Salil Misra, Slices of India History: The Story of India's Transformation

Delhi: Primus Books, 2025, pp 328.

Abstract

It is no surprise that India’s journey has taken many twists and turns—marked by both change and continuity—to become the nation we inhabit today. Writing the story of India’s transformation, with all its present-day paradoxes, is never an easy task. Yet this book takes on that challenge with conviction. It offers readers a comprehensive account of India’s encounters with modernity, from the possibilities imagined in the time of Tipu Sultan to the making of the republic in 1950. In doing so, it examines the complexities of colonial rule and the layered legacies of nationalism. The book does not end with its final page; it lingers in the reader’s mind, placing upon us a quiet responsibility—to work toward a better India, through both economic “hardware” and ideological “software.”