Podcasts about king's india institute

Professor Sunil Khilnani from the King's India Institute in London, on the life and legacy of the Indian business tycoon Dhirubhai Ambani, founder of Reliance Industries. The son of a penurious schoolteacher, Ambani credited himself with an almost animal instinct for trading, coupled with a steel trap memory and an appetite for audacious risk. Today fifteen per cent of all India's exports go out in his company's name. It's the ultimate rag to riches story, mixed with street cunning and dazzling deals. In one case, which began with a tip from an underworld don, Ambani executives were accused of violating the Official Secrets Act by possessing sensitive Cabinet documents, including a draft national budget. A joke quickly did the Delhi rounds: the budget wasn't leaked to Reliance; Reliance had leaked the budget to the ministry. Producer: Mark Savage Editor: Hugh Levinson.

Professor Sunil Khilnani, from the King's India Institute in London, looks at controversy over the Indian artist MF Husain, who spent the last days of his life in exile. Husain is considered by some to be the face of modern art in India but not necessarily by people in India itself. Husain died in his nineties having completed around ten thousand works. His paintings often attracted high prices but he became a target for mob anger over his portraits of Hindu goddesses and Indian feminine icons. Female deities had often shown nude in traditional art, but what enraged right-wing Hindus was that these images were created by a Muslim artist. "Had Husain been less popular beforehand, he probably would have been less hated." says Professor Khilnani. Producer: Mark Savage.

Professor Sunil Khilnani, from the King's India Institute in London, explores the life and legacy of Charan Singh, the lawyer turned politician who championed the cause of India's farmers. Singh is remembered today as the politician who took on Indira Gandhi in the Congress Party's heartland state. Uttar Pradesh. He redistributed power and altered the social structure of Northwest India, non violently. And he helped the world see the potential of the Indian farmer a bit more clearly. He succeeded in becoming India's first peasant prime minister but went from the highest office in a flash, replaced by his nemesis Indira Gandhi. Although today he is most often remembered for being a leader of his own caste, Professor Khilnani argues that Charan Singh has a unique status in Indian history. Producer: Mark Savage.

Professor Sunil Khilnani, from the King's India Institute in London, looks at the life of Indira Gandhi, India's first woman prime minister, whose darkest moment was a two year period known as "the emergency". Jails filled up with her critics while journalists and editors were detained alongside the political opposition. Those arrested could be held without trial and and she attempted to reduce the birth rate by offering men incentives to be sterilized. "Indira Gandhi in many ways issued the greatest threat to democracy in independent India's history," says Professor Khilnani, "weakening constitutional regularities established by her father. Yet the enduring effect of her rule was to open the state to a deeper and more accessible democracy". Producer: Mark Savage Music: Talvin Singh.

Professor Sunil Khinani, from the King's India Institute in London, looks at the life of Krishna Menon, the abrasive Indian diplomat and statesman who invented the concept of non-alignment. He was one of the most reviled figures of the Cold War era. The Americans regarded Menon as a "mischief maker"; the British thought he was in bed with the Soviets while the Soviets thought he was a lackey of the British; and the Chinese resented his attempts to school them in international affairs. The diplomat, who was the voice of India's foreign policy for almost two decades, pursued an agenda which deeply unsettled the superpowers. But, says Professor Khilnani, "Menon's approach helped give India an influential voice at the global diplomatic table, dominated by the big four powers." Producer: Mark Savage Music: Talvin Singh.

Professor Sunil Khilnani, from the King's India Institute, looks at the life of the celebrated actor and movie director Raj Kapoor who attracted a huge following well before the term 'Bollywood' became known. Kapoor started making films, just as India became independent in 1947. Back then, the medium was more than mere entertainment. In a country where the literacy rate was 12 per cent, film was also a crucial medium of education and exposure. "Kapoor brought romance, sexuality, song and soul to Indian socialism," says Professor Khilnani. Producer: Mark Savage.

Professor Sunil Khilnani, from the King's India Institute, looks at the life of Bhimrao Ambedkar, champion of the community previously known as 'untouchables' whom he renamed as Dalits. Ambedkar, who was a Dalit himself and fought against caste discrimination. His face can be found on posters, paintings and coloured tiles in tens of millions of Dalit homes. To Indian schoolchildren, he is the man who wrote the country's constitution; and to India's politicians he is a public emblem of how far India has come in addressing the blight of caste. "Both readings simultaneously exaggerate and ghettoize Ambedkar's contribution," says Professor Khilnani. "He was a sophisticated, long-sighted Constitutional collaborator whose interests extended past caste to the very structure and psychology of Indian democracy." Producer: Mark Savage.

