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Contemporary South Asia

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War and peace in modern India

Jivanta Schottli
a a

University of Heidelberg, Germany

Version of record first published: 19 Sep 2011

To cite this article: Jivanta Schottli (2011): War and peace in modern India, Contemporary South Asia, 19:3, 344-345 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09584935.2011.594286

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Book reviews

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for private ownership of women, land or wealth. Yet they are not a minor group, as Openshaw notes in some parts of Bengal, Vaishnavism and Islam are almost wholly identiable with their Bartaman-panthi varieties (207). Close examination of this rst Baul autobiography to be found enables Openshaw to engage again with debates about the origin of such egalitarianism. Was it western-inspired or indigenous? Analysis of Rajs life history, and of the stylistic devices used in his writing, leads her to conclude that it is both a traditional and autonomous response to the structures of his society. The authors main focus is on ideas of the self and the individual in relation to genres of life-narration. She argues, contra Dumont, that renouncers are less individualised than Bauls and adds her voice to those who have argued that the notion of the self is less bounded and essentialised in South Asia than in Europe. In a complex but fascinating discussion of Rajs concept of the androgynous self, she explores his view that the male has to become more like the female to achieve selfrealisation. However, the reverse seems not to be true. This high valuation of women cannot, then, I would have thought, be glossed egalitarian. For Raj, women are superior and dierent, not ordinary and awed like men. Openshaw wonders whether a high valuation of women combined with an intense love relationship universally corresponds with a radical orientation. This book is an outstanding ethnography, well-contextualised, scholarly and clearly-written, but is likely to appeal mainly to specialists because of the density of its discussion. It has implications for many areas of academic debate. Mary Searle-Chatterjee University of Manchester, UK Email: msearlechatterjee@gmail.com 2011, Mary Searle-Chatterjee

War and peace in modern India, by Srinath Raghavan, Basingstoke, Palgrave, 2010, 359 pp., ISBN 978-0-230-24215-9 Srinath Raghavan distinguishes his book from the many others on Jawaharlal Nehru by arguing that rather than judge Nehrus policy choices he seeks to explain them. This he proposes to do by using a selection of foreign policy crises which hit the newly independent Indian state in the 1950s and early 1960s, all involving territory, neighbours and hence, national security. Departing from the usual tendency to indict Nehru on grounds of excessive caution or misplaced idealism, Raghavan argues that courses of action which appear to depart from a rational standard require an analysis of the political considerations at work (7). By this the author is referring to the following set of possible forces: domestic concerns and constituencies, powerful external actors, normative standards of international behaviour and issues of reputation. However, in his introduction no model of decision-making, policyselection or strategy-formulation is proposed, although the author does seek to distinguish between consensual, controlling and coercive strategies, with each making varying use of threats of force. Having laid bare a minimal conceptual and theoretical frame, chapter one presents a short intellectual background to Nehrus strategic outlook. The tension

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between realism and liberalism within Nehrus thinking is highlighted and the fact that he very quickly came to regard himself as the undisputed expert on foreign policy issues. Some clues are provided of Raghavans analytical prism. For instance, when he writes that a core task of political leaders is to demonstrate the links between policies, interests, and values (p. 21). Unfortunately, the linkage between these three components is not overtly explored. Subsequent chapters are highly detailed and intricate in their observations about how Nehru viewed and responded to critical crises. The cases of Junagadh, Hyderabad and Jammu and Kashmir are used to reveal the complications that arose from the issue of accession to the Indian Union in 19471948. The refugee inux and instability within Pakistan provoked numerous occasions of tension and the need for urgent, rm and delicate diplomacy. Chapters seven and eight are devoted to yet another scale of crisis: the boundary dispute with China and the run-up to the SinoIndian war of OctoberNovember 1962. Here perhaps there could have been more analysis of the 1954 Panchasheel Agreement between India and China, the contents and its implications. War and peace in modern India is a polished historical study, making extensive and thorough use of archival material in India and the United Kingdom, drawing upon both private papers and open sources such as newspapers and periodicals from the time. It is also an unusual work, in that the author claims as a main goal the need to uncover patterns and options of strategic behaviour which emerged during this crucial phase and which continue to be relevant for contemporary India. This dimension of the book is particularly important given on-going discussions about Nehrus legacy and the controversies this generates. However, here is where the book suers slightly, for one misses a clear hypothesis relating to policy-making (the processes involved, the importance of individuals versus structures and institutions) that could have provided an organizing framework to the dense empirical chapters. Perhaps because of this the concluding chapter is rather brief. Nevertheless, Raghavans coverage of early foreign policy crises will be of great use to teachers and students of Indian foreign policy, especially as not so much is available on the Junagadh and Hyderabad issues of accession and particularly not linking the various responses to crises. The 1950s in Indias political development remains a wellspring of information and insight into the dynamics of institution building and the learning process that leaders were going through during phases of crisis-management. Jivanta Schottli University of Heidelberg, Germany Email: schottli@yahoo.com 2011, Jivanta Schottli

Stateless in South Asia: the Chakmas between India and Bangladesh, by Deepak K. Singh, New Delhi, Sage, 2010, xx 289 pp., ISBN 978-81-321-0236-6 In 2000 India was ocially home to some 290,000 international refugees, including refugees from Tibet, Myanmar, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Bhutan and Nepal. Not