Set in Bombay during the Quit India movement, the book is about three children—Sakina, Zenobia and Mehul—who are eager to be a part of Indian freedom struggle. When Sakina realises that there’s an underground radio network and her Bela aunty is a part of it and that she might be ousted to the British Government, she and her friends help the Underground People’s Radio in their mission to evade the British police—while their mothers are just running a cooking club. Read it for a glimpse of 1942 Bo...
Nov 13, 2022•33 min
Based on the repercussions of the Burma War between British India and the Japanese Army, the book centres around Raji and her sisters who are sent off to live in Manikoil, in their mother’s village in 1944. Away from the war but also terribly embroiled in it through her brother who decides to enlist in the British Indian Army, Raji feels the whiff of independence in the air. When Ilavarasi, her new friend, also lets on that she’s a refugee of the war, Raji is forced to come to terms with its dev...
Nov 12, 2022•29 min
Through six chapters dedicated to a mostly unknown village in Bengal and its craft, Payal Mohanka paints a picture of the rural crafting communities that produce rather unusual crafts objects like wigs, decorative lights, polo balls, boats, shuttlecocks and jeans . As a journalist , when Payal was filing four-minute capsules on each of these activities for the India Business Report on BBC World Service television , she made a decision to capture these activities in more detail. After a decade Pa...
Nov 11, 2022•30 min•Season 2Ep. 11
Tanjore, 1942 There are few excitements in Thambi's quiet life. There is the new hotel, disapproved of by elders, which lures him with the aroma of sambar with onions. There are visits to the library to read the newspaper, and once in a while, a new movie at the Rajaram Electric Theatre. More disagreeably, there are fortnightly visits from his uncle to lay down the law. When Gandhiji announces the Quit India movement, Tanjore is torn apart by protests. The train station-the lifeline of the town-...
Oct 02, 2022•37 min•Season 2Ep. 10
Calcutta, 1928 As the student protests gather momentum all across Calcutta, and police atrocities grow, ten-year-old Bithi wants to join in the struggle for freedom. But living in a society where her best friend is to be married and just the fact that she is going to school is regarded with disapproval, how can Bithi play a substantial part? How can she fight those who are dearest to her? Discouraged but not daunted, Bithi schemes and plots and lies and is drawn into unexpected danger-all for th...
Oct 02, 2022•25 min•Season 2Ep. 9
Join author VR Devika and host Ayushi Mona as they describe the indomitable spirit of a woman who campaigned to get rid of the practice of wet nurses, fought for girls’ education and widow remarriage, equal property rights for women, education reform, and rural healthcare for women. She took up the case of getting the practice of dedicating young girls as Devadasis, abolished. This monograph describes how Dr Reddy established Avvai Home for poor and destitute girls, from where thousands have gra...
Aug 21, 2022•37 min
Iridescent Skin is the first of its kind multispecies ethnography on humans and white sharks, entangled through the practice of cage diving at the very end of New Zealand. It is based on an immersive field work of marine anthropologist Prof. Raj Sekhar Aich, and his friend, research assistant, and anthropologist—Soosan Lucas, as they go in search of the elusive and mystified Great White Sharks of Foveaux Strait. This is not a ‘shark book’, although it revolves around sharks in the classical sens...
Jun 18, 2022•31 min•Season 2Ep. 7
Are you someone who asks a lot of questions that contains, but why?. Why did humans invent money? Why do we need to pay interest when we borrow money? Why are so many people trying to sell me insurance-linked investments? Why do experts suggest investing in stocks when the prices swing all over the place? Why do some swear by index funds, while some suggest real estate? Why do they present historic data to support their products while also saying past performance is no guarantee of future return...
Jun 11, 2022•46 min•Season 2Ep. 6
Homi Jehangir Bhabha was a nuclear physicist who pioneered the Indian nuclear research programme. Often hailed as the father of India’s nuclear power project, his ambition, far sightedness and enterprise shaped the development of modern science in India. Understanding the need for achieving self-reliance, he laid the framework for nuclear research in India by founding theTata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR) and the Atomic Energy Establishment, Trombay (AEET), later renamed Bhabha Atomic...
May 28, 2022•32 min
The Worlds Within You tells the story of Ami Shekar, who has decided to take a break from her first year of university in the UK and return to her home in Chennai. Ami is stuck, and finds herself fretting, overthinking and retreating into her own head. But she knows that whatever it is that makes her feel 'weird' all the time must have a name to it. And so, Ami is back home, to come to terms with many things: her mental health, her own identity, memories of her grandfather and, finally, herself....
