An Advanced History of Modern India has been designed for undergraduate students as well as those preparing for civil services examinations at both central and state levels. It is a daunting task to write a book of this kind when dynamic changes have occ

An analytical and critical account of the political history of early modern India from 1707 to 1813. The narrative shatters the contention of contemporary European writers that it was 'the dark age' of Indian history, characterised by 'political anarchy and misgovernment', until the British brought it under their sway. The main thesis of the author is that the period was marked by two distinct phases; the first phase, which lasted from 1707 to 1760, saw the rapid disintegration of the Mughal power and its replacement by the Maratha hegemony. Meanwhile, the English traders turned colonialists, after consolidating their hold along the Indian seacoasts and conquest of 'Carnatic' and Bengal, challenged the Maratha hegemony. The second phase of developments was thus marked by the struggle for supremacy between these two powers. The author makes use of contemporary English and Marathi sources and the intensive researches of modern historians to portray a compact picture of their findings in the form of a text book for the benefit of the degree students. Historical facts are reinterpreted through illuminating expositions, refreshing characterisation of historic personalities, and objective assessment of events and movements. Together with maps, a select bibliography, glossary and an elaborate index, the volume makes a rich contribution to the advancement of modern historical literature.

This book provides an interpretive and comprehensive account of the history of India between the eighteenth and twentieth centuries, a crucial epoch characterized by colonialism, nationalism and the emergence of the independent Indian Union. It explores significant historiographical debates concerning the period while highlighting important new issues, especially those of gender, ecology, caste, and labour. The work combines an analysis of colonial and independent India in order to underscore ideologies, policies, and processes that shaped the colonial state and continue to mould the Indian nation.

The book (in threevolumes) was first published in 1971, and has beenextensively revised and updated with the new findings wherever thrown up by thecurrent researches. It covers the entire period of the Indian History from 1707to 1947. All the available primary and secondary published works have beenjudiciously used to make account authentic and dependable. Efforts have beenmade to give refreshing interpretations and throw up new ideas here and there toinspire the imagination of those who would like to go deeper into the subject.

It is one of the bestselling books on Modern Indian History covering the time line from 1707 to the modern times. The book covers the entire gamut in a very unique style- it mentions not only factual data about various topics but also provides information about different interpretations put forth by Western and Indian historians, with an integrated analysis. This makes the book equally useful for undergraduate students of History and aspirants appearing for various competitive examinations

From Plassey to Partition is an eminently readable account of the emergence of India as a nation. It covers about two hundred years of political and socio-economic turbulence. Of particular interest to the contemporary reader will be sections such as Early Nationalism: Discontent and Dissension , Many Voices of a Nation and Freedom with Partition . On the one hand, it converses with students of Indian history and on the other, it engages general and curious readers. Few books on this crucial period of history have captured the rhythms of India s polyphonic nationalism as From Plassey to Partition.

Another Reason is a bold and innovative study of the intimate relationship between science, colonialism, and the modern nation. Gyan Prakash, one of the most influential historians of India writing today, explores in fresh and unexpected ways the complexities, contradictions, and profound importance of this relationship in the history of the subcontinent. He reveals how science served simultaneously as an instrument of empire and as a symbol of liberty, progress, and universal reason--and how, in playing these dramatically different roles, it was crucial to the emergence of the modern nation. Prakash ranges over two hundred years of Indian history, from the early days of British rule to the dawn of the postcolonial era. He begins by taking us into colonial museums and exhibitions, where Indian arts, crafts, plants, animals, and even people were categorized, labeled, and displayed in the name of science. He shows how science gave the British the means to build railways, canals, and bridges, to transform agriculture and the treatment of disease, to reconstruct India's economy, and to transfigure India's intellectual life--all to create a stable, rationalized, and profitable colony under British domination. But Prakash points out that science also represented freedom of thought and that for the British to use it to practice despotism was a deeply contradictory enterprise. Seizing on this contradiction, many of the colonized elite began to seek parallels and precedents for scientific thought in India's own intellectual history, creating a hybrid form of knowledge that combined western ideas with local cultural and religious understanding. Their work disrupted accepted notions of colonizer versus colonized, civilized versus savage, modern versus traditional, and created a form of modernity that was at once western and indigenous. Throughout, Prakash draws on major and minor figures on both sides of the colonial divide, including Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, the nationalist historian and novelist Romesh Chunder Dutt, Prafulla Chandra Ray (author of A History of Hindu Chemistry), Rudyard Kipling, Lord Dalhousie, and John Stuart Mill. With its deft combination of rich historical detail and vigorous new arguments and interpretations, Another Reason will recast how we understand the contradictory and colonial genealogy of the modern nation.