Pritish Nandy - Peerless Minds: An Arc of Achievement

PEERLESS MINDS

An Arc of Achievement

Edited by

PRITISH NANDY

and

TAPAN CHAKI

CONTENTS

P eerless Minds began as a discussion over a cup of tea (Darjeeling for Tapan; English Breakfast for me) at the poolside of The Oberoi Grand in Kolkata, one of those beautiful old colonial buildings that the City of Joy is best known for. We thought of putting together a book featuring interviewsQ&As as well as narrativeswith twenty of the most scintillating Indian minds; and, in some cases, people of Indian origin settled elsewhere in the world.

As the book progressed, the numbers increased a bit. We could have easily included many more, but that would have impaired the importance of the choice. We began with living legends and then added a few interesting younger people who are firmly on their way to becoming ones. You have here three Nobel Prize winners, three Bharat Ratnas, three Knights of the British Empire, a Pulitzer Prize winner, a two-time Best of the Bookers winner and many more who have been awarded the highest accolades in their areas of excellence. There is an Abel Prize winner, a Pritzker Prize winner, a Fields medallist, a Fukuoka Prize winner, a Turner Prize winner, a Praemium Imperiale winner, an Academy Award winner and many Padma Vibhushans and Padma Bhushans. But that is not why they are here. They are here because they have inspired great new ideas or set new standards of excellence that are not easy to match. That is why we are celebrating them.

We intended to have better (actually, far better) representation for women in this book. But two interviewees who we were very keen to have here refused at the last minute, referring to the current political environment, and a third who is in Princeton never answered, despite repeated requests. Also, the book was supposed to comprise interviews with living people but, unfortunately, between the closure of the manuscript and its appearance in print, two of the most interesting people here passed away. Sir Vidias interview by Roderick Matthews was possibly his last and excerpts from it were carried in several publications. The same is true for Annapurna Devi, who never ever spoke to the media after parting ways with her husband, the legendary Pandit Ravi Shankar. She never performed either, but became a reclusive teacher. Some parts of Aalif Surtis tribute to her have been reproduced in publications since her passing away.

We have not included any politiciansor political activistsin this book, in the belief that it would make the work more enduring. Politics change. People change parties, ideologies. And India, as we all know, is still a work in progress. We had to regretfully drop one interview when the person, a pioneering technologist, joined active politics. We have, however, kept intact the political views of those who may have expressed them here, barring a couple of sharp quotes bordering on the defamatory. The book is a celebration, not a platform for rage or outrage.

We hope that this book will reintroduce some of Indias most brilliant minds to the millennials and Generation Z (or the post-millennials as they are often called) who may have moved on to newer heroes and newer themes. Technology, the new God of all things big and small, has largely inspired the shift, as well as a world that continues to alter its priorities. But the great artsmusic, literature, poetry, history, sculpture, architecturewill endure even as they change, and the great sciencesmathematics, medicine, economics, probability theory and the future-anticipating technologies of todaywill keep changing the world as we go along.

Here they are, then, for you, the best minds of today sharing each others company in a book that we hope will give you exciting insights into what India and Indians think, wherever in the world they may be, whatever be the personal goals they chase. We thank the wonderful peopleauthors such as Aatish Taseer and Karan Mahajan, columnists like James Astill and Khalid Mohamed, journalists Shereen Bhan, Manimugdha Sharma and Indu Bhan, and photographer Rohit Chawlawho gave their time so generously to travel and meet them, talk to them, photograph them and make this book happen. It would not have been possible but for the grant from Sunil Kanti Roy of the Peerless Group, which enabled us to spend ten months of our lives working almost exclusively on it. We thank him for his generosity. All editor royalties earned from this book will go to his favourite charity, the Ramakrishna Missions Sister Nivedita School for Girls.

Pritish Nandy

Tapan Chaki

PEERLESS MINDS

An Arc of Achievement