Co - Navayana

Unclaimed TerrainAjay NavariaTranslated from Hindi by Laura Brueck4In Scream—the lead story in Ajay Navaria’scollection—the unnamed protagonistis told at the very beginning, ‘Crime isvery seductive. And revenge a trickster.’The narrator rejects having his identityconstrained by the cruel monikersassigned by the caste Hindus of his villageor the supposed refuge of the Christianchurch. He occupies an ‘unclaimed terrain’,as do many of Navaria’s characters.Journeying from a Dantewada village to thetown of Nagpur and from there to Mumbai,the Byronic protagonist is raped, works asa masseur and then as a gigolo even whilepursuing his education. The city teacheshim the many meanings of labour, and heis freed—and ultimately destroyed—by itsinfinite possibilities for self-invention.As complex as they are political,Navaria’s characters—ranging froma brahmin servant to a dalit maleprostitute—are neither black nor white,neither clearly good nor evil. They inhabita grey zone; they linger in the transitionalpassageway between past object andfuture subject, casteism and democracy.Like James Baldwin was for Americanfiction, Ajay Navaria is a guerilla in theIndian literary field.Unclaimed Terrain heralds the arrival of abold, new voice in Indian literature.Ajay Navaria has been associated with thepremier Hindi literary journal, Hans. Heteaches Hindu Ethics at Jamia Millia IslamiaUniversity, Delhi. Navaria is the author oftwo collections of short stories, Patkathaaur anya Kahaniyan (2006) and Yes, Sir(2012), and a novel, Udhar ke Log (2008).Laura Brueck is Assistant Professor ofHindi literature and South Asia S4tudies atthe University of Colorado, Boulder, US.‘Navaria makesa strong effort tocreate castelesscharacters, much likeJeanette Winterson’sgenderlessprotagonist in Writtenon the Body’ TehelkaDecember 2012ISBN 9788189059521190 pages Hardback 5 x 7.8” Rs 295All rights available

The Place OutsideSiddalingaiahTranslated from Kannada byS.R. Ramakrishna10Siddalingaiah, one of the founders of theDalit Sangharsha Samiti, tracks his journeyfrom a dalit colony on the edges of Magaditown, through the years in dalit studenthostels, to a career as a political activist,public intellectual and university professorin the city of Bangalore. We see the childwho would rather roam the hills and wadein rivers than attend school; we watchas the teenager develops a passion forstudy, sits at the feet of mentors, tastessuccess (and danger) as an orator, devoursliterature from pavement vendors; we hearthe adult’s fiercely rationalist political voiceas well as his poetic voice, resonant withthe dreams and hauntings of dalit folklore.The Place Outside is a vivid evocation ofeveryday life and labour, of conviviality andcourage, of poverty and loss in the dalitcolony. As critic D.R. Nagaraj says in hisAfterword, Siddalingaiah offers us a bonsailikecompression of life. ‘This is writing thatmakes rage pleasant. Here, anger becomessarcasm. Ire is translated into a mischiefthat grasps the subtleties of life. Whatmight have appeared strange if turnedinto a grand narrative becomes a story ofhuman activity. Siddalingaiah transformswrath into mischief.’Siddalingaiah is a major Kannada poet.He has also written two plays, and astudy of folk deities. He has served twiceas member of the Karnataka LegislativeCouncil. He is now chairman of theKannada Development Authority.S.R. Ramakrishna is a journalist, musiccomposer and translator. He lives inBengaluru.‘Malgudi Days with acritical difference...Megalahatti ispopulated byghosts, deities, strictheadmasters andwandering ascetics,set against rivers,hills and forests’Education World‘The entire book is full of lively anecdotes,memorable pen sketches and inimitablecaricatures. But the personal and thegeneral are so organically bound to eachother that the book is as much aboutSiddalingaiah the individual as it is aboutall major social, political and culturalmovements of Karnataka in the last fourdecades’—The HinduDecember 2012ISBN 9788189059552Paperback 5 x 7.8” Rs 295All rights available

Ear to the GroundWritings on Class and CasteK. BalagopalBalagopal’s writings, from the early 1980still he died in 2009, offer us a rare insightinto the making of modern India. Civilrights work provided Balagopal the causeand context to engage with history, thepublic sphere and political change. Hewrote through nearly three tumultuousdecades: on encounter deaths; strugglesof agricultural labourers; the shiftingdynamics of class and caste in the 1980sand thereafter in Andhra Pradesh; thevenality and tyranny of the Indian state;on the importance of re-figuring thecaste order as one that denied the rightof civil existence to vast numbers of itsconstituents; the centrality one oughtto grant patriarchy in considerations ofsocial injustice; the destructive logic ofdevelopment that emerged in the India ofthe 1990s, dishonouring its citizens’ rightto life, liberty and livelihood. This volumecomprises essays—largely drawn fromthe Economic & Political Weekly to whichhe was a regular contributor—that dealwith representations and practices of classpower as they exist in tandem with stateauthority and caste identities.Inspired by naxalism in the late 1970s,intellectually indebted to D.D. Kosambi’swritings on Indian history and society, andpolitically and ethically attentive to thepolitics of feminist and dalit assertion inthe 1990s, Balagopal refused dogma andshrill polemics just as he refused theorythat did not heed the mess of history andpractice.A mathematician by training, KandalaBalagopal (1952–2009) was associatedwith the Andhra Pradesh Civil LibertiesCommittee for two decades. In 1998, hebecame one of the founder-members ofHuman Rights Forum in which he wasactive till his death.‘As a human rights worker active since1981, and slightly older than Balagopal,I remember him as a magical figure. Thewritings in this volume help interpret theoften chaotic developments in AndhraPradesh, and provide a model tool forunderstanding other regional realities ofIndia’—Binayak Sen‘For studentsand activists ofthree generations,Balagopal’s voicewas an ethical andpolitical compass’‘Every article shines with the originality ofhis insight and the fury of his concern’—Wall Street Journal–MintBiblio: A Review of BooksISBN 9788189059408488 pages Paperback 6 x 9.25” Rs 550All rights available

