The Seen and the Unseen - hosted by Amit Varma Amit Varma

To understand modern India, we must understand the history of Hindutva -- and we must wrestle with Savarkar. Vinayak Chaturvedi joins Amit Varma in episode 385 of The Seen and the Unseen to discuss his life and work as a historian -- and the importance of history in shaping the present moment.

(FOR FULL LINKED SHOW NOTES, GO TO SEENUNSEEN.IN.)

(This episode was recorded in March, 2024.)

Also check out:
1. Vinayak Chaturvedi at UC Irvine and Amazon.
2. Hindutva and Violence: VD Savarkar and the Politics of History -- Vinayak Chaturvedi.
3. Peasant Pasts – History and Memory in Western India -- Vinayak Chaturvedi.
4. Imaginary Homelands -- Salman Rushdie.
5. The Road and No Country for Old Men -- Cormac McCarthy.
6. No Country for Old Men -- Joel and Ethan Coen.
7. Wanderers, Kings, Merchants: The Story of India through Its Languages — Peggy Mohan.
8. Understanding India Through Its Languages — Episode 232 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Peggy Mohan).
9. Partha Chatterjee on Amazon, Wikipedia and Columbia University.
10. The Egg -- Andy Weir.
11. Deepak VS and the Man Behind His Face -- Episode 373 of The Seen and the Unseen.
12. The Incredible Insights of Timur Kuran -- Episode 349 of The Seen and the Unseen.
13. Private Truths, Public Lies — Timur Kuran.
14. The Long Divergence — Timur Kuran.
15. Some plagiarism complaints against Claudine Gay: 1, 2, 3, 4.
16. The Exquisite Irony of Claudine Gay's Downfall -- Glenn Loury with John McWhorter.
17. Why Did Harvard Cancel Its Best Black Professor? -- Documentary by Rob Montz on the destruction of Roland Fryer.
18. “A White Male Would Probably Already Be Gone” -- Carol Swain interviewed by Christopher Rufo.
19. How one hearing brought down two Ivy League presidents -- Sareen Habeshian.
20. Carlo Ginzburg and Christopher Bayly.
21. The Birth of the Modern World -- CA Bayly.
22. Recovering Liberties: Indian Thought in the Age of Liberalism and Empire -- CA Bayly.
23. The Indian Ideology -- Perry Anderson.
24. Event, Metaphor, Memory : Chauri Chaura -- Shahid Amin.
25. Peasant Intellectuals: Anthropology and History in Tanzania -- Steven Feierman.
26. Elementary Aspects of Peasant Insurgency in Colonial India -- Ranajit Guha.
27. Maps Are Magic -- Episode 44 of Everything is Everything.
28. On Exactitude in Science — Jorge Luis Borges.
29. Rulers, Townsmen and Bazaars -- CA Bayly.
30. The Cheese and the Worms -- Carlo Ginzburg.
31. From Peasant Pasts to Hindutva Futures? -- Vinayak Chaturvedi.
32. Gita Press and the Making of Hindu India — Akshaya Mukul.
33. The Gita Press and Hindu Nationalism — Episode 139 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Akshaya Mukul).
34. The Life and Times of Vir Sanghvi -- Episode 236 of The Seen and the Unseen.
35. A Rude Life — Vir Sanghvi.
36. The BJP Before Modi — Episode 202 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Vinay Sitapati).
37. The Importance of the 1991 Reforms — Episode 237 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Shruti Rajagopalan and Ajay Shah).
38. Essentials Of Hindutva -- VD Savarkar.
39. Farewell Waltz -- Milan Kundera.
40. A Zone of Engagement -- Perry Anderson.
41. Spectrum: From Right to Left in the World of Ideas -- Perry Anderson.
42. BR Ambedkar's interview on BBC from 1955.
43. Hindutva before Hindutva: Selected Writings and Discourses of Chandranath Basu in Translation -- Edited by Amiya Sen.
44. The Ferment of Our Founders — Episode 272 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Shruti Kapila).
45. The Many Shades of George Fernandes -- Episode 327 of The Seen and the Unseen.
46. The Life and Times of George Fernandes — Rahul Ramagundam.
47. Hind Swaraj — MK Gandhi.
48. Annihilation of Caste — BR Ambedkar.
49. Understanding Gandhi: Part 1: Mohandas — Episode 104 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Ram Guha).
50. Understanding Gandhi: Part 2: Mahatma — Episode 105 of

He has lived two lives: first he reached the top of the corporate ladder and became a top banker; and now he is embarked upon the long game of changing India. Narayan Ramachandran joins Amit Varma in episode 384 of The Seen and the Unseen to talk about stimulating change, building institutions -- and making ideas and serendipity come together.