May 07, 2022•40 min•Season 2Ep. 4
In Everyday Superfoods , bestselling author and nutritionist Dr Nandita Iyer brings to you everything you need to know about easily available local superfoods and ways to incorporate them into your diet. Through 60 simple recipes using an arsenal of 39 superfoods easily found in Indian kitchens, this book will not just help you understand your relationship with food but also show you how to improve your eating habits and enrich your daily meals with the goodness of superfoods. This book includes...
Apr 30, 2022•55 min•Season 2Ep. 3
When WHO first declared COVID-19 a global pandemic in March 2020, there was a great deal of apprehension about how India - the country with the highest TB cases and diabetes, inadequate health infrastructure and a population of 1.3 billion - would fare. Between the Janata Curfew and the first vaccinations, a piece of massive machinery has been working as seamlessly as possible to make sure that, despite some missteps and missed infections, India conquers what has been the greatest challenge the ...
Apr 24, 2022•49 min•Season 2Ep. 2
All You Need is Josh: Inspiring Stories of Courage and Conviction in 21st Century India is a book of hope in a world of cynicism. The book is a stories of individuals across India – of the aspiring astrophysicist who wanted to walk on the moon; the first person with a disability to top the civil services examinations; the domestic help who is now a published author; the army officer who amputated his own leg; the transgender woman who was expelled from her house; the Dalit child bride who now ru...
Aug 21, 2021•41 min•Season 2Ep. 1
An appeal to the Lord to arise and save the world, the Venkatesa Suprabhatam is the first of four recitations that are sung together every morning in the Lord Venkateswara temple in Tirumala, where it was originally sung. Prativadi Bhayankaram Anna, who composed this prayer in the fifteenth century, was a saint, a poet and an ardent devotee of Lord Vishnu. The poet’s devotion shines through, most unforgettably in M.S. Subbulakshmi's rendition, which rings through many south Indian homes in the m...
Jan 28, 2021•32 min
The Green Revolution resulted in spectacular advancements in Indian agriculture. Having achieved food security for its citizens, the country has now become a net exporter of different agricultural commodities. But sadly, this does not reflect the real state of the Indian agricultural sector. In truth, our farmers are plagued by crop failures, poor income, and indebtedness. Such is their misery that they are of late driven to commit suicide. Join the author Prof. Narayanamoorthy in conversation w...
Jan 23, 2021•30 min
Colaba, the southernmost tip of Mumbai, is Mumbai's most iconic neighbourhood. This bustling locality—with the Gateway of India, the world-famous Taj Mahal Hotel, and the Colaba Causeway, a shopper’s paradise—is an unparalleled tourist attraction. But barely 200 years ago, it was a rocky, jackal-infested island, separated from the rest of Bombay by a temperamental creek. In this episode, host Ayushi Mona discusses the compelling biography of the neighbourhood with author Shabnam Minwalla. The po...
Jan 16, 2021•56 min
Do you often wonder— ‘Is my money safe in banks?’ India is grappling with its worst banking crisis ever, and we are still trying to figure out what landed us here. This podcast episode with economist Madan Sabnavis analyses the role of the government and RBI in allowing the problem to reach the dimension it has assumed today. When will the never-ending NPA issue be resolved? Does it make sense to merge two PSBs when the culture and governance structures are alike? Should the RBI reserves be used...
Jan 09, 2021•41 min
In this episode of India Booked, host Ayushi Mona talks to Rajat Chaudhuri about 'The Butterfly Effect', on how his work as a climate activist is reflected in his fiction, the necessity of "enveloping scientific ideas in a story" to make it more accessible, the interconnected roles of technology, politics, public health and the environment, especially in India, and more. Listen in for a scathing yet succint breakdown of how consumption and corporate lobbies work, and the role activism can play i...
Jan 02, 2021•46 min
In this episode of India Booked, host Ayushi Mona talks to Veio Pou, about his brilliant new debut novel, Waiting for the Dust to Settle, published by Speaking Tiger Books. Set in Manipur, the book is a moving novel about the human cost of the violence that the Naga. The podcast discussed what people have endured since the 1980s telling the story of Operation Bluebird—one of the darkest yet little discussed moments in the history of the Indian Army in the northeast. Above everything else, this i...
Dec 26, 2020•44 min
In this episode of India Booked, host Ayushi Mona talks to Vikram Sampath, the best selling author of four acclaimed biographies, ‘Splendours of Royal Mysore: the Untold Story of the Wodeyars’ on the Mysore royal family; ‘My Name is Gauhar Jaan: The Life and Times of a Musician’- the biography of India's first recording superstar Gauhar Jaan of Calcutta; ‘Voice of the Veena: S Balachander - A Biography’, the story of eminent veena maestro late Dr. S Balachander and ‘Savarkar: Echoes from a Forgo...