12In The Tiger’s ShadowThe Autobiography of an AmbedkariteNamdeo NimgadeBorn into a family of landless bondedlabourers in the dustbowl of Sathgaonin western India, Namdeo Nimgade is14 when he finally manages to attendhis village school where, being an‘untouchable’, he has to stand on the ‘hotverandah and listen to lessons througha window’. Inspired by Dr B.R. Ambedkar,he steadfastly pursues his education.Graduating from Nagpur, Nimgade goes onto complete his PhD in soil science from theUniversity of Wisconsin in 1962—perhapsthe first dalit after Ambedkar to earn adoctorate in an American university. Inthe 1950s, as an associate at the IndianAgriculture Research Institute in Delhi,Nimgade gets to spend time with DrAmbedkar. Throughout his life, Nimgaderemains singularly committed to theambedkarite movement.Nimgade narrates incidents in his lifewith candour and delightful humour—whether recounting his great-grandfatherGanba’s combat with a tiger in a forest, orhis ‘forbidden’ love for a non-dalit woman.Moving away from the framework ofvictimhood narratives, Nimgade’s life is aninspiring story of triumph against odds.‘Our family name Nimgade probablyderives from the neem tree, which isknown for its healing properties andhealth benefits. Many people from ouruntouchable community bear namesreferring to trees or plants, such as mybrother-in-law, Khobragade—which refersto a coconut. There’s similarly Ambagade,referring to mango, Jamgade to guava andBorkar to berry. Quite likely, these arborealnames derive from the peaceful Buddhistperiod in Indian history, and are citedas further evidence that many of India’suntouchables were previously Buddhist.’‘This book must beread not only by allthose who want tounderstand the dalituniverse but also bythose who enjoy agood Indian book inEnglish’ DNA, MumbaiISBN 9788189059309310 pages Paperback 5.5 x 8.5” Rs 350All rights available

The Persistence of CasteThe Khairlanji Murders & India’sHidden ApartheidAnand TeltumbdeWhile the caste system has been formallyabolished under the Indian Constitution,according to official statistics, everyeighteen minutes a crime is committed ona dalit. The gouging out of eyes, the hackingoff of limbs and being burned alive orstoned to death are routine in the atrocitiesperpetrated against India’s 170 milliondalits. What drives people to commit suchinhuman crimes?The Persistence of Caste uses theshocking case of Khairlanji, the brutalmurder of four members of a dalitfamily in 2006, to explode the myththat caste no longer matters. Analysingcontext and crime, it seeks to locatethis event in the political economy ofthe development process India hasfollowed after Independence. Teltumbdedemonstrates how caste has shownamazing resilience—surviving feudalism,capitalist industrialisation and a republicanConstitution—to still be alive and welltoday, despite all denial, under neoliberalglobalisation.‘Anand Teltumbde’sanalysis of thepublic, ritualisticmassacre of adalit family in21st centuryIndia exposes thegangrenous heart ofour society’ Arundahti Roy‘I would hope to see it read by every Indianactivist and also foreigners who do not seehow odious the caste system is’—Samir Amin‘Teltumbde bears witness to thedegradation of Indian democracy’—Vijay Prashad, HimalAnand Teltumbde is a civil rights activist.He teaches at the Indian Institute ofManagement, Kharagpur, and is acolumnist with the Economic & PoliticalWeekly.ISBN 9788189059286192 pages Paperback 5.5 x 8.5” Rs 200World English rights: Zed Books;published in Kannada and TeluguAll other rights available

Against the Madness of ManuB.R. Ambedkar’s writings onBrahminical PatriarchySelected and introduced by Sharmila RegeA brahmin ‘mega convention’ incontemporary Pune reasserts faith inendogamy for ‘national interest’, andimposes new codes on brahmin women.A brahmin Congress leader suggests thata dalit chief minister be raped and paidcompensation. That the caste systemthrives by its control of women and thatcaste is a product of sustained endogamywas an insight offered by the 25-year-oldAmbedkar in 1916, in his paper “Castes inIndia”. Since then, till the time he pilotedthe Hindu Code Bill that sought to radicalisewomen’s rights in the 1950s, Ambedkardeployed a range of arguments to makehis case against brahminism and its twin,patriarchy.While Ambedkar’s original insightshave been neglected by sociologists,political theorists and even feminists,they have been kept alive, celebrated andmemorialised by dalit musical troupes andbooklets in Maharashtra. Sharmila Rege,in this compelling selection of Ambedkar’swritings on the theme of brahminicalpatriarchy, illuminates for us theunprecedented sociological observationsof Ambedkar. Rege demonstrates how andwhy Ambedkar laid the base for what was,properly speaking, a feminist take on caste.‘A brilliant andtimely interventionin feministscholarship in India,dalit studies,legal sociology,and the sociologyof caste’Kamala Visweswaran, AssociateProfessor of Anthropology,University of Texas, Austin‘In this volume, Sharmila Rege provides usa theoretically advanced interpretation ofBabasaheb’s thinking on the interstices ofthe caste and feminist questions. Rege’swork assumes significance especially inthe context of limited engagement withcaste in mainstream feminism’—Gopal Guru,professor, Jawaharlal Nehru University16Sharmila Rege is a sociologist who headsthe Krantijyoti Savitribai Phule Women’sStudies Centre, University of Pune. She isthe author of Writing Caste/Writing Gender:Narrating Dalit Women’s Testimonios.December 2012ISBN 9788189059538290 pages Paperback 5.5 x 8.5” Rs 350All rights available

