Mukti: Free to be Born Again – Partitions of Indian Subcontinent, Islamism, Hinduism, Leftism and Liberation of the Faithful -- Book

Dear Friend:

            I am pleased to inform you that my book, Mukti: Free to be Born Again – Partitions of Indian Subcontinent, Islamism, Hinduism, Leftism and Liberation of the Faithful, has been released in the U.S. by Author House. It is a 684 page book available on hard cover, soft cover and as eBook. In the US it is available in bookstores, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Author House, ISPaD: Partition Center Office in Jamaica, Queens, NYC and more. Attached is a copy of the front and back covers.

Here is a bit from the book’s Preface, “Mukti is a product of love and pain of at least three decades. It is a byproduct of over three decades of field work, social work and travel in the 1947 Partition-affected Bengal –Bangladesh (formerly East Pakistan), West Bengal State of India – as well in the neighboring states…….During my travel in Muslim-majority Bangladesh I have come across the term ‘mukti’ from many, especially indigenous pre-Islamic Hindu, and lately Buddhist, families as they pray for liberation from their suffering….The book is directed towards Western readers many of whom may have heard of India, yet very little is known about post-partition Muslim-majority Bangladesh and Hindu-majority West Bengal, the effects of Indian Partition on the people of the Bengali-speaking region, the former mixed Hindu-Muslim Bengal Province of Colonial British India……Yet the privileged-caste Hindu-refugee elites quickly rose to power in two Hindu Bengali-majority states in India: West Bengal and Tripura. They would champion liberal, left and Marxist ideologies but refused to show solidarity with the oppressed, mostly belonging to Hindu oppressed castes [whom they left behind]… Seeds of Mukti was first sown in early 1990s when many of my friends and associates asked for translation of my Ai Bangla, Oi Bangla (This Bengal, That Bengal.)…..The Bengal of British India was known to be a relatively-tolerant mixed Hindu-Muslim society where both Hindu and Muslim nationalism played significant role. In a surprise twist of history after Partition of Bengal and India in 1947 both Bengals took stride towards intolerant politics, one…Islamism, the other….Leftism, led by Bangladeshi (East Pakistani) Muslims and Bangladeshi (East Pakistani) Hindu, albeit refugee. The book delves into that ethos and contradiction, although politically incorrect and, at times, impolite…..I have no power to protect individuals and families who have shared their deepest feelings to my family. I have no power to protect their villages either. As a result I have not used the real names of individuals, villages and neighborhoods….”

Here are some sites on the Internet where the book is listed: 

Price of the book: $35/$30/$5 for hardcover/paperback/eBook; (At Partition Center Office in NY only paperback is available.)

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Mukti-Partitions-Subcontinent-Islamism-Liberation-ebook/dp/B0178DD6BG/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1448802232&sr=8-1&keywords=mukti%3A+free+to+be+born+again

Barnes & Noble: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/mukti-sachi-dastidar/1122834558?ean=9781496944832

Other book sellers,
Ispad: Indian Subcontinent Partition Center Office, Jamaica, Queens, New York City, www.ispad1947.org and Phone: 917-524-0035.

 Sachi G. Dastidar

Radio Interviews in the U.S.:

With Cheryl Nason: http://webtalkradio.net/?s=INSIDE+THE+WRITER%27S+CAFE

With Stu Taylor: https://www.dropbox.com/s/blp2967jcuncsok/663916_mp3.mp3?dl=0 

With J. Douglas Barker https://www.dropbox.com/s/xrpttxpayoirj4o/663916.mp3?dl=0 

TV  Interviews in the U.S.
With Ashok Vyas of ITV of New York https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gOFyuoEa2K8&t=136s   
  

Here are a few of the comments:

Dr. Dastidar: 

Have a great Thanksgiving, Sankaranti, Pongal and all clustered festival. A safe one. My warmest congratulation on a magnum opus. I had some ideas on Bangladesh Issues (as one deep rooted in Anthropology for many years) but have become intensely sensitive (after learning from conversations and review of Prafulla Mukerji's efforts in this area). 