Professor Sunil Khilnani, from the King's India Institute in London, looks at the life and legacy of Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the founder of Pakistan. Descriptions of his early life do not sound like someone who would go on to lead India's Muslims: he spoke English, dressed impeccably in Western clothes from Savile Row, smoked cigarettes and, according to some accounts, consumed alcohol and ate pork. Yet it was Jinnah who, along with others, publicly assented to the partition of India which, carried out in haste, would give roughly half of India's Muslims political autonomy, cause around a million deaths, displace some 14 million people and transform the geopolitics of the world. Producer: Mark Savage Music: Talvin Singh.

The Annual Sarfraz Pakistan Lecture, Wolfson College, Oxford, 30 Nov 2015 Christophe Jaffrelot is Professor of Indian Politics and Sociology at the King's India Institute, and Research Director at the CNRS (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique). He also teaches South Asian politics and history at Sciences Po (Paris) and is an Overseas Fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He was Director of CERI (Centre d’Etudes et de Recherches Internationales) at Sciences Po, between 2000 and 2008. His research interests include: theories of nationalism and democracy; mobilization of the lower castes and untouchables in India; Hindu nationalist movement; ethnic conflicts in Pakistan; the Dargah culture (with special reference to Ajmer sharif as a shared sacred space) and the relations between businessmen and politicians in India (with special reference to Gujaratis). This annual lecture aims to promote Pakistan studies within Oxford to a wide, non-specialist audience.

Professor Sunil Khilnani, from the King's India Institute in London, tells the story of Akbar, the greatest ruler of the Mughal Empire. Akbar seems to have managed to combine a ruthless early career with a startling religious tolerance in later life. His empire covered a huge swathe of the Indian subcontinent, from the Bay of Bengal in the east to the Arabian Sea, and southwards to the Deccan. Akbar showed no mercy in his pursuit of power and secured his gains with an iron fist. The defenders of a fort in Rajasthan chose mass suicide rather than surrender and Akbar went on to slaughter, some say, more than 20,000 inhabitants. And yet he seems to have grasped the diversity of beliefs and of culture across the land he ruled and propagated his own syncretic system of religious faith known as Din-I-Lahi. His stance has made him a pet for modern secularists but Professor Khilnani says we should be cautious. "However complex his motivations might have been, his commitment to pluralism yielded clear-cut instrumental advantages: it allowed him to expand his empire and maintain dominion over so many subjects." Producer: Mark Savage Researcher: Manu Pillai Listeners can catch up with the series and see the list of remarkable Indians featured on the Radio 4 website.

Professor Sunil Khilnani, from the King's India Institute in London, visits Hampi in today's Karnataka, site of the sprawling capital of Krishnadevaraya, 16th-century warrior and self-doubting king. Krishnadevaraya lived in a brutal age and yet his writings show he was both learned and thoughtful, with an artistic temperament. He was a compulsive self-promoter whose presence is felt amongst the ruins at Hampi, now a UNESCO World Heritage Site. But it is in the Amuktamulyada, his long poetic work, that we hear his original voice which marks, says Professor Khilnani, "the emergence of an individual self, a subjective voice - centuries before the arrival of colonial ideas of the individual". Produced by Mark Savage Researcher: Manu Pillai Editor: Hugh Levinson.

Rajaraja was not the first of the Chola dynasty but he took their empire to its zenith - from a relatively small kingdom to the dominant empire in India. Professor Sunil Khilnani, from the King's India Institute in London, visits Tamil Nadu where he finds modern day connections with the ruler whose name means 'king of kings'. Professor Khilnani visits the temple at Thanjavur which Rajaraja built a thousand years ago and named after himself, utilising the profits of trade. "For Raja Raja had pulled off something that no Indian ruler before him seems to have done," says Professor Khilnani. "He'd commandeered trading boats, timber sailed craft and launched maritime expeditions, bringing far flung wealth back home." The king was lavish with his gifts and used his wealth to capture the imaginations of those he ruled. His most important gift to art history came at the temple's consecration: 60 portable icons of Lord Shiva, the Hindu deity. Producer: Mark Savage Researcher: Manu Pillai With incidental music by the composer Talvin Singh Listeners can catch up with the series and see the list of remarkable Indians featured on the Radio 4 website.

Professor Sunil Khilnani, from the King's India Institute in London, explores the life and legacy of Aryabhata, the legendary Indian mathematician and astronomer. Unknown in the West until a few decades ago, he is said by some to rank with Euclid and the great Greek mathematicians and astronomers such as Ptolemy. But unlike Euclid, Aryabhata left no proofs, explaining how to recreate his findings. "His ideas, translated into Arabic, influenced Islamic astronomers and mathematicians. But he wasn't working in the idiom of his Western counterparts, so his ideas didn't feed into the global stream of scientific discovery, and eventually Indians forgot Aryabhata too. It was only when science and technology began to flourish in modern India that his reputation got a relaunch," says Professor Khilnani. Producer: Mark Savage Researcher: Manu Pillai Listeners can catch up with the series and see the list of remarkable Indians featured on the Radio 4 website.