A Rogue and Peasant SlaveAdivasi Resistance 1800–2000Shashank Kela18Why do adivasi societies defendthemselves so desperately against thestate? What is it that sparks so muchprotest and conflict in India’s adivasiregions? These are some of the questionsthis book seeks to answer. The first partshows how the bhils of western MadhyaPradesh were affected by colonialism,the perceptions and notions that shapedcolonial policy, its effects on material lifeand politics, how bhil groups adapted tothese developments—and resisted them.A social history cast as narrative—a narrative of blindness and rancour,resistance and change—it charts theemergence of an unjust and oppressivesocial order.The second part is a reflection on adivasipolitics in the twentieth century. It beginswith the (understandably suspicious)adivasi response to nationalism, and goeson to examine India’s development policiesand their effect upon adivasi societies.It looks at the emergence of an adivasimiddle class and the contradictions of itspolitical role, as well as collective modesof protest and adaptation. A Rogue andPeasant Slave challenges the currentacademic consensus on the relationshipbetween adivasi societies and the castebasedagrarian order, and seeks to placethem in the context of a wider agrarian andecological history. It reveals the intimateconnection between the past and thepresent, and shows how some of India’smost pressing contemporary conflictscan only be understood with reference toa history whose consequences are stillworking themselves out.Shashank Kela worked as an activist in atrade union of adivasi peasants in westernMadhya Pradesh between 1994 and 2004.This is his first book.‘Succeeds inbringing alive, withgreat sympathy, thehistories of thosewho reject our waysof life, and what itdoes to them’‘Well argued, cogently written—fills a majorlacuna in the existing literature on adivasipasts and futures in mainland India’—Mahesh Rangarajan, Director, NehruMemorial Museum and Library‘Chronicles the devastating impact ofcolonialism on adivasi societies in Indiacontinuing to the present engagement ofthe state with the forest communities’—The Hindu‘Contributes to the scholarship on tribalsocieties and adds to the voices speakingout against the neglect and exploitation ofadivasi people’—India TodayWall Street Journal–Mint2012ISBN 9788189059361392 pages Hardback 5.5 x 8.5” Rs 595All rights available

Ambedkar’s WorldThe Making of the Dalit MovementEleanor ZelliotThis is a re-issue of a classic monograph onthe rise of the Mahar movement in westernIndia. While Eleanor Zelliot has publishedthree books and eighty articles on caste,untouchability and the dalit movement, her1969 PhD thesis has remained unavailable.This book documents the social andpolitical forces that shaped Bhimrao RamjiAmbedkar (b. 1891), the greatest leaderof dalits in India, and the manner in whichAmbedkar shaped the destiny of the dalitsof Maharashtra and India. The Mahar armytradition, the cult of Cokhamela, the Mahadsatyagraha, temple-entry movements, thevarious newspapers Ambedkar edited, theRound Table Conferences, the question ofconversion, the political parties Ambedkarfounded—Zelliot chronicles them all. Usinga wide array of primary sources she offersa rich history one of modern India’s mostdefining movements.In its scope and depth as a singlecastehistory, this work remains as yetunsurpassed.‘Eleanor Zelliot, the doyenne of historiansof untouchability, that senstitive student ofcontemporary Maharashtra who is widelyadmired by the scholars and activists ofMaharashtra... has both captivated andinfluenced me’—Ramachandra Guha, historian‘Eleanor’s historicalwork on Ambedkar,on the Buddhist conversion of theDalits... and on the subsequentcultural and literary movementshas changed theparadigm in thestudy of SouthAsia’— Citation, 1999 Award forDistinguished Contributions to Asian Studies fromthe Association for Asian StudiesEleanor Zelliot pioneered the study of thedalit movement in India in the 1960s. Shewas Laird Bell Professor of History (1969–1997) at Carleton College, Minnesota. Sheis the author of From Untouchable to Dalit:Essays on the Ambedkar Movement.December 2012ISBN 9788189059545280 pages Paperback 5.5 x 8.5” Rs 295All rights available

20The Buddha’s WayA Socio-Historical ApproachNalin SwarisIn this magisterial study of thesocial élan of early Buddhism, NalinSwaris argues that the radical thrust ofthe Buddha’s teaching is based on hisrealisation that ‘the individual’ is a fictionof human craving. The Buddha’s decisionto found a community of compassion andsharing was the practical expression ofhis conviction that individualism is theprincipal obstacle to human happiness.The Buddha’s Way was not discoveredand preached in a social vacuum.Orthodox Hinduism classifies its sacredtraditions into srutis (sacred truthsof the Vedas ‘heard’ by ancient rishiswhile in a trance) and smritis (codes ofconduct). In deliberate counterpoint tothe brahman tradition, the majority ofthe Buddha’s discourses begin with thedeclaration: Evam me sutam—‘Thus haveI heard’.Swaris argues persuasively thatBuddha’s teachings are not esoteric, butgrounded in everyday life. The Dhamma isnot a revealed truth that humans could nothave discovered by themselves. It is like alight brought into a darkened room so thatpeople could see what is already there,once the fog of delusion is dispelled.In a style that would appeal to both layreaders and scholars, Swaris shows howthe Buddha anticipated Marx, Derrida andFoucault by centuries.Born in Colombo, ordained a Catholicpriest in 1962 in Bangalore, NalinSwaris completed his PhD on the “Buddha’sWay” at the State University of Utrecht in1997 with summa cum laude. Swaris wasalso a human rights activist and the authorof Buddhism, Human Rights and SocialRenewal.‘This highly originalwork uses a multidisciplinaryperspective to determine the originalmessage of Shakyamuni Buddha. Critiquingthe usual belief that the Buddha’s idealof human liberation ‘is to be realisedin solitude, away from the everydayconcerns of ordinary men and women,’Swaris demonstratesthat the Buddha’spath to awakeningis oriented towardssocial liberation.His main argument offers adifferent (and persuasive) way ofunderstanding anatta, the doctrine ofnon-self and non-substantiality. He arguesthat anatta provides the perspective fromwhich to understand the meaning andsignificance of all other Buddhist doctrines,especially those relating to the theory andpractice of the Buddhist moral life. This is insharp contrast to the usual interpretationsof early Buddhist teachings now current inacademic Buddhology’—David R. Loy, authorof A Buddhist History of the West: Studiesin Lack2011ISBN 9788189059316388 pages Hardback 6 x 9.25” Rs 590All rights available

