THE FOURTH LION

Gopalkrishna Gandhi has been an administrator, diplomat, author, and public intellectual of distinction for over four decades. His writings have spanned diverse genres, showcasing both his deep scholarship as well as a profound engagement with issues of politics, history, literature, and culture. He is respected not only for his statesmanship, but also admired as an exemplar of a fading ideal of our republic, one that placed ethics and the pursuit of the common good at the core of our public life. The Fourth Lion, a festschrift in honour of Gopalkrishna Gandhi, consists of twenty-six essays contributed by individuals drawn from various walks of life and from across the globe. Organized into thematic sections—Literature and Culture, History, Environment, Politics and Public Affairs, and Memoirs—the essays speak to concerns, interests and sensibilities that animate our lives.

Venu Madhav Govindu has co-authored The Web of Freedom: J. C. Kumarappa and Gandhi’s Struggle for Economic Justice (Oxford University Press, 2016). His professional interests are in computer vision and he is Associate Professor, Department of Electrical Engineering, Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru. Srinath Raghavan is Professor of International Relations and History at Ashoka University. He is the author of several books, including The Most Dangerous Place: A History of the United States in South Asia (Penguin Random House, 2018).