Congratulations again,

            Hari Om,

            Dr. Akkaraju Sarma, U.S.A.; November 26

            Congratulation. As you know I am working very much in this area. Let us keep in touch.                     Manasda

            Prof. Dr. Manas Chatterji, U.S.A.; Nov 26

            Dear Sachi,

            Happy Rush Purnima and Thanksgiving to you too. And congratulations on the release of your book. I will most certainly look into it.
            Namaskar,
            Sunil
            Prof. Dr. Sunil Kukreja; U.S.A. Nov 26

            Sachi da

            Can I buy 5 copies of the book? 

            Milita Chanda, U.S.A.; Nov 26

            Dear Dastidar, 

            Pl accept our heartiest congratulations on the new publication, May GOD bless you all, With fond regards, 

           Verma

            Brig. Gen. S. Verma, U.S.A.; Nov 26

           Congratulations, Sachi for the fulfillment of your four decades of work in bringing this book     out for the Westerners, especially.

           Hope you are doing well.

           Sincerely,

           T.K.Mani, U.S.A.; Nov 26

           Dear Mesho Uncle,

           Congratulations on the book. I just downloaded on Amazon and look
forward to reading it.
            Best regards,
            Udayan 

            Udayan Chattopadhyay, U.K.; Nov 26

            Dear Sachi

            Glad to note that you have wrote a book on such an important subject.

            When an opportunity arises I will certainly go through the book.

            Congratulations.

            Vaskarda

            Partha Roy, India; Nov 26

           Congrats Sachi 

           Looks and sounds interesting. It's a life time of good work by you.

           Tom

           Prof. Dr. Tom DelGuidice, U.S.A.; Nov 27

           Congratulations dada ! 

           It is a remarkable achievement of your dedication to our community. I will collect one copy for myself. 

           Enjoy your upcoming holidays with your family and friends. 

          With the best 

          Selima Ashraf, U.S.A.; Nov 27

          Thank you Dada. 

           I like to buy one of your book with soft cover. Also you can share this in Facebook may be more people will be interested. Should I email to other people who will be interested to have as they are in other countries?

           Thanks again.

           Mousume Sarker, U.S.A.; Nov 27

           Hello Sachi,

           Happy Thanksgiving.

           It is wonderful that you and Shefali could find time from your busy schedule to write two books regarding the partition. It seems "Memoirs of Homeland" is available in Kolkata only.

           Thank you and congratulations.

           Regards,

          Amitabhada 

          Amitabha Chatterjee, U.S.A.; Nov 28

          Congratulations dada.!!!

          Dr. Helen Roy, U.S.A.; Nov 28

          Congratulations!

          I too am one of those who knows almost nothing about this.

          Best regards,

          Edi

          Prof. Dr. Edlslav Manetovic, U.S.A.; Nov 29

           Dear Sir,

            Thank you. Preface of the book is very much interesting of historical perspective. How can I collect one copy?

            Regards,

            Ajoy Kumar Bose, Bangladesh; Nov 28

            Dear friend Sachi:

          Congratulations.  I am sure your publication will be received eagerly by research scholars  all over the world .  

           Best wishes.  

           V. Subramanian, Nov 29

           Dear Sabyasachi

          Congratulation for  the publication of your new book-Mukti. We shall look forward more contribution from your hand.
          Chittada
          Prof. Dr. C. R. Pathak, India; Nov 29

           Dear Sachi,

           Congratulations on this great accomplishment!

            Best,

            Rita

            Prof. Dr. Rita Colon-Urban

           Friends

           This book is an eye witness account of my friend, Dr. Sachi Dastidar, a Bangladeshi Hindu refugee.

          You might be interested in reading what happened to Hindus of Bangladesh.

          Bal K. Gupta, U.S.A.; Nov 29

          Congratulations!!!!!

          Khusi

          Dipika Basu, U.S.A.; Nov 29

          

         Dear Dr. Dastidar,

         Namaskaar.
         Congratulations on the new book !

         Would like to know if this would be available in India payable in INR? If so, when? Kindly let me know at your utmost convenience.

         Thank you sir.

         Best regards,

         Rajiv

         Rajiv Verma, Nov 29

         Congratulations!

         Judy

         Prof. Dr. Judith Walsh, U.S.A.; Nov 30

         Congratulations!