Dispersed RadianceCaste, Gender, and Modern Sciencein IndiaAbha SurThis book is a step towards writing asocially informed history of physics in Indiain the first half of the twentieth century.Through a series of micro histories ofphysics, Abha Sur analyses the confluenceof caste, nationalism, and gender inmodern science in India, and unpacksthe colonial context in which science wasorganised. She examines the constraintsof material reality and ideologies on theproduction of scientific knowledge, anddiscusses the effect of the personalities ofdominant scientists on the institutions andacademies they created.The bulk of the book examines thescience and scientific practice of India’stwo preeminent physicists in the first halfof the twentieth century, C.V. Raman andMeghnad Saha. Raman and Saha were—interms of their social station, politicalinvolvement, and cultural upbringing—diametric opposites. Raman came from aneducated Tamil brahmin family steepedin classical art forms, and Saha from anuneducated rural family of modest meansand underprivileged caste status in easternBengal. Sur also reconstructs a collectivehistory of Raman’s women students—Lalitha Chandrasekhar, Sunanda Bai, andAnna Mani—each a scientist who did notget her due.Dispersed Radiance makes an importantcontribution to the social history ofscience. It provides a nuanced and criticalunderstanding of the role and locationof science in the construction of Indianmodernity and in the continuation of socialstratification in colonial and postcolonialcontexts.‘Sur has woven ameticulous accountof the subalternhistory of physicsin India during thefirst half of the 20thcentury’ Science‘This scholarly study of the social andpolitical framework in which some leadingscientists worked and interacted in India inthe first half of the 20th century brings tothe fore facts that outsiders would hardlysuspect—a subtle dissertation on casteand gender hegemony in India’—Choice‘A fascinating account of the play of casteand gender in science and in scientificinstitutions in India’—The HinduAbha Sur teaches in the MIT Program inWomen’s & Gender Studies in Cambridge,Massachusetts.2011ISBN 9788189059323286 pages Hardback 5.5 x 8.5” Rs 495All rights available

Finding My WayA Gondwana JourneyVenkat Raman Singh ShyamA third-field artist renders his life in artthat is as rooted in Gond expression asit is animated by an experience of thecontemporary.‘Although I don’t consider myself sofamous or important, I think my lifestory is unusual and I want to tell it ina new way—using both pictures andwords. In certain ways this will also bean illustrated story of my community.I will walk you through Gond creationmyths; my dreams of riding a wingedhorse; the first toy-cart my father madefor me; my first bicycle ride; storiesabout my grandfather, Prasadi Lal Uikey,who could stop tigers in their tracks andbirds in their flight; my aversion to thestraightjacket of school; my life in Delhias a rickshaw puller, as a cook, as apainter of signs; my latter-day encounterswith doors that open automatically andwater that flows without one’s havingto touch the tap; and my personalexperience of two internationallymomentous events: the November 2008Mumbai terrorist attacks, and two yearslater the many days I spent marooned atthe Frankfurt airport owing to volcanicash.’‘Represents anemergent third fieldof artistic productionin contemporaryIndian culture that isneither metropolitannor rural, neither(post) modernist nortraditional, neither derived fromacademic training nor inherited withoutchange from tribal custom. Indeed, thirdfieldartists draw their energies from theadroit, dynamic management of knottyparadoxes’—Ranjit Hoskote, curator, Indianpavilion, Venice Biennale 2011, on VenkatShyam’s fellow-artists from MadhyaPradeshVenkat Raman Singh Shyam, nephew ofthe legengary Jangarh Singh Shyam, isone of the torchbearers of contemporaryGond art. Mentored by Jangarh and the lateJagdish Swaminathan, he has exhibitedwidely in India, the US and Europe.24

Nov 2013ISBN 9788189059576All rights available

Bonbibi and the TigerStory: Annu JalaisArt: Baharajan Chitrakar andSumon ChitrakarA holy man who pined for human flesh tookthe form of a tiger and began attackingthose who made a living from the forest.In another part of the world, a young girl,Bonbibi, was raised by a deer after hermother abandoned her in the forest. Oneday, she heard Allah-talla tell her to protectfishers, honey-collectors and woodcuttersfrom the jaws of the man-eating tigerdemonof the ‘land of the eighteen tides’—the Sundarbans.What happens when Bonbibi goes tomeet the tiger-demon, Dokkhin Ray?Using stunning organic dyes, Patua artistsBaharjaan Chitrakar and Sumon Chitrakarpour life into a popular Bengali folk story.Annu Jalais’ retelling, about how a singlewoman makes her way in the world, bringsto light the intricately linked worlds ofhumans and animals.Annu Jalais is an anthropologist andAssistant Professor at National Universityof Singapore. She is the author of Forestof Tigers, on the Sundarbans. BaharjaanChitrakar, 66, has taught many youngPatuas their art. She was drawn to thestory of Bonbibi and drew particularlymoving pictures of the legend. SumonChitrakar, 22, the husband of Baharjaan’sgranddaughter, was fascinated by Bonbibi’slegend calling Muslims and Hindus to beone family.26