(FOR FULL LINKED SHOW NOTES, GO TO SEENUNSEEN.IN.)

Also check out:
1. Narayan Ramachandran at LinkedIn, Takshashila and Mint.
2. Narayan Ramachandran's quote on timeframes in an interview by Rithika Kumar.
3. India’s Massive Pensions Crisis — Episode 347 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Ajay Shah & Renuka Sane).
4. The omnibus volume of BR Nanda's biographies of Gokhale, Gandhi and Nehru.
5. The Road to Serfdom -- Friedrich Hayek.
6. The Constitution of Liberty -- Friedrich Hayek.
7. Why Talent Comes in Clusters -- Episode 8 of Everything is Everything.
8. Marching For Salt -- Amit Varma.
9. The Reformers -- Episode 28 of Everything is Everything.
10. The Life and Times of KP Krishnan — Episode 355 of The Seen and the Unseen.
11. The Median Voter Theorem.
12. Morgan Hausel's books and podcast.
13. The Fortune at The Bottom of The Pyramid -- CK Prahalad.
14. 'Surely You're Joking, Mr Feynman' -- Richard Feynman.
15. Lessons from an Ankhon Dekhi Prime Minister — Amit Varma’s column on reading.
16. The Surface Area of Serendipity -- Episode 39 of Everything is Everything.
17. Mindset -- Carol S Dweck.
18. Dunbar’s number.
19. How Many Friends Does One Person Need? — Robin Dunbar.
20. Religion, Food, Indian Society — Episode 207 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Shoba Narayan).
21. Fixing the Knowledge Society -- Episode 24 of Everything is Everything.
22. When Ideas Have Sex -- Matt Ridley.
23. Traffic -- Tom Vanderbilt.
24. RSJ's newsletter post on Akio Morita and Japan.
25. Praise for intelligence can undermine children’s motivation and performance — Claudia Mueller and Carol Dweck.
26. Sudhir Sarnobat Works to Understand the World — Episode 350 of The Seen and the Unseen.
27. Rick Beato's Ultimate Bundle.
28. Rahul Matthan Seeks the Protocol -- Episode 360 of The Seen and the Unseen.
29. Beware of These Five Fallacies! -- Episode 45 of Everything is Everything.
30. Chip War -- Chris Miller.
31. The Power Law -- Sebastian Mallaby.
32. The Economist, New Yorker and National Geographic.
33. Lords of the Deccan -- Anirudh Kanisetti.
34. Empire of the Mughal -- Alex Rutherford.
35. Vajpayee: The Ascent of the Hindu Right, 1924–1977 -- Abhishek Choudhary.

Amit’s newsletter is explosively active again. Subscribe right away to The India Uncut Newsletter! It’s free!

Amit Varma and Ajay Shah have launched a new video podcast. Check out Everything is Everything on YouTube.

Check out Amit’s online course, The Art of Clear Writing.

Episode art: ‘The Puzzle’ by Simahina.

She gave up a corporate career to live a slow life: to travel, to immerse, to write, to learn to see. Arati Kumar-Rao joins Amit Varma in episode 383 of The Seen and the Unseen to talk about her writing, her photography and the lessons she has learnt by standing still and looking.

(FOR FULL LINKED SHOW NOTES, GO TO SEENUNSEEN.IN.)

Also check out:
1. Arati Kumar-Rao on Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn and her own website.
2. Marginlands: Indian Landscapes on the Brink -- Arati Kumar-Rao.
3. The Peepli Project.
4. The Prem Panicker Files — Episode 217 of The Seen and the Unseen.
5. Killers of the Flower Moon -- David Grann.
6. Sowmya Dhanaraj Is Making a Difference — Episode 380 of The Seen and the Unseen.
7. Rahul Matthan Seeks the Protocol — Episode 360 of The Seen and the Unseen.
8. Masanobu Fukuoka and Wendell Berry.
9. India’s Water Crisis — Episode 60 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Vishwanath S aka Zenrainman).
10. The American Geographies -- Barry Lopez.
11. The Invisible Gorilla.
12. Letters to a Young Poet -- Rainer Maria Rilke.
13. Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor -- Rob Nixon.
14. The Fatal Conceit -- Friedrich Hayek.
15. The Gokhale Bridge fiasco.
16. Pritika Hingorani Wants to Fix Our Cities — Episode 361 of The Seen and the Unseen.
17. Toba Tek Singh -- Sadat Hasan Manto.
18. The Rooted Cosmopolitanism of Sugata Srinivasaraju — Episode 277 of The Seen and the Unseen.
19. Episodes of The Seen and the Unseen with Ramachandra Guha: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6.
20. Modern South India: A History from the 17th Century to our Times -- Rajmohan Gandhi.
21. Blindness --  José Saramago.
22. The Wreck -- Rabindranath Tagore.
23. Rabindranath Tagore, Satyajit Ray and Gulzar.
24. Rachel Carson, Barry Lopez, Nan Shepherd and Robert Macfarlane on Amazon.
25. The Living Mountain -- Nan Shepherd.
26. The Peregrine -- JA Baker.
27. Paul Salopek on Twitter and the Out of Eden Walk.
28. Pradip Krishen on Wikipedia, Amazon and IMDb.
29. Pather Panchali -- Satyajit Ray,
30. The Grapes of Wrath -- John Steinbeck.
31. Working Days: The Journals of The Grapes of Wrath -- John Steinbeck.
32. Call Me American -- Abdi Nor Iftin.
33. Hisham Matar and Kamila Shamsie on Amazon.

