclaimed and have won many national and international awards.

A treat from the NFDC- another bonus of the Tagore Sesquicentennial- is a boxed DVD collection of 6 movies and a documentary, Tagore Stories on Film.

The documentary on Tagore is by Satyajit Ray.  Made in 1961, in English, this nearly hour long film in black and white is an early Ray masterpiece.  Satyajit Ray was a lifetime admirer of the man Tagore, his works and vision. He not only made films from five of Tagore's stories, but also took upon the task to make this dramatized documentary on the life of the poet-laureate. Made in 1961, the same year in which Ray made Teen Kanya from three of Tagore's stories, this was made to celebrate Tagore's birth centenary. Conscious that he was making an official portrait of India's celebrated poet, Ray refrains from touching upon the controversies in Tagore's life. However lovers of cinema will see the deft cinematic touches of a master filmmaker that sets it apart from most biographical documentaries in the world. The dramatized sequences in the film of the young Tagore are moving and lyrical, befitting the biography of one the most progressive man ever.

Nearly 100 films owe their inspiration to the work of Tagore, and most of these have been in Bangla. And this does not include movies where  Rabindra Sangeet has played an integral part: in many cases, his songs and even poems have inspired complete films.

A bonus in this six-pack is a film of  Tagore's  Natir Puja - an adaptation of his poem Pujarini, which the poet had staged in 1927. This was the only time that Tagore was so closely associated with cinema with the screenplay being written under his guidance by nephew Dinendranath 'Dinu' Tagore and the master composing the background music, with students of Santiniketan acting in the film. Tagore not only directed this dance-drama shot over four days, but also played an important role in the film. Though the film in its entirety has been lost, a portion has been found and restored.

The  films in the set are 

Disc 1 - Khudito Pashan (Runtime: 106 min)

Disc 2 - Teen Kanya (Runtime: 161 min)

Disc 3 - Kabuliwala (Runtime: 140 min)

Disc 4 - Ghare Baire (Runtime: 138 min)

Disc 5 - Char Adhyay (Runtime: 110 min)
Disc 6 - Natir Puja (Runtime: 20 min),  Satyajit Ray's Rabindranath Tagore (Runtime: 52 min)

In our Documentaries sectiom, Rs 399 plus shipping. Tagore Stories on Film

On Broken Glass

In early 2010, Arundhati Roy travelled into the forests of Central India, homeland to millions of indigenous people, dreamland to some of the world's biggest mining corporations. The result is Walking with the Comrades, a powerful and unprecedented report from the heart of an unfolding revolution.

War has spread from the borders of India to the forests in the very heart of the country. Combining brilliant analysis and reportage by one of India’s iconic writers, Broken Republic examines the nature of progress and development in the emerging global superpower, and asks fundamental questions about modern civilization itself.

Penguin Books will release Arundhati Roy's Broken Republic: Three Essays and Walking with the Comrades in Delhi on Friday the 20th May.

At the release which will be at the India Habitat Centre in New Delhi, Roy, Booker novelist, and outspoken and articulate critic of the Indian government will be in conversation with Amit Bhaduri, a distinguished economist and onetime colleague at JNU, where he is presently Professor Emeritus in the School of Social Sciences. 

NWE, IWE, same difference

If Indian Writing in English (IWE) is a genre, then arguably, Nepali Writing in English (NWE) is one too, albeit with far fewer exponents.

Today being Buddha Purnima, it seems appropriate to write about one of the finest writers from the subcontinent, the Nepali-American author, Samrat Upadhyay. His most recent novel, published in India by Rupa, is Buddha's Orphans.

Buddha’s Orphans is a novel permeated with the sense of how we are irreparably connected to the mothers who birthed us and of the way events of the past, even those we are ignorant of, inevitably haunt the present. But most of all it is an engrossing, unconventional love story and a seductive, transporting read.

Upadhyay directs the creative writing programe at Indiana University, and is the author of  The Guru of Love. Which, as it happened, was the first of his novels that I read, provocative title notwithstanding- and which floored me in its simplicity and complexity... It was a New York Times Notable Book and a San Francisco Chronicle Best Book of the Year. 