Oct 2013ISBN 9788189059583All rights available

BhimayanaExperiences of UntouchabilityArt: Durgabai Vyam, Subhash VyamStory: Srividya Natarajan, S. AnandWhat does it mean to be an untouchablein India? Why do some Indians despisethe touch of others? Bhimrao RamjiAmbedkar (1891–1956), one of India’sforemost revolutionaries, recounts hisexperiences of growing up untouchable andbeing routinely discriminated against: inschool at the age of 10, in Baroda after hisreturn from Columbia University, and whiletraveling.Battling odds, Ambedkar drafted theConstitution of India and eventuallyembraced Buddhism. Experiences similarto Ambedkar’s continue to haunt a majorityof India’s 170 million dalits. They arestill denied water, shelter and the basicdignities of life. In this ground-breakingwork, Pardhan-Gond artists DurgabaiVyam and Subhash Vyam interweavehistorical events like the Mahad satyagrahawith contemporary incidents. Defyingconventional grammar, they infuse freshenergy into the graphic idiom through theirmagical art mounted on an epic scale.‘An extraordinary book’—John Berger‘Beautiful... unforgettable’—Arundhati Roy‘Distinctive... challenging in all the rightways’—Joe Sacco‘Highlights one ofthe biggest denialsof human rights stillin existence on theplanet. Among theTop 5 political comicbooks’ CNN.com28Durgabai Vyam, who has illustrated adozen books and won the BolognaRagazziaward in 2008 for The Night Life of Trees,says Bhimayana is her most accomplishedwork yet. Subhash Vyam began as asculptor before turning to painting. Theylive in Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh. SrividyaNatarajan is a dancer and novelist; shelives in London, Canada. S. Anand is thepublisher of Navayana.‘Evocative masterpiece’—The Hindu‘Ambedkar’s plea for justice can beheard again through this compellingdocumentary’—Times Literary SupplementHardback ISBN 9788189059354 Rs 995Paperback ISBN 9788189059170 Rs 395108 pages 4-colour 8 x 11”Rest of the world English: Tate Publishing, UKFrench: Editions MeMo; Korean: Darun; Spanish:Sextopiso. Published in Malayalam, Tamil, Hindi,Marathi, Telugu and Kannada

Where willI go? Whowill takeme in?Ahyou’llstay withfriends.Nonotwithfriends.An untouchablehas no friends amongother castes. If Iclaim a friendship, andam rejected, it will beembarrassing andpainful on both sides.Thenmake sureyou stay ata good Hinduhotel.To stay in aHindu hotel, I’llhave to pretendto be uppercasteand if I getcaught, I’ll getbeaten up, maybekilled.63

A Gardener in the WastelandJotiba Phule’s Fight for LibertyStory: Srividya NatarajanArt: Aparajita NinanJotirao Govindrao Phule wrote Slavery(Gulamgiri)—a scathing and witty attackon brahmanism and the slavery of India’s‘lower’ castes that it engendered. UnlikeIndian nationalists, Phule (1827–1890)saw the British as people who could tamethe local elite—the brahmans who wieldedpower simply on the basis of birth. Inspiredby Thomas Paine’s Rights of Man and theideals of Enlightenment philosophers,Phule mounted a critique of the vedas asidle fantasies of the brahman mind. Withthe objective of liberating the sudras andatisudras, he founded the SatyashodakSamaj (Society of Truthseekers).Phule dedicated Slavery ‘to the goodpeople of the United States as a token ofadmiration for their sublime, disinterestedand self-sacrificing devotion in the causeof Negro Slavery.’ Written in the formof a dialogue between Dhondiba andJotiba—reminiscent of Buddha’s suttas,of Socrates’ dialogues—Slavery tracesthe history of brahman domination inIndia, and examines the motives for andobjectives of the cruel and inhuman lawsframed by the brahmans.This revolutionary text remains relevanttoday, and given Phule’s rather graphicimagination lends itself almost naturally tographic art—the first time a historical workhas been interpreted as a graphic bookin India. Srividya Natarajan and AparajitaNinan also weave in the story of Savitribai,Jotiba’s wife and partner in his struggles,who started a school for girls in Pune in1848, despite social opprobrium.‘Bracing. This book wakes you up like apunch in the face’—Business Standard‘Not just a book, but a declaration ofwar... The Indian comics scene, presentlysubmerged in mythologicals, desperatelyneeds more books like A Gardener in theWasteland’—Indian Express‘Reminiscent ofMarjane Satrapi’sPersepolis. Bringssmack into theforegroundsomethingunequivocally evil’‘You should get yourself a copy... beforesome right-wing militant organisation getsits dander up’—TimeoutHindustan Times30Srivdiya Natarajan is a dancer and theauthor of the novel, No Onions Nor Garlic,a comic satire on caste, and Bhimayana.Aparajita Ninan is a graphic designer fromDelhi. This is her first book.2011ISBN 9788189059460128 pages Paperback 7 x 9.5” Rs 220Kannada rights sold. All other rights available

A Second SunrisePoems by CheranEdited and translated from Tamil byLakshmi Holmström and Sascha Ebeling34The sea swallowed the sunsplitting open, sprayingcrimson bloodover the clouds.A Second Sunrise showcases the bestpoems of Cheran, an accomplished poetof our times. The Sri Lankan civil warlooms over much of his work. Poems of theprecariousness of love are interwoven withpoems of war. The idyllic seascape of 1977whenWaves lap along the shorespreadingwithin methe seais ruined forever by the experience of war(1981–89). These are followed by poemsof exile and the experience of the diaspora(1993–2003).Now there is leftonly a great landwounded.No bird may fly over ituntil our return.Finally, 2004 onwards, there are poemsthat take us to the devastation of May2009, by whenThe sea has drained awayTamil has no territoryKinships have no name.With such a wide range, translatorsLakshmi Holmström and Sascha Ebelingtreat each poem both as fresh in itsparticularity and as part of the poet’soeuvre. Their English renditions capturethe resonances and rhythms that connectCheran to a long Tamil poetic tradition thatspans over two thousand years.Cheran is a major Tamil poet. LakshmiHolmström is an award-winning translatorof Tamil fiction and poetry. Sascha Ebelingis an assistant professor of Tamil at theUniversity of Chicago.‘The poems are likemini-bombs set toblow a hole throughyour heart. Theybear witness to thetragedy of the SriLankan civil war’The Hindu‘Cheran’s poetry... is deeply human, directand moving without being sentimental;political without being loud. The translatorshave been able to capture the mood andthe tone and help us imagine the idiom ofthe original’—Indian Express2012Hardback ISBN 9788189059491 Rs 295Paperback ISBN 9788189059507 Rs 195160 pages 8 x 5.25” All rights available