           Prof. Dr. Santanu Datta, U.S.A.; Nov 30

           Dear Sachida,

         Have you considered sending this blurb to the online (and print) magazine Swarajya (www.swarajyamag.com), which is an ideal outlet for the promotion of your ground-breaking work?

May I forward it to them? (I think it is better that you do so yourself. I believe they will be honoured to hear from you.)

          Dileep

          Prof. Dr. Dileep Karanth; U.S.A.; Dec 3

          Great News. Congrats

          Jaydeep Biswas, U.S.A.; Dec 8, 2016

           Sachida,
           Great work; on this subject. How we can listen to that? Can I get an
original Bangla book 'Ai Bangla, Oi Bangla'?
           Make a Book publishing ceremony in  ISPaD: Partition Center Office in Jamaica,
           Sincerely,
           Khourshed

           Khourshedul Islam, U.S.A.; Nov 27, 2016

Dear Dr. Dastidar

We wish you and your family a Very Happy, Healthy, Safe and Prosperous New Year 2016! 

We were in California with our son Dr. Rajesh Gupta and his family. 

They gave me your book "Mukti" as a Christmas gift. We came back to-day and will start reading it from to-morrow. 

Kusum and Bal Krishan Gupta

Dear
Hare Krishna!

"Apart from his eight principal wives, Krishna is described to have married several junior women, he rescued from the demon Narakasura. The Bhagavata Purana and the Harivamsa (appendix of Mahabharata) state that 16,000 women were rescued. (Ref. Wikipedia)

Demon Narkasur had forcibly married all the kidnapped girls. When Lord Krishna killed Narkasur,they became widows. But Lord Krishna married them all with Hindu rituals and took them to Dwarika.

Lessons: Lord Krishna started widow marriage and marriage of kidnapped girls. ISKCON and other Hindu sects, should follow Lord Krishna and start marriages of  Hindu widows and that of kidnapped Hindu girls in Bangladesh. I am sure they can achieve a target of 16,000 by Krishna Janamshtmi. (Hindu and Sikh refugees from of Pakistan in 1947, performed hundreds of thousands [lakhs] of such marriages.)

You may forward it to Hindu leaders in Bangladesh and ISKCON devotees worldwide. May Lord Krishna bless you in rescuing Bangladeshi Hindu women!

Bal Krishan Gupta, USA

February 29, 2016

************************
I am reading your book now. It's an absolute masterpiece.

Dr. Arvind Chandrakantan
April 3, 2017

         

************************

Sachida,

I meant to ask you this question for a while - just did not know what you would think so I did not ask you earlier. Will you please consider making the book available online in PDF format? I think that book will be an eye opener for lot of people, as it was for me. Your writing changed my perception 100% - and I am  sure it will affect others also. Please consider this request - people need to read this book. You can have it on ISPAD site or FB or we can create a new website for you as an author (sachighoshdastidar.com). I want to show your site and work to people and make them aware of your work. 

Please let me know what you think - I can help in any way I can

Thanks,
Milita

October 3, 2017

*************************************************

Hi:

I am a slow reader and it will take a while, but  enjoying it so far.

Saumya
Chicago
8/25/2018

**************************************************
Dear Professor Ghosh-Dastidar:

I am Rudranath's mother. I read your book and was really impressed. I will be happy if you could please discuss the book with me whenever you are free.

Best wishes,
Monica Talukdar, Uttarkhand, India
January 25, 2020

***********************************************

Hi,

This is I wrote Amazon reviewing your book.

Dr. Sachi Dastidar's monumental work - Mukti: Free To Be Born Again - is an intensely personal but extraordinarily researched book and one integrating an amazing range of knowledge of post-1947 India with his own family's history. It is simultaneously both informative and horrifying, documenting a tragedy ignored almost equally by the world as well as most of his fellow Indians. Mukti focusses, in particular, on Dastidar's native Bengal, a part of pre-partition India ripped apart twice, once after Britain relinquished power in the late '40's and again in 1971 when the area, then known as East Pakistan, was attacked by West Pakistani forces as the new nation of Bangladesh struggled to achieve independence. 

     It's subsequent history is an appalling saga of the ongoing effort to eradicate the Hindu population of Bangladeshi Bengal by forced removal, massacres, and continuous persecution by Islamist elements. The age-old Bengali culture one that had both Hindu and Moslem

features, is being slowly eradicated.

