Born against a background of privation and civil war, divided along lines of caste, class, language and religion, independent India emerged, somehow, as a united and democratic country. The story of its making has never been told before. Now, in this remarkable book, we have an epic account of the world's largest and least likely democracy. Guha writes compellingly of the myriad protests and conflicts that have peppered the history of free India. But he writes also of the factors and processes that have kept the country together, kept it democratic, and defied the numerous prophets of doom who believed that its poverty and heterogeneity would force India to break up or come under autocratic rule.