Ms MilitancyMeena KandasamyMeena Kandasamy’s full-blooded andhighly experimental poems challenge thedominant mode in contemporary Indianpoetry in English: status-quoist, depoliticised,neatly sterilised. These causticpoems with their black humour, sharpsarcasm, tart repartees, semantic punsand semiotic plays irritate, shock and stingthe readers until they are provoked intorethinking the ‘time-honoured’ traditionsand entrenched hierarchies at work incontemporary society.The poet stands myths and legends ontheir head to expose their regressive core.She uses words, images and metaphorsas tools of subversion, asserting, in theprocess, her caste, gender and regionalidentities while also transcending themthrough the shared spaces of her socioaestheticpractice. She de-romanticisesthe world and de-mythifies religious andliterary traditions by re-appropriating thehegemonic language in a heretical gestureof Promethean love for the dispossessed.The poet interrogates the tenets of asolipsistic modernism to create a counterpoeticcommunity speech brimming withemancipatory energy.‘As a womandalit poet, MeenaKandasamy writesangrily, ofteneloquently, aboutthe politics of thebody and castein contemporaryIndian society’ The Hindu‘When she tells the self-proclaimedarbiters of morality and decency andreligious practice where to get off in“Should You Take Offence...”, you want tostand up and cheer’—Timeout‘...a sharp eye for detail, a grasp of worldlyinsight, and an appetite for phrasal shapeshifting’—Biblio:A Review of BooksMeena Kandasamy is a poet and translatorwho has performed widely in venuesacross the world. She is currently workingon her novel, Gypsy Goddess. She lives inChennai.2011ISBN 978818905934764 pages Paperback 6.5 x 8.5” Rs 150All rights available

Give Us This Day A Feast of FleshN.D. RajkumarPoems from Tamil translated byAnushiya RamaswamyWhere the word becomes flesh, wherereason is dazzled and magic reignssupreme: in that world delves Rajkumar.Sensuous and ferocious, the poetry ofRajkumar cracks open a world that offersthe modern reader stunning glimpses intoa magic-drenched, living dalit history. Borninto a traditional shaman community ina border town between Kerala and TamilNadu, Rajkumar revels in his ability toclaim disparate discourses as his poeticsubjects. His angry goddesses of unreasonand excessive emotion embody unfetteredpower, independence and freedom—elements excised from the daily life of thedalit.Anushiya Ramaswamy, through herinspired translations, and in an essay thatlocates Rajkumar’s insurrections in a globalliterary context, shows how the poet is notwriting for inclusion into a centre: he hasre-drawn the lines in such a way that thecentre itself is meaningless. The centre hasthe right of it to fear the Other, the Mohini,the darkness, the Isakki, the mother withher breasts full of the poisonous essence,forWe who cannot experienceThe BrahmamLink hands and walkWith our Jungle Gods.‘Powerfulliminalities,threshold momentsof transit andtransformation, areat play in the poemsof N.D. Rajkumar’Biblio: A Review of Books‘As a member of the kaniyar caste amongthe dalits in Tamil Nadu, Rajkumar uses theshamanistic, magical and supernatural,with which the kaniyars are associated,to fashion an aesthetic that can seemanarchic and is certainly destabilising in itseffects on the reader’—DNA, Mumbai36N.D. Rajkumar has published four volumesof poetry in Tamil. He works as daily wagelabourer in the Railway Mail Service inNagercoil. Anushiya Ramaswamy teachesat the Department of English, SouthernIllinois University, Edwardsville, US.2011ISBN 9788189059330110 pages Paperback 6.5 x 8.5” Rs 180All rights available

A Current of BloodNamdeo DhasalPoems selected and translated fromMarathi by Dilip Chitre‘I am a venereal sore in the private partof language.’ That’s Namdeo Dhasal, themaverick Marathi poet who hardly had anyformal education. Born in 1949 in a former‘untouchable’ community in Pur-Kanersarvillage near Pune in Maharashtra, as ateenage taxi driver he lived among pimps,prostitutes, petty criminals, drug peddlers,gangsters and illicit traders in Bombay/Mumbai’s sinister and sordid underworld. In1972, he founded Dalit Panther, the militantorganisation modelled on Black Panther.The same year he published Golpitha thatbelongs to the tradition in modern urbanpoetry beginning with Baudelaire’s LesFleurs du Mal. Since then, he has publishedeight collections of poems from which thisrepresentative selection is drawn.In 2004, India’s national academy ofletters, Sahitya Akademi, honoured Dhasalwith the only Lifetime AchievementAward it gave during its golden jubileecelebrations. Dhasal’s long-time friendand bilingual poet Dilip Chitre, acclaimedfor his translations of the seventeenthcentury Marathi poet-saint Tukaram,considers Namdeo Dhasal to be one of theoutstanding poets of the twentieth century.‘This is Mumbaiwithout her makeup,her botox, her poweryoga; the Mumbaithat seethes,unruly, menacing,yet vitally alive’ The Hindu‘This elegant book is a journey through thebowels of those quarters over which wehave constructed robust mental flyovers’—The Sunday Times of India‘Chitre succeeds in reproducing the imagesand metaphors of Dhasal’s work, and hisunmistakable, hard-hitting voice’—OutlookDilip Chitre (1938–2009) was a poet,painter, translator, and filmmaker. He wrotemore than fifteen volumes of poetry inMarathi and ten in English. His film Godamwon the Prix Special du Jury in Nantes in1984.‘Dhasal employs an aesthetic of fracture...towards writing into existence thecontinuing alienation of dalits seducedby the shiny assurances of a still-newnation’—Biblio: A Review of Books2011ISBN 9788189059385120 pages Paperback 6.5 x 8.5” Rs 180All rights available

