and economic liberalization 670–3
environmental movement 539, 742
suicide 666
Tribal Rights 115, 646, 685
see also Scheduled Tribes; specific tribes
Trichur 290, 291
Trinamool Congress (TMC) 689, 744
Tripura 259, 273, 335, 450, 586, 646, 744
Tripura National Volunteers (TNV) 586
Trivandrum 294
Truman, Harry S. 401
tuberculosis 281, 669
Tuensang 269
Tulpule, Bagaram 500
Tumkur 657
Tungabhadra Dam 211
Tungabhadra River 210
Turkey 156, 369
Tyabji, Badruddin 352
Tyabji, Saif 367–8
Tyagi, Mahavir 108, 114
Tynan, Kenneth 492
Udaipur 48
Ukhrul district 548–9
ul Haq, Mahbub 461
unemployment 201, 204–5, 482, 700, 741
Union Cabinet 134, 204, 231, 326, 367, 375, 399, 489, 722
Union Carbide disaster 571–2
Unionists 11–12
United Council for Relief and Welfare (UCRW) 84
United Front 561, 636, 651, 653
United Front-Left Front alliance 419
United Kingdom 45, 133, 156, 320, 337, 386, 394, 466, 504, 545, 546, 556, 591, 655. see also Britain
United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA) 645–6
United Nations (UN) 47, 55, 72–3, 77, 80, 81, 162, 239, 240, 242, 252, 305, 315, 405, 428, 452, 456, 655
resolutions 163
Special Commission for Kashmir 74
troops 133
United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) 145
United Nations Security Council 72, 73, 157, 162, 239, 396, 655
United News of India (UNI) 498
United Progressive Alliance (UPA) 684, 685, 704, 710, 712, 713, 717, 718, 724, 725, 729–30, 740
United Provinces 9, 29, 79, 106, 110, 116, 127, 200, 360–1, 364
United States 110, 150, 152–8, 161, 166, 168, 176, 204, 207, 303, 402, 453, 454, 546, 556, 591, 677, 694, 742, 755
African Americans 767
atomic weapons of 389
and the Chinese invasion of India 334, 336–8
Cuban missile crisis 334
and India 152–8, 214, 338–40, 400, 406, 407, 460, 489, 523, 546, 632, 660, 702–4, 710, 734, 743
and Indian agricultural reform 214
and industry 204
and Kashmir 242, 249, 252
and Pakistan 156–8, 168, 339, 452–3, 454–7, 653, 655, 678, 743
and state intervention 207
and Vietnam 407, 412, 414, 420
United States Congress 154
United States Department of Agriculture 407
United States Navy 7th fleet 457
unity of India xix–xxi, xxvii, 23, 25, 31, 77, 109, 148, 188, 191–2, 194, 196, 328, 389, 391, 393, 489, 503, 561, 594, 627, 639–40, 712, 751, 754–5, 757, 759, 762–4
universities 192, 213, 550, 645, 659
University of California 784
Untouchables xxvii, 4, 6, 119, 134, 146, 184, 185, 228, 285, 425, 469, 518, 628
abolition of their status 225, 359–60, 371, 381
redesignated ‘Harijans’ by Gandhi 112, 371
reservation for 112–3, 114
status 359–60, 371–8, 379–81
see also Dalits; Harijans; Scheduled Castes
Upadhyaya, Deen Dayal 347–8
upper castes 95, 113, 249, 379, 561, 604, 619, 697, 709, 735, 736, 783
abuse of Untouchables 104, 359, 371–7
caste conflict 531–2, 603, 746–7
and local self-governance 635
voting habits 748, 781
women’s rights 538
Upper House 107, 237, 375, 439, 684
urbanization 374, 469, 735, 781
Urdu 88, 117–8, 178, 364, 367–8, 443, 459, 679, 732 756
Uri 66, 68, 70, 74, 77, 395
Urs, Devaraj 533
US News and World Report 155
Usman, Brigadier 80
Utkal Alumina 672
Uttar Pradesh 125, 137, 167, 191, 214–15, 416, 425, 429, 441, 484, 494, 507, 512, 520, 525, 527, 533, 543–4, 548, 559–60, 568, 578, 582, 604, 606–7, 618, 620–1, 623–4, 629–31, 634, 641, 668, 671, 673–4, 709–10, 712, 725, 737–9, 741, 744, 764, 773