This episode is sponsored by CTQ Compounds. Check out The Daily Reader and FutureStack. Use the code UNSEEN for Rs 2500 off.

Amit’s newsletter is explosively active again. Subscribe right away to The India Uncut Newsletter! It’s free!

Amit Varma and Ajay Shah have launched a new video podcast. Check out Everything is Everything on YouTube.

Check out Amit’s online course, The Art of Clear Writing.

Episode art: ‘River’ by Simahina.

He describes himself as a dharmik skeptic, and has written a book about how atheism evolved within Hindu philosophy. Kushal Mehra joins Amit Varma in episode 382 of The Seen and the Unseen to discuss his intellectual evolution-- and his journey as a podcaster.

(FOR FULL LINKED SHOW NOTES, GO TO SEENUNSEEN.IN.)

Also check out:
1. Kushal Mehra on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and his own website.
2. Nastik: Why I Am Not an Atheist -- Kushal Mehra.
3. The Cārvāka Podcast -- Kushal Mehra's podcast on YouTube.
4. Kushal Mehra's YouTube monologues.
5. 'How We Spend Our Days Is How We Spend Our Lives' -- Amit Varma.
6. Hanlon's Razor.
7. Tim Urban's tweet on getting to know people.
8. The Harm Principle.
9. Deepak VS and the Man Behind His Face — Episode 373 of The Seen and the Unseen.
10. A Life in Indian Politics — Episode 149 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Jayaprakash Narayan).
11. I, Pencil -- Leonard Read.
12. Why People Believe Weird Things -- Michael Shermer.
13. Richard Dawkins on the God of the Old Testament.
14. Vinamre Kasanaa and Prakhar Gupta on YouTube.
15. Kushal Mehra on Dostcast.
16. A Meditation on Form — Amit Varma.
17. Sowmya Dhanaraj Is Making a Difference -- Episode 380 of The Seen and the Unseen.
18. The God Delusion -- Richard Dawkins.
19. Robert Sapolsky’s biology lectures on YouTube.
20. The Evolution of Cooperation -- Robert Axelrod.
21. A Manual for Creating Atheists -- Peter Boghossian.
22.  A Godless Congregation — Amit Varma.
23. Tell Me You Love Me -- Amit Varma.
24. Dr Chatterjee and therealnihal's Instagram post on friendship.
25. The New Atheism and the Four Horsemen.
26. Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Christopher Hitchens and Daniel Dennett on Amazon.
27. ‘Wet Streets Cause Rain’ — Michael Crichton.
28. The Big Questions -- Steven Landsburg.
29. Three cultures of atheism: on serious doubts about the existence of God -- Simon Glendinning.
30. Charvaka and Jayarāśi Bhaṭṭa.
31. Tattvopaplavasiṃha — Jayarāśi Bhaṭṭa.
32. The Rooted Cosmopolitanism of Sugata Srinivasaraju — Episode 277 of The Seen and the Unseen.
33. Imagine There’s No Svarga: Rediscovering Cārvāka, India’s 2,700-Year-Old Atheistic Tradition -- Kushal Mehra on Quilette.
34. Moral Foundations Theory, proposed by Jonathan Haidt, Craig Joseph and Jesse Graham.
35. Hitchen's Razor.
36. Consciousness Explained -- Daniel Dennett.
37. Who We Are and How We Got Here — David Reich.
38. Soul and Sword: The History of Political Hinduism -- Hindol Sengupta.
39. Hind Swaraj -- MK Gandhi.
40. Yugank Goyal Is out of the Box — Episode 370 of The Seen and the Unseen.
41. Hindutva -- Vinayak Savarkar.
42. Gita Press and the Making of Hindu India -- Akshaya Mukul.
43. The Gita Press and Hindu Nationalism — Episode 139 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Akshaya Mukul).
44. Rangila Rasul.
45. The Intellectual Foundations of Hindutva — Episode 115 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Aakar Patel).
46. The Populist Playbook -- Episode 42 of Everything is Everything.
47. Don't Insult Pasta (2007) -- Amit Varma.
48. Caged Tiger: How Too Much Government Is Holding Indians Back — Subhashish Bhadra.
49. Subhashish Bhadra on Our Dysfunctional State — Episode 333 of The Seen and the Unseen.
50. The Progress of Humanity -- Episode 101 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Steven Pinker).
51. Colours of the Cage -- Arun Ferreira.
52. Modi's Domination: What We Often Overlook -- Keshava Guha.
53. The BJP Before Modi — Episode 202 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Vinay Sitapati).
54. Anand -- Hrishikesh Mukherjee.
55. How We Do the Small Things -- Amit Varma.
56. How Not To Get Trolled -- Amit Varma.
57. The Pursuit of Happyness -- Gabriele Muccino..
58. Andaz Apna Apna -- Rajkumar Santoshi.
59. I Wonder If Heaven Got a Ghetto -- Tupac Shakur.
60. Shiv Kum