Professor Sunil Khilnani of the King's India Institute in London looks at the life and legacy of the emperor Ashoka, who ruled over a large part of the Indian sub-continent. He came to power around the time the Romans were fighting Carthage and the Chinese were building their Great Wall but faded from view over time. Rediscovered by the British, he went on to become an inspiration to India's nationalists. Ashoka's symbol of four lions, each facing in a different direction, can be found on official Indian documents and the nation's currency. His most remarkable legacy is the rock edicts, public instructions to his people on correct behaviour - including religious tolerance and his own principle of Dhamma. "Dhamma described the ruler's duty to interest himself in the welfare of his people, their health and happiness. It even committed him to planting banyan trees and mango groves along the roads, to provide water and resting places for travellers . . an early statement about the private faith of a leader and the responsibilities of public office" Producer: Mark Savage. Researcher: Manu Pillai With incidental music by the composer Talvin Singh. Listeners can catch up with the series and see the list of remarkable Indians featured on the Radio 4 website.

Professor Sunil Khilnani, from the King's India Institute in London, looks at the life and legacy of Kautilya, whose treatise on political power dates back at least two thousand years. The Indian political strategist has been compared to Machiavelli. Some say he is more ruthless. Kautilya's text, written on dried palm leaves, lay forgotten for more than a millennium until it turned up at a library in Mysore at the turn of the twentieth century, providing inspiration for early Indian nationalists. "The discovery summarily exploded a Western cliché: that Indians were primarily ethereal, spiritual thinkers," observes Professor Khilnani. "Here was a strategic text--focused on worldly ends, advocating ruthless means to achieve power." Producer: Mark Savage With incidental music by the composer Talvin Singh. Listeners can catch up with the series and see the list of remarkable Indians featured on the Radio 4 website.

Professor Sunil Khilnani, from the King's India Institute in London, looks at the life and legacy of Panini, a master of the ancient Sanskrit language who lived around two and a half thousand years ago. His grammar, known as the Astadhyayi, had a lasting impact and helped to make Sanskrit the lingua franca of much of Asia for more than a thousand years - not through conquest or colonisation but because it served a purpose. Panini's grammar relied on a system that functioned like a powerful algorithm, or a computer programme today. He created, "in a mere forty-pages, the most complete linguistic system in history and helped to make Sanskrit the lingua franca of much of Asia for more than a thousand years". Produced by Mark Savage With incidental music by composer Talvin Singh. Listeners can catch up with the series and see the list of remarkable Indians featured on the Radio 4 website.

Over the course of 50 episodes, Sunil Khilnani, director of the King's India Institute in London, takes listeners on a whirlwind journey from ancient India to the 21st century through the prism of the life stories of 50 remarkable individuals. He will also explore their surprising afterlives, which illuminate both the astonishments and urgent conflicts of India today. He begins with the Buddha, exploring the story of his life and how he has been reinvented in modern India by those who oppose the caste system. "Buddha's solution to suffering lay in the individual mind. But he was also sketching a new form of society," says Professor Khilnani. "He was a moral meritocrat, and to an extent a social one too." Produced by Mark Savage Listeners can catch up with the series and see the list of remarkable Indians featured on the Radio 4 website.

Professor Sunil Khilnani of the King's India Institute explores the life and legacy of Mahavira Jain. Born more than two thousand years ago, Mahavira is the inspiration for millions of followers of the Jain religion. It teaches that the way to liberation and bliss is to live a life of non-violence and renunciation. At its heart is a belief that the entire world, from the ground we tread on to the air we breathe, is filled with life: our duty is to protect this universe of living souls through non-violent action. Mahavira is the last in the line of Tirthankars, beings who were said to be able to cross over from the world of human suffering into the realm of spiritual liberation. Unlike the other Tirthankars, we can be certain that he existed. "Mahavira asked his followers to renounce untruths and sex, to give up greed and attachment to worldly things - and stop all forms of killing or violence," says Professor Khilnani. "In short, the normal, devious, grasping and aggressive self had to be conquered." Produced by Mark Savage Listeners can catch up with the series and see the list of remarkable Indians featured on the Radio 4 website.

Dr Srinath Raghavan is Senior Research Fellow at King's India Institute. He took his MA and PhD from the Department of War Studies, King's College London. He is the author of 'War and Peace in Modern India: A Strategic History of the Nehru Years'(2010) and '1971: A Global History of the Creation of Bangladesh' (2013). On 25 February 2015 he gave a talk examining the economic impact of the Second World War on India. It was hosted by the Sir Michael Howard Centre for the History of War and the the King's India Institute, and chaired by Professor David Edgerton. DISCLAIMER: Any information, statements or opinions contained in this podcast are those of the individual speakers. They do not represent the opinions of the Department of War Studies or King's College London.