Smitha Balachandran

In 2022, I undertook a master’s degree in political science from SNDT University, Mumbai, at the age of 52. I was keen on doing the programme and, as expressed in an introductory letter to the head of the department, I wished to study out of sheer interest, unlike 38 years ago when I did my bachelor’s in the same subject only because I needed a degree. At that time, I had not developed any passion or interest in the subject. I had done that degree almost mechanically, like a robot prepped to...

Arranged Marriage, a collection of short stories first published in 1995, is celebrated author Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni’s debut fiction work. Apart from being a bestseller in the United States, the book won the PEN Oakland Josephine Miles Prize for fiction, an American Book Award and the Bay Area Book Reviewers Award for fiction. Divakaruni, apart from teaching creative writing at a local college, is the coordinator for a helpline for South Asian women. This book reflects her interest and...

Immortalizing a literary work which juxtaposes art and history, culminating in the creation of a masterpiece is no easy task. But a historian of Manu S. Pillai’s caliber has achieved this on a monumental scale in False Allies: India’s Maharajahs in the Age of Ravi Varma. Pillai describes the travels of the painter Ravi Varma through five princely states. He demonstrates how these maharajas, far from being frivolous despots consumed by lust and luxury, were involved in industrialization,...