India – A million mutinies now – V. S. Naipaul
A detailed account into the lives of so many common men from different parts of India, with all their baggages from the past shadowing their present and future, how psyche evolves over decades, how each influences the life – whether it be the British or Portugese rule or the local rulers and how the life is torn between several manipulations for power and business between state and central governments and above all how people thrive, even with all their fears and limitations. An interesting insight is that of inhabitants of Bombay having lived in spatial constratints enjoying a rich social life due to the proximity they share with a wide array of strangers – who cease to be strangers after a while and the way they adjust their life to living in such conditions. When these sort of people move out of Bombay into a place without such spatial constraints, they feel nostalgic and develop a longing for Bombay and the rich social interaction spun out of the lack of space.
However the account is of the India before 1990, before the economic liberalisation and the “banglored” era. Luckily for me the cosmic force has trusted a copy of the “Age of Kali” through the hands of a dear one. On to that now
