In this provocative book, The Sensual Self: Explorations of Love, Sex & Romance, bestselling author Shobhaa Dé asks you to ditch the rulebook and ‘abandon good sense’ when it comes to owning your sensuality. It doesn’t matter if you’re twenty or seventy, sensuality has no expiry date. Whether you’re nursing a heartbreak or rejection, dissatisfied with sex in marriage, or are anxious about your waning libido—Dé has got you covered. From thrilling first dates and the aesthetics of a perfect kiss, to the messy world of casual coupling, group sex, kinks, and sexual red flags, Dé strips away the taboos and lays it all bare with her trademark wit and candour. Whether it’s heartbreak, rejection, jealousy, or fidelity, she dives into the chaotic terrain of human desire and sexual complexities. She asks men to roll up their sleeves and put in more effort, be experimental and non-judgemental, and demands that women stop settling for boring dal-chawal sex when life can offer spicy, finger-licking chicken chilli fry. Part manifesto, part guide, The Sensual Self is a fearless exploration of sensuality, love, and desire across every age and stage of life. Bold and unfiltered, The Sensual Self shows how you can embrace your (im)perfect curves, take charge of your sensuality, reclaim your desires, and live, love, and lust, on your own terms.
Shobhaa Dé is a celebrated author, journalist, columnist, and social commentator. She has more than twenty bestselling books to her name. Her works have been extensively translated into a variety of languages, including French, German, Hungarian, Italian, Korean, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, and Turkish.
In this diagnosis of contemporary Indian society, with a tinge of dark humour, acclaimed writer Manu Joseph explores why the poor don’t rise in revolt against the rich despite living in one of the most unequal regions of the world.
The poor know how much we spend in a single day, on a single meal, the price of Atlantic salmon and avocados. ‘Why,’ he asks, ‘do they tolerate it? Why don’t they crawl out from their catastrophes and finish us off? Why don’t little men emerge from manholes and attack the cars? Why don’t the maids, who squat like frogs beside kitchen sinks, pull out the hair of their conscientious madams who never give them a day off? Why is there peace?’
Why the Poor Don’t Kill Us shows in pitiless detail just how hypocritical and exploitative people of privilege are, and it also shows how and why they get away with it. It’s a sharp, at times searingly witty, but a very perceptive critique of the many faults of the India we live in.
Why The Poor Don’t Kill Us has also evolved into a stand-up act by Manu Joseph. He prefers to call it ‘stand-up anthropology’.
Manu Joseph is the author of the novels Serious Men, The Illicit Happiness of Other People, and Miss Laila, Armed and Dangerous. He is the winner of the Hindu Literary Prize and the PEN Open Book Award, whose jury described him as ‘…that rare bird who can wildly entertain the reader as forcefully as he moves them’. He has been nominated for several other prizes. He is also the creator of the Netflix series, Decoupled.
He was the editor of Open Magazine and a columnist for the New York Times. This is his first work of non-fiction.
Sanskrit has long been celebrated as one of the building blocks of Indian civilization, and is venerated in temples, scriptures, and classical literature. In Language of the Immortals, renowned scholar and critic G. N. Devy uncovers the astounding paradox of Sanskrit—an ancient language that shaped Indian thought, philosophy, and identity for millennia, yet was never truly a language of the people.
With rigorous scholarship, Devy dismantles enduring myths and offers a revealing commentary on Sanskrit’s historical and cultural trajectory. He shows how it achieved unsurpassed prestige not through conquest or commerce, but sheer intellectual brilliance. He explores the way in which Sanskrit shaped intellectual life across centuries, influenced cultures beyond India, and maintained its prestige through the oral tradition and spiritual symbolism rather than the patronage of the state.
This concise yet profound work reimagines what it means for a language to live on—long after it has ceased to be spoken.
G. N. Devy is currently the Senior Professor of Eminence and Director, School of Civilization, Somaiya Vidyavihar University and was previously the Obaid Siddiqi Chair Professor at the National Centre for Biological Sciences, and Director, Adivasi Academy, Tejgadh, and Professor of English at the Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda. He led the People’s Linguistic Survey of India (PLSI), a comprehensive documentation of all living Indian languages, forming a fifty-volume PLSI Series. He has received several awards for his writing as well as for his community work, including the Padma Shri, Prince Claus Award, and Linguapax Award. His English publications include After Amnesia, Of Many Heroes, Painted Words, Nomad Called Thief, The Question of Silence, Countering Violence, The Crisis Within: On Knowledge and Education in India, Mahabharata: The Epic and the Nation, and India: A Linguistic Civilization. He is the co-editor (with Ravi Korisettar and Tony Joseph) of The Indians: Histories of a Civilization.
