Written in Khushwant Singh's trademark style to be accessible to a general, non-scholarly audience, the book is based on scholarly archival research (less)

Tracing the history of this race from the inception of its religion by Guru Nanak, this book explains the turbulent history of the Sikhs, their faith in one God, their ten Gurus and the casteless fraternity of the Khalsa Panth. It chronicles their customs, beliefs, rituals, modes of worship, weddings baptisms, dances and martial traditions - the factors that make them an assertive and extrovert people with a zest for living.

The Sikhs are now prominent in all spheres of modern life. It is said that every Sikh looks upon himself as sava lakh (equal to 125,000 people).

The succinct, yet comprehensive and objective, text by one of India's most celebrated authors is enhanced by rare, brilliant and varied photographs taken by one of the country's best photographers who has explored (less)

The present gold rush owes a great deal to the foresight of Penguin, easily the most prestigious global publisher, which made a home here when the world wasn?t yet in thrall to the Indian market. Penguin India began operating at a time when trade publishing in English was virtually unknown in the country.

The company launched its local programme in 1987 with seven titles: two novels in English and one in translation from Bengali, two biographies, a travelogue and a book of poems. Two decades on, it publishes 200 new books annually across a wide range of genres.

Along the way, it has published authors from every country in the Subcontinent. In 2005, with the launch of its Hindi list, Penguin became the first global publisher to publish in an Indian language other than English, and now releases over sixty titles every year in Hindi, Marathi, Malayalam and Urdu.

When it was set up in a two-bedroom flat in New Delhi, Penguin India?s most valuable asset was a boardroom table made of teak, at which strategies were devised, contracts signed and commitments made. Today, the table is no longer listed among the company?s assets.

Instead, it can boast the finest list of Indian authors (or authors of Indian origin) anywhere in the world. And the list keeps growing: among the long-admired names we?ll publish in the coming months are Kamala Markandaya, with her posthumous novel Bombay Tiger, and Amitav Ghosh, with his stunning new novel Sea of Poppies, the first in a trilogy.

Penguin India?s publishing remains as vibrant and confidently eclectic as our first clutch of titles promised. Our best authors, our true wealth, have stayed with us through the years, and helped us bring the best in contemporary Indian and international literature to readers everywhere.

These commemorative volumes of the finest writing we?ve published up to our twentieth year are dedicated to each one of them. Showcased here are authors who have topped best-seller charts in India and abroad, and won virtually every major literary prize, including the Nobel Prize, the Jnanpith Award, the Man Booker Prize, the Sahitya Akademi Award and the Commonwealth Writers? Prize.

It is unlikely you will find a richer, more representative collection of writing from or about South Asia. Now, when virtually every major international trade publisher is present in India, the fastest-growing English-language publishing market in the world, Penguin India remains committed to the vision laid out on that teak table twenty years ago.

It is a vision that has ensured that Penguin in India, as in the rest of the world, is the publisher of choice for the best writers and the most discerning readers. And this is exactly how things will be twenty years from now (less)

In My Personalized Religion, There Is No God! Khushwant Singh, Over The Decades, Has Built Up A Reputation For Coming Up With Something New And Controversial In Each Book, And He Does Not Disappoint His Readers This Time Too. He Begins With A Chapter On The 'Need For A New Religion - Without God', In Which He Questions The Relevance Of God.

He Then Moves On To Describe How Religion Has Proved To Be More Harmful Than Beneficial And, In The Process, Debunks Astrologers And The Breed Of So-Called 'Godmen'. However, He Is Not Dismissive Of Religion.

Through His Lucid Writing, He Brings Out The Beauty And Significance Of Holy Books Such As The Bhagvad Gita, The Quran And The Granth Sahib (less)

Madan Mohan Pandey, amateur astrologer and scholar of ancient Hindu texts, finds to his horror that his doe-like bride is not quite what he had expected. Pious Zora Singh, Pride of the Nation, rumoured to be a chaar sau bees and a womanizer, silences his detractors by earning the Bharat Ratna.

Devi Lal makes his peace with a fickle God when his daughter-in-law delivers a son, following secret visits to the Peer Sahib's tomb. And Vijay Lall, emboldened by his miraculous escape from death, decides to act upon his silent obsession with Karuna Chaudhury, which takes him to a shifty soothsayer behind the Khan Market loo (less)

.as the last Viceroy and indeed when I stayed on as the first Governor-General of the independent country of India.

Lord Mountbatten A rare collection of essays that invites the reader to revisit a vanished era of sahibs and memsahibs. From Lord Mountbatten to Peggy Holroyde to Maurice and Taya Zinkin, Britishers who lived and worked in India reminisce about topics and points of interest as varied as the Indian Civil Service and the Roshanara Club, shikar and hazri, the Amateur Cine Society of India and the Doon School, Rudyard Kipling and Mahatma Gandhi.

Selected from a series of articles commissioned by Khushwant Singh when he was the editor of the Illustrated Weekly of India these delightfully individualistic and refreshingly candid writings reveal a fascinating array of British attitudes, experiences, observations, fond memories, the occasional short-lived..

. Read more » (less)

The significance of the Sikh holy book, the Guru Granth Sahib, and its centrality to the religion are emphasized. The author discusses epoch making developments such as the setting up of Singh Sabha and the accompanying social reform, the decisive Akali agitation for control of various Sikh shrines and the impact of the Ghadr rebellion (less)

.Perhaps his greatest gift as a writer is a wonderful particularity of description'--London Magazine Khushwant Singh first established his reputation as a writer through the short story.

His stories--wry, poignant, erotic and, above all, human--bear testimony to Khushwant Singh's remarkable range and his ability to create an unforgettable world. Spanning over half a century, this volume contains all the short stories Khushwant Singh has ever written, including the delightfully tongue-in-cheek 'The Maharani of Chootiapuram', written in 2008.