But that was a while ago. Other novels by Upadhayay on the SwB site include The Royal Ghost that features characters trying to reconcile their true desires with the forces at work in Nepali society. Against the backdrop of the violent Maoist insurgencies that have claimed thousands of lives, these characters struggle with their duties to their aging parents, an oppressive caste system, and the complexities of arranged marriage. In the end, they manage to find peace and connection, often where they least expect it-with the people directly in front of them. These stories brilliantly examine not only Kathmandu during a time of political crisis and cultural transformation but also the effects of that city on the individual consciousness.

Arresting God in Kathmandu is a collection of short stories, that  brilliantly explores the nature of desire and spirituality in changing society. With the assurance and unsentimental wisdom of a long-established writer, Upadhyay records the echoes of modernisation throughout love and family. Psychologically rich and astonishingly acute, Arresting God in Kathmandu introduces a potent new voice in contemporary fiction.

In our Fiction section, 

Buddha's Orphans, Rs 295, ISBN: 9788129116178
The Royal  Ghosts, Rs 250, ISBN: 9788129109156
Arresting God in Kathmandu , Rs 195, ISBN: 9788171678037

Pachyderm Pirouettes

David Malone's provocatively titled Does the Elephant Dance? Contemporary Indian Foreign Policy elegantly surveys key features of contemporary Indian foreign policy. David Malone identifies relevant aspects of Indian history, examines the role of domestic politics and internal and external security challenges, and of domestic and international economic factors. He analyzes the specifics of India's policy within its South Asian neighborhood, and with respect to China, the USA, West Asia, East Asia, Europe, and Russia as well as multilateral diplomacy. The book also touches on Indian ties to Africa and Latin America, and the Caribbean.

India's 'soft power', the role of migration in its policy, and other cross-cutting issues are analyzed, as is the role and approach of several categories of foreign policy actors in India. Substantive conclusions touch on policies India may want or need to adjust in its quest for international stature.

Malone is President of the International Development Research Centre. He was Canada's High Commissioner to India and non-resident Ambassador to Bhutan and Nepal from 2006 to 2008. He has published extensively on peace and security issues, in book form and in journals.   He has published earlier with OUP who will formally release his book in New Delhi on the 16th of May.

Meanwhile, the book has garnered quite a bit of attention, and praise:

A wonderfully illuminating book on India's relations with the world informed both by remarkable expertise on diplomacy and foreign relations and by carefully acquired intimate knowledge of a very complex country. The book will enlighten not only Indians involved in public discussion and policymaking but also people across the world interested in an ancient land undergoing extraordinarily rapid transformation.  Amartya Sen, University Professor and Professor of Economics and Philosophy, Harvard University, and 1998 Nobel Laureate in Economics 

With the analytical mind of a scholar and the perceptive eye of an experienced diplomat, David Malone ranges across history, geography, economics and strategy to provide a treatment of Indian foreign policy which is both lucid and profound. Strobe Talbott, President of The Brookings Institution, former US Deputy Secretary of State, and author of Engaging India 

David Malone has written an impressively thorough and deeply insightful analysis of how a previously inward-looking India is now reaching out to the world. Comprehensive in scope, examining major themes and regions, [this book] shrewdly brings history and economics to bear on our understanding of [India's] foreign policy. Ramachandra Guha, Historian, and author of India After Gandhi 

David Malone has written an impressively thorough and deeply insightful By daring to walk through Delhi's Tower of Babel, David Malone has produced a rewarding work on the sources and conduct of India's contemporary international relations. The capacity to differentiate between the "signal" and the "noise" in Delhi's rambunctious discourse and a deep empathy for India's aspirations allow Malone to excavate the obscure riches of India's new regional and global engagement. C. Raja Mohan, Senior Fellow, Centre for Policy Research. 

In our Strategic Affairs section, 432 pages, Rs 495 in hardcover. ISBN: 9780199552023  

K for Kashmiriyat

Chitralekha Zutshi is  Associate Professor of History at the College of William and Mary in the US. Her new book, published by Permanent Black, is Languages of Belonging: Islam, Regional Identity, and the Making of Kashmir.


