The Indus Saga : From Pataliputra to Partition

Contents: Preface. I. The two regions 2000 BC to AD 1800: Introduction. 1. The priests of prehistory. 2. The man on horseback. 3. Iron, Krishna and Buddha destroy the tribe. 4. Porus: an Indus version. 5. Pax Mauryana: the First Universal State. 6. The Oxus and the Indus. 7. The romance of Raja Rasalu. 8. Feudalization and the first Feudal State. 9. An Arab visitor. 10. More men on horseback. 11. The Second Feudal State. 12. Turbulent north, peaceful south and Panipat. 13. The Second Universal State. 14. Resistance, opportunism and consumerism. 15. Bhakti, Nanak and the Sufis. II. The two worlds AD 1600 to AD 1897: Introduction. 16. The Europe that came to India. 17. The India that awaited Europe. 18. Uneasy heads on the peacock throne. 19. Tombs, ostentation and land tenure. 20. Sea power and military tactics. 21. The Sikhs and the subsidiary states. 22. 1857. 23. The third universal state. III. The two nations AD 1757 to AD 1947: Introduction. 24. The character of the Hindu Muslim divide. 25. Sonar Bangla. 26. The plunder. 27. The famine and settlement. 28. The economic divide. 29. Whither the Muslims? 30. The sons of the Indus fight. 31. Parting of the ways. 32. Towards partition. Bibliography. Index.

"The Indus region, comprising the northwestern part of the Indian subcontinent (now Pakistan), has always had its distinct identity-racially, ethnically, linguistically and culturally. In the last five thousand years this region has been a part of India politically for only five hundred years.

Pakistan, then, is no \'artificial\' state conjured up by the disaffected Muslim elite of British India. Aitzaz Ahsan surveys the history of Indus--as he refers to this region-right from the time of the Harappan civilization to the era of the British Raj, concluding with independence and the creation of Pakistan.

Ahsan\'s message is aimed both at Indians still nostalgic about \'undivided\' India and at his Pakistani compatriots who narrowly tend to define their identity by their \'un-Indianness\'." (jacket)