Basic education, like a prism, refracts a spectrum of economic, political and cultural issues that usually remain knotted. The writer discovered this when he toured West Bengal – from the heart of Sundarbans to Shantiniketan, from the floodplains of dying rivers to the ochre plains of Jangalmahal. What emerges is a tapestry of sights, sounds and smells that often speak more than cold statistics. Learn More

Mid-nineteenth century had brought in the hope that science was set to usher in the golden era of a humane world free from pain and exploitation. But soon it transpired that while scientific truths might be objective, the practice of science was certainly not above imperialist class interests. How then to reconcile science with human values? How then to assert that to lose faith in science is sin? Wise and compassionate scientists never stopped worrying about this crucial question. Great minds such as Joseph Needham, Linus Pauling and Dorothy Hodgkin delved deep into history, philosophy, religion and politics in order to redeem humanity's confidence in science. Each such scientist had to face imperialist persecution and harrassment despite attaining dizzy heights in their respective fields. Each had also to fight against highly talented but tragically paranoid and pro-imperialist scientists such as Edward Teller, for whom finishing off the USSR in a nuclear war was the ultimate idea of peace on earth. This book is a fascinating and inspiring account of that tumultuous struggle involving the two sides of science - the benign and the grotesque, much of it in the scientists' own words translated into Bengali with ample notes and prefaced with knowledgeable introductions. The book takes a fresh look not only at the history of science but at that of the anti-imperialist and anti-fascist struggles of the twentieth century.

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His early life in the intimate natural setting of Barisal and Silchar, the great Bengal famine of 1943, the violent legacy of Partition, and above all his experience of service in the armed forces went to the making of Manindra Gupta(1926-2018), one of the major architects of Bangla poetry in the post-Jibanananda era. He assimilated all that was best in his predecessors and carved out a style all his own. Dispensing with the conventional lyric mode marked by effusion, Gupta brought his intensive reading of world literature, critical thinking, and unsentimental worldview to bear on his unique style of presentation that is manifest in the deft employment of the occult and the absurd. This book offers an interpretation of Gupta's life, his texts and times.

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This book is a record of the investigation conducted by Gautam Chattopadhyay into the impact of the November Revolution in Russia (1917) on Bengal. Originally published in 1967, the work has been reprinted to commemorate the centenary of the Bolshevik Revolution, with an Introduction by Ramkrishna Bhattacharya and notes by Siddhartha Dutta. Learn More

Dui Bangali Ek Bangali deals with the complex history of Bengali Muslims as a community, their identity formation, the challenges they face and the invincibility of their spirit. The legendary fight of the people of Bangladesh for the recognition of Bengali language, the threat of communalism, their rich heritage of literature, art, music and theatre – all that characterize the cultural history of Bangladesh – have been sincerely examined. Learn More

One of the most remarkable autobiographies ever produced in Bengali literature. Learn More

Biographies of Sorrowful Satis : Novels written by women in nineteenth century Bengal. Learn More

Here we find an account of the changes brought by Rammohan Roy, Vidyasagar, Bankimchandra, Rabindranath and Aurobinda in the social and political climate of Bengal. Learn More

An anthology of essays of Bengal’s major writers and thinkers on the culture of reading, publishing and collecting books. Learn More