When tradition lingers like a faded script, what does it mean to be modern? Harsha V. Dehejia embarks on a profound exploration of modernity, weaving together philosophy, aesthetics, and emotion. He tries to decode the shifting soul of modern Indian art, where the artist is no longer a servant to patron or literature but a seeker of personal truth. In this landscape of artistic liberation, a new Rasa emerges—duhkha, the quiet despair of modernity. Born of solitude, capitalism, and the slow fracturing of old bonds, it stains the canvas with existential urgency and pulses with angst.
Through the works of ten modern Indian artists such as Rabindranath Tagore, Krishen Khanna, Tyeb Mehta, Bhupen Khakhar, Sudhir Patwardhan, Nalini Malani, Atul Dodiya, and more, Dehejia deciphers the symbols of this evolving aesthetic—where past and present collide, where longing and liberation coexist.
Modern Indian art is unbound—free, secular, polychromatic, and fiercely individualistic.
Harsha V. Dehejia has a double doctorate, one in medicine and the other in ancient Indian culture, both from Mumbai University. He is a practising physician and professor of Indic studies, with more than thirty books, four films, and several curated exhibitions to his credit. His main interest is in Indian aesthetics.
. This is so perfect. Romesh Bhattacharji , former Narcotics Commissioner of India, reading #KaranMadhok‘s book, “Ananda: An Exploration of Cannabis in India”.
Upon spotting this picture on Facebook, Karan Madhok shared it on his wall saying, “This is a wonderful full circle moment: I quoted India’s former Narcotics commissioner Romesh Bhattacharji in my book – glad to see he’s got his hands on a copy.”
Cannabis, or ganja, is practically as old as recorded Indian civilization, with references to the plant being found in some of India’s earliest written texts and myths. Native strains of the plant are as common as rice or millet in many Indian states, and can often be found growing wild in the countryside. In scriptures and in the opinion of enthusiasts, ganja is said to provide ananda (bliss) or vijaya (victory) over the cares and ills of the world. Cannabis is best known as a recreational drug but it has a myriad other uses as well.
In this lively, well-researched, humorous, and occasionally trippy account of ganja, Karan Madhok looks at every aspect of the cannabis plant: botanical, spiritual, medical, and recreational. Madhok hits the road in search of cannabis strains around the country, including a visit to the Himalayan hamlet that is home to the world-renowned Malana Cream (which has inspired various counterculture movements); looks for the mythical Idukki Gold in Kerala; seeks the Sheelavathi variety in the Andhra/ Orissa region; portrays the travails of addicts, and details the shadowy world of gangsters and suppliers; hangs out with devotees who openly consume bhang and other derivatives of ganja; and visits hospitals and clinics which use the drug for a wide range of therapeutics.
Besides the factual and eye-opening research into every aspect of the narcotic, the author contemplates the concepts of freedom, creativity, spirituality, and paranoia associated with the drug, and examines the upside and problems of decriminalizing ganja in India. Ananda, the first major study of cannabis in India, is entertaining, and enlightening—it is the perfect introduction to an integral aspect of the country that has often got a bad rap and is imperfectly understood.
Karan Madhok’s debut novel, A Beautiful Decay, was published in 2022. His creative work and journalism have appeared in Epiphany, Sycamore Review, Bombay Review, SLAM Magazine, Fifty Two, The Caravan, Scroll, among others.
Karan is the editor and co-founder of the Indian arts and culture website The Chakkar. He is a graduate of the MFA programme from the American University in Washington D.C.
The Five Mindfulness Trainings, also known as ‘Precepts’, form the foundation of ethics and morality in Buddhism: not to kill, steal, commit adultery, lie, or consume intoxicants. In The Mindfulness Survival Kit, revered Zen Master and peace activist Thich Nhat Hanh discusses the deep relevance of these simple yet profound principles in both our personal lives and in the world around us.
