Book Review: India from Midnight to the Millennium and Beyond

‘India from Midnight to the Millennium and Beyond’

By Shashi Tharoor

Penguin

This is my first read from Shashi Tharoor’s. There are many books written on India, all from different viewpoints and capturing India’s different phases in history or different shades of life, but this book “India: from midnight to the millennium and beyond”, has its own honorable place. It is the story of India’s history, from 15 August 1947 onwards. It tells how Nehru took our nation forward with his socialism which in the end reached us to the verge of near bankruptcy in 1991. It covers policies and autocracy of Indira Gandhi and the terror of Emergency. In a way it covers the whole Nehru-Gandhi dynasty till the time of Sonia Gandhi. Along with the political leadership, the pages cover issues like economy, communalism and secularism (Hindus standpoint Vs Muslim appeasing politics in India), a big chapter on NRIs and expatriation (this chapter is an absolute delight to read), the politics of castes and reservations, and what not. The book is exhaustive and amazing to read. The only downside is that if someone like me has lived in India always, one already knows the nitty-gritty of our political system and national saga. As such Shashi Tharoor’s learned opinion and sharp representation of facts make the book still going through with delight. And for outsiders and foreigners, his sensible explanation really helps. 

I have typewritten some portions from the book. I regret errors if any. Have not given any titles to the paragraphs, but topics are evident. Just some snapshots taken from the first half of the book:  

Successive Indian govts permitted the retention of Muslim Personal Law separate from the country’s civil code and even financed Haj pilgrimages to Mecca. Two of India’s first five Presidents were Muslims, as were innumerable cabinet ministers, ambassadors, generals and supreme court justices. (P xxvi)

To them, an independent India, freed after nearly a thousand years of alien rule (first Muslim, then British), and rid of a sizeable portion of its Muslim population by Partition, had an obligation to assert its own identity, one that would be triumphantly and indigenously Hindu. They are not fundamentalist in any meaningful sense of the term, since Hinduism is uniquely a religion without fundamentals: there is no Hindu Pope, no Hindu Sunday, no single Hindu holy book, and indeed no such thing as Hindu heresy. (P xxvi)

The negative side of the ledger is easily listed: economic exploitation (often undisguised looting of everything from minerals to jewels); stunting of indigenous industry (symbolized by the deliberate barbarity with which, on at least two occasions, the British ordered the thumbs of whole communities of Indian weavers chopped off so that they couldn’t compete with the producers of Lancashire); the creation of a landless peasantry (through archy of Zamindars created by the British to maintain rural order); and general poverty, hunger, and underdevelopment. (P14)

A builder’s daughter from Torino, without a college degree, with no experience of Indian life beyond the rarefied realms of the prime minister’s residence, fiercely protective of her privacy, so reserved and unsmiling in public that she has been unkindly dubbed “the Turin shroud,” leading a billion Indians at the head of the world’s most complex, rambunctious, and violent democracy? (P 26)

Rajiv had barely begun to grow into the role when Mrs. Gandhi was assassinated by the forces of Sikh extremism, forces she had herself primed for narrow partisan purposes. In 1977 the Congress Party had been ousted in Punjab by the Sikh Akali Dal Party, an ally of Janata; Mrs. Gandhi typically decided to undermine them from the quarter they least expected, by opponents even more Sikh than the Akalis. So she encouraged (and reportedly even financed) the extreme fanaticism of a Sikh fundamentalist preacher, Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale. (P 37)

Above all, as a Hindu, I belong to the only major religion in the world that doesn’t claim to be the only true religion. (P 57)

An uncle of mine put it ironically, “In my parent’s time, during the nationalist movement, they were encouraged by Gandhi and Nehru to reject caste; we dropped our caste-driven surnames and declared caste a social evil. As a result, when I grew up, I was unaware of caste; it was an irrelevance at school, at work, in my social contacts; the last thing I thought about was the caste of someone I met. Now, in my children’s generation, the wheel has come full circle. Caste is suddenly all-important again. Your caste determines your opportunities, your prospects, your promotions. You can’t go forward unless you are a Backward.” (P 111)

The attitude of an expatriate to his homeland is that of the faithless lover who blames the woman he has spurned for not having sufficiently merited his fidelity. (P 143)

A wonderful book which I recommend to all. 

- Rahul

Book Review: Show Business, by Shashi Tharoor

‘Show Business: A Novel’

By Shashi Tharoor

Penguin

‘Show Business’ is the story of life in Mumbai’s film industry, called Bollywood. It’s the story of a young talented man Ashok who went on to become a superstar. On his way, he misses a lot of genuine friends, goes through a lot of corrupting experiences and I think he never realizes when and how he loses his integrity and character. It is a disturbing story as such, of characters losing ‘character’ and leading a life full of miseries, false put-ups, faking expressions and corrupting experiences. But that I guess is part of “show business”! 

Many a time while reading the book, it seemed to me that the author has based Ashok’s character over Amitabh Bachchan. From physical attributes to him marrying another actress who had to leave acting after wedding, many things match. Even Ashok’s entry into politics and a near fatal accident are the same. But if such similarity brings familiarity, it is for the benefit of the reader. Because in a lot of aspects it is a fresh story. The novel runs many parallel stories at the same time. In portions, it also narrates screens from movies; it’s amazing to see how Mr. Tharoor could be a super hit script writer for movies too. The climax of the story is shocking and so twisting that you don’t get it till you finish the last paragraph. 

After reading this book, I am in absolute admiration for Shashi Tharoor’s writing skills and imagination. I always knew he writes well but his fiction is also so touching, sensible and wonderful to read. Just read how sensitive this portion has become: 

“Do you have to go, Ashok?” she asks, as the ayah begins to change the diapers and we move away from the babies.

“You know I do,” I reply reasonably. After all, it is my profession. 

“You spend so little time with the girls,” she says.

What she really means, of course, is that I spend so little time with her. 

“They’ve got you, my love,” I point out. “That is the whole idea, isn’t it? One of us must be with them as much as possible. I have got to go out and earn the daal and chawal.”

“But you don’t need to work so hard any more, Ashok,” she says. “We can afford all the daal and chawal we can possibly want, and more. You told me yourself you didn’t know what to do with all the black money that has been pouring in.”

What she really means is, you don’t have to do so many films with Mehnaz Elahi. She has heard the rumors, like everyone else. But she never asks about it. Never mentions Mehnaz’s name. Proud woman, my wife. I like that about her: her pride. (P 128-129)

I haven’t read many books on life in Bollywood but I feel this novel brings many fresh perspectives, which are solely due to the writer’s own learned points of view. I highly recommend this novel to all. 

- Rahul