 

     In some ways, the worst aspect of this decades long tragedy is how most of the expatriate Hindu population, refugees from East Pakistan/Bangladesh, many of them now secularized members of Calcutta's elite, have abandoned any concern for their poorer, rural Hindu relatives left behind in the mass immigrations since 1947.

 

     Dr. Dastidar passionately defends the integrity of the traditional Bengali culture, praising it's reverence for nature and the environment, while criticizing it's negative characteristics, such as the

vestiges of the caste system and the ahistorical nature of the Hindu faith. He  laments the failure of late 19th and early 20th Century reform movements like those of Aurobindo and Gandhi to forge

 

     Dr. Dastidar's work is epically long (668 pages), requiring a dedicated perseverance to travel it's length. And, as a personal journey taken with numerous family and friends, it can be confusing at

times in terms of the frequent change of characters, with their Indian names necessitating concentrated attention. Nevertheless, the account with it's remarkable record of a decades long pilgrimage, along with much colorful detailing of places, cuisine, costumes and. customs,

and the dreadful history it so vividly documents, makes reading Mukti a compelling but disturbing experience.

                                             

Lorne

Long Island, New York, U.S.A.

March 28, 2020

         
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Memoirs of Homeland: Refugees of 1947 Bengal Partition in India -- Book

Dear Friend:

            Greetings!

I am pleased to inform you that our book, Memoirs of Homeland: Refugees of 1947 Bengal Partition in India, authored by Shefali and me has recently been released by Firma KLM Publishers of Kolkata. It is a 320 page soft-cover book. Attached is a copy of the front and back covers.

Here is a bit of explanation from the book, “Between 1982 and 1986, for no particular reason, we decided to interview [in the U.S.] some of the refugees – Hindu and Muslim – as many of their stories were riveting to us, and now socializing with individuals from the “other” groups from whom they fled earlier. How are they able to do so? How do they feel about their homeland? Not so surprisingly, all the refugees remembers in minute detail how and when their families fled, or what made them to choose a different nationality leaving their home of their ancestors, especially for Hindus for whom the village water and soil, flower and fish, are sacred and needed for religious services. Majority of refugees were Hindus who fled from East Pakistan/East Bengal to India…..….Altogether there are 22 stories; 16 men and 6 women; Hindu 18 and Muslim 4. This was an unscientific sample. In real life Hindu Bengali displacement is enormous compared to Muslim displacement. So number of Muslims in the sample is proportionally a bit higher; whereas the number of refugee women is certainly much lower.” (p 14)

The book is priced Rs. 500 (five hundred) Indian rupees. If anyone you know might be interested in obtaining a copy, one can do so from Firma KLM www.firmaklm.net. One can also get a copy from our friend (to whom the book is dedicated) Sri Tapan Kumar Das of Baghbazar, in north Kolkata for RS. 425 or Rs. 450 by mail. You may contact him in his cell phone # 9051-350-796 or in his land line at (33) 2530-4557 for his address, and also from ISPaD: The (Indian Subcontinent) Partition Documentation Center, New York City, www.ispad1947.org, phone # 917-524-0035, for $15 dollars..

If you have further queries, please let me know. Please share with others.

Sincerely,

Sachi (Sabyasachi) Ghosh Dastidar

A few of the comments since announcement of the release in November 2015:

Dear Sachi Da,  
                Congratulation on the publication of your book.  
                 Regards
                Jatinder Singh, India November 18

            Thanks, a very good attempt to aware world about the crisis.

            Sachin Karmakar, Bangladesh, Nov 18

            Dear Sabyasachi

          Congratulations for yet another book. Meanwhile a new edition of  'My People                      Uprooted has come out (Synergy books, Delhi).

          I shall buy a copy. 

          Best wishes

          Tathagata Roy, India, Nov 19

          Congratulations Sachi. I will order it.

           Sucheta Mahajan, India, Nov 19

            Congrats. Look forward to read it.
            Warm regds
            Saradindu Mukherji, India, Nov 19

            

            Yours in Prayer.

            Bharti Taylor, U.K.  Nov 22