Dec 19, 2020•54 min
RAYA: Krishnadevaraya of Vijayanagara, written by author Srinivas Reddy, is the definitive biography of India’s first truly global leader and one of the greatest kings who changed the course of Indian history. In this episode of India Booked, host Ayushi Mona and author Srinivas Reddy engage in an ardent conversation about Deccan history, the life of Krishnadevaraya and the town of Hampi. Srinivas Reddy is a scholar, translator and musician, and his previous books include translations of Krishna...
Dec 12, 2020•51 min
In this episode of India Booked, journalist and children’s book writer Priyanka Pradhan takes us on a journey through the Himalayas by discussing stories from her book ‘Tales from the Himalayas’ which features snow leopards to bagpiping girls to the real life stories of heroes from the Himalayan state of Uttarakhand, Gaura Devi and Nain Singh Rawat. This book is for “all the children, including the children in us” as she says, for the stories in it, from the heart of the mountains, though fascin...
Dec 05, 2020•26 min
In this episode of India Booked, Ayushi Mona discusses with social activist, writer and editor Ishmeet Nagpal, an array of essential topics ranging from the upsurge in domestic violence during the lockdown to the plight of migrant workers stranded far away from their homes, the unfair burden of expectations on women during the quarantine and the uncertainty of living in cities. The podcast explores ‘Isolocation Poems’, which is an anthology of shortlisted poems coedited by Ishmeet that reflects ...
Dec 04, 2020•35 min
‘Panjab: Journeys Through Fault Lines’ is a rigorous investigation and a personalized narrative by Amandeep Sandhu about the matters of Panjab, an account on the recovery from its past and the discovery of its present. This episode of India Booked is illuminating and comprehensive, much like the book itself, which brings an alternative outlook to the pre-existing perspectives on Panjab by discussing the impacts of militancy, separation, farm bills and egalitarianism, underlining the contrasts of...
Nov 28, 2020•54 min
Writer, literary translator, book critic and a literary podcast (Desi Books) host herself, Jenny Bhatt speaks to Ayushi Mona how the themes of Dhumketu’s books resonated with the short stories of her own, prompting her to bring out her debut literary translation, ‘Ratno Dholi: The Best Stories of Dhumketu’. In this hour-long episode on short stories and translations, Jenny describes, through brilliant metaphors, how a short story differs from a novel and why it is unfair to expect authors with d...
Nov 21, 2020•50 min
‘Twilight in a Knotted World’ is the third novel by journalist and historian Siddhartha Sarma that uncovers the many layers of the Phansigar problem and a hierarchy of stranglers through the investigations of Captain William Henry Sleeman, unearthing mysteries and bleak, uncomfortable truths about India. In the 18th episode of India Booked, discussing the period of colonial India, host Ayushi Mona and Author Siddhartha Sarma unravel the aspects of history and the gaps that are filled by fictiona...
Nov 14, 2020•37 min
‘Bhairavi- The Runaway’, written by Shivani aka Gaura Pant, a pioneer of women’s fiction in India, is the story of a woman's life, her resilience, her moral and mental strength, and about the restraints and choices women have in the society. In this episode of India Booked, the translator of ‘Bhairavi’ and Chitra Mudgal’s ‘Giligadu’, Priyanka Sarkar talks to Ayushi Mona about her experience translating the books, the scope and depth of women’s literature, about bringing alive a concept to an una...
Nov 07, 2020•42 min
Stoned, Shamed, Depressed’ is an alarming reality check of the struggles faced by the teens of India, dealing with the evident but deliberately denied issues of substance abuse, social media and gaming, bullying, body shaming and the frailty of mental health. Renowned journalist and author Jyotsna Mohan Bhargava traces the difficult journey from teenage to adulthood, where children easily give into temptations without realizing the repercussions and dangers of the virtual world and bad habits. I...
Oct 31, 2020•37 min
‘The ‘Other’ Shangri-La: Journeys through the Sino-Tibetan frontier in Sichuan’ is a narrative travelogue based on author Shivaji Das and his wife’s journey which explores the region’s history and the lives and cultures of the people inhabiting these remote lands in detail. In this episode of India Booked, Shivaji Das and Yolanda Yu recount their journey to Tibet as writers and more significantly as travellers, embellishing it with quirky incidents and fascinating anecdotes. The travel enthusias...
Oct 24, 2020•35 min
In the 14th episode of India Booked, author Anukrti Upadhyay takes us through the deserts of Rajasthan and the hot springs of Japan through her novel Kintsugi. In the same conversation, she connects contrasts betweenthe cultures of Jaipur and Japan and creates a delightful echo, all of her own. Anukrti Upadhyay is also the author of the twin novellas Daura and Bhaunri, which have been commended for its independent characters and fresh narrative, and a short story collection in Hindi called Japan...
Oct 17, 2020•37 min