Describing the precepts as a ‘diet for a mindful society’, he shares insights into their value and meaning and teaches how embracing each mindfulness training can nurture a society grounded in care, harmony, and mutual respect. In his poetic and lucid style, Hanh presents a practical and secular vision for building and sustaining a way of life that is healthy, compassionate, and doesn’t harm or disrupt peace. Thich Nhat Hanh was one of the best-known Zen Buddhist teachers in the world. He was the author of numerous bestselling books. He lived in Plum Village, in southwest France, where he taught the art of mindful living. He passed away in Hue, Vietnam, in January 2022.
Nearly 90 million people around the world identify as Tamil, a proud and ancient community with a unique language, history, and culture. The Tamil people have given India and the world some of its most iconic revolutionaries and political leaders, industrialists, philosophers, sportspeople, scientists, and mathematicians (including winners of the Nobel Prize), and celebrated writers, poets, dancers, musicians, and actors. The influence of the community on science, culture, religion, philosophy, art, architecture, literature, film, and politics has endured across millennia. While the majority of Tamils live in South India, the diaspora is to be found in countries around the world—especially in Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Singapore, Canada, the UK, and USA, where Tamil traditions thrive and assume new and interesting forms. A people of immense resilience, intellect, and creativity, the Tamils continue to leave an indelible mark on the world.
But who are the Tamils, really? How have they preserved a distinct cultural heritage while evolving across time and geographies? And what is the Tamil ‘gunam’ or identity? How has Tamil culture endured even as it has evolved and mutated over centuries?
In The Tamils, author Nirmala Lakshman draws from a wealth of historical information, original research, and her own keen observations of the community that she is part of to craft a rich and expansive exploration of Tamil history, society, and culture. The book has been published by Aleph Book Company.
Today’s Tamil Nadu largely corresponds to ancient Tamilakam and is bound by the mountain ranges of the Western Ghats and the Bay of Bengal, with tracts of dry red earth, green paddy fields, and pebbled riverbeds in between. This book traces the remarkable journey of the people of this land, starting from the Stone Age (1.7 million years ago) all the way up to the epic Sangam era (300 BCE to 300 CE), whose literature highlights the influential role of dynasties like the Pallavas, Pandyas, Cholas, and Cheras, and the thriving Jain community of that time; it then examines the evolution and spread of Tamil culture through the Bhakti movement, and the arrival of Christianity and Islam. In parallel to the cultural, philosophical, and religious influences that shaped Tamil society, the book examines the medieval and modern political history of the region, and describes the setting up of the sultanates of the south, the rule of the Nayaks, the Vijayanagar dynasty, the Marathas, and the coming of the British. Thereafter, it goes deep into the freedom struggle, and the Non-Brahmin movement before describing the distinctive attributes of the Tamils in the modern era, especially the changes that are taking place in the twenty-first century.
Through incontestable scholarship and lucid analysis, the book delves into the complex intersections of politics, religion, caste, economics, and gender in Tamil society, while also capturing the spirit of Tamil creativity in art, architecture, handicrafts, dance, music, sports, mathematics, IT, and more. It studies the opposites that mark the community—the refinement and heights of Tamil culture, but also the violence stemming from centuries of prejudice. It explores the ways in which Tamil culture continues to evolve—through migration, debate, acculturation, and social upheavals. Accessible and comprehensive, The Tamils is a compelling portrait of one of the world’s oldest continuous cultures—in an ever-globalizing world, it reflects on what it means to be Tamil today.
Nirmala Lakshman has been steeped in Tamil culture by virtue of being Tamil and observing Tamil society through her years in journalism. She is currently Publisher and Chairperson of The Hindu Group of Publications and was earlier Joint Editor of the paper. She founded and edited The Hindu Literary Review, conceptualized and created Young World, India’s only children’s newspaper supplement, and developed several other feature sections of The Hindu. She launched The Hindu’s annual literature festival and continues to curate it. Nirmala has a PhD in postmodern fiction, and has written a book on Chennai, Degree Coffee by the Yard, and edited an anthology of contemporary Indian journalism, Writing a Nation.
Read an extract from the book published on Moneycontrol.
Our Living Constitution: A Concise Introduction & Commentary by Dr. Shashi Tharoor is a slim hardback, an essential commentary on the workings of the longest written constitution in the world. It is published by Aleph Book Company. Our constitution is truly a visionary document. A fact that Dr. Tharoor chooses to spell out in the nine chapters.
