Battlefield India: 25 Years of Politricks and Economix

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Battlefield India is a chronicle of the near past which tells us how the cycle of chaos repeats itself. The story starts in 1997 on the eve of India's 50th year as an independent nation, and ends in 2022 as free India celebrates its 75th birthday.

The political, economic, and social events of the last 25 years are recounted through the voices of people the author has interviewed over the years.

These voices include many who shall go down in the history books as legends of this period in India's long history: among others, the man behind the Green Revolution and a member of independent India's Constituent Assembly C Subramaniam, the former President of India R. Venkataraman, the eminent agronomist Dr M S Swaminathan, the acerbic cartoonist Abu Abraham, the inimitable political commentator Cho Ramaswamy, and the ever eloquent MP Shashi Tharoor.

It was one of those casual meetings I had after my walk with my neighbour in the evenings. He, a regular reader of Rediff.com, liked to discuss India's economy based on the interviews I had done. One day he asked me, why don't you compile your interviews? My response was, 'they are very topical. Who will be interested in reading after a few years?' 'Think about it', he said.

That was the beginning of this book. This was in 2019.

The idea remained in my mind without taking any shape. Then my son Siddhu said, 'you should have a story to tell through your interviews.

That was the eureka moment.

One of the most exciting times of my career as a journalist was interviewing people who had witnessed India's independence. I thought, why not start the story from 1997, when India celebrated 50 years of independence?

The pandemic gave me the opportunity to tell the story till India celebrated 75 years of independence.

That is, 25 years of India's story; from 1997 to 2022; from when India celebrated 50 years of independence to when it is celebrating 75 years of independence.

Of course, I have not recorded every single event that happened in these 25 years through my interviews. But then I felt there was a story.