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Welcome to this edition of The Hindu on Books Newsletter.
For several weeks now, we have been hearing about the implosion in the world of Big Tech with giants like Meta, Twitter, Amazon all announcing huge layoffs. In For Profit: A History of Corporations (Basic Books), William Magnuson tells the story of how businesses work and how they fail, about what makes a great leader and what makes a poor one. “If there is one constant in the world of corporations, it is that they have always and ever exerted an outsized influence on world events,” he writes. “If in ancient Rome, corporations helped transform the Roman army into the most efficient fighting force known to man,… more recently they have ushered in the era of Big Tech, with smart phones and the internet transforming the way we interact with the world.” Pointing out that the role of corporations has not always been positive, Magnuson lays down some of the reasons why Big Tech is in trouble, from privacy practices, monopoly positions to its handling of free speech. Corporations, he writes, possess one characteristic that makes them a particularly attractive vessel for running a business: limited liability. “Unlike partnerships, where every partner in the business can be sued if the business fails, the owners of a corporation have no duty to meet the future financial needs of the company. Once the stockholders buy their shares, they can rest assured their purses are safe from creditors, no matter how badly the business goes.” The chapter titled ‘Start-Up’ showcases the sheer size and scope of Facebook (now Meta), and Magnuson ominously states: “We are witnessing a seismic shift in the structure of the corporation, and no one knows how the plates will settle.”
This week, we carry an excerpt from P. Sainath’s new book on the extraordinary heroes of the freedom struggle, explore the art and craft of indigenous India while illustrating books, review a coming-of-age tale in the shadow of cricket and more.
Books of the week
The Last Heroes: Foot Soldiers of Indian Freedom by P. Sainath
P. Sainath’s book, The Last Heroes: Foot Soldiers of Indian Freedom (India Viking), profiles people, farmers, labourers, homemakers, forest produce gatherers, artisans and others, who stood up to the British. They did not go on to hold important posts after Independence, but what they had in common was their uncompromising opposition to Empire. Sainath says he wanted to write about these people who hail from diverse backgrounds and religions because “the post—1947 generations need their stories, to learn what they understood – that freedom and independence are not the same thing.” Many of these extraordinary people continued their fight for freedoms long after 1947. The excerpt we carry is from the chapter, ‘Must I Choose Between Gandhi and Ambedkar’, on the life and times of Shobharam Gehervar who vividly recalls the battle against the British.
“The British had surrounded the place where we made bombs. This was out in the jungle near Ajmer, up a hill. It was also near a stream where a tiger would come to drink water. That tiger would come and go. From the fact that we would fire in the air with pistols sometimes, it learnt that it should come, have water and walk away. Else we would fire at him and not in the air”.
“But that day, the British had learnt of the hideout and were closing in. Those were the days of the Raj, after all. So we blasted some explosives—not me, I was far too young, my older friends there—at the same time the tiger showed up for his water”.
“The tiger didn’t drink the water and fled, running right behind the British police. All of them started running. With a tiger somewhere behind them. Some fell down the hillside, some fell on the road. Two policemen died during that mayhem. The police did not have the guts to return to that place. They were scared of us”.
“The tiger apparently got out of the mess unscathed. And lived to drink water another day.” That’s veteran freedom fighter Shobharam Gehervar, now 96, talking to Sainath at his home in Ajmer on April 14, 2022. He lives in the very Dalit basti he was born in almost a century ago, never seeking to leave it for more comfortable quarters. Which this two-time municipal councillor could easily have done had he wished to. He paints a vivid picture of his 1930s and 1940s battles with the British Raj”.
Excerpt of P. Sainath’s The Last Heroes: Foot Soldiers of Indian Freedom
Using Indian cricket as the spine Amrish Kumar tells a coming-of-age story in his book Gods of Willow (Roli Books). The tale, says he reviewer K.C. Vijaya Kumar, draws an arc from Hyderabad to Mumbai with the protagonist Kabir Menon going through a series of life alterations. Through him, we observe India of the 1990s and early 2000s. “The sweeping gaze takes in all, be it politics, cricket, media, communalism and then juxtaposes it with personal facets like adolescence, first love, childhood friendships and even wretched office politics.” With shades of Mitch Albom’s Tuesdays with Morrie, this book “will find resonance with those who look back wistfully at an India of the past with cricket being a constant shadow.”
Spotlight
In the final instalment in the series on children’s books illustrators, Menaka Raman writes on the art and craft forms indigenous to India from digna to embroidered saris and how illustrators are making use of them. She writes about books illustrated by Nina Sabnani and Durgabai Vyam who for over 15 years have created thought-provoking content around themes like gender, caste, and acceptance. And artistically, says Raman, the two have introduced a generation of young readers to Indian folk and tribal art through their work. Vyam, who is from Madhya Pradesh, began to be noticed for the illustrations she did for Chakmak magazine; “I remember my first copy of Mai and Her Friends (Katha), the story of a cow that gets lost in a thunderstorm only to be rescued by a group of unlikely heroes. The Gond style was something I had seen as a child…to view them in the pages of a picture book felt surprising, yet reassuringly familiar.” Sabnani forayed into animation by chance and then felt inspired when she was told that she needn’t look at Disney films for inspiration but India’s own indigenous art forms. In My Mother’s Sari, made with author Sandhya Rao, Sabnani creates illustrations using photographs of saris – each borrowed from a loved one – and acrylics. The lives and imaginations of our children, says Raman, are so much richer thanks to artists like them.
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- Amid shifting contemporary geopolitics, Strategic Challenges: India in 2030 (HarperCollins), edited by Jayadeva Ranade, covers strategic challenges India is likely to face by 2030. Experts including Vijay Gokhale, Vikram Sood, Arun K. Singh, Air Marshal Raghunath Nambiar, Vice Admiral Shekhar Sinha, Kiran Karnik, and others, write on the difficulties and opportunities.
- The economist, who was nicknamed Dr. Doom until his warnings of the 2008 housing bubble came true, says there is another crisis looming. In his new book, Megathreats (John Murray/Hachette), Nouriel Roubini writes about 10 overlapping, interconnected threats, and warns that the world must act now to stave off the crises.
- From the writer of A Man Called Ove, comes a new book, And Every Morning the Way Home Gets Longer and Longer (Penguin Random House). Fredrik Backman writes a moving portrait of old age and relationships around the lives of Grandpa and Noah. Time doesn’t stand still but what will they do when it starts slipping away faster than they could ever imagine?
- Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay’s classic gets a 21st century makeover in Aayush Gupta’s My Name is not Devdas (HarperCollins). Will a woke Marxist Devdas still fall for Paro, who is an entrepreneur, or is he more likely to join forces with Chandramukhi, the daughter of a jailed separatist?