The opening passages of the prologue encapsulate the arguments laid out in this slim treatise.
On 26 November 2024, Parliament held an unprecedented special session to celebrate the day seventy-five years earlier, on 26 November 1949, when the Constitutent Assembly, the indirectly-elected 299-member body in charge of the task, finished its daunting task and agreed on a Constitution that was to be formally adopted two months later, on 26 January 1950.
That day, 26 November 1949, marked the conclusion of a long process of Constitution-making. The nationalist movement that gave our Constitution its legitimacy and sanctity had itself used many arguably non-constitutional methods in its struggle against imperial rule — non-cooperation, civil disobedience, satyagraha. Yet, it culminated in a democratic Constitution, the world’s longest written Constitution for any nation and (or so many thought at the time) its most imperilled. Handwritten exquisitely in both English and Hindi by calligraphist Prem Behari Narain Raizada, each page adorned with intricate artwork inspired by Indian culture and heritage and designed by famous artists led by Nandlal Bose, the Constitution was not merely a legeal document: it was a work of art. In its pages, to borrow Jawaharlal Nehru’s famous metaphor, the soul of a nation, long suppressed, had found utterance.
On that occasion, Dr B. R. Ambedkar, chairman of the Drafting COmmittee of the Constituent Assembly, rose in what is now the Central Hall of the Samvidhan Sadan (the old Parliament House) to address his colleagues, his fellow Founding Fathers, with a prescient warning to the nation, ‘Howveer good a Constitution may be,’ he said, ‘it is sure to turn out bad because those who are called to work it, happen to be a bad lot. However bad a Constitution may be, it may turn out to be a good lot. The working of a Constitution does not depend wholly upon the nature of the Constitution.”
It was a sobering reminder that the Constitution we celebrated then, as we celebrate it today, can be distorted and misused by ‘wrong-minded’ people in power.
As a staunch defender of democracy in both principle and practice, Dr Ambedkar anxiously wondered whether Indians would place ‘the country above their creed’. He recalledd the history of the Buddhist Bhikshu sanghas, which were known to have observed rules of modern-day parliamentary procedure, and added: ‘The democractic system India lost. Will she lose it a second time? I do not know. But it is quite possible, in a country like India . . . there is danger of democracy giving place to dictatorship. Iti s quite possible for this newborn democracy to retain its form but give place to dictatorship in fact. If there is a landslide [victory], the danger of the second possibility becoming actuality is much greater.’
p. ix – xi.
Later, in the chapter “The Vision of the Founders” the context behind the Constitution’s adoption is detailed. Read an extract published on Moneycontrol ( Friday, 16 May 2025). It is a sobering reminder of the incredibly diverse history of this sub-continent. This diversity was represented in the constitutent assembly and is apparent even today, in modern India. It is at the very heart of this nation that we call India.
The book is being launched on 10 May 2025 in New Delhi.
This is one of those days when truth is stranger than fiction, or is it? In 2013, the late Shovon Chowdhury published an extraordinary novel called The Competent Authority. It was his debut and in his inimitable style, tongue-in-cheek humour. A decade later, voila!, we have an official letter stating that “as desired by the Competent Authority”, Cow Hug Day has been withdrawn.
A single-volume history of India such as this is sorely required. It is also beautifully illustrated with photographs and maps. History books on the trade list sell exceedingly well. These books access different communities of readers. But “A New History of India” will work tremendously well for ordinary readers, supplementary reader in middle and senior schools, prescribed text for schools that are not using state published textbooks or are affiliated to the NCERT or SCERT school boards, job aspirants taking various competitive exams including the Holy Grail — to join the hallowed portals of Indian bureaucracy, and many more. As a hardback, proced at Rs 999, it is a tad too expensive for many of the aforementioned readers but if a low-priced paperback, albeit published on poorer quality paper, this edition will sell like hot cakes. It also needs to be available in Indian languages. It will have a much larger reach. It is critical that it is made available since more than 50% of the Indian population is below the age of 25 and more than 65% is below the age of 35. This time period coincides with an astonishing lack of history about India’s history. This is exactly the lack of ignorance of the youth that is being preyed upon by Machiavellian individuals for their immediate political gains. It is a very worrying trend. Hence, books like this that are easy to consult and provide clear snapshots of our magnificent history are very welcome.
