Private diary of Ananda Ranga Pillai

One of the most intimate windows into 18th century South India comes from the pen of a single merchant in Pondicherry. Every entry feels urgently present. Kept by Ananda Ranga Pillai, dubash to Governor Joseph Francois Dupleix of the French East India Company, this extraordinary 18th century diary records the political manoeuvres, daily negotiations and private anxieties of dubash merchant life at the heart of a thriving port in the Pondicherry French colony. Volume II carries the reader further into colonial Pondicherry society, where European rivalries, local courts and household rituals intersect in a colonial India diary that is both candid and deeply humane, a historical primary source collection unlike any other. Long regarded as a cornerstone of sources for colonial Pondicherry and the wider conflicts of the time, Ananda Ranga Pillai's chronicle illuminates diplomacy, commerce, religious life and family ties amid shifting alliances, making it essential for academic researchers colonial India, south Indian history students and East India Company history readers seeking a vivid Carnatic Wars history book that reads with the immediacy of lived experience. Yet the voice remains personal, accessible and often strikingly modern, speaking directly to anyone fascinated by character, chance and survival under empire. Out of print for decades and now republished by Alpha Editions. Restored for today's and future generations. More than a reprint - a collector's item and a cultural treasure.