Uttarakhand 548, 671
Uzbeks 614
Vadodara 559
Vajpayee, Atal Behari 304, 324, 350, 411, 461, 522–4, 535, 605, 635–7, 651, 653, 655, 658, 661, 674, 677, 680, 682–3, 710, 730, 743, 756
Valley, the (vale of Kashmir) 59– 61, 65–6, 68–71, 76, 78, 160, 243–7, 249, 250, 255–6, 258, 305, 344–5, 347, 349, 352, 354, 370, 393, 395, 409–10, 428, 446, 462, 471–2, 474, 527, 562, 588, 609–14, 643–6, 678, 699, 700, 715–16, 748–9, 764–6
Varma, Justice J.S. 728
varnas xxvi–xxvii
Vedas 134, 229
Vellalas 425, 527, 662
Venkatachar, C. S. xxxii
Veraval 49
Verghese, B. G. 498
Verma, Kewal 595
Vidarbha 191
Vidyavachaspati, Indra 230
Viet-Minh 133
Vietnam 150, 414, 524, 741
Vietnam War xxxiii, 407, 420, 457
Vijayanagara Empire 182
Vijayawada 561
Vimochana Samara Samiti (Liberation Committee) 292–3, 294
Vindhyas 484
Virudhunagar 418
Vishakapatnam (Vizag) steel plant 410–1
Vishwa Hindu Parishad (World Hindu Council) (VHP) 579–80, 582, 591–2, 605, 607, 620–3, 624, 637, 641–2, 654, 679–81, 708, 715
Visveswaraya, M. 198
Vividh Bharati 513
Vizag 185, 410–11
Vokkaligas 425, 601
Vyas, Jai Narayan 144
Walker, Johnny 782
Wallace, Paul 558
Walong 332, 333
Wangala, Mysore 215
Warangal district 52, 95
Wars xi–xii, 74, 84, 330–6, 396–9, 457–61, 675–8
Washington 56, 157, 337, 407, 453, 455, 457, 458, 523, 570, 677, 702–3, 705
Washington Post (newspaper) 754
water sharing 608–9
water supply 171, 222, 567, 696, 748. see also irrigation
Wavell, Lord 31, 35, 46, 103
Waziristan 68
Weber, Max 771
Welldon, J. E. 3
West
Cold War 126, 156, 303
disillusionment with Nehru 176
Indian alliance with the 166
military aid of 331–2, 333
West Bengal 8, 90–1, 93, 115, 125, 131, 194, 208, 322, 370, 416, 419, 421–3, 450, 461, 487, 494, 524, 525–6, 538, 550, 568, 591, 633–4, 649, 651, 689–91, 697, 712, 725, 727, 738, 744, 761
West Pakistan 12, 137, 179, 360, 447–9, 451, 452–4, 455, 457
West Punjab 11, 14, 15, 16, 18, 63, 66, 74, 83–5, 87, 171, 173, 211
Western Ghats 216
wheat 160, 198–9, 215, 397, 400, 407, 440, 529
White Revolution 528
Wint, Guy 405
Wipro 659, 660
Wired magazine 651
women 5, 103, 106, 138–9, 151, 159, 202, 211, 212, 225, 270, 273, 293, 319, 347, 418, 460, 467–70, 501, 508, 541, 576, 612, 631, 635, 640, 641, 643, 725–8, 756, 769, 783
abduction 93–4, 361, 610
and the burqa 446, 643–4
and the Constitution 112
and religious personal laws 136, 224–5, 227–30, 232–3, 236, 411, 575, 576, 577–8, 640
discrimination xxvii–xxviii, 726–8
education 370, 468–9, 469, 667–8
employment 471–2, 646, 659, 661, 686, 710, 726
falling sex ratio 468–9, 726–7
franchise 131–2, 280, 633
l
abour 198–9, 468, 538–40, 698
literacy 468, 667, 668, 735
lower-caste 372, 376, 469, 530, 735
names 132
professional class of 629
rape 67–8, 361, 538, 613, 681
refugees 15, 90–1, 93–4
rights 136, 225, 229, 233, 235–7, 281468–9, 538, 578, 713, 717
violence against 429, 494, 549, 624, 644, 673, 701, 726
voting 131–2, 280, 469, 768, 781
Woodcock, George 762
Woolf, Leonard 3
Wordsworth, William 159
workers xxvi, 27, 28, 47, 63, 130, 134, 136, 139, 142–3, 159–60, 192, 201, 212, 285, 292, 323–4, 374, 376–7, 420, 422, 434, 491, 539–41, 546–7, 559, 625, 630, 645, 661, 675, 685, 723, 726, 734–5, 740–1, 764
World Bank 172, 408, 450, 615, 696
World Council of Churches 516
World Economic Forum 2006 770