He created the iconic Simputer, and has lived a life that married science and its applications. V Vinay joins Amit Varma in episode 381 of The Seen and the Unseen to talk about his journey and what it taught him.

(FOR FULL LINKED SHOW NOTES, GO TO SEENUNSEEN.IN.)

Also check out:
1. V Vinay on Twitter, LinkedIn, IISC and Google Scholar.
2. The UNIX Episode -- Episode 32 of Everything is Everything.
3. Calculus Made Simple -- H Mulholland.
4. India vs West Indies, 1st Test, Bengaluru, November 22 – 27, 1974.
5. Ram Guha Writes a Letter to a Friend -- Episode 371 of The Seen and the Unseen.
6. A Text-book Of Inorganic Chemistry -- JR Partington.
7. Perkin and Kipping's Organic Chemistry -- Stanley F Kipping and Barry Kipping.
8. There’s no speed limit — Derek Sivers.
9. The Botany of Desire -- Michael Pollan.
10. Vishwa Bandhu Gupta on cloud computing & more!
11. Design & Analysis of Computer Algorithms -- Alfred V Aho, John E Hopcroft and Jeffrey D Ullman.
12. A Circuit-Based Proof of Toda′ s Theorem -- Ravi Kannan, H Venkateswaran, V Vinay and Andrew C Yao.
13. Ramesh Hariharan's website.
14. The Little Prince -- Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.
15. Bruce Sterling on the Simputer in the New York Times.
16. Rahul Matthan Seeks the Protocol — Episode 360 of The Seen and the Unseen.
17. James Hadley Chase, Alistair Maclean, Desmond Bagley and Agatha Christie on Amazon.
18. Illusions -- Richard Bach.
19. Jonathan Livingston Seagull -- Richard Bach.
20. Lila -- Robert M Pirsig.
21. The True Believer -- Eric Hoffer.
22. Crime and Punishment -- Fyodor Dostoyevsky.
23. The Idiot -- Fyodor Dostoyevsky.
24. Leo Tolstoy's short stories.
25. Essays -- Ralh Waldo Emerson.
26. The Journals of Ralph Waldo Emerson.
27. Self-Reliance -- Ralph Waldo Emerson.
28. Walden --  Henry David Thoreau.
29. Vinaya Pitaka.
30. Isha Upanishad.
31. Atoms in Motion -- Richard Feynman.
32. Mandukya Upanishad.
33. Brihadaranyaka Upanishad.
34. The Matrix -- The Wachowskis.
35. Chanakya -- Chandraprakash Dwivedi.
36. Chomana Dudi -- BV Karanth.
37. Akira Kurosawa and Yasujirō Ozu.
38. Tokyo Story -- Yasujirō Ozu.
39. Departures -- Yôjirô Takita.
40. The Silence of the Lambs -- Jonathan Demme.
41. Notorious -- Alfred Hitchcock.
42. Mr Smith Goes to Washington -- Frank Capra.
43. The Philadelphia Story -- George Cukor.
44. Bringing Up Baby -- Howard Hawks.
45. Casablanca -- Michael Curtiz.
46. Gandhi -- Richard Attenborough.
47. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter... and Spring -- Kim Ki-duk.
48. Bicycle Thieves -- Vittorio De Sica.
49. Ilaiyaraaja, TM Krishna and MS Subbulakshmi on Spotify.
50. Twenty-Five Twenty-One -- Jung Ji-hyun.
51. Misaeng --  Kim Won-seok.
52. My Ahjusshi -- Kim Won-seok.
53. Succession, Breaking Bad, Game of Thrones and House.

