Tuesday, October 31, 2023

12:00 PM - 2:00 PM
Bunche Hall 10383

The story of this book begins on August 15, 1947. As the new nation-states of India and Pakistan prepared to negotiate land and power, the citizens of the princely state of Hyderabad experienced the unravelling of an intense political conflict between the Union government of India and the local ruler, the Nizam of Hyderabad. The author explores how the state of Hyderabad was struggling to produce its own tools of cultural renaissance and modernity in the background of the Union Government of India's deployment of the central army, the Nizam's idea of a 'Muslim state' and the Telangana Armed struggle fostered by leftist parties. With evidence from the oral histories of various sections - both Muslims and non-Muslims - and a wide variety of written sources and historical documents, this book captures this intense moment of new politics and cultural discourses.

Afsar Mohammad teaches at the University of Pennsylvania. He is a published poet and literary theorist in his home language of Telugu and now also working on various translations of literary works into English. He published the book, The Festival of Pirs: Popular Islam and Shared Devotion in South India, in 2013 with the Oxford University Press. His recent book, Remaking History: 1948 Police Action and the Muslims of Hyderabadi, is published by Cambridge University press.

Sponsor(s): Center for India and South Asia, Department of History