World War I 201, 305, 340
World War II xxxi, 5, 20, 27 65, 101, 270, 279, 305, 340, 395–6, 398
Yadav, Akhilesh 620, 737, 776
Yadav, Lalu Prasad 604–6, 620, 771, 776
Yadav, Mulayam Singh 604–6, 620, 631, 649, 737, 776
Yadav, Yogendra 768
Yadavs 425, 527, 601, 604, 698, 736
Yagnavalkya 228, 234
Yarkand 170
yatras (processions) 605–7, 614, 715
Young India (Gandhi) 3
‘Young Turks’ 434–5, 482
Youth Congress 507, 508
Zaheer, Sajjad 461–2
zamindars see landlords
Zeitgeist 202
Zia-ul-Haq, General 524
Ziegler, Philip 31–2
Zinkin, Maurice 637
Zinkin, Taya 637
Zoramthanga 646–7
Photo Section
Jawaharlal Nehru and the Kashmiri leader, Sheikh Abdullah, in days when they were still friends, Srinagar, c.1949.
(Nehru Memorial Museum and Libreary)
Jawaharlal Nehru addressing a public meeting in Srinagar, 1952. Sheikh Abdullah, who is seated immediately to his left, was to be jailed by Nehru’s Government a year later.
(Press Information Bureau)
A group of mostly Muslim women queueing up to vote in the first general election in the old city of Delhi, February 1952.
(Press Information Bureau)
One side of non-alignment: Jawaharlal Nehru greeting the Soviet leaders N. A. Bulganin and N. S. Khruschev at Delhi airport, 1955.
(Author’s collection)
Hindi-Chini bhai-bhai: Nehru and Chinese premier Chou En-lai in days when they were still friends if not brothers, New Delhi, 1956.
(Nehru Memorial Museum and Libreary)
V. K. Krishna Menon (1897–1974), Nehru’s confidant, and a controversial defence minister in the years leading up to the war with China in 1962.
(Nehru Memorial Museum and Libreary)
Menon’s bête noire. J. B. Kripalani, veteran of many battles with the British Raj and with successive Governments of free India.
(Nehru Memorial Museum and Libreary)
The London-educated lawyer turned Communist Jyoti Basu (left) being sworn in as the chief minister of West Bengal, Writers Building, Calcutta, 1977. Basu stayed in the job for twenty-three years.
(Ananda Bazar Patrika)
The cartoonist turned demagogue Bal Thackeray, whose party, the Shiv Sena, episodically in power in Maharashtra, and whose cadres have been responsible for a series of attacks on Muslims.
(The Hindu)
The anti-corruption crusader Anna Hazare, on fast in New Delhi, 2011.
(Getty Images)
Narendra Modi, the superb orator with a controversial past who became India’s prime minister in May 2014.
(Getty Images)
About the Author
RAMACHANDRA GUHA was born in Dehradun in 1958, and educated in Delhi and Calcutta. He has taught at the universities of Oslo, Stanford and Yale, and at the Indian Institute of Science. He has been a Fellow of the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin, and also served as the Indo-American Community Chair Visiting Professor at the University of California at Berkeley.
After a peripatetic academic career, with five jobs in ten years in three continents, Guha settled down to become a full-time writer, based in Bengaluru. His books cover a wide range of themes: they include a global history of environmentalism, a biography of an anthropologist-activist, a social history of Indian cricket, and a social history of Himalayan peasants. His entire career, he says, seems in retrospect to have been an extended (and painful) preparation for the writing of India After Gandhi.
