Nehru's Hero DIlip Kumar: In the Life of India

by Meghnad Desai

168 pages, Hardcover

Published March 30, 2005

About the author

Meghnad Desai is emeritus professor of economics, London School of Economics, where he was also founder and former director of the Global Governance Research Centre. He is a member of the House of Lords and chairman of the Official Monetary and Financial Institutions Forum.

Reviews

[Pranjal Awasthi · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an interesting premise - The study of Dilip Kumar not just as an actor but as a manifestation of the freshly Independent India under the Nehruvian dispensation. Be the changing mindsets of Urbane Indians, a rising of the Middle class, a fading aristocracy and the crippling poverty, Dilip Kumar, through is roles, represented these varying personalities much more than other leading men of the day Dev Anand and Raj Kapoor.

Now Meghnad Desai is not just a top economist but also an avid film goer. He makes no qualms about being a big fan of Dilip Kumar and it might taint his judgements attributing outsized impact Dilip Kumar might have had in the Indian pop-culture of the 50s and 60s, but nonetheless the arguments he makes are compelling and those, I would guess, find large scale resonance with so many of our grandfather's generation.

The only reason I did not get blown away by the book was because I have seen only a handful of Dilip Kumar's films. The ones which I have seen are represented well in the book. If you wanna read film criticism and also a unique perspective on Indian history, this book is worth reading