Embodying Difference: The Making of Burakumin in Modern JapanTimothy D. AmosISBN 9788189059293 Hardback 302 pages 5.5 x 8.5” Rs 495The book attempts to rethink the boundaries of buraku history and thecategory of the outcaste in Japan. ‘A clear and readable accountof thecontingencies of buraku identity in Japan.’—Elyssa Faison, AssociateProfessor of Japanese History, University of Oklahoma(Rights sold to University of Hawi‘i Press)In Pursuit of Ambedkar: A MemoirBhagwan Das (with DVD)ISBN 9788189059255 Paperback 86 pages 7 x 7” Rs 175A meeting with Ambedkar in 1943 defined the trajectory Das’ life, and inspired him in hissingle-minded pursuit of Babasaheb’s ideals. This memoir, and the DVD of a documentaryfeature that accompanies it, offer a dalit perspective on key events and figures of modernIndian history.Thus Spoke Ambedkar, Vol. 1: A Stake in the NationEd. Bhagwan DasISBN 9788189059262 Hardback 228 pages 7.5 x 7.5” Rs 395ISBN 9788189059279 Paperback 228 pages 7.5 x 7.5” Rs 295The twenty speeches (with annotations) showcase the wide range of issues thatDr B.R. Ambedkar had engaged with. They unravel a story otherwise jettisoned bymainstream ‘nationalist’ narratives that valorise a rather Hinduised ‘idea of India’.The Rupture with Memory: Derrida and the Specters that Haunt MarxismNissim MannathukkarenISBN 9788189059088 Paperback 116 pages 5 x 7.5” Rs 150The author argues the Marxists need to engage with Derrida to rebuild strategies formounting a challenge to the evangelical neo-liberal hegemony and to other religiousfundamentalisms. ‘A clear-headed study of Jacques Derrida’s venture into Marxist politicaltheory.’—FrontlineThe Blindness of Insight: Essays on Caste in Modern IndiaDilip M. MenonISBN 9788189059071 189 pages Paperback 5 x 7.5” Rs 200Exploring the intimate relation between the discourses of caste, secularism andcommunalism, Dilip Menon argues that communalism in India may well be the returnof the repressed histories of caste. ‘An elegantly argued book... It offers a provocativethesis.’—New Indian Express40Waking is Another Dream: Poems on the Genocide in EelamCheran, Jayapalan, Yesurasa, Latha, RavikumarEd. RavikumarTrans. Meena Kandasamy and Ravi ShankerISBN 9788189059378 Paperback 68 pages 6.5 x 8.5” Rs 180What is the poetry that can emerge from a ‘wounded landmass’ where ‘no bird is able tofly’, where people ‘ate death’? Five frontline Tamil poets from Eelam lament the loss oftheir land, their language and thousands of people. ‘Evokes the ravaged world of the SriLankan Tamil.’—DNA, Mumbai

Turning the Pot, Tilling the Land: Dignity of Labour in Our TimesText: Kancha Ilaiah Illustrations: Durgabai VyamISBN 9788189059095 Paperback 108 pages 9 x 9” Rs 200This book—with stunning illustrations by Durgabai Vyam—is the firstever attempt to inculcate a sense of dignity of labour among India’schildren. ‘It’s a hugely important book. Every Indian child should readit.’—UNICEF IndiaPeople Without History: India’s Muslim GhettosJeremy Seabrook and Imran Ahmed SiddiquiISBN 9788189059446 Paperback 272 pages 5.5 x 8.5” Rs 295(S. Asia only)This book is about life in the inner-city areas of Kolkata’s mainly Muslim settlements. Itasks a simple question—how do the vast majority of Muslims, especially the poor, live,work, love and die? ‘Inevitably, stories of neglect, deprivation, disease and addictionunfold.’—The TelegraphThe Myth of the Holy CowD.N. JhaISBN 9788189059163 Paperback 208 pages 5.5 x 8.5” Rs 200(S. Asia only)Historian D.N. Jha argues that the ‘holiness’ of the cow is a mythand its flesh played an important part in the cuisine of ancientIndia. Includes an essay by B.R. Ambedkar on beef-eating anduntouchability. ‘Jha traces the history of the doctrine... coveringboth the classic texts and cutting-edge scholarship.’—TLSReligious Rebels in the Punjab: The Ad Dharm Challengeto CasteMark JuergensmeyerISBN 9788189059200 Paperback 382 pages 5.5 x 8.5” Rs 400This pioneering work chronicles the history of the Ad Dharm movement by weavingin the life stories of dalit leaders. ‘Juergensmeyer takes one bold step forward fromconventional social history, and he deserves our unqualified praise for that.’—T.K.Oommen, Contributions to Indian SociologySeeking Begumpura: The Social Vision of AnticasteIntellectualsGail OmvedtISBN 9788189059453 Paperback 304 pages 5.5 x 8.5” Rs 295Omvedt emphasises the continued relevance of the vision ofthe anticaste intellectuals in the era of globalisation. ‘Marks awatershed in the battle to uncover the hearts and minds of theoppressed and powerless —the ‘subalterns’ of the Subcontinent’shistory.’—HimalLose Your Mother: A Journey Along the Atlantic Slave RouteSaidiya HartmanISBN 9788189059392 Paperback 288 pages 5.5 x 8.5” Rs 350 (S. Asia only)Undertaking a personal journey, the author retraces the history of the Atlantic slave

