Colonial kedgeree (uncooked)

Mr Akbar steers us through the incident-crowded book as to how the British came and lived in India

Doolally Sahib and the Black Zamindar: Racism and Revenge in the British Raj

Author: M J Akbar

Publisher: Bloomsbury

Pages: xxvi + 350

Price: Rs 899

Even a veteran reviewer sometimes meets more than his match. How does one review a book that has Emperor Akbar’s navaratnas, the famed poets of the Delhi in the court of the last Mughal Emperor Bahadur Shah Zafar, wisdom of the famed Vijayanagar wit, Tenali Raman, Sufi philosophy and all the major and many not-so-major figures from the days of the East India Company to the end of the British Raj, obscure recipes of the memsahibs and their