Arun Shourie Livres

Over the last couple of decades, B.R. Ambedkar has come to be idolized as no other political leader has. His statue is one of the largest in the Parliament complex. Political parties have reaped rich electoral dividends riding on his name. A decades-old cartoon of him in a textbook rocked Parliament for days recently, causing parties across the political spectrum to run for cover and call for the withdrawal of the 'offending' cartoon. In Worshipping False Gods, Arun Shourie employs his scholarly rigour to cast a critical look at the legend of Ambedkar. With his distinctive eye for detail, Shourie delves into archival records to ask pertinent questions: Did Ambedkar coordinate his opposition to the freedom struggle with the British? How does his approach to social change contrast with that of Mahatma Gandhi's? Did the Constitution spring from him or did it grow as a dynamic living organism? Passionately argued and based on a mountain of facts that it presents, Worshipping False Gods compels us to go behind the myths on which discourse is built in India today.

The work done by Arun Shourie and his colleagues rocked institutions and the freeing of 40,000 undertrials; revealing the Bhagalpur blindings; purchasing Kamla; dislodging a 'Sultan'; foiling 'strikes'; controverting Judges; battling privilege motions; courting contempt of court charges; nailing corruption, forgeries, lies, and the opportunism of rulers; uncovering suppressed reports... What lay behind these and the consequences that followed?A comprehensive account of dramatic incidents like getting governments to swallow legislation against the press, unseating of chief ministers, a prime minister unspooling himself even as manoeuvres to unseat him are scotched, a deputy prime minister trying to dislodge colleagues with fabricated documents, people's movements ending up as rivulets in the sand, The Commissioner for Lost Causes discusses Shourie's innings, the calumny hurled at him, his dismissal, and his being recalled and removed again.Delicious tales of characters from the noble to the colourful to the short-sighted to outright from JP, to a president, to prime ministers, a deputy prime minister, chief ministers, a conman, indignant editors, and of course a great warrior, the press baron, feature in this honest retelling of the life of Arun Shourie, the writer, former editor and minister who was acclaimed as one of the fifty 'World Press Freedom Heroes'.

The life of Ramakrishna Paramahamsa 'enables us to see God face to face', Gandhiji wrote. Similarly, when someone in his circle was distraught, the Mahatma sent him to spend time at the Ashram of Ramana Maharshi. The Paramahamsa and the Maharshi have been among the greatest spiritual figures of our country. They have transformed the lives of and have been a solace to millions. Their peak, mystic experience is what we yearn to have. But what if several of the experiences they had occur in other circumstances also?With the rigour and painstaking research that mark all his work, Shourie probes the lives of two of India's greatest spiritual masters in the light of the breath-taking advances in neuroscience as well as psychology and sociology. The result is a book of remarkable vigour: an examination - and ultimately reconciliation - of science and faith as also of seemingly antagonistic, irreconcilable worldviews.