A NEW HISTORY OF INDIA: From Its Origins to the Twenty-First Century

A complete one-volume history of India illustrated throughout by maps and photographs in full colour.<br />
The book covers all the major landmarks of Indian history from prehistoric times up to the twenty-first century&mdash;starting with the country&rsquo;s geological origins a few billion years in the past and the migration of <i>Homo sapiens</i> from Africa into the region several millennia ago. It traces the evolution of Indian civilization through a multitude of epochs personalities and turning points including the Harappan Culture Vedic Society the age of Mahavira and the Buddha Ashoka and the Mauryas the Gupta period the Delhi Sultanate major kingdoms in the east west and south the Mughal empire European incursions into the subcontinent the British Raj the freedom struggle led by Gandhi Nehru Patel Bose Tagore and others Independence and Partition and key developments in the life of the modern republic. Deepening the overarching narrative are essays on archaeology caste religion art architecture philosophy language culture the economy and various aspects of the nation&rsquo;s plural diverse society. Written by award-winning historian Rudrangshu Mukherjee along with cultural historian Shobita Punja and photographer-archivist Toby Sinclair <i>A New History of India</i> brings the story of one of the oldest most complex countries on earth to vivid life by blending state-of-the-art pictures and maps with a text of depth clarity and rigorous scholarship.

Rudrangshu Mukherjee is Chancellor and Professor of History at Ashoka University of which he was the founding Vice Chancellor. He was educated at Calcutta Boys’ School, Presidency College, Calcutta, JNU, and St Edmund Hall, Oxford. He was awarded a DPhil in Modern History by the University of Oxford. He has taught in the department of history, Calcutta University, and held visiting appointments at Princeton University, Manchester University, and the University of California, Santa Cruz. From 1993 to 2014 he was the Editor, Editorial Pages, The Telegraph. He is the author of many books—these include Nehru & Bose: Parallel Lives; Awadh in Revolt 1857–58: A Study of Popular Resistance; Spectre of Violence: The Massacres in Kanpur in 1857; The Year of Blood: Essays on 1857; Dateline 1857: Revolt against the Raj. His recent books include A Begum and a Rani: Hazrat Mahal and Lakshmibai in 1857; Tagore and Gandhi: Walking Alone, Walking Together, which won the Valley of Words Award, 2022, non-fiction; and Twilight Falls on Liberalism. He is the editor of Great Speeches of Modern India and The Penguin Gandhi Reader and the co-author of New Delhi: The Making of a Capital and India: Then and Now.

Shobita Punja is the author of over fifteen books including Museums of India; Divine Ecstasy: The Story of Khajuraho; and Daughters of the Ocean: Discovering the Goddess Within. She has been invited to lecture on Indian art at various institutions and universities in India and abroad and has worked with several cultural organizations such as CCRT and INTACH, and served as CEO of the National Culture Fund, Ministry of Culture, Government of India.

Toby Sinclair is a London-born Scot who has been working in India for the last forty-five years. He has been involved in the production of wildlife, history, and cultural documentaries since 1995 and is a director at & Beyond Asia. He is a member of Ranthambhore Foundation’s executive committee and is a founder and past vice president of The Responsible Tourism Society of India. He is a Fellow of the Royal Geographic Society, London, and received the Carl Zeiss Wildlife Conservation Award in 2007. He continues to be involved in conservation issues.