Despite its centrality to the political life of India and Pakistan, Kashmir has met with rather perfunctory treatment from historians of South Asia. The few works of history and politics that have appeared on this region, moreover, insist on defining Kashmiri culture, history, and identity in terms of the ahistorical concept of Kashmiriyat, or a uniquely Kashmiri cultural identity. This book, in contrast, questions the notion of any transcendent cultural uniqueness and Kashmiriyat by returning Kashmir to the mainstream of South Asian historiography. It examines the hundred-year impact of indirect colonial rule on Kashmirs class formation. It studies the uses (and abuses) made of Kashmirs political elites by the state. It looks at the responses of Kashmirs society to social and economic restructuring. It shows that while all these historical changes had a profound impact on the political culture of the Kashmir Valley, there is nothing very inevitable or quite definite about the 'political regionalism' and 'Islamic particularism' of this area. Using local language sources and every important archive, this major history of the formation of Kashmir shows precisely how the Kashmir Valley assumed the position it has come to occupy in postcolonial South Asia.

The book has been widely praised.  “Languages of Belonging is a quantum leap forward in Kashmir studies and will make one of the best histories of ‘regional’ identities and economies in India yet produced. The work brings forward a great deal of new and important material and provides a new framework for understanding regional identities in South Asia”  says C. Bayly of  Cambridge.  “This is an outstanding book. Based on massive archival research in Delhi, Jammu and Srinagar and the unearthing of rare Kashmiri literary sources, it skilfully uncovers the religious sensibilities that underlay the formation of Kashmir’s regional identity in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth century … Languages of Belonging will light up new ways of understanding the formation of identities in South Asia’s regions.” This from Sugata Bose of  Harvard. 

In our History and Politics sections, in paperback, 366 pages,  Rs 395, ISBN 9788178243344

The Canonical Tagore

The sesquicentennial anniversary of Rabindranath Tagore's birth is being celebrated today. Last month, Harvard University's Belknap Press brought out  The Essential Tagore, edited by Fakrul Alam and Radha Chakravarty, with a foreword by Amit Chaudhuri.

The Essential Tagore showcases the genius of India’s Rabindranath Tagore, the first Asian Nobel Laureate and possibly the most prolific and diverse serious writer the world has ever known. Marking the 150th anniversary of Tagore’s birth, this ambitious collection—the largest single volume of his work available in English—attempts to represent his extraordinary achievements in ten genres: poetry, songs, autobiographical works, letters, travel writings, prose, novels, short stories, humorous pieces, and plays. In addition to the newest translations in the modern idiom, it includes a sampling of works originally composed in English, his translations of his own works, three poems omitted from the published version of the English Gitanjali, and examples of his artwork.


Tagore’s writings are notable for their variety and innovation. His Sonar Tari signaled a distinctive turn toward the symbolic in Bengali poetry. “The Lord of Life,” from his collectionChitra, created controversy around his very personal concept of religion. Chokher Bali marked a decisive moment in the history of the Bengali novel because of the way it delved into the minds of men and women. The skits in Vyangakautuk mocked upper-class pretensions. Prose pieces such as “The Problem and the Cure” were lauded by nationalists, who also sang Tagore’s patriotic songs.


Translations for this volume were contributed by Tagore specialists and writers of international stature, including Amitav Ghosh, Amit Chaudhuri, and Sunetra Gupta.

Another Indian Nobel laureate, the economist Amartya Sen is said to have been given his name by Tagore. Writing about this volume he says "Tagore is one of the greatest literary figures of our time, who commands universal admiration from native readers of Bengali, but the excellence of whose work is difficult to preserve in translation. In rising to this challenge, the editors and translators of The Essential Tagore have done a splendid job of producing a beautiful volume of selections from Tagore's vast body of writings. The book is also powerfully strengthened by an enjoyable and remarkably far-reaching foreword by Amit Chaudhuri."

A substantial book in more ways than one, 864 pages, 9.4 x 6.6 in and over a kilogram in weight... Ironically, though, there is no Indian edition of the book yet, but there undoubtedly will be one soon enough. ISBN: 9780674057906. In the meanwhile, do write in if you would like to get the book- its priced at $40.