Mohandas - Rajmohan Gandhi (2006)

The best tribute a person can give to his grandfather. More so if your grandfather is the greatest soul of India. A detailed treatise on Mahatma Gandhi's life. Beautifully presented in a fairly long book. The language is not easy read. It needs a fair bit of pauses before you proceed. Written in a chronological fashion, it starts with Gandhiji's childhood, talks about his London years, establishing Satyagraha in South Africa and subsequently all the work carried out in India. The book quotes from various sources of Gandhiji's life. It talks about many of Gandhiji's well known activities in the struggle for freedom. Also, speaks a lot about his personal and family lives. His emotional attachment to a middle-aged lady or experiment of celibacy at the age of 70 which was denounced and less understood.

At the end of reading such a voluminous work you still wonder, was he a saint, a politician, a reformist or just a hyped-up image of the Indian independence struggle. In fact he was such a crucial force for Indian struggle for independence. But there were other factors as well. How can a person have such a simple solution for all complex problems of life? All these make one wonder.

This is a work of scholarship by Dr. Rajmohan Gandhi. And needs serious time and effort to get the best out from this work. For many, this book may become the cornerstone of Gandhian studies. Recommended if you are serious about knowing about Gandhi. There are simpler and shorter books in the market if you want a quick grasp of his life and works.

The Tao of Programming - Geoffrey James (1987)

Get your free version at: http://www.canonical.org/~kragen/tao-of-programming.html. 

It is a short book on programming full of parables, fun quotes, and generally acceptable fun facts about software programmers. Just a 20-page book, it shall take no longer than a few minutes to go over it. However, I will generally suggest every computer programmer review it and ruminate over each idea for a few minutes.  

The Journey Home - Radhanath Swamy (2008)

The book is an autobiography of Radhanath Swami of ISKCON. It is based on the travel stories of a 19-year-old boy.  Richard Slavin heads out on a Europe trip to realize his calling for the spiritual needs of his soul. On the way, he makes friends with various people, shares their food, lodging, and transport to make a circuitous path from Europe to India. Sometimes even making solitary journeys on foot. He has met helpful people, cheats, sadhus, and even some frauds. The book essentially brings out if you have clarity of thought, the world will make way for you to realize your goals. After an exploration of two long years, he meets Swami Prabhupada of the ISKCON order in Vrindavan. Thus, he decides to commit to him as his spiritual master. Unlike other autobiographies by other Gurus, this is not a book about realization. Rather a long experience of battles one needs to go through in finding the spiritual master for yourself. His progress in the ISKCON order is not part of the book. The book is essentially well written, has lots of elements of the hippie culture of the period. Youthful abandon and engagement with drugs, sex, and other unhealthy practices and the ability to keep it off for one's spiritual progress are given due importance.  The benevolent commoners and deriding power-hungry sadhus who cheat hapless devotees are mentioned in the book. Then there are people whose main aim is to help others at the cost of affecting themselves are covered in some details as true love to humanity. Lucid language and style make the book an easy read. 

Living with the Himalayan Masters - Swami Rama (2007)

The book is an autobiography of Swami Rama, who lived with his Guru, a Himalayan seer, all his life. Simple language that will keep you gripping to the book. The book talks about early childhood, realization, experiences as a seeker, and learnings various seers he met in life. One may feel the story similar to The Autobiography of Yogi. However, I will differentiate it a bit as this book is very much like reading a storybook and very little on the actual spiritual processes. Secondly, there are a lot more interactions described. He has talked about meeting the sages of other religions like Buddhism, Jainism, Christianity, and Islam. He has met saintly figures who are associated with the freedom movement of India - Mahatma Gandhi. He has met Sri Aurobindo Ghosh, who had taken to complete spiritual upliftment after his experiences with the armed freedom struggle of India.  Overall, this is a book on learning from experiences.  While the author has been exposed to several forms of spiritual initiations, he has kept himself focused on the teachings of the Adwaita philosophy of Shankaracharya. His liking and bond with his Guru are presented nicely in the book. Though an old book, it is advisable for someone interested to know about Indian mysticism. 

