Book Review - The India Way

This has been the longest I have taken to complete a book. Any reason that I say would only be a justification to my laziness. My book streak for the year 2023 has been quite poor. Hoping to improve it at-least in 2024. 

Now that I have finally completed the book, this is my review of the same. The book is written by Minister of External Affairs S Jaishankar. He had long career in international relations as he joined the ministry after several years of service as a bureaucrat (Indian Foreign Service Officer). 

This book is a insightful read for someone looking to understand the stance of Indian Government for today’s geopolitics. The book covers India’s relation with most big players of the world. The author takes us through the history of the relation of India with each major country. When we know the history of each country in relation to India, we can trace to understand how the relationship works today between the two countries. 

He points out that the mistakes that we have taken in our external policy since independence (some of which I thought might be due to the political differences). He delves upon the details of handling the western countries. He also impresses upon the fact that “West is superior” and there can be no denial of that. 

With reference to China, he helps us understand why our borders are complex, why they are dominant and the way forward for peace & tranquility in this relation. With many countries he has pointed that India has to explore more into the relationship like Japan for instance. 

Throughout the book he has given a clear message that, India cannot be a “mere spectator” to witness how the major players are changing geopolitics. India has to play its part to be a change maker & achieve our national interest. 

I fell in love with the chapter where he has connected every incident of international relation to that of Mahabharata. It really speaks of his experience. I found the book overall to be a little complex read for me & I had to re-read the book at times to understand the context. The vocabulary used in the book is quite sound & we get to learn many new words. 

Overall, this book is recommended for someone interested in geopolitics & for someone willing to understand how & why countries of the world are interacting with India. The author has come out with another book now “ Why Bharat Matters” hoping to read it too. But my next book would be of the self help category “Coffee Can Investing”.