'Khushwant's stories enthrall..

.[He has]an ability akin to that of Somerset Maugham.

..

the ability to entertain intelligently'--India Today 'His stories are better than [those of] any Indian writing in English--Times of India 'The Collected Short Stories leaves the reader in a delightful, inebriated trance'--Sunday Chronicle 'He is not an ordinary short story writer..

.[Collected (less)

Written in Khushwant Singh's trademark style to be accessible to a general, non-scholarly audience, the book is based on scholarly archival research. Volume 1: 1469-1839: This volume covers the social, religious and political background which led to the formation of the Sikh faith in the fifteenth century.

Basing his account on original documents in Persian, Gurmukhi and English, the author traces the growth of Sikhism and tells of the compilation of its sacred scriptures in the Granth Sahib. The transformation of the Sikhs from a pacifist sect to a militant group called the Khasla led by Guru Gobind Singh is portrayed in detail, as is the relationship of theSikhs with the Mughals and the Afghans, until the consolidation of Sikh power (less)

The present gold rush owes a great deal to the foresight of Penguin, easily the most prestigious global publisher, which made a home here when the world wasn?t yet in thrall to the Indian market. Penguin India began operating at a time when trade publishing in English was virtually unknown in the country.

The company launched its local programme in 1987 with seven titles: two novels in English and one in translation from Bengali, two biographies, a travelogue and a book of poems. Two decades on, it publishes 200 new books annually across a wide range of genres.

Along the way, it has published authors from every country in the Subcontinent. In 2005, with the launch of its Hindi list, Penguin became the first global publisher to publish in an Indian language other than English, and now releases over sixty titles every year in Hindi, Marathi, Malayalam and Urdu.

When it was set up in a two-bedroom flat in New Delhi, Penguin India?s most valuable asset was a boardroom table made of teak, at which strategies were devised, contracts signed and commitments made. Today, the table is no longer listed among the company?s assets.

Instead, it can boast the finest list of Indian authors (or authors of Indian origin) anywhere in the world. And the list keeps growing: among the long-admired names we?ll publish in the coming months are Kamala Markandaya, with her posthumous novel Bombay Tiger, and Amitav Ghosh, with his stunning new novel Sea of Poppies, the first in a trilogy.

Penguin India?s publishing remains as vibrant and confidently eclectic as our first clutch of titles promised. Our best authors, our true wealth, have stayed with us through the years, and helped us bring the best in contemporary Indian and international literature to readers everywhere.

These commemorative volumes of the finest writing we?ve published up to our twentieth year are dedicated to each one of them. Showcased here are authors who have topped best-seller charts in India and abroad, and won virtually every major literary prize, including the Nobel Prize, the Jnanpith Award, the Man Booker Prize, the Sahitya Akademi Award and the Commonwealth Writers? Prize.

It is unlikely you will find a richer, more representative collection of writing from or about South Asia. Now, when virtually every major international trade publisher is present in India, the fastest-growing English-language publishing market in the world, Penguin India remains committed to the vision laid out on that teak table twenty years ago.

It is a vision that has ensured that Penguin in India, as in the rest of the world, is the publisher of choice for the best writers and the most discerning readers. And this is exactly how things will be twenty years from now (less)

Variously lyric, satiric, tragic and fantastic, they are unified in their vigour and humanity. TThe anthology features a rich assortment of voices from both new authors and established names including Abraham Verghese, Manju Kapur, Githa Hariharan and Amitava Kumar.

With an insightful introduction by Khushwant Singh, one of India's foremost literary personalities, this is the definitive survey of a lively modern scene (less)

And every evening, at the sunset hour, they sit together on a bench in Lodhi Gardens to exchange news and views on the events of the day, talking about everything from love, lust, sex and scandal to religion and politics. As he follows a year in the lives of the three men--from January 26 2009 to January 26 2010--Khushwant Singh brings his characters vibrantly to life, with his piquant portrayals of their fantasies and foibles, his unerring ear for dialogue and his genius for capturing the flavour and texture of everyday life in their households (less)

Written in Khushwant Singh's trademark style to be accessible to a general, non-scholarly audience, the book is based on scholarly archival research.Volume 1: 1469-1839: This volume covers the social, religious and political background which led to the formation of the Sikh faith in the fifteenth century.

Basing his account on original documents in Persian, Gurmukhi and English, the author traces the growth of Sikhism and tells of the compilation of its sacred scriptures in the Granth Sahib. The transformation of the Sikhs from a pacifist sect to a militant group called the Khasla led by Guru Gobind Singh is portrayed in detail, as is the relationship of the Sikhs with the Mughals and the Afghans, until the consolidation of Sikh power (less)

I. The Punjab and the birth of Sikhism: 1.

The Sikh homeland. 2.

Birth of Sikhism. 3.

Building of the Sikh church. 4.

The call to arms. 5.

From the Pacifist Sikh to the Militant Khalsa. II.

The agrarian uprising: 6. The rise and fall of Banda Bahadur.

7. Persecution of the Sikhs and the reorganisation of the Khalsa Army.

8. Ahmed Shah Abdali and the Sikhs.

9. From the Indus to the Ganges.

III. Punjab monarchy and imperialism: 10.

Rise of the Sukerchakia Misl. 11.

Maharajah of the Punjab. 12.

Suzerain of Malwa. 13.

British annexation of Malwa: treaty of Lahore, 1809. 14.

Consolidation of the Punjab. 15.

Extinction of Afghan power in Northern India. 16.

Europeanisation of the army. 17.

Dreams of Sindh and the sea. 18.

Across the Himalayas to Tibet. IV.

Appendices: 1. Janamsakhis and other sources of information on the life of Guru Nanak.

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