> Skip to content
  • Published: 28 February 2019
  • ISBN: 9780241388082
  • Imprint: Penguin eBooks
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 400
Categories:

Democracy on the Road




The international bestselling author of Breakout Nations and The Rise and Fall of Nations chronicles two decades of engagement with democracy in India, in anticipation of the country's next major election

India is a country obsessed by politics. In early 2019, it faces national elections, and urgent questions present themselves: will India continue down a path of populism and increasingly strident Hindu nationalism or will it return to its postcolonial secular vision? Is the long-promised economic boom finally at hand, or is some form of socialism part of India's DNA? Will the seemingly invincible Modi triumph again, or will India revert to its habit of throwing out incumbents? Bestselling author Ruchir Sharma has been on the road during Indian elections for twenty years and here distills the wisdom of his observations and experiences over that time in a deeply insightful book about the world's largest and most complex exercise in democracy.

  • Published: 28 February 2019
  • ISBN: 9780241388082
  • Imprint: Penguin eBooks
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 400
Categories:

About the author

Ruchir Sharma

Ruchir Sharma, author of Breakout Nations, is head of emerging markets at Morgan Stanley, a position which lends him a truly global perspective and first-hand experience of the world he is describing, as well as affording him unique access to top CEOs, key finance ministers and heads of state. He is an occasional television commentator, on CNBC and in India, and a regular columnist for Newsweek, the Wall Street Journal and the Economic Times of India.

Also by Ruchir Sharma

See all

Praise for Democracy on the Road

Sharma's account of his travels offers a fascinating insight into the quixotic characters populating India's political landscape. Along the way, we meet mavericks and ministers, holy men and hoaxers. Sharma is a diligent, informed and sympathetic guide

Oliver Balch, Prospect

A high-speed, breezy drive through two decades of electoral politics

Menaka Doshi, Bloomberg

For a quarter of a century, Ruchir Sharma has been doing in India what political pundits should have done in the US, UK and France to understand Donald Trump, Brexit and the gilets jaunes protestors: he has left the big cities and listened to voters in the mofussil or provincial parts of the subcontinent. ... Above all, the trips allowed Sharma to predict and understand the rise of the Bharatiya Janata party's charismatic Narendra Modi, the collapse and later revival of the Congress party under the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty, and the enduring influence of regional politicians such as Nitish Kumar in Bihar and the late J Jayalalithaa in Tamil Nadu

Victor Mallet, Financial Times

An immediate must-read. A definitive one-volume on the modern India

Tom Keene, Bloomberg's Editor-at-large

Packed with nuance and detail of the many Indias that make India

Vogue