In the Making : Identity Formation in South Asia

Contents: Introduction by Kumkum Sangari. 1. A historiographical essay on Hindu-Muslim relations. 2. Composite culture in pre-partition Punjab: fractures and continuities. 3. The historian and the Indian census: accounts of religion in late nineteenth century Punjab. 4. The census in colonial Ceylon. 5. Minority rights, secularism and civil society (co-authored with Yamini Aiyar). 6. The Ahmadi Problem: an unfinished essay. Appendices: I would like to ... (Draft for scholarship application). Concept paper on the census. Being an Ahmadi in an age of 'Islamic terrorism'. Meeto by Judith Brown.

"This book critiques the taken-for-granted opposition of Hindu and Muslim as separate and cohesive categories, the frequent coding of syncretism as deviant, impermanent or tolerant, and moves towards a more nuanced approach. It questions the historicist preoccupation with incidents and processes of conflict, conquest, iconoclasm, and sets out to look at co-existence and peaceful interactions at the grassroots as equally crucial for the formation of identities. Written with perception and lucidity, it could be used profitably by scholars and by students, teachers, activists and the general reader."