Amit’s newsletter is explosively active again. Subscribe right away to The India Uncut Newsletter! It’s free!

Amit Varma and Ajay Shah have launched a new video podcast. Check out Everything is Everything on YouTube.

Check out Amit’s online course, The Art of Clear Writing.

Episode art: ‘Searching for Truth’ by Simahina.

How do women live in India? How do workers live? What impact can economics have in the real world? Sowmya Dhanaraj joins Amit Varma in episode 380 of The Seen and the Unseen to describe her life, her work and the churn in our society.

(FOR FULL LINKED SHOW NOTES, GO TO SEENUNSEEN.IN.)

Also check out:
1. Sowmya Dhanaraj on LinkedIn, Twitter, Google Scholar, Good Business Lab and her own website.
2. Male Backlash and Female Guilt: Women’s Employment and Intimate Partner Violence in Urban India -- Sowmya Dhanaraj and Vidya Mahambare.
3. Family structure, education and women’s employment in rural India -- Sowmya Dhanaraj and Vidya Mahambare.
4. The Life and Times of Ira Pande -- Episode 369 of The Seen and the Unseen.
5. Yugank Goyal Is out of the Box -- Episode 370 of The Seen and the Unseen.
6. Fixing the Knowledge Society -- Episode 24 of Everything is Everything.
7. Tell No One -- Harlan Coben.
8. Introductory Econometrics: A Modern Approach -- Jeffrey Wooldridge.
9. Econometric Analysis -- William Greene.
10. The Beauty of Finance -- Episode 21 of Everything is Everything.
11. Swapna Liddle and the Many Shades of Delhi -- Episode 367 of The Seen and the Unseen.
12. Indian Society: The Last 30 Years — Episode 137 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Santosh Desai).
13. Santosh Desai is Watching You -- Episode 356 of The Seen and the Unseen.
14. Metrics of Empowerment — Episode 88 of The Seen and the Unseen.
15. Challenges of Change: An Experiment Promoting Women to Managerial Roles in the Bangladeshi Garment Sector -- Rocco Macchiavello, Andreas Menzel, Atonu Rabbani & Christopher Woodruff.
16. Women at Work — Episode 132 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Namita Bhandare).
17. The Loneliness of the Indian Woman -- Episode 259 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Shrayana Bhattacharya).
18. Alice Evans Studies the Great Gender Divergence — Episode 297 of The Seen and the Unseen.
19. The Loneliness of the Indian Man — Episode 303 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Nikhil Taneja).
20. Sowmya Dhanaraj and Vidya Mahambare speak to Alice Evans on her podcast.
21. We Are All Amits From Africa — Episode 343 of The Seen and the Unseen.
22. India Moving — Chinmay Tumbe.
23. India = Migration — Episode 128 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Chinmay Tumbe).
24. Deepak VS and the Man Behind His Face -- Episode 373 of The Seen and the Unseen.
25. Our Unlucky Children (2008) — Amit Varma.
26. Emergent Ventures.
27. Malini Goyal is the Curious One -- Episode 377 of The Seen and the Unseen.
28. Is Work Fun -- Tyler Cowen.
29. Dance Dance For the Halva Waala — Episode 294 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Jai Arjun Singh and Subrat Mohanty).
30. Housefull Economics.
31. This Passing Moment -- Amit Varma's Housefull Economics piece on Opportunity Cost.
32. Who gains from the new Maternity Benefit Act Amendment? — Devika Kher.
33. Here’s What’s Wrong With the Maternity Benefits Act — Suman Joshi.
34. Evicted -- Matthew Despond.
35. Whole Numbers And Half Truths -- Rukmini S.
36. The Importance of Data Journalism — Episode 196 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Rukmini S).
37. Rukmini Sees India’s Multitudes — Episode 261 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Rukmini S).
38. The Great Indian Kitchen -- Jeo Baby.
39. Pariyerum Perumal -- Mari Selvaraj.

Amit’s newsletter is explosively active again. Subscribe right away to The India Uncut Newsletter! It’s free!

Amit Varma and Ajay Shah have launched a new video podcast. Check out Everything is Everything on YouTube.

Check out Amit’s online course, The Art of Clear Writing.

Episode art: ‘Machinery of Society’ by Simahina.