The country’s periphery, however, is dotted with sleepy towns and desolate villages whose people, simply by having more in common with citizens of neighbouring nations than with their own, have to prove their Indian identity every day.It is these specks on the country’s map that Pradeep Damodaran rediscovers as he travels across India’s borders for a little more than a year, experiencing life in far-flung areas that rarely feature in mainstream conversations. In Borderlands, he recounts his encounters with the war-weary fishermen of Dhanushkodi at the southernmost tip of Tamil Nadu, who live in fear both of the Indian Coast Guard and the Sri Lankan navy; farmers in Hussainiwala, a village on Punjab’s border with Pakistan, who are unwilling to build concrete houses for fear of them being destroyed in an ever looming war; Tamil traders of Moreh, a town straddling the Manipur–Myanmar border, who pay bribes to at least ten different militant organizations so they can safely conduct their business; and ex-servicemen in Campbell Bay who were resettled there three generations ago and have long been forgotten by the mainland.From Minicoy in Lakshadweep to Taki in West Bengal, Tawang in Arunachal Pradesh to Raxaul in Bihar, Damodaran’s compelling narrative reinforces the idea that, in India, a land of contrasts and contradictions, beauty and diversity, conflict comes in many forms.

    Pundits describes the subsequent tour, detailing the matches, the moods, the games and the players. More than merely that, though, it is also a book about the first major sporting encounter between India and Pakistan in 15 years - a period in which the two countries had fought one war and come close to another. What emerges is a fascinating contemporary account of a beautiful game in its most crucial setting, captured through the eyes of a young Indian discovering Pakistan.

    As a result of this, Salman Rashid’s family fled Jalandhar for Pakistan, the newly created country across the border.They were among the nearly two million people uprooted from their homes in the greatest transmigration in history. Besides those who fled, other members of the family became part of a grimmer statistic: they featured among the more than one million unfortunate souls who paid with their lives for the division of India and creation of Pakistan.After living in the shadow of his family’s tragedy for decades, in 2008, Rashid made the journey back to his ancestral village to uncover the truth. A Time of Madness tells the story of what he discovered with great poignancy and grace. It is a tale of unspeakable brutality but it is also a testament to the uniquely human traits of forgiveness, redemption and the resilience of the human spirit.

    In these marvellous essays on history, politics and society, cultural critic Nadeem Farooq Paracha upturns various reductive readings of the country by revealing its multi-layered reality. With wit and insight, he investigates past events and their implications for modern-day society. Thus, one piece explores how and why Mohenjo-daro has been neglected as a historical site, and another examines how Muhammad-bin-Qasim, who briefly invaded Sindh in 713 CE, has come to be lionised as the original founder of Pakistan. There is a story about a Pakistani Jimi Hendrix who plays the guitar like a dream and also one about a medieval emperor who lives on in the swear words of a Punjabi peasant. There are essays on Pakistani pop music, on Afro-Pakistanis and on how Jhuley Lal came to be more than just a folk deity for Sindhi immigrants in India. Points of Entry examines the constant struggle between two distinct tendencies in Pakistani civic-nationalism—one modernist, the other theocratic—and the complex society it has birthed.

    Sheikh Mujibur Rehman in East Pakistan has just won an electoral mandate to become the prime minister of Pakistan. Accustomed to treating the eastern wing of the country as a colony, the ruling disposition in West Pakistan is not pleased, and launches a genocide against the residents of East Pakistan, flooding India with lakhs of refugees. With the violence in East Pakistan reaching a crescendo, the Indian government is faced with a difficult option: remain a mute spectator to the savagery on its eastern borders, or take action and go to war against its western neighbour. Thus was born Naval Commando Operation (X) - comprising Indian navy officers and divers, eight deserters from a Pakistani submarine and a ragtag bunch of Bengali youth fleeing the genocide - one of India's largest clandestine operations, meant to destabilize the West Pakistani efforts to bring East Pakistan to its knees. Revealed for the very first time, here is the explosive authentic account of the guerrilla operation that went for the maritime jugular of Pakistan, and facilitated the birth of Bangladesh.

    Trains that once provoked awe and fear-they were viewed as fire chariots, smoke-spewing demons-have today become a nations lifeblood.Taking a walk along Indias first rail lines, the author stumbles upon fragments of the past-a clock at Victoria Terminus that offers a rare view of a city, a cannon near Masjid Bunder Station that is worshipped as a god, a watchtower overlooking Sion Station, believed to have housed a witch. Each pit-stop comes with stories of desire and war, ambition and death-by Dockyard Road Station, for instance, author Laurence Sternes beloved, Eliza Draper, followed a sailor into the sea or close to Parel Station, the wife of Indias governor general, Lord Canning found a garden rich in tropical vegetation this, she replicated at Barrackpore.Drawing from journals, biographies, newspapers and railway archives-and with nostalgic, first-time accounts of those who travelled by Indias earliest trains-the book captures the economic and social revolutions spurred by the countrys first train line. In this, Halt Station India is not just about the railways-it is the story of the growth of Indias business capital and a rare study of a nation.

    He brings the animal and human characters alive against the background of the jungle and the excitement and danger their co-existence generates.

