It is in the nature of democracies, perhaps, that while visionaries are sometimes necessary to make them, once made they can be managed by mediocrities. In India, the sapling was planted by the nation's founders, who lived long enough (and worked hard enough) to nurture it to adulthood. Those who came afterwards could disturb and degrade the tree of democracy but, try as they might, could not uproot or destroy it. - Ramachandra Guha, India after Gandhi

After being "convocat-ed" at the 39th Convocation at IIM Bangalore on 27 March 2014, I had a good 3 months at home to look forward to. These three months were coming to me after 5 long years and I had sworn to myself (for that's not binding :P) that I will make most of this rare time. This included indulging my lovely parents with paying a long due visit to all my relatives (which is fun, still), learning how to cook (serving an ultimatum) and definitely learning how to drive (after my failed attempt in 10th std. and lack of activity ever since). Aah! And getting up early and exercising (we all know that was never going to happen... And it didn't)

Promising my parents that I will be the good daughter, I had some "me" plans as well . These included shopping, travelling and reading (wait, isn't this what my blog is about?).

Now that my holidays are nearing their not-so-awaited end, all I can say is there is no place like home. But we all know that! So apart from enjoying the obvious pleasures of home, I did visit all my relatives (and got pretty gifts), learnt how to cook (or that's what I would like to believe)  and can drive a car (my dad doesn't hold the hand brake while I am driving now). I also exercise (in the evening and quite sporadically :P). As for my plans, I shopped (never enough), travelled (Rishikesh, Kashmir and Himachal) and I read.

 Why am I writing my holidays story in the reading section? Because reading during these holidays has been the most satisfying (though a visit to Kashmir is close)! Finding a good book to read has always been a challenge but these holidays I seemed to have gotten lucky. The luckiest I got was when I decided to finish reading the 800+ page history of the world's largest democracy - India after Gandhi by Ramchandra Guha.

Image Courtesy: Google Images

Having taken almost 3 months to complete this book, I want to keep this book on a shelf and worship it everyday. I have always loved my country for its food, colors and variety in general. But having spent the past 2 years in a B-school and being required to read business newspapers and magazines, I read only about red-tape, corruption, inflation, deficits, poor sanitation, communal politics, poor leadership or in short all that could go wrong in a country. The only good news in India seemed to be D. Subbarao and his successor Raghuram Rajan.  When all my judgments and opinions about my country seemed to be indelible, I decided to read this much heard about book.

This book got me to appreciate the very essence of our country which we often take for granted – it being a sovereign, secular, democratic republic. Such an elaborate history of such an elaborate country has been written so beautifully. This book is a comprehensive guide to why India is what it is today. Today’s generation needs to read this book to understand the definition of a visionary leader. Today’s generation should read this book to know what sometimes misunderstood men like Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, J P Narayan, C. Rajagopalachari etc. have done for this country. One will truly appreciate the common phrase in Indian schools, “Unity in diversity” after reading this book. It takes you through various historical incidents(communal, political, geographical, lingual etc.) which threatened the Indian democracy time and again and yet how India today is the only democratic country in the world to be united despite have no shared language, a shared religious faith, a shared territory or a common enemy.

India is not a perfect country. It has its set of economic, political and social problems. What this book has done is tell me that India has survived many predicted deaths by scholars all over the world and that I should be a hopeful citizen. For India is worth it.

P. S. My eyes welled up while reading the last chapter titled, “Why India survives”.

I don't remember much of what I did back when I was a child. Watching Mahabharata or Ramayana or Shree Krishna was certainly not it.

And now that I am all grown-up (or so says my driving license)  and I have Flipkart and Amazon in my life and a wonderful concept called word of mouth, I decided to read The Palace of Illusions in the hope that I will learn something about the great epic without being overwhelmed by the sheer size of it.

And The Palace of Illusions truly lived up to its expectations. The facts are obviously right. For who would dare change the Mahabharata? But the initial chapters on the childhood of the spirited Draupadi are a wonderful ad on. I just could not put the book down. Though the book might get boring for people who know the entire story of Mahabharata already, I would definitely suggest this book for the first half because its spirited, its juicy and it has never been written before. As for me, I was really slow towards the last chapters because I didn't want to keep this book down!

Thanks to this book, now I know who the five Pandavas are, what is their story and what led to the battle of Kurukshetra. And I got to know all this from the perspective of the woman who was married to five men at the same time and who was born to bring this world to that war!