Guha’s books and essays have been translated into more than twenty languages. The prizes they have won include the UK Cricket Society’s Literary Award and the Leopold-Hidy Prize of the American Society of Environmental History. In 2008, Prospect and Foreign Policy magazines nominated Guha as one of the world’s one hundred most influential intellectuals. In 2009, he was awarded the Padma Bhushan for services to literature and education. In 2015, he was awarded the Fukuoka Prize for contributions to Asian culture and scholarship.
Discover great authors, exclusive offers, and more at hc.com.
Praise for India After Gandhi
BOOK OF THE YEAR – The Economist, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, San Franciso Chronicle, Time Out and Outlook
WINNER OF THE SAHITYA AKADEMI AWARD
‘Finally, here is a history of democratic India that is every bit as sweeping as the country itself . . . [A] magisterial work’
EDWARD LUCE, Financial Times
‘A formidable undertaking . . . As comprehensive, balanced and elegantly crafted as any reasonable reader could expect’
PHILIP ZIEGLER, Spectator
‘[A] dazzling book’
London Review of Books
‘Guha is a scholar of astounding energy and ingenuity, and his book triumphantly dismisses an often-made plea: that India’s contemporary history cannot be written because (as a result of government pigheadedness) the sources are not available. He seems to have visited every archive from Alabama to Allahabad, Calcutta to California, delving into a sea of private correspondence, news reports, pamphlet ephemera, as well as state papers. The result is a fascinating, kaleidoscopic narrative’
Daily Telegraph
‘Guha has given democratic India the rich, well-paced history it deserves’
Washington Post
‘Combining academic rigour with the readability of a thriller, India After Gandhi is a breathtaking survey’
Time Out Mumbai
‘Superb, gloriously detailed . . . a brilliant and beautifully balanced book. It is impeccably researched and documented, but Guha is no dry-as-dust academic historian. He presents his facts objectively but never hides his patriotism or cosmopolitan, Nehruvian ethos. He avoids self congratulation and celebrates the survival of democratic India without overlooking the nation’s countless failings and shortcomings’
Independent
‘Magnificently told . . . A riveting story with unforgettable characters and towering challenges, immense greatness and extraordinary venality, soaring hopes and profound disappointment’
India Today
‘It’s not often that you want a 771 page book to be longer. But as you race – yes, race – through India After Gandhi . . . you keep feeling that way. Guha writes lucidly, with unobtrusively readable prose, covers most bases, paints characters in with apposite quote or wry comment, points to broad themes, but also picks fascinating small details and in general keeps things going at an excellent pace’
The Economic Times
‘A riveting narrative . . . India After Gandhi is a balanced and unfailingly insightful work’
Sunday Times
‘No brief review could convey the astonishing range of this remarkable and capacious book . . . Guha marshals his facts and figures brilliantly . . . There will undoubtedly be other books covering the extraordinar
y and exhilarating story of post-independence India, but it is hard to imagine there will be a better one’
Sunday Telegraph
Also by Ramachandra Guha
The Unquiet Woods:
Ecological Change and Peasant Resistance in the Himalaya
Savaging the Civilized:
Verrier Elwin, His Tribals and India
Environmentalism:
A Global History
The Use and Abuse of Nature
(with Madhav Gadgil)
An Anthropologist among the Marxists and Other Essays
The Picador Book of Cricket
(editor)
A Corner of a Foreign Field:
The Indian History of a British Sport
How Much Should a Person Consume? Thinking through the Environment
Makers of Modern India
(editor)
Patriots & Partisans
Makers of Modern Asia
(editor)
Gandhi Before India
Democrats and Dissenters
Copyright
INDIA AFTER GANDHI. Copyright © Ramachandra Guha 2007, 2008, 2017. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
Ecco® and HarperCollins® are trademarks of HarperCollins Publishers.
FIRST ECCO PAPERBACK PUBLISHED 2008
FIRST ECCO HARDCOVER PUBLISHED 2007
Digital Edition JUNE 2019 ISBN: 978-0-06-297385-6
Version 05292019
Print ISBN 978-0-06-297806-6
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