BOOK DISCUSSION on

Princestan: How Nehru, Patel and Mountbatten Made India
By Sandeep Bamzai

ABOUT THE BOOK: In the run-up to independence, a vile plan was devised by a handful of powerful princes to not join either India or Pakistan. The plan was led by the Chancellor of the chamber of princes, Nawab of Bhopal, who was operating under the patronage of Mohd. Ali Jinnah, Lord Wavell and British Prime Minister, Winston Churchill. The idea was to create a third dominion called Princestan where the 565 princely states would stay outside the ambit of the two free states and retain paramountcy under the aegis of the departing British. The success of such a malevolent plan would have made the newly independent nation unstable and vulnerable. However, three persons stood in the way of the nefarious British plan to balkanize India. This is the hitherto untold story of how Jawaharlal Nehru, Lord Mountbatten and Sardar Patel battled the rulers of the princely states at every twist and turn to foil that cunning plan, even as the process of decolonization had begun.

CHAIR: Shri Gurcharan Das, Author, Commentator, & Public Intellectual

PANELISTS: Prof. Rajendra G. Harshe, Former Vice-Chancellor, Central University of Allahabad & Visiting Prof, South Asian University; Shri Ashok Bhan, Senior Advocate, Supreme Court of India; Shri Sandeep Bamzai, CEO and Editor-in-Chief, IANS &  Author of the Book