The Shadow of the Great Game: The Untold Story of India's Partition - Narendra Singh Sarila (2005)

 Indian independence is like a story told differently. One sees many versions depending on who is telling the story. Some would say, Congress and Gandhi who were instrumental in India's independence. Some would insist it was Azad Hind Fauz and Subash Bose. Some even go to the extent of dedicating independence to the naval mutiny that was unsuccessful. India was getting restless, and various parts of the large country expressed their restlessness in one or other means in terms of reactions. However, some aspects do not get a mention. For example:

1. The US was interested in India getting freedom as one country and not being broken down and Balkanized. 
2. Mountbatten was equally responsible for merging the princely states as much as Patel's continuous follow-ups. In some sense, the princely states wanted to settle before their European masters left the country. 
3. Mountbatten was popular and had a good relationship with the Indian people and leadership but had three primary motives behind his actions.
1. The blame for partition should not come up as a British raj doing. 
2. The northwest part of India should have enough military presence to thwart the advancements of communism. 
3. India, though independent, must remain in the British commonwealth. 
4. Jinnah was interested in some Pakistan region and not essentially a large piece of territory. Even a land-bound from all sides by India was acceptable to him. He even wooed some Hindu princely states to join him to get a corridor of power till Bhopal. He was ready to do anything and agree to any terms of the raj placed in front of him. 
5. The British forces spearheaded the Indo-Pak war and the native army. Some of the British commanders took their own volition in deciding on the war fronts from Pakistan. The British had more faith in Pakistan than in India. 
6. Nehru got carried away by Mountbatten to take Kashmir to the UN. There were other ways for India to ascertain its hegemony over the region. 
7. Attlee was more inclined to India getting freedom than Churchill. Churchill was merely interested in India accepting colonial independence. Churchill blames Mountbatten for the same.
8. Lord Wavell had a much more significant role in the partition of India than Mountbatten. Wavell and Cripps scripted the Mountbatten plan. Mountbatten executed the plan. 

Starting as an ADC to Mountbatten, and continuing to be an ambassador in many allied nations, Sarila has seen a close account of Indian foreign policy in action in the initial years. As much as India's struggle for freedom was an internal affair, there was significant international interest in the same as well. 

Devil's Advocate - Karan Thapar (2018)

 The Newslaundry interview by Madhu Trehan (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EM-2VXMg6VY&t=2s ) introduced me to this book. 

The book is absolutely curt and to the point with economic usage of words in describing the ranges of areas he has touched upon. He talks of his childhood, marriage, his association with Benazir Bhutto, Sanjay Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi, subsequently leading to his journalistic journeys in India. While one gets to know Karan as a person well connected in Luyten's Delhi who pretty much can reach anyone who mattered in India, he was well connected in Pakistan as well. And one gets to feel personal relationships were much stronger than professional relationships. Towards the end, you see a few of the interviews and people he has become distant to eventually because he brushed them on the wrong side: Ram Jethmalani, L. K. Advani, Jayalalithaa, and Narendra Modi. 

He talks about why he wrote the book. He had time and he wanted to tell more interesting parts of his life. Somewhere, I felt he has a sense of guilt which haunts him if he did the right thing with some of his interviewees. Moreover, he expects readers to judge his actions. He is trying to portray, he did things within the journalistic duties. I felt everything said and done, journalists have to clearly keep a balance. The people they critique are the same that they have to keep the best relationships for a continued stream of interviews. Today you see a different Karan Thapar on Incisive Interviews on The Wire. However, you do not see the big names from the political circles, rather academicians, writers, etc. only. 

The book is definitely a must-read. 

Sister Nivedita - Basudha Chakravarty (1975)

When I went to my alma mater IIT Kharagpur, I was surprised to see the largest ladies hostel in the campus was named after Sister Nivedita. A bit curious as almost all the hostels in IIT KGP are named after freedom fighters, I was not able to place sister Nivedita among them. Luckily National Book Trust released this book for free for public reading during the Corona lockdown. This gave me an insight into this great soul and the multifaceted character she is. The book is concise note on the sister's life. Almost a breeze read.

Sister Nivedita got enchanted into Hindu philosophy with Swami Vivekananda's discourses. She decided to lead the Hindu ways of life and had set herself the path to come to India and help set up education for women in India. Although, she partially was successful in that mission, she has contributed to spreading of Hindu ways of life in the west, helping scientists like Dr. J. C. Bose in funding and encouraging their research. Culturally, connecting with Rabindranath Tagore and other Tagore clan members in spreading the importance of Indian culture. She has contributed and at times led the void in leadership during the early freedom struggles of India. She interacted with Bipin Chandra Pal, Aurobindo Ghosh and Khudiram Bose who had extreme views on Indian freedom struggle while maintaining an equally close association with the moderates. Moreover, she had Lady Minto, the wife of the viceroy as a regular visitor to her school. She has expressed her views on varied areas of interests related to India and Indian culture and Hindu heritage that are published as works of literature, simple children stories or as speeches. For me the book was an eye opener to know a great soul from Indian history who does not get as much of a mention as she should be.