trade. ‘Hartman’s mix of history and memoir has the feel of a good novel, told with charmand passion, and should reach out to anyone contemplating the meaning of identity,belonging and homeland.’—Publishers WeeklyThe Business of WordsAndré SchiffrinISBN 9788189059477 Paperback 296 pages 5.5 x 8.5” Rs 295 (S. Asia only)A passionate account of the collapsing standards of contemporary publishing,across the world. ‘Schiffrin’s careful tracing of the growth of independent andcommitted publishing holds many lessons for India.’—Urvashi Butalia, publisher,ZubaanUn/Common Cultures: Racism and the Rearticulation of CulturalDifferenceKamala VisweswaranISBN 9788189059415 Paperback 354 pages 6 x 9.25” Rs 450 (S. Asia only)This book offers an incising critique of the idea of culture at the heart ofanthropology. ‘A major intervention in cultural studies, anthropology, and feminist andSouth Asian studies.’—R. Radhakrishnan, author of History, the Human, and theWorld BetweenImagining a Place for BuddhismAnne E. MoniusISBN 9788189059194 Paperback 272 pages 5.5 x 8.5” Rs 350 (S. Asia only)In this pioneering study, focusing on two extant Buddhist Tamil texts, AnneMonius, Professor of South Asian Religions at Harvard Divinity School, shedslight on the role of literature and literary culture in the formation, articulation andevolution of Tamil Buddhist religious identity and community.Abnormal: Lectures at the Collège de France, 1974–75Michel FoucaultISBN 9788189059224 Paperback 400 pages 5.5 x 8.5” Rs 490 (S. Asia only)In the lectures comprising Abnormal, Foucault shows how and why defining‘abnormality’ and ‘normality’ were prerogatives of power in the nineteenthcentury, shaping the institutions—from the prison system to the family—meantto deal in particular with ‘monstrosity’.The Future of the ImageJacques RancièreISBN 9788189059231 Paperback 160 pages 5 x 7.5” Rs 200 (S. Asia only)The author offers a fascinating new concept of the image in contemporary art, showinghow art and politics have always been intrinsically intertwined. ‘Rancière’s writings offerone of the few conceptualisations of how we are to continue to resist.’—Slavoj Žižek.42Political Interventions: Social Science and Political ActionPierre BourdieuISBN 9788189059248 Paperback 416 pages 6.25 x 9.25” Rs 490 (S. Asia only)For Bourdieu, sociology is ‘a combat sport’. In this comprehensive collection he is at hiscombative best. ‘France’s leading sociologist, its most influential intellectual—and one ofits angriest men.’—London Review of Books

The System of ObjectsJean BaudrillardISBN 9788189059125 Paperback 240 pages 5 x 7.5” Rs 225 (S. Asia only)This book offers a cultural critique of the commodity in consumer society, classifying theeveryday objects of the ‘new technical order’. He subjects home furnishing and interiordesign to a celebrated semiological analysis. ‘A sharp-shooting Lone Ranger of the post-Marxist left.’—New York TimesFirst as Tragedy, Then as FarceSlavoj ŽižekISBN 9788189059217 Paperback 156 pages 5 x 7.5” Rs 200(S. Asia only)In his analysis, Slavoj Žižek frames the moral failures of themodern world in terms of the epoch-making events of thefirst decade of this century. ‘Žižek leaves no social or culturalphenomenon untheorised, and is master of the counterintuitiveobservation.’—The New YorkerThe Sublime Object of IdeologySlavoj ŽižekISBN 9788189059132 Paperback 256 pages 5 x 7.5” Rs 240(S. Asia only)In this provocative book, Slavoj Žižek takes a look at the question of human agency ina postmodern world. His analyses explore the ideological fantasies of wholeness andexclusion that make up human society. ‘Žižek will entertain and offend, but never bore.’—The StrangerWomen, Race and ClassAngela Y. DavisISBN 9788189059422 Paperback 284 pages 5.5 x 8.5” Rs 295 (S. Asia only)This powerful study of the women’s movement in the U.S. from abolitionist days to thepresent demonstrates how it has always been hampered by the racist and classistbiases of its leaders. A classic.Are prisons obsolete?Angela Y. DavisISBN 9788189059439 Paperback 128 pages 5 x 7” Rs 150 (S. Asia only)Davis has put the case for the latest abolition movement inAmerican life: the abolition of the prison. ‘Angela Davis swingsa wrecking ball into the racist and sexist underpinnings ofthe American prison system.’—Cynthia McKinney, formerCongresswoman, US.

etcNavayana offers excellent editorial,typesetting, design and productionservices out of India. We have doneprepress work and printed editionsfor Tate Publishing, London; Zed Books,UK; and for the University of Hawai’i Press, USA.Prepress work and production are cheaperin India compared to the first world, butone ought to know how to get quality workdone and whom to trust it with. Navayanaprovides reliable publishing solutions—from editing a manuscript (in English) toshipping finished copies of the book to you.Navayana also offers quality design work byAkila Seshasayee—our covers and book designbear testimony to this.Navayana155, 2nd Floor, Shahpur JatNew Delhi , India 110049anand@navayana.org+91-11-26494795www.navayana.orgNavayana titles are distributed in India by IPDAIndependent Publishers’ Distribution Alternatives35A/1 Shahpur JatNew Delhi, India 110049+91-11-26491448 / 26492040ipd.alternatives@gmail.com

‘Navayana has chosen to embraceliterary practices that have beenmarginalised by mainstreampublishing...A young alternativepublishing house, Navayanacombines its dedication to anAmbedkarite perspective on Indiansociety with an infectiousenthusiasm for contemporarycultural theory’Biblio: A Review of Books‘If there’s a contemporaryheir to Seagull, it maybe Navayana, set up tochallenge the invisibilityof many kinds of Indianwriting, from worksby dalit authors topoetry...the catalogueis politically engaged,challenging and oftenunsettling’Business Standardwww.navayana.org