“To other countries, I may go as a tourist, but to India, I come as a pilgrim.”
In June 2023, India became the most populous country in the world. It was the latest landmark in a long line of achievements that have made the South Asian country one of the most significant, vibrant and fascinating hubs on the planet. India’s history stretches back over 55,000 years and has always seen huge mixes of cultures, languages and religions that continue to mould the country and its people to this day. Contemporary Indian history naturally centres on the struggle for freedom under British Crown rule, the aftermath of independence and the far-reaching diplomatic, economic and technological rivalries both inside and outside of its borders. To help you better understand the state of the country in 2024 and some of its greatest challenges, join us today at What We Reading for the best books about India!
India After Gandhi: A History – Ramachandra Guha
First up on our list of the best books about India is Ramachandra Guha’s India After Gandhi. The book is an exhilarating chronicle of the brutal conflicts that have rocked India in modern history and the extraordinary factors that have helped hold the country together against all odds.
Revised and republished for 2023 and the seventy-fifth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi’s assassination, this is one of the most definitive and energetic compilations of India’s past and present. From Narendra Modi’s re-election, increasing violence against women, Dalits and religious minorities, large-scale civilian protests, the unprecedented crackdown on dissent and the widening gap between those on the wave of prosperity and those facing devastating poverty, all of India’s most pressing issues are condensed masterfully by Guha.
Check Out The Best History Books From 2023
Imagining India: The Idea Of A Renewed Nation – Nandan Nilekani
India’s economic boom is comparable to that of Europe in the 1970s or the US in the 1990s and has had a profound impact on the country’s social, political and cultural shape. In his book about India, Imagining India, business leader Nandan Nilekani uses his global experiences to dissect what the future of the nation looks like both as a booming economy and as a new global player.
Nilekani reflects on how India’s future rests on more than economic growth, but also reform and innovation in every sector across public life. Imagining India goes through the country’s past and present leaders and their efforts to develop frameworks that meet its characteristics and challenges. One of the best India books for understanding some of the most pressing issues facing the country’s society today, Nilekani’s work is a crucial look at caste, higher education, labour reform, public health, the environment and political agendas and what the future might look for all of them.
Maximum City: Bombay Lost And Found – Suketu Mehta
Award-winning author, journalist and screenplay writer Suketu Mehta is a native of Bombay (Mumbai). In his bestselling book about India, Maximum City, he gives readers an inside view into the stunning metropolis where he grew up through an altogether new lens. He approaches the city from a series of unexpected perspectives, guiding through the criminal underworld of Muslim and Hindu gangs, following a bar dancer raised amid poverty and abuse, peeling back the curtain on Bollywood and telling the many stories of countless villagers who arrived in the city looking for a better life, only to end up living on the streets.
Throughout each story, Mehta also recounts his own efforts to try and make a home in the city after two decades of living abroad. Impassioned, candid and heartrending, Maximum City is a revelation of an ancient and ever-changing world and one of the best portraits of a modern Indian city.
The Struggle For India’s Soul: Nationalism And The Fate Of Democracy – Shashi Tharoor
Over a billion Indians are alive today. However, author Shashi Tharoor asks whether some of these are more Indian than others through an exploration of nationalism, patriotism, citizenship and belonging in her 2021 book about India, The Struggle for India’s Soul.
Across this insightful read, Tharoor introduces two opposing ideas that have emerged across India: ethno-religious nationalism against civic nationalism. This struggle for India’s soul threatens to hollow out the concepts of pluralism, secularism and inclusive nationhood that were founded during independence. Through everything from mythical pasts being propagated, to universities being assailed to minorities and women being demonised, Tharoor shows how authoritarian leaders are stripping away identities and establishing bogus theories of Indianness. Yet, he also shows how, through this long view of India’s existential crisis, things can be turned around and everything that is sacred and unique to the country can be preserved.
Unequal: Why India Lags Behind Its Neighbours – Swati Narayan
Swati Narayan’s Unequal is one of the best books about India from 2023 and a compilation of findings from her five-year study across India, Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka. Her study found that even poorer neighbouring countries were doing better than India on a range of social indicators including health, nutrition, education and sanitation.
Narayan’s intensive and immersive research illuminates the difficulty India has had in diluting social inequalities. From the burgeoning billionaire class to the neglected masses, social ills, stunted development and even geographical differences between northern and southern states, Unequal is packed with human stories and hard data to present a guide through India’s most pressing issues and provides a roadmap on how they can be tackled.
The Argumentative Indian: Writings On Indian History, Culture And Identity – Amartya Sen
First published in 2005, The Argumentative Indian is a collection of sixteen linked essays by Nobel Prize-winning economist Amartya Sen. Across this book about India, Sen discusses the country’s intellectual and political heritage, and how its argumentative tradition is vital for the success of its democracy and secular politics.
An exhilarating trek through the fundamental aspects of Indian history and culture. It is also an acclaimed analysis of some of the most highly-charged disputes surrounding these subjects – the nature of Hindu traditions, Indian identity, the huge gulf between rich and poor in the country and India’s current place in the world.
Check Out The Best Books On Hinduism
The Greatest Indian Stories Ever Told – Arunava Sinha
The Greatest Indian Stories Ever Told is a collection of some of the best short stories written by Indian authors since the genre arrived in the country in the late nineteenth century. Including early masters of the form, contemporary stars as well as those that stepped into the limelight in the twenty-first century, Arunava Sinha’s anthology takes in its sweep stories from all the religions, languages and literatures of India.
Between them, the authors featured in Sinha’s work have won virtually every major literary prize there is to win, including the Nobel Prize for Literature, the Jnanpith Award, the Sahitya Akademi Award and numerous other prizes at state, national and international levels. For one of the best India books for celebrating the diversity and flavour of Indian literature, look no further than Sinha’s bestseller!
Part-time reader, part-time rambler, and full-time Horror enthusiast, James has been writing for What We Reading since 2022. His earliest reading memories involved Historical Fiction, Fantasy and Horror tales, which he has continued to take with him to this day. James’ favourite books include The Last (Hanna Jameson), The Troop (Nick Cutter) and Chasing The Boogeyman (Richard Chizmar).
