BOOKS OF THE WEEK

India’s Forests: Revisiting Nature and History | Environmental History of India, Ecology, Colonial Impact and Forest Communities by Arupjyoti Saikia and Mahesh Rangarajan

ABOUT THE BOOK

India’s Forests brings together essays by some of the country’s leading scholars with a fresh view of nature and history. These reappraisals of Indian forests and their many lives in past and present matter more than ever today.

Born of years of sustained reflection, the essays here view forests not as passive unchanging backdrops to the past but as living, contested spaces.

Forests were shaped and in turn deeply influenced by power, culture and society. They could mean very different things to different people who often were in contest over meaning as much as control of the space or the resource.

The volume spans from prehistory through ancient and early modern India into the present. It is also alive to the impact of the colonial era while tracing the changing fortunes of tribal and hill peoples.

They are ecological lifelines and sites of legend, memory, and scientific knowledge. Material remains and life cycles of animals and plants matter, so too do social and literary imaginations.

Forests have been continually redefined through conflict, negotiation, and care. Attentive to the changing meanings across time and place, the book asks us fundamental and unsettling questions: what are forests for?

India’s Forests will inform as well as stimulate thought for all who are concerned with the fate of forests now as much as about the country’s past.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Arupjyoti Saikia is a professor of history at the Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati. He held the Agrarian Studies Programme Fellowship at Yale University, and visiting fellow positions a Cambridge University and the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London. His research spans across the economic, political and ecological histories of Assam. His published works include Forests and Ecological History of Assam, 1826 to 2000 AD (2011), The Unquiet River: A Biography of the Brahmaputra (2019) and The Quest for Modern Assam: A History, 1942–2000 (2023).

Mahesh Rangarajan is professor of history and environmental studies and chair of the HDFC Archives of Contemporary India at Ashoka University in Haryana. Previously, he has taught at Cornell University, University of Delhi, Krea University and the National Centre for Biological Sciences, Bengaluru. His notable works include Fencing the Forest (1996) and Nature and Nation (2015). He has edited the Oxford Anthology of Indian Wildlife (1999) and Environmental Issues in India (2007). His co-edited works include Shifting Ground (2014) and At Nature’s Edge (2018).

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BOOKS OF THE WEEK - 21st August 2015

Living Legends Learning Lessons 

Up Close And Personal With 10 Global Icons

By : Bala V Balachandran, A Kavipriya

About the Book : Living Legends, Learning Lessons Up, Close And Personal With 10 Global Icons

Leadership is a difficult subject to write on. There is no formula or a set of specified skills that makes a good leader. Leadership is not something that one is born with. It is a multitude of many traits and one can never stop learning how to be a better leader.

Living Legends, Learning Lessons by Prof. Bala V Balachandran and Kavipriya profiles ten path-breaking leaders from the world of business, government, spirituality and academia. The book captures their life story and also offers the reader a generous glimpse of their personal side. To know the 'person behind the name is a rare privilege and this book goes up, close and personal with these leaders and makes them relatable to the common man.

As Keki Dadiseth notes in his Foreword, "Many of the insights that Bala mentions in this book are ones that are essential for a successful leader. The qualities of 'sense of purpose, 'foresight, 'spirit of innovation are indispensable for leaders in todays highly competitive and fast paced business landscape. At the same time, I also recognise the importance of traits like 'acting on impulse and 'apprehension of failure while these may seem counter intuitive to some. Each leaders story is unique, just as their personalities. Each story has an interesting set of insights and ones that will resonate when you interact with leaders in your daily life and prepare yourself for leadership.

"Living Legends, Learning Lessons is at one level a book about leadership. In equal measure, it is also a book about taking adversity head-on and emerging triumphant. Each one of these stories is a life-lesson in itself. Truly an enriching read!

About the Authors : 

Dr. Bala V. Balachandran is the J. L. Kellogg Distinguished Professor (Emeritus in service) of Accounting and Information Management, Northwestern University, Illinois, USA and Founder, Dean and Chairman, Great Lakes Institute of Management, Chennai, India. Dr. Bala serves as a consultant to the senior management of many companies, educational institutions as well as the governments of the United States, India and Malaysia. He has been at the helm of creating top-rated b-schools and management programmes in the USA, UK, Israel, Thailand, Germany, Malaysia etc. The Government of India conferred on him, the Padma Shri in 2001, in recognition of his contribution towards higher education in India.

Kavipriya is a Leadership and Branding professional and a CSR initiatives expert. She is a humanitarian, classical dancer and an acknowledged filmmaker. She is the Founder and Chairman of Adding Smiles Media Private Limited, which has two wings - 'Adding Smiles — a CSR and Campaigns Company and 'Adding Leaders — a Leadership and Branding Company. Her team serves a wide range of clientele from startups to established companies. As a dancer, she has danced with and for cancer affected children and people with cerebral palsy

   ISBN : 9789385152481         Price :  Rs. 599.00