    Ambassador Prabhu Dayal shares his recollections of that period and keeps you laughing throughout his account of the bumpy ride of Pakistan’s domestic politics and its relationship with India. He tells you how a Sahiwal cow was brought into the equation, and where an elephant comes in.He says, ‘The past, the present and the future are in one continuous motion. Whatever I witnessed in Pakistan during Zia’s rule extends its long shadow not only over the present times but will do so well into the future also’. He poses the ultimate question whether the two South Asian giants can live as friends, offering his own suggestions.

    This is a land where the 10th and 20th centuries uneasily intermix--and often explode.

    From arid land to verdantfields, from jungles with glimpses of elephants and tigersto tea gardens…Along the way, he meets a yogi and his singing goat, exploresancient caves, is frightened in a wild life sanctuary, sees aschizophrenic bicycle and helps a police inspector overcomehis stammering problem. A variety of experiences later, heis finally in Thimpu where a Buddhist monk reveals theroad-map to being happy.A funny, honest and entertaining real-life adventure storythat promises to surprise, shock and perhaps even liberate!

    This is where 927 Days of Summer picks up the trail. After shipping Nacho from Argentina to Malaysia on a container ship, Brad and Sheena resume their journey, this time with the ambitious goal of driving all the way around the world. When they roll out of the shipping container onto Malaysian soil, their odometer turns over 300,000 miles. Is Nacho really up for the brutal journey ahead?This hilarious, and often harrowing tale follows them through the sweltering jungles of Southeast Asia, the buzzing hornet's nest of India, into the remote Nepalese Himalayas, through the stony hills of Anatolia to the Sahara Desert in Africa, through Europe and beyond. Whether dodging rickshaws on crater-filled roads, defying Maoist rebels on cliff-hanging Himalayan tracks, getting hopelessly stuck in the desert on the Pakistani border, or becoming the subjects of an international missing persons case in the remote mountains of Laos, there is never a dull moment in 927 Days of Summer. Come along as a diverse cast of characters guides our subjects through a world of unfolding landscapes and cultures on the road trip to end all road trips, and then ask yourself: can you really just go home, unpack, and eat a sandwich?

    Moments later, Rajiv Gandhi was dead, blown up by suicide bomber Dhanu, irrevocably changing the course of Indian politics, as Neena Gopal, just yards behind him, watched in horror. In this gripping, definitive book, Gopal reconstructs the chain of events in India and at the LTTE�s headquarters in Sri Lanka where the assassination plot was hatched, and follows the trail of investigation that led to the assassins being brought to justice. Drawing on extensive interviews, research and her own vast experience as a journalist, she deftly establishes the background�the shortsightedness of India�s Sri Lanka policy; the friction between the intelligence agencies and between the agencies and the external affairs ministry; the many warnings that went unheeded; and the implacable hatred that LTTE supremo Prabhakaran felt for Rajiv Gandhi. Bringing all these complex threads together, Gopal takes us step by step to Sriperumbudur as Rajiv Gandhi walked inexorably to his death on that tragic May evening twenty-five years ago.

    On 13 August 1972 Parulkar, along with Malvinder Singh Grewal and Harish Sinhji escaped from a POW camp in Rawalpindi. Four Miles To Freedom is their story.Based on interviews with eight Indian fighter pilots who helped prepare the escape and two who escaped, as well as research into other sources, Four Miles is also the moving, sometimes amusing, account of how twelve fighter pilots from different ranks and backgrounds coped with deprivation, forced intimacy, and the pervasive uncertainty of a year in captivity, and how they came together to support Parulkar's courageous escape.

    He travelled with the armies of both countries and could study what is effectively the ground zero—the location where entrenched animosities as well as sudden surges of comradeship are enacted. This is one of the most fortified places on the planet.Jacob writes, "I was keen on getting into their world, the world of men in uniform, fighting each other and yet respecting each other. It was a curious world. It had breath-taking adventure, mind-blowing stories and unforgettable heroism. I loved it, and I was welcome."This vividly told, fast paced narrative brings the border area to life. Jacob was given unprecedented access by the Indian and Pakistani armies and he explores how the border is seen—both in the popular imagination and by those who exist in its shadow. He chronicles the lives of civilians and soldiers, their courage and resilience in the face of constant danger and the extraordinary similarities between the two sides.

    Then read on a sun-lounger, between dozes, wishing you were doing those terribly adventurous things - which being secretly glad you're not.' Duncan Craig, Sunday Times Levison Wood was only 22 when he decided to hitch-hike from England to India through Russia, Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan, but he wasn't the conventional follower of the hippy trail. A fascination with the deeds of the early explorers, a history degree in the bag, an army career already planned and a shoestring budget of £750 - including for the flight home - he was determined to find out more about the countries of the Caucasus and beyond - and meet the people who lived and worked there.EASTERN HORIZONS is a true traveller's tale in the tradition of the best of the genre, populated by a cast of eccentric characters; from mujahideen fighters to the Russian mafia. Along the way he meets some people who showed great hospitality, while others would rather have murdered him...This book confirms that Levison Wood, Winner of the 2016 Edward Stanford Adventure Travel Book Of The Year Award, has indeed 'breathed new life into